Day 1 of my new regime

I'm going to paint (or draw) every day this year.
Well, I took my sketchbook to the beach. I don't know why I haven't done that before. I love other peoples beach sketches! (I particularly love Marina's.) Maybe that's why I don't take mine there... I don't want to know mine are not as wonderful as theirs. Well, now I know it, but I also know practise will improve them!

On the painting front, I needed to do a bit more towards the reorganising of my studio space. I grandly call my little room my 'studio'. It is tiny and I have sooooo much stuff and furniture. I'm moving some of my stuff next door into a storeroom. It will mean I'll have to go in there on and off, but it will be better for painting. My problem is that the storeroom is already full so sorting, throwing out and reorganising is going on in both rooms. It will take time, but I'll get there. In the mean time I've almost made enough space to do some painting! Yay!

Well well well. I had to scan my Moleskine so I could show you my bad beach drawings so I scanned my Paris drawings at the same time. The reason I haven't shown you my drawings (I think) is that scanning them really means the trip is over. In my mind I race back to Paris at every moment I can. Scanning the drawings makes it really really over. Ahh, Paris!

...I simply remember my favourite things and then I don't feel sooooo bad

Making things, pattern, gentle rain, sleeping, old books
My latest entry in Clare's Moleskine for Moly_x_25. It's part of Moly X: An International Moleskine Sketchbook Exchange. This one is nearing completion. Look how full Clare's gorgeous book is now.
In fact, this one is done all bar Clare's own final entry. What a ride this book has had!

The Williams

Finally I have some art to post here!

My second entry in Tracy's Moleskine is titled "The Williams." Tracy's Moly-X-25 did not start with a specific theme but from day one has been destined to be a book exploring our favourite artists. "The Williams" is a homage to William Kentridge, William Morris and anyone named 'William' in a Boys Own Journal.

My favourite beach

I just uploaded these photos to the Moly_x_25 blog and thought I'd put them here too. I drew this today and it is in Kerry's Moleskine. You can read the post here.
This is my favourite rock on my favourite beach. (If I ever tell you I don't believe in favourites, don't believe it, OK.)
I can tell you it was hot there today!

Stocking the shop with new items...

...and they are on sale already!
First there is my 'Shall We?' Gocco printed Moleskine Cahier notebook.
'Indian Garden' Silver printed Moleskine Cahier
'Daisy Day' Another silver print.
'Minimum' A pair of acrylic abstract paintings on canvas panels.
And don't forget you will receive one of these flat notecards free if you order from my shop during my sale this week.
Click on the pictures to be taken straight to my shop. There you can read the story behind each creation and feel free to have a look around if you haven't already. Thank you for a great year! More new listings coming soon! What a week it will be.

Moleskine Exchanges Update

Well, I must say being in three different Moleskine Exchanges does keep me busy. Recently the stack of molys on my desk was disturbingly high so I got stuck into them.
I did these in Pamela's moly for the Exquisite Corpse exchange.


Then I did my entry in Alison's book for moly_x_25. This is the middle entry in the book so it takes up 5 pages of the Japanese fold Moleskine. I couldn't get it all in the first shot but you can see it all in the 2nd one.

Then came the very daunting task of drawing Emma in her small Japanese fold moly for moly_x_portrait1. I drew her eyes too close together!!! So as punishment I drew mine too close as well.

Moly_x_portrait1 Update

Yes, still catching up on my exchanges. This one is of Remi and myself done as part of moly_x_portrait1 exchange. For this exchange we do a portrait of the books owner and a self portrait before sending it on it's way. I got the idea from a photo of Remi on Flickr in which he was looking very French. A little bit of escargot and a meat pie and tomato sauce later and voila!

What is it with BIG things?

Ok, I said I'd show my books, I know. This is a book but it is not one I made. This is my latest entry in the moly_x_25 Moleskine exchange. I managed to do this after work today and it is another thing off my to-do list and happily on my done list!!! If things go according to plan I might have another to show tomorrow...

Coffs Harbour has two main tourist attractions. One is the Pet Porpoise Pool which is an excellent spot to kiss seals and pat dolphins and even have a swim with them. It is always a great day at the Pet Porpoise Pool. The other is The Big Banana.

There is a little artistic license in this sketch. I left out the gift shop, the snack bar and the History of Bananas building. From this perspective you can't see the lolly (sweets) factory, the puzzle shop, the toboggan ride, the snow slope, the ice rink or the water park, so it was easy to leave them out.

There is a fine tradition of Australian artists sketching and painting Luna Park in Melbourne. I love these works. They capture the essence of the conflict between fun, fear and sleaze in Luna Park and other attractions like it. When I look at them I wish I lived in Melbourne to be able to paint it too. Then I realised - we have the Big Banana right here! I could paint it. That idea was firmly implanted into my 'one day' basket right up until Clare drew Luna Park in Kerry's moly and posted it off to me to follow on. Too good an opportunity!

But it's not the same when it is a conflict of fun and sleaze only, without the fear. I'm left thinking 'it's just a big banana.'

For more information on Moleskine exchanges visit here.

My Moleskine Exchanges - Update

This was done as part of Moleskine exchange 25 (Moly_x_25). I had to follow on from Clare's tribute to Van Gogh. I was stumped for a long time not knowing what to do. Ah, Matisse! That's always the answer!
For Moly_x_Portrait1 I drew the gorgeous Marina. She is such a delight to draw! I couln't stop!

I left drawing my self-portrait until last in Marina's book. After her I didn't find myself inspiring at all! I drew myself with Sunday morning hair.

So close I think I'm there

Here are the Moleskine exchanges I've been working on that have brought me just about up to date. This one is in Melissa's moleskine and is part of Moly_x_25. There is no theme for her book but I took my lead from Clare's turtle and made mine a water image too with a local flavour added to the exotic wave inspired by Hokusai by including the South Solitary Island and it's lighthouse that can been seen from my beach.
For moly_x_portrait 1 I made a little book to attach inside the front cover as my 'sign-in' page. Each participant in the exchange will draw a quick self portrait in this book. Each page is cut into 3. At the end of the exchange it should be quite a fun little book to see.


For this exchange I drew my self portrait. It now goes on to the next person who draws themselves and me (from photos). And on it goes.

5 Favourites

Jenn (ninox) tagged me! I haven't done a tag for a long time, but it is always a lot of fun, and when I saw it was to list 5 favourite things, well... of course!

Also it is a coincidence because last night I finished my entry into Clare's Moleskine as part of Moly_x_25, and she has set the Moly's theme as "a few of my favourite things!" In my drawing I just drew 4 favourites - my dog Roly, my coffee, my books and pattern.

For Jenn I think I might have to add another. I guess it would have to be...
this is hard...
Ok, I have it...
One of my favourite things is saying "I don't believe in favourites!"

I usually say this just before I say what my favourite for that split second is. I change my mind a lot.

Do I have to tag someone else? I don't think it's a law, so I'm going to let it slide.

The Moly has Landed

Actually I had never heard Moleskines called 'Moly's' up until very recently when I joined a Moleskine Exchange. I recently blogged about my own Moly (here and here) for the exchange and my first entries in it.  I posted it off to Alison earlier in the week after a dodgy beginning. Then I just waited for Clare's to arrive for me to draw in.
Well here it is!  While I've  heard others say (well read really) that they look so different in the flesh, well... IT DOES!  It looked good to me in the online shots Clare put up on the Moly_x_25 blog and her Flickr site, but in the flesh! it just looks... well... (I hate to use those often overused words again, but...) absolutely fabulous!!!  It comes in its own little cosy cover and is accompanied with gifts!  What more could a girl ask for? (I won't say anything about the gifts for fear of spoiling the surprise for the next recipients in the exchange.)  

So, here I am.  With it.  Feeling all VERY precious about it.  And wondering what to do.  

It made me think about my own Moly, out there, travelling the world without me for the next 6 months.  I thought about how good it had turned out that I messed it up and had to get completely unprecious about it.  I put sticky notes in it to tell its future artists to write this here, that there etc etc.  I found myself thinking I wish I had put more notes in it, saying in particular, don't follow my rules, don't follow the rules of anything, just plain get into my book. Interact.  Replace. Obliterate. Transform. Get  down and dirty!!! (Maybe not 'obliterate'.)

Once again art brings about surprise.  I do expect art's nice surprises.  But I never expect the elements that end up surprising me.

My Moleskine Exchange page completed

Well I'm ready to send off my moleskine to it's first exchange member.  

I had a spot of bother doing this.  I had planned a completely different picture and added found book pages as a border (see above right).  I sketched the whole drawing and then... eeek! discovered I'd done it on the wrong pages.  I needed to remove as much as I could and go back a page to do my drawing. Lucky a part of moly_x_25 is to allow the drawing to extend onto the next half a page... so mine extends onto the next 3 pages... not much difference there...
So back to a new page I found new ideas were needed.  But I had none.  So I just started working and this is what came out.  It ended up being a tribute to William Morris.  My moleskines theme is Red/Read.  I have lots of books on William Morris which I love to read and look at, so it tied in there.  My man had taken a photo of our new hibiscus and I just love the shape... one thing led to another as they say.  I had a bit of difficulty with the area in the fold peeling back all the time so I solved that with a piece of duct tape.  The silver matches the silver coloured pencil I used.  A bit of white line over the top and I was happy.  I think I will be able to post it off tomorrow.

moly_x_25

I'm participating in a Moleskine exchange with five other artists. I haven't done anything like this before.  How it works is we each get a Japanese fold Moleskine and draw on the first 2 1/2 pages then send it on to the next artist.  They complete the 1/2 page and add their own spread with just a little extending onto the next page for the next artist to complete and so on and so forth.  The inside cover pages of mine have the 'sign-in' page, where each artist writes her details, and the title of my book.  
My theme is Red/Read [both pronounced the same].  I think this will be loose enough to be fun but also still enough of a theme to create a bit of interest.  In keeping with the 'read' part of the theme I made my 'sign-in' page a library card.  It sits it's envelope with the 'Due Date' slip attached.  As we each have a month to work on the book before it is sent on to the next artist, I thought it would be nice to record these dates - library style!

All I have to do now is think of something to draw on my 2 1/2 pages!!!

Check out the moly_x_25 blog!

Absolutely Fabulous!

Well, I feel like I've been away for about 3 weeks, not the 5 days of my actual trip! This is Peppers Convent at Pokolbin in the Hunter Valley wine district of NSW. We spent three days and two nights here. It is an old Brididine convent that was built in Coonamble and transported the 600+ Kms to it's present location in 1991. The nuns kept the stained glass, the cedar doors, the beautiful mirror and lots of other goodies when they sold it. Once its rebuild was completed the nuns were invited to visit. They were so impressed with the job that had been done that they gave back all of the goodies they had kept so that it could be truly complete again. It is absolutely gorgeous and now has a tasteful yet comfortable French flavor to its interior decoration. We loved it! Maybe the bottle of french champagne on arrival helped, as did the spectacular service and food perfection, or was it the wine and canapes in the evening... It has been many years since I was last in the Hunter Valley and it was virtually unrecognisable. There are now 130 vineyards and the ones we saw were both beautiful and tasty! We only visited 4 (or was it 5? all a blur by the end of the day) vineyards. And this is how we got around! Frank was our driver and Fred was our Clydesdale horse power.There is not much nicer than a slow day of food, wine and great company. Frank is a true character. I told him that if he had bookings where people asked to have him as the driver and state that they MUST visit Tyrrells, then he would know I had recommended them!!!
These vines were back at Peppers Convent, although we saw this in many places. They are beautiful but have had the grapes left to rot on the vine due to a glut of red wine (a glut!?!?! What have we all been doing with out time???) They will be pruned off with the rest of the vine within the next month when they cut it all back to within 18" of the stem.

Ah, the memories. I drink a few more of them in every night.

Fresh!

I just added these little notebooks to my Etsy shop.  It is tricky to capture the colours with a photo, but they are printed in layers of silver and lime greens.  The colours change in the light and depending on which way you look at them.  And I think they are pretty groovy baby!
And I have just finished my first bulk order!  50 hand-printed cards. I created my groovy pattern for these.  They are nicely folded and have all their corners rounded now.  They sit in a very satisfying stack!  Now all I have to do is source some nice envelopes to go with them - I'm thinking metallic silver - and then they will be whisked away to their new home - the office of a dear friend who is a lawyer sweet enough to send notes on nice cards when the moment calls for it.  (I think there may be a couple of spares that will make into The Little Shop of Horus soon!)

Sydney blue

I haven't uploaded any Moleskine pages for a long time, and I actually haven't used my Moleskine much lately either. Well, I've rectified both. There are a few old pages newly on my Flickr page if you are interested and this one I did on the weekend while staying at the 'Harbour View' in North Sydney (a subtle but effective name, really). I love the view over Lavender Bay. It is the same view that Brett Whiteley painted again and again. In fact you can see Brett's favourite palms from the 'Harbour View', but the don't really show up in this sketch.

Anyway, I had a lovely time in Sydney but came home with a bad head cold. Yuck. What I came home to that wasn't 'yuck' was this email:

Hi Jan,
Last night I dropped by your blog & found the interview with Eric Maisel. As I read the interview a light bulb went off in my brain. I have an artist friend who has bouts of depression, who is passionate about her art, who wants to put it out there in the world but becomes depressed when faced with even the prospect of a rejection. The last couple of days have been particularly bad & I even suggested to her that it may be time to seek professional help. She battled through it & a couple of days later things seemed brighter as a new outlet for her art presented itself.

It was late last night when I sent her to your blog. She read the interview & this was her response:

"I was hanging off every word... looks like my prayers for help have been answered "

Needless to say, she immediately found an online supplier & ordered The Van Gogh Blues. I really hope that she has found some answers & guidance.

I believe in fate, serendipity, whatever people call it. I was thinking I was meant to make contact with you because of the art course but it wasn't about me at all.

Thanks Jan & thanks Eric

Christine (who is {im}patiently waiting for her course material to arrive!)

I was so touched by this. Eric Maisel's books truly do have the capacity to prompt positive change in the lives of creative people. I return to them over and over for renewed inspiration and a reminder of the habits I'm hoping to instill permanently. It is a journey. I'm getting somewhere. I like where I'm at now, and looking forward to seeing where I end up next.

No need to search for the perfect journal anymore

I've written a few posts over the years about my search for the 'perfect' journal. From the stats of this blog, I frequently see people have 'found' me by searching for that very thing on Google. I have found a few solutions to the issue in the past. I still LOVE my rebound sketchbooks and my Firenze one, ....but... well, I'm sure you understand... the search goes ever on...

And here is my latest solution! I've been printing the covers of Moleskine Cahiers with my new Print Gocco!

I love this cow cover. "This is a diary. The dairy is across the other side of town." This one came about from my (and I don't think it is just me) confusion over the two words. In fact, I have a friend who insists on calling her diary a dairy!
I've put my "Clown Skeleton Wallpaper" on moleskines with the natural covers.
I've put my "Glamour Girl" on the covers too. In fact, she wraps around onto the back cover too. I drew her with my drawing tablet and printed her with 2 screens.
I love pattern! I just had to have patterned covers.
Yep, they're all Moleskine pocket Cahiers (3.5 x 5.5 inches/9 x 14 cm).
Swirly patterns that grace the side of a cover are just enough fabulousness to quickly tell me which is the front when I'm in a rush to jot down some idea or do a quick sketch.
Dots! How can there ever be enough dots in the world?

If you are searching for that perfect journal, these are for sale in my etsy shop The Little Shop of Horus, well the ones I'm not using myself, that is.