March madness…

Firstly, I have to say…this is not my image, but my son’s.”Upside down moon” is its title I believe. I have posted this, as for the first time ever, I have no new photos or art to share with you. My camera has been collecting dust over the past few months as I have been focused on completing some study and family priorities which have consumed me recently.

So, here I am, in nearly March and not one single blog, photo or art to share…not that I haven’t been thinking about it all…I have the application for the Lysaght Watt Trust Art Award for this year and am close to a decision on a piece to enter..imagine winning twice!!!  It is an interesting theme too, being “Yin Yang” which has me thinking about the endless flow between light and dark, solid and fluid, old and new, good and evil, morning and evening, hard and soft,  masculine and feminine and the other Yin Yang examples found in nature and around us and also in us….two opposite and opposing forces at play…

I am thinking also of another GARDEN Art Exhibition this year (after our great review last year) and also a photographic exhibition of Taranaki photographers… and I dream to enter a portrait competition and also of having an exhibition of my Italian photos and setting up a real physical art support group too – to share ideas and support each other, even more than we do now……so many ideas. Maybe I just needed some creative down time over recent months to re-emerge stronger, more creative and inspired than ever before? The balance of creative forces in my own body and mind and heart are shifting again and I feel  a re-awakening happening…

May March bring you joy and creative inspiration also.

Botanical Beauty

Finally….Botanical Beauty (2016) was my entry into our GARDEN art exhibition recently held. It was printed on linen (although I also have a copy printed on archive quality fine art photography paper too) and it looks amazing! I was so happy with it after a nervous start when I realised the original photo was taken on my phone and not my trusty canon!

It’s such a great feeling when an image comes together just as you imagined in your head.

Fall is finally upon us…

Some of the gorgeous fall colours I saw at Hollard’s Garden last weekend…so pretty!

Opening week….

A few photos of the new Black Box Art Studio & Gallery all set up and open for business from tomorrow… Exciting! 

Fading pink in the heat of summer….

The hydrangeas are out in full glory. Perhaps this seemingly endless summer is even too hot for them this year, as they look drier and pinker than usual.

Of course, I love the muted shades, the messy variegated colours seen as they slowly die off from what was a glorious bloom, and this hedge was a perfect example of the colours.

A vision of pink….

Roses from garden today….pink and violet and gorgeous..what a lovely sight to see….

Sorry is the hardest word.

Why is it so dam’n hard to say I am sorry? It is such a short little sentence.

It shouldn’t be so hard…. Especially to say to those we love. Yet it seems hardest then.

Maybe the roses, greenery and rosemary picked from our garden, tied in a bow and left for them to find, will help me to say the three hardest words to say…I am sorry.

 

My favourite time of year again…

The Hydrangeas are out…Some people love the all white ones, some love the pretty sky blue ones or perhaps the all pink ones…but I like the muted, mixed-up, muddled looking ones as they go from full bloom to final fade…

Preparing for take off…

Sometimes you get to witness something special.

A monarch drying out its new wings and preparing for flight. Some, I understand, fly thousands of kilometres from North America to Mexico and back, while our New Zealand ones prefer to stay home!

The romance of roses…is it dead?

As you know, I love roses. I love them even when they are dying, like these ones. There is something beautiful, yet slightly macabre about gorgeous red roses in their final stages of bloom.

Maybe it’s a cliché but roses really are like a metaphor for love in real life….first, the precious rose-bud like the thrill of new romantic love, then there is the full blown blooming gorgeousness of long-life-together-kind-of-love represented by roses in full bloom. Then, finally the graceful and bitter-sweet love found in appreciating something and thinking it beautiful through its final stages of life, while decaying and dying…somehow fragile yet still achingly beautiful. I am sure a poet wrote about it….