Every new year I think the same thing – that January is such a strange month! Unique. It’s summer, school is out, Christmas has been and gone, New Year has been celebrated, we can even buy hot cross buns! People are enjoying holidays and so local streets are that much quieter (although with each passing week, more and more cars return to the roads as people start to return to work), and we realise the year is slipping away as fast as it always does. Probably faster!
I’ve been enjoying playing around here in my studio, most recently for a piece that is now on its way to Canberra for an exhibition at the Belconnen Arts Centre. ‘Earth unframed’ will be an exhibition of unframed works on paper, every one of them A3 in size. My entry is a patchwork of pieces with a common thread – whimsy.
I’m also gathering pieces together to submit in this year’s Easter Show (coming up in April) and, before then, the Northern Beaches Rotary Art Show, which last year was responsible for me reuniting with a girl I’d been at college with 40 years ago. Linda had bought one of my paintings and subsequently sent me an email, and we finally met again at the Greengate Hotel last month with a few others from the early 1980s. It was wonderful catching up with these old friends again, and the date has already been set to do it again!
As always there are plenty of opportunities ahead for me to show my work, so those details will unfold as the year does. Oh, I went to see Sydney’s newest gallery on New Year’s Day – Sydney Modern! Having not even known it was being built until I saw its opening on the news, I knew very little about it. But then I read a couple of articles in the paper, and heard a little more from my neighbours who had been in to see it. I really wasn’t sure what to expect, or whether I’d like it, but I loved it. The photo above is one of the interactive pieces of art that started as nothing but is growing by the day. In fact it has probably changed significantly since I added my clay ball to the tabletop, as the artist was going to plan its evolvement as it went along.
Completely unrelated, there are a couple of things I’ve been wondering (please email me if you can shed some light) …
Why do we say ‘double-U’ and not ‘double-V’ for W?
We hear about third world countries, and first world problems, but who are the second world countries?
Back to my art … On now, or coming soon:
Biblio Art Prize at Blarney Books & Art, 37 James Street, Port Fairy, Victoria, to the end of February
‘Earth unframed’ at Belconnen Arts Centre, 118 Emu Bank, Belconnen, ACT, from Friday 10 February to Sunday 26 March
Northern Beaches Rotary Art Show, Mona Vale Memorial Hall, Mona Vale, NSW, from Friday 24 to Sunday 26 February
Sydney Royal Easter Show, Homebush NSW, from Thursday 6 to Monday 17 April
Until next month.