Author: Catherine Barker-Sheard

I guess I should’t say I was a good blogger, but I was certainly a dedicated blogger. It’s fair to say life overtook me recently, with art exhibiiotns, work, an overseas trip to plan – and so the excuses go on. Tomorrow TOny and I pack our bags, and the next day we head for Italy for the LEGATO exhibition. Service may be patchy but I will try and update during the trip.

This trip is exciting for a number of reasons. Tony has never been overseas and I last went overseas 30-mumble years ago. We have not had more than 3 nights away from home together since we started looking after Mum 12 years ago. (But MUm has been to my sister for a week or 10 days at a time, but we’ve stayed home and worked etc).

I have sold a few paintings in the last week, including Full Tide #3 which is perhaps one of my favorites. I suspect what I feel is a bit like what a parent feels when a child leaves home – pleased but a bit sad or apprehensive too. I hope the buyer’s new artworks makes them happy. It made me happy creating it. 

Each year the NZ Art Guild produces an amazing collaborative work, which is auctioned off with proceeds going to the Mental Health Foundation of NZ. I have participated the last two years and am really happy to be involved again this year.

We each receive a small panel in the mail, which is partly painted; we paint it and send it back. Apart from one or two committee members, no one knows what the whole thing is going to look like once it is put together. My piece has a deep blue/grey and a couple of shades of warm cream on it.

My piece is based on the lyrics of a HIM (His Infernal Majesty) song. For me, but probably not to others, it speaks to my heart about how love saved me almost 20 years ago now. And still saves me today. I have blossomed and grown in the last 20 years with that love. Hence the flowers (blooms). I never go into the details except to say my life was a mess (my “garden of insanity”). Tony, both literally and figuratively, saved me.