Apocalypse

One half of a set of two drawing that I have sent to Melbourne to be in the final show for Brunswick Bound's gallery next month. The show will be called "Apocalypse". More details to come.

Life Drawing

Part two (of three) of blog post for today. Last night I went to the first exhibition opening that I have been to in ages. Called "Life Drawing" (name brings up kind of bad life drawing class connotations, but really it was everything but generic university working-on-an-easel-looking-at-boring-naked-people art), it was at Magic Pony's new art gallery space place, called Narwhal Art Projects.

My favourites were the pink bright sexy happy cats from Ginette Lapalme (in an excellent matching pink frame), (its the picture below, but imagine the frame around it please) and a big secret mushrooms painting by Melinda Josie. Other artists in the show included Howie Tsui, Lauchie Reid, Lee Hutzulak, Marc Bell, Michael Comeau, Selena Wong and Tara Azzopardi.

I suggest you go and have a look for yourself. More information (including how to get to the gallery etc) is here.

p.s The prices for all of the drawings are also rather affordable, so you should buy some because they are great. Or you could just buy me the above cats and we can call it even.

p.p.s I think I need to practice putting my thoughts into coherent sentences, everything alway read kind of disjointed like the way that I think, and I am always hoping that it makes sense to whomever you are.

Happy.

...even though I'm listening to Magnolia Electric Co.  Just had a lovely day in Toronto. It was sunny and WARM (comparatively anyway). I went on a super nice adventure which included most of my favourite things; art, art supplies, talking to artists, exploring, various kinds of squirrels, cake and beer. Hooray. So glad that it is finally springtime, I thought I would never get through the winter.

Oh and the new friend which I went on adventures with today also works for one of the street press things in Toronto (called NOW), and she is doing a series of interviews about artists and their studios, which she interviewed me for last week, you can read it here (photos too!).

I have lots of things to say but I'm deciding whether to write a few more blog posts instead of just putting everything in one post. Probably makes sense to do it that way. ok, thats all for this post then. Read the interview. 

Nearly...

So yesterday I just started listening to music instead of podcasts and, in some amazing instant magical moment, I remembered how to make ideas and draw and it was fantastic. I think Kes represents everything that is important about being alive and nature and, well, if you haven't heard, just listen. Ideas and afternoon boat rides up a river in the wilderness.

I'll make this quick before I get back to work, but also I wanted to say that I'm up to 197 sales at my etsy shop. You should buy things so that I reach 200. 200th sale gets an extra special prize. Obviously. 

Back to pencils and music and dancing alone with cats.

Home

I know that I have a lot more traveling to do, but today I am dreaming of having a real home.

(from "Lastleaf")
(from Alice Saunders)
(from "Yava Glass")
(from "Down From The Mountains")
(from Sophie Jade)

Lola

Recent commission. I like her, she is like a storybook kitty.

100th blog post!!!! Yeah!!!

Not that it is all that exciting or anything, but oh well. I got some new prints made this week, by popular demand, of my drawings "Tattoo Sweater and the Colours of Everything Inside" and "Branch from the White Forest" (links go to the prints of you got that).

Hardcore drawing weekend this weekend. Getting some nice fresh new paper, some avocado on toast, and getting down to business.

Live in the wilds

That's it. I've decided, I'm growing my hair out, long and wild. I will be a girl who lives with nature and thus it will be necessary for me to have untamed tresses (this may take quite a while though, since right now my hair it approximately 1cm long).

Hair inspiration...

(from "abdabs")
(from "there's a ghost in my backyard" )
(from Wendy Bevan)
(also from "there's a ghost in my backyard" )

If snow was warm and soft and not cold and melty

Over the past few weeks, I have been looking back repeatedly to the photographs of Theresa, aka Simple Moth. They make me feel happy and like things are important.

Here are two of my favourites from her, and you can see more of her photos here.

Rain rain rain

So the good news... it's warming up a little here in Toronto. Bad news? Rain. Not that I don't like rain, but I can't go outside right now because my shoes are not in any way "water resistant" (they are full of holes and I don't like owning more than one pair of shoes). Hopefully the new shoes that I ordered online will arrive next week. I don't think I really ever buy anything from real life shops anymore, other than food. Last year when I was getting an eye exam they asked me about payment at the end and I misheard and started quoting my paypal address.

Starting some new art projects this week, had a burst of inspiration this afternoon which was awesome. Now I have eaten too much lunch however, (mmm walnut bread) and I can never concentrate on art after eating too much. I just feel too contented. My desk is set up so nice right now, I have my little collection of art and my paper bag full of knitting projects all within reach. I was going through some of my papers and documents yesterday and rediscovered the wonderful narwhal painting that I bought from Oliver Hunter from the Lines on Paper exhibition I curated last year...

I love the galaxy of his face.

Over the last few days Tim and I have been discussing what we want to do with our lives, after our trip to Canada and the U.S is over at the end of the year. We've come up with some ideas that I am kind of excited with, regarding places where we might like to live, jobs we could do etc. As much as I like traveling around, adventuring and seeing new things, I feel like it would be nice to have a more permanent home some time. Perhaps with a little garden with a pear tree in it.

Commission

Recently I have been doing a few commissions of people's cats...

This is Tula

I've done a few others (one particularly that I though worked out really well) I'll how you some pictures as soon as the person who ordered the commission gets it (I don't want to ruin the surprise).

Ahhh too much coffee

So when I woke up this morning, I had a little message in my inbox with a photo attached of a tattoo someone got done of one of my fox drawings. I guess its like the ultimate complement when someone wants to get a drawing that I've done on their body... forever. Pretty cool, and the white parts of the fox actually seemed to come out quite well. The girl who got the tattoo also asked me for permission before she got it too, so that was especially nice.

I think next time if anyone wants to get a tattoo of one of my drawings I would like to be a little more involved in the process though, by designing a piece specifically for someone, and maybe have a chat or something with the tattoo artist.

(Secret message to Androniki of Bhavani or whoever owns the original fox drawing that I did: "...hey that drawing you have is on someone now! from Sarah")

Lets see... oh man, got Mel Stringers "Cream Suck" zine in the mail this week. It's so good. It's for girls. Mel is one of the most amazing artists ever, I love her work so much. Inspiration. Apparently she is working on a new zine/comic at the moment so I will definately have an update when that happens.

I'm slowly taking better photo's of all my things, and as I usually like to have photos with my blog post, here are some of them...





P.S If you are from Toronto and know of anything that is interesting in the way of art or music, let me know. I must leave my house some more.

And something lovely.

This is how I feel when I sit at my desk and tune out from everything:


Wonderful mountain lands. I'm sure there is a warm breeze blowing there even if you are at the top and you can inhale the clean air and it smells like the lichen and rocks and clouds and a valley far away where they grow fruits and grains. This is the work of Christian Davies, whose paintings I recently came across. (If you would like to see more of his wonderful paintings, you can do that here.)

Arg. I wonder if I am somehow becoming more materialistic, I seem to be wanting for a lot of things if art can be defined as an item. Maybe its just the idea or feeling that I am wanting for. I hope that is it. Or maybe I am completely wrong in thinking that anti-materialist is the way to go. From my basic investigation into Buddhism (investigation, not actual acceptance of any kind of god or religion, so forgive me if this information is completely inaccurate), I read that this "Buddha" character tried to attain the spiritual apex first by starving himself almost to death, then realised that this was not the way to go, hence chubby happy Buddha that you have on your mantelpiece. So maybe I'm starving myself of material goods (well not really, I do "shop" on the odd occasion, but as I have said before, I only own one suitcase of possessions) and this is not helping me at all. Who knows.

Something entirely unrelated to Buddhism or art... (well perhaps not entirely unrelated, I'm not sure what Mr Davies does in his private time when not painting mysteriously inviting scenes) ...I love the house where I live so much! There was a party downstairs on Friday night which involved this massive multi-generational sing-a-long, complete with interpretive kitchen related instruments, guitar/piano dueling, and the most indoor cigarette smoking I have ever encountered in my life. It was so nice just to see people enjoying themselves and not caring (photos will probably emerge on facebook soon).

I only have a few episodes of "The Skeptics Guide to the Universe" podcast left. Why do I even listen to something that I know is bad for my imagination? (Constantly hearing there are no spirits and magic means that I can't draw them, no matter how hard I try). Ok, so the hosts of the show are really funny and I like to listen to the banter as I get on with my everyday work, but for the real stuff like art, blank blank blank idea destruction.

So many other things and happy nice things too, but I might just have write another blog entry tomorrow as well, must get back to whatever it is that I'm doing.

In the middle

Feel like I'm a small hibernating mammal. Just about ready to emerge from my winter sleepy times, peering out the mouth of my cave to check whether it's spring yet. Outside all the snow has melted and it looks really sunny and warm. But it is -5º outside. Brrrr.

Haven't touched the knitting needles for 2 days. Will I make it to 3? Who knows.