I'm back from the South of France. In truth all plans went out the window when we got there. With bright blue skies and temperatures in the low to mid twenties we spent most of the time either walking or sunning ourselves at the beachside cafes. Wine, espressos and warm sunshine with the gentle music of the sea to accompany them. We did visit Cannes, and Menton but the rest of the time we spent doing much of nothing and practicing my pigeon french with waiters. It is a sad fact that their english is usually far better than my french... but I do try!

I did do some painting, here I am with my morning coffee on the apartment patio painting the tree in front of me.... also photographed by Christine...

Yesterday I went into the studio and finally did a clearout. I then got stuck in and painted for a few hours, the sketching I did while away got the juices flowing. Either that or the sunshine recharged the batteries.

Either way I am raring to go and get to work.

see ya!

I'm on my travels again....

I am busy for the next couple of weeks, I need to send in a completed application for funding by March 31st. This doesn't sound too bad, but I'm away in the south of France for a week! I am applying for funding towards my trip to Starry Night Retreat in New Mexico next April.

I am organising a studio sale of older works in June or July, this will be held in a local gallery over one weekend. It will allow me to reduce the number of older works in the studio, and it will allow some of my art collectors to obtain works with an earlier slant. My work has evolved over the last decade. It became quite dark for a while, and these works in particular are not likely to be seen again. I have a few very realistic still lifes too which are unlikely to be repeated as I now use my still life studies for more expressionist work.

There are one or two very large works I will have on sale also, I tend to work smaller now since moving to my current studio. I am going to use this studio sale to fund my International Competition duties in September, and hopefully also go a long way to funding my New Mexico trip too. When I return from the French Riviera I will have to go into organisation mode for this as I need to firm the date and get invites/postcards printed for mailing out. I will be taking some watercolours and paper with me to France, but I don't know how much painting I'll get done this trip as my main reason is to visit the art centre of St Paul de Vence and the Chagall museum in Nice (Biblical works). If we have time I'd like to visit Le Cannet again this year.

I am glad to say that they will open a Bonnard museum later this year in Le Cannet. I will just have to make do with the Renoir Museum in Cagnes sur Mer this trip if we have the time. So much to do- so little time to do it- We are determined to get to the Friday Market in Ventimigilia across the Italian border this trip. But plans are made to be flexible in our case... we may find something more interesting sidetracks us again. It's always nice to leave a reason to return. :D

Pancakes and Parlaying.

Yesterday we had another Tallaght arts forum get-together. I provided pancakes in honour of shrove Tuesday... yes I slaved over a hot frying pan for an hour :D. We had another enjoyable and varied discussion bouncing ideas around. The artist's forum is a great bonus to individual artists in the South Dublin area, giving a monthly opportunity to talk with other artists about work, work practice, and other relevant ideas. It also allows us to meet and get to know each other, ideal for forming liasons for collaborative works. The artists come from all backgrounds, multi-disciplines, some arts degree educated, some self taught, in other words a wide variety of artists and those employed within the arts.

The venue is supplied by Rua Red, (Tallaght arts center) and this month three of the Artists with studio spaces in the center opened their studios to the forum prior to the meeting. Many of us hadn't seen the spaces prior to this. One of the difficulties working as a Visual artist is that most of the time I work alone, in isolation from others. The forum gives me, like others, an opportunity to interact with other artists which allows me to discuss ideas and problems that may come up in normal working environments.

Now I need to start preparing applications, both for my Starry night retreat trip in New Mexico, and my fishing duties in the UK in september

New Mexico and Cambridgeshire....

I have just sent off my "official" application to Starry night retreat in New Mexico to confirm my residency for next year. I am looking forward to it, but I will have to start working on funding applications shortly. It is going to be a busy year this year, I need to try to raise some sponsorship towards my International team fly fishing duties this year too. (I have set the date for the residency as April 2012, just in case I hold my team place for the spring International, in March ;) though the Autumn competition in September again would suit me better)
I hope to get organised soon... ... for some reason I seem to be at sixes and sevens at the moment. Too many irons in the fire I think.
I will hopefully be back to general chaos shortly, that I can handle. :D