Listing and packing

 

As you can see from the photo above, after doing the final framing yesterday, I spent quite a bit of time at the studio-gallery grouping and list the watercolour paintings I'm planning to take to Scotland. White list dots from a past list are exchanged with orange dots and numbers for the present plan.Fiona was working across from me in the studio working on her latest artist's book - love that red colour.

As it turns out there will be 30 works to be packed - that started today with all the works wrapped in pairs in bubble wrap. I did this to estimate what I would use to transport them - I'm hoping a largish suitcase will suffice.

A few more images  of the works in groups. 

Fiona and I hope to do a joint pop-up exhibition in the local village hall whilst we are over there. Below is an image of some of the watercolour paintings that are connected to the village that I hope would be included in such a pop-up exhibition.

Again as we say - it is not just about doing the art there are many decisions about what we will do with our art; and these always lead to many administrative tasks.

Brushstroke exhibition is ready to open

 

Our friend Sheila has done a great job curating of the Brushstrokes exhibition works; and it is all looking gorgeous for the opening event 5-7pm Friday 29 November. 

This is a pop up exhibition so it is on for one weekend only - Saturday 30 Nov and Sunday 1 December 10am-4pm. 

As well as exhibiting my watercolours Fiona will be showing The Shape of Things - works developed in collaboration with Annwyn. There will also be a 25% off sale of all other gallery-shop stock - but just for the opening and two days of the exhibition.

I know a lot of folk cant make it to the exhibition but might enjoy seeing a few images of the set up.

Flat no more

 

Fiona needs seven small plinths to display one of her art works for her upcoming exhibition (Hame, Strathnaver Museum Annex opening 7 pm 30 August). I volunteered to make the plinths to her design (graduated sizes [largest 600mm high and 200mm square] and colour [grey]). 

I decided to fabricate them in my Maleny workshop, flat pack them to transport to Armadale  and assemble them in our cottage workshop aka converted garden shed.

The flatpacks arrived safely and over the last couple of days I have assembled the seven plinths as you can see in the opening photo - the background includes back stone wall of the cottage and shadows of the outdoor clothesline including peg shadows.

Working space in the workshop-shed is a bit tight because of other timber stored for another project - but some process-progress photos follow.

Over the weekend I will sand the plinths and give them a final couple of coats of grey paint.

Art bits and pieces

 

Fiona and I are in Sydney doing a couple of weeks of house-cat sitting. This has given us the opportunity to catch up with a few friends, walk and check out the art and exhibition scene. 

So no work being done by me in the letterpress studio or the workshop. Instead here I simply share a few images of details or fragments of art pieces that have caught my eye over the last few days.

Of course one keeps one's eyes peeled to pick up objects that might find their way into art pieces.

Connecting components

 

On Saturday I finished and put together components for my small fishing boats. Many of these boats have torn sails - the result of ferocious northern Scottish seas. Three are pictured above.

A collection of components before assembling.

A couple more photos of completed boats.

I needed to make a couple more copper components so I did a metal melt whilst putting the boats together. One trick I have learnt is if you heat up the graphite moulds there is less chance of spitting and bubbles in the metal when you pour the molten metal - less chance of a shock caused by sudden change of temperature. The rough cast pieces below need to have excess cut off and then filed and polished.

I have almost finished all the melted metal elements for this piece that will go into the Vessels exhibition in October at the Old Ambo Gallery.

After the storm - beauty and/or destruction?

 

I have been progressing some elements of my pieces for the Vessel exhibition. My pieces will reflect a tragic side of the fishing story of the Scottish Highlands - including the loss of life through storms. The photo above was a bit of an accident - Fiona had put our rainbow of hearts in a circle and when I came to photograph some of the formed hulls (melted metal) I combined them with the rainbow - the contrast between a gentle rainbow aspect of rain shower with the destruction that could occur in the form of hulls of wrecked boats. 

In all I have formed 12 destroyed hulls and 4 smashed hulls. Some photos of the process of cutting off excess metal follow.

And photos of the pieces after grinding and then polishing with a wire wheel.

It was good to get this aspect of the work done.