Cath Sheard Art

Category: Uncategorized

  • Winning with Kandinsky – NZ Art Guild Masters Challenge

    Every month NZ Art Guild members are given an artist to study. They have the next 4 weeks to paint/create something inspired by the work of that artist. These challenges are completely voluntary. Submissions must be original, be of any size, medium or style, must adhere to copyright laws and be completed during the 4 week time-frame. The most recent Masters Month Challenge was the work of Wassily Kandinsky.
    I spent some time looking at his work, including here, and decided the circles appealed to me. I thought they were a good chance to have a play with oil pastels on top of an acrylic underpainting. The finished piece is 4×8″ on gallery wrap canvas.
    My piece won the “People’s Choice” for the month as voted by fellow Guild members. Thanks everyone.
    Circles after Kandinsky
    Circles after Kandinsky

  • Remembering summer’s colours ;-)

    The weather has been beautiful here for the last few days; to be honest it’s been a bit too hot for my liking. But this afternoon the weather has taken a turn for the worse. I have gone from wearing a sleeveless cotton dress round the house, with barefeet, to jeans and a medium weight top. But I can still enjoy the colours of early summer with another of the series of four wee canvas I posted about the other day. Here’s a second from the set.summer-garden-8

  • Summer’s colours

    summer-garden-5I’ve been playing round with more 4×4 canvas, stocking up for the Christmas and summer trade. While I was taking photos for my files etc I realised there were some recent works I hadn’t blogged about. Well, can’t have that! Not when there’s nothing else to post about today anyway…

    This is one of a set of four that was done about a month ago, and the colours were inspired by wandering round our garden, where the rhododendron are starting to flower. All those lovely mauves, blues, pinks and purples – and that wee hint of yellow or white in the centre. Stunning.

  • Tagged!

    It’s years since I was tagged, and the tag comes from my good blogging friend artist Martha Marshall, so what the heck. Why not? Here’s how tagging works —

    List 5 unusual things about yourself. Put a link in your post to the person who tagged you. Tag 5 other bloggers at the end of your post and comment on their blogs to let them know. Let the tagger (me) know when you have posted your list.

    Five unusual things you might not know about me are:

    1. I have a scar on my upper thigh where a sheep race gate fell on me as a child.

    2. I have a terrible phobia about an insect we don’t even have here in New Zealand – I can’t type the name sorry, even knowing I’m kind of thinking about it makes me feel hot and sick.

    3. My husband Tony and I have been living with my mother as her caregivers for the last 10 years. Hard work? Yes. But also a privilege few daughters get these days.

    4. I love Hokey Pokey ice cream and chocolate chips – together.

    5. I have a degree and post grad diploma in sociology. I loved my time as a student, and would love to do more study one day.

    I’m tagging:

    Sandra at Dreamswork – she’s a wonderful New Zealand artist; I love her life drawings.

    Denise at Melancholie Dreams- another Kiwi artist who makes the most amazing ceramic works.

    Trish at Liquorice – wonderfully supportive TLC art tutor and textile artist.

    Sue from It’s a dog’s life – a good friend and a colleague, who blogs on behalf of one of her dogs.

    Shelly at Gift of Art – a lovely new Kiwi art gallery, where owner Shelly wants to provide art classes for youth.

  • And an aerial view

    This is a view of Mt Egmont that I guess relatively few people see – taken from the air. Incredible. If you fly from New Plymouth, my nearest airport, to Auckland – NZ’s largest city -you get spectacular views of Egmont as you fly past. Providing the clouds part that is 😉

    In my two libraries we also act as information centres, so deal with a lot of tourists keen to see the mountain. Especially after it was made famous by Tom Cruise filming The Last Samurai in the region. But the reality is that a lot of people passing through simply do not get to see her – because of cloud cover. Lots of cloud cover!

    This is another wee 4×4″ in acrylics on gallery wrap canvas, based on a photo taken on a clear day when there was no real cloud cover, and not a lot of snow either to be honest.

    Mt Egmont from the air, 4x4" in acrylics
    Mt Egmont from the air, 4×4