milo art...

i mentioned in my last post that i spent the weekend in some-what bliss creating in the purple palace's shed.  i was in no hurry this weekend and managed to complete three and almost finish off two more.  well i thought i'd almost finished.  that is, until i walked past these two paintings on my studio table today and noticed milo splashed all over one of them!!!  well, not exactly splashed all over... just the part of the painting which was the face painted in oil colour!!! ( am i overusing the exclamation mark here?????)  *breathe*  so i've just now had to re-do the entire face again and it will now be another 24-48 hours before she's ready to be detailed...  oh well - i suppose it could have been worse.  it could have happened after the face was completely finished.  and who do you think may have haphazardly splashed milo over my painting??? 

well i suppose i'm lucky.  they have been walking in and out of my studio now for years and this is the first real accident.  i hope it's the last!

x me

i've been hiding in the shed...

this weekend i've had all to myself  - almost all to myself - except for a bout 2 hours!  what a strange feeling it was not to have to respond to every little cry, squeal or command.  and to sleep in!!!  and all thanks to my wonderful awesome amazing sil and bro who let me bunker down at their house and take over their BIG SHED and ping-pong table as a make-shift studio...  there are three more paintings which are about 90% complete - i'm waiting for the oil paint to dry so should have them completed by tomorrow night.  but for now here's a bit of a show and tell for you.

 this painting here titled 'you are enough' is something a little different for me.  the town i live in is actually one of the windiest places on earth.  no kidding.  so i have to laugh because this is what most people look like when they head out for a walk here - lol!  but i suppose it's just about being happy in your own skin.  that we all have a unique magic to share with the world that no-one else can, and truly, that is enough...

and the next one - with the cocoon has been a little something brewing in my head for a while.  i suppose it can mean many things for different people - but for me, the inspiration was my two children, and just wondering where their lives will take them, what journey they will embark on in their own walk through life.  what will they do?  who will they meet?  what talents will come to the fore?  well, as the painting says,

just wait and see!

and don't be a stranger either - say hello and let me know where you've come from in the global village!  have a great week,

x me

this beautiful soul...

i took this photo of my boy last week. looking at it makes me say a prayer of thanks for being such a lucky mumma.   the light is playing in his eyes.  he is innocent and beautiful and lovely.  all boy.  much love.

i hope you can find something to be thankful for today...

x me

assemblage love...

for the past 8 weeks, every thursday evening my niece and i have been attending our local tafe college for evening jewellery classes.  we've tried our hands at creating glass pendants, brooches and earrings, enamelling and clay/glass pendants.  it's been a fantastic experience playing with materials, machines and kilns that are normally so out of reach. 

my glass pieces are a tad on the average side, but i really enjoyed enamelling.  obviously being a jewellery class we were supposed to be making such things, but for this piece, it just took on a life of its own and developed into an assemblage piece of art instead!  the copper plates making up the wings and central section were pressed/embossed through a cuttlebug and then wired to the house using copper wire.  the house was cut from a rectangular piece of copper and then enamelled.  the copper wings were attacked very ferociously with a blow-torch to achieve those gorgeous rainbow colours (that was fun!).  the little heart was also embossed and enamelled with a little 'd' twisted from wire adhered using clear enamelling powder.  and the wirly-gigs are made of copper wire of varying thicknesses and threaded with beads.  the assemblage is adhered to a felt/paper collage using 3d squares ( i was inspired by a gorgeous soul meg who does beautiful landscapes from material on wood.)

the house represents me (i sign my work 'donna heart' - hence the letter 'd' in the tiny heart).  i'm finding my creative wings and starting to soar with a trail of loveliness being left behind!!!

 just today i was reading a great post by mati rose   she writes... "when i get stuck and overwhelmed with the oodles of art and trends and thousands of ways of doing things. i now simply look up and say "mati, show the world... you... your magic". what no one else has that is uniquely YOU. this is not easy mind you, but it helps to start from this place and eliminate some of the creative clutter and doubt."  this is so true.  i really do get overwhelmed especially by all the amazing talented artists 'out there'.  and then that teeny tiny (but oh so powerful)  critic in me rears it's ugly head to give me all the reasons why i'm wasting my time and really shouldn't embarass myself by showing my art to others!  but it's heartening to read that this is actually a very common experience and emotion amongst creatives, and knowing that many of you out there triumph daily over these pesky little gits gives me that same courage to push mine a little lower,  look up to the universe and say 'show the world your magic too'

x me

beautiful me, beautiful you...

well i finally finished off this painting last night and i'm really stoked with how it turned out.  this is one of the few paintings i've actually done a sketch for and when i was drawing her the words 'beautiful you' just spilled out across the page - it just came so easily.  i used the new claudine hellmuth paints on this one, and they really are so lovely.  there's not too many colours that don't go well together, it makes colour matching and blending so easy!  i painted her on a claybord which i absolutely love (will i ever return to canvas?) and of course the hat - she's obviously destined for race-round for sure!

it's spring here in western australia, and yesterday i planted pots and baskets filled with marigolds and petunias.  the everlastings are in full bloom and the sun is shining.  the cool sea breeze is here - it's easy to believe in beauty.  hope you're finding some beauty in your everday life as well,  x me

have yourself a merry little christmas...

september, and i'm thinking about christmas already...  are you?  i've recently finished this painting for a friend of mine.  he approached me to see if i'd donate a painting to be turned into a christmas card (along with some other artists) to create a pack of christmas cards to be sold as a fundraiser to help a little boy with muscular dystrophy. of course, there was nothing else to say but yes!  but it was quite nerve wracking as it's my first sort-of commissioned piece i've had to paint.  and although there were no stipulations other than 'it has to have a christmas theme' there was always the little voice in the back of my head saying that it wont be good enough!  anyway, i'm learning not to pay close attention to that dream-destroying voice!  so here 'tis.  would you buy this christmas card??? :)

x me

lovin' claudine...

this is me with 4 eyes and 4 cheeks and one extremely overweight ear!!!

a lovely little package arrived in the mail for me today - something i've been waiting for for about two weeks...  are you familiar with amanda blake soule?  aka soulmama ...  she has a new book out called handmade home with some gorgeous ideas on how to repurpose old materials into lovely new family treasures.  i definitely want to make a word banner, art tray, letter satchel and a silky eye pillow!  ahhh... so much to do, so little time.  i definitely feel the calling of my sewing machine, it really has been a while. 

a few weeks ago i received my order of supplies from dickblick in the states (i love this store - it seems to stock everything!).  as it turned out, it was only $20 more expensive to order from the US rather than Sydney - and i had a lot more choices in size (claybords).  at the same time i also purchased the claudine hellmuth paints, brushes, gel medium and sticky back canvas.  the paints are absolutely lucious - i really am enjoying the new palette - alot!  but the sticky back canvas had me stumped and has been sitting on my table in the studio staring at me now daily...  until i had an idea (yes i know it doesn't happen too often!) 

apparently this is me and Miss M's dad, and the two little ghosties are Miss M and Mr T!!!  i think she got the idea from some of the ads and displays at spotlight of Halloween things!

recently my little girl of 3 has been creating the most gorgeous drawings.  i'm aware that i can't keep every single one, but have been scanning them into my computer to keep forever. in her two books, soule mama has many projects to turn children's art into keepsakes, and after reading her idea on a table runner displaying artworks, i wondered if i could use my photo software to print out one of my dd's pictures onto claudine's canvas.  so i tried it, and it worked!!!

so now, i can simply stick it to the table runner and sew around it to make a centre piece of DD's art work!  stay tuned for the final chapter.  like i said - i have to get the sewing machine out!

 this is my Miss M - a self portrait with lots of legs and lots of cheeks!!! (you need them when you smile alot)

x me

a multitude of small delights...

blogger isn't playing nice tonight - it wont let me move the photos around, and lazy me doesn't want to delete them all and start again to get the order i wanted! i wanted to show you my new inspiration board first - but you'll have to scroll down for that! at the end of 2007 we moved from Longreach in central queensland to the west coast. we had a great old house which was an old shearers quarters - converted into a home and it was the closest i've ever gotten to having my dream home... so when we moved, i had to take the old set of french doors (which were i nthe shed, not on the house!) with me - with the thought of one day turning them into something interesting and lovely. so finally i have (well one of them at least) and now i have a little bitof nostalgia as well as happy thoughts with me in my studio... speaking of collecting happy moments (see photo below!) these two munchkins ran outside yesterday when we had a 2 minute shower just to try out their new wellie's in the rain (pitiful excuse for rain i know). they were so 'incited' ( that's three-year old for excited) and being such good friends i had to take a pic of it...


one of my favourite quotes - i have it hanging in my studio where i can see it all the time so that i never forget what true happiness really is...

and here's a little something i'm creating in my thursday evening tafe course on jewellery making. now it's a tad ostentatious for a necklace i know - i did get a bit carried away... but i was having alot of fun with the design so decided just to make a little something to hang in the studio. the little swirly mark thing is actually how i write a lower case 'd' and is in the heart shape as i sign all my art as 'donna heart' the little house is me and the wings are my dreams starting to fly...enamelling has been great fun, and next week we get to put our hand to etching into metal plates, so looking forward to that...and here's the old door which should have been at the top of this post :)

i'm nearly finished a few pieces so hopefully i'll have some more creative news for you soon. sorry it's been a while, i'll make amends - promise!

x me

be bold be brave

lately i've been riding a happy wave. you may remember that a couple of months ago i managed to get a heap of painting done - 14 actually, and to my absolute surprise, they all sold - very quickly. so i did a few more, and they sold too. so i grabbed what i had hanging on my walls, and they sold as well! to say i was beside myself is an understatement. it is hard to describe the feeling you get when you start to realise that there are people 'out there' who like what you make. but even more than that, when you know that your creations touch others' hearts and souls. it brought about totally unexpected feelings.

i realised that it was unfamiliar territory (oh so this is what it feels like to be happy again!?) - yes it has obviously been a while since my heart was happy and that's a scary thought. so this whole 'painting thing' has been on the one hand serendipitous, and another, healing and reassuring. reassuring in the sense that i can believe i'm on the right track. that i am heading in the direction i'm meant to be travelling. healing because i'm drawing closer back to the real me(who got lost along the way), and serendipitous because it was all so unnexpected and unplanned. such a wonderful and happy accident!

so this painting has evolved out of all of that. the words be brave, be bold are my mantra this week. i've got some big dreams, and i'm just at the beginning of making them real. so i need to trust my heart, trust my intuition and trust that the affirmations from others are real and authentic. and maybe, just maybe, my dreams will come to pass...

does my heart well...

it was a beautiful day here in our little part of western australia. spring has certainly sprung and our wildflower season is absolutely amazing! the peeps and i took a drive out to the lovely coalseam national park today with some friends and we were not disappointed. the flowers are blooming in absolute proliferation - there are just carpets of wildflowers everywhere - and the smell of them is heady - truly you just want to lay down in them and dream your way off to sleep in the sun - absolutely magic. and to top it all off it was the most perfectly perfect weather as well - as you can see, clear blue sunny skies, a gentle breeze and about 24 degrees celcius... it truly did do my heart good to get out into the open spaces and breathe in the goodness of the day. here's a peak at our slice of heaven...

i just adore this photo - asleep in the everlastings...

gorgeous grevillea...

exploring as only a three year old can...

dancing with a friend in the flowers - what more could you want?

it was such fun!

it seems our winter is slowly fading now. how is it in your part of the world? x me