Art in September in my studio and in my practice is all about workshop activities, new ideas for screen printing, entering a couple of art shows, being featured in a magazine and visiting the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes at the Art Gallery of NSW. I also have run my first ‘Art Retreat’ with seven artist guinea pigs and have ideas for more, so read on!

Art in September workshops will include my usual Wednesday mornings at Lennox Arts Collective and on Saturday 10th September, the workshop is on on painting and drawing ‘Fruit and Flowers’ – let me know if you are coming and have not yet told me as it is filling fast! For more  information look here – Workshop Timetable September to November.

School Holidays – I am adding in some classes for those on school holidays and will take anyone from 12 years and up on Wednesday afternoons 1.30-4pm, 28th September and 5th October for creative drawing and painting and also special school holiday ‘Simple Silk Screen Printing’ workshop on Sunday 26th September 9.30-3.30pm – look here for more information.

I have been asked to create a few more ‘bird’ designs for my hand silk screen printed ‘art’ tea towels, which are popular as gifts and have even been framed by some! I also recently designed a new ‘Hibiscus’ pattern and am pretty happy with that – hope you like it too- you can see the tea towels for sale at this link.

I always like to support Caldera Art as I have been lucky enough to be a finalist each time I have entered – keeping fingers crossed again. Will also aim for other shows – even if you don’t get chosen as a finalist it is great to have an objective and I find it focuses my creativity.

I popped down to Sydney last weekend to see family and also take the opportunity to go to the wonderful Art Gallery of NSW to see the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes – my favourite is the Wynne as I am much more a landscape painter than a portraitist and love to see just what has been created to tell the story of the land ( I loved the Wynne winning entry by the Ken sisters, it is spectacular – see the photo below) . Here are some of the Archibald finalists:

Please look out for the Spring Edition of ‘Art Edit’ magazine – my work will be featured in the ‘Ones to Watch’ section.

The Art Retreat at Nimbin was enormous fun – you can read about it here. I am now planning other retreats;

There will be another 3 day Nimbin retreat at the beginning of April 2017 on the same lines as the retreat we have just completed (dates to be advised) and a further one in August 2017 (dates to be advised)

Another idea is a weekend involving a one day workshop at the Lennox Arts Collective, a lovely dinner at one of our fine dining restaurants (we are spoiled for choice in the Northern Rivers) and then a trip to the Tweed Regional Gallery the following day to visit the collection, current exhibition and the Margaret Olley Centre. This is likely to be in early February 2017.

I am also planning to lead a visit to France called ‘A Taste of Impressionism’ – I think this would include meeting in Paris for 3 days to visit Musée d’Orsay, the Orangerie, the Louvre and Giverny (Monet’s home and garden) – here you would start on your French visual diary.

We would then travel to Provence where I will rent a villa (probably close to Avignon where there are good transport links) for a week and conduct classes in painting and drawing with acrylics, pen and ink, gouache and more! We can explore the surrounding countryside and the fabulous city of the French Popes and do lots of plein air artwork.

I want to get started on organising these retreats very soon, so would appreciate expressions of interest in any of the above ideas.