Cath Sheard Art

Tag: painting

  • Snow paintings finished

    Back here, I showed you work in progress on some snow paintings. The idea of painting the lights, colours and shadows that sit in and under snow came to me after seeing news reports about avalanches in the South Island here in NZ. The finished works are mutli-layered: blue, mauve, purple etc then transparent layers of white, more colour, more white, more colour, more white…

    The four are now finished, strung, signed etc and off to a busy Auckland hair salon for a time. It’s all about keeping my work out there, making sure people see it and see my name. You can read what Alyson at ArtBizBlog says about getting your art of of the studio here.  

     Here’s the first of them, I’ll save the erst for later in the week when my art room is quiet. This one, titled “Glacial”, is 12×16″ on W&N deep edge canvas. Glacial 2009

  • Back to mapping the land

    Mapping the land #2Over the last few months I have been looking at Aboriginal Art, especially works which map the land using an aerial perspective. It fascinates me, but it turns out I find it quite hard to do; the traditional Western viewpoint is so strongly ingrained. You can see my original post about this here, and some unsuccessful attempts here.  

    Yesterday I was having a ‘play’ day – just spending time with paint, stamps, glue etc. I did some mono-prints, some mixed-media collage, a little scrapbooking. A bit of this and a bit of that. I sifted through a few books on my shelf, including some that show the land from above.

    After I had relaxed a bit I pulled out some heavier weight watercolour paper and did some monoprints using a bonded plastic bag I had saved from something-or-other. I started just casually working on top of the monoprint. And there it was – the first attempt at aerial mapping that starts to approach what I had in mind. It feels like I have broken through an unseen barrier.

  • Graffiti it – NZ Art Guild challenge

    The current NZ Art Guild Challenge is graffiti. Given the recent awful graffiti on my work place I was keen to try this one, and make it more about art, less about vandalism.

    Title: Cath was here, 2009

    Size: 21x30cm on Art Spectrum Colourfix paper

    Medium: Background – acrylic, inks, rubber stamps, stencils, pastel. ‘Cath was here, 2009’ added digitally.

    Inspiration: I have had the start of the background sitting round for two years, knowing one day I would use it. I have added another couple of layers to it today, then scanned and added ‘Cath was here’ in Photoshop.

    grafitti 001

  • Old house – latest Art Guild challenge

    You might remember that a few posts back I showed you the reference photo for the latest NZ Art Guild Challenge. At the time, I was sure it was the colours that would inspire me – and I was right. I tackled the subject twice today; once in acrylics and once with ink, oil pastels, soft pastels and acrylics. Neither are an accurate representation of the image and in one I have moved windows, resized some parts, generally messed with it a bit. In the second I was thinkng mainly about colour blocks, the Impressionists, ghosts (don’t ask!) and light.

    For me the NZ Art Guild challenges are a great opportunity to tackle a subject, style or material/s I might not normally go for; a chance to have a creative play with no real pressure. So here are my two most recent entries:

    001

    002

  • WIP – interested in snow

    I have to finish four works to send off to Auckland mid to late September, for a busy hairdressing salon. There have been quite a few avalanches here in new Zealand recently, sadly some of them have been fatal. This got me thinking about snow, avalanches, global warming, glaciers – fascinated, I have been doing some reading, looking at images, talking to people about snow etc. I have made a start on all four canvas at once. I want them to end up pale, with hints of mauves and blues under lots of layers of white – like shadows on snow or objects buried under fresh snowfall.

    Here are the first few layers done. One of the photos has come out far too bright, and all seen to have a weird green tinge in places, but the general idea is there. More layers coming soon….