Pleasure and pain

                                                       Pilbara flowers, acrylic on paper

                                                       Pilbara feathers, acrylic on paper

As you all know from my last blog, I spent Christmas in my beloved Pilbara.  The above are some small paintings I made while I was there.  The flowers were collected from the garden at the Port Hedland house and the foreshore at Cemetery Beach and the boat ramp.  I painted them on the day I collected them.  As you can imagine, they wilt pretty quickly.  The hawk or osprey feather I found on a windswept walk along Cemetery Beach and the earth stained Corella feather was located on Athol Street during my morning run.

I am planning a small work which will incorporate these paintings and include several more made from a collection of feathers and found objects that I made in addition to the daily collections for my jars.

After much playing, exploring and experimenting, I have decided that I love making small paintings, drawings and studies.  The reason for this is simple.  I only have small amounts of time in which to paint and draw, and it is immensely satisfying to make a small finished painting rather than to work for months on a large one in small bursts.  I can stay focused on a small image and paint enough individual images over two or three months to make one large (120x120cm) sewn together painting, whereas I loose interest pretty quickly on a single image of the same size because my studio sessions are so random that it might be a week or more between visits and I find it difficult to sustain the same amount of enthusiasm over such a long period of time.  There is also a deep feeling of satisfaction in completing something rather than allowing it to drag on without any sense of an end.

With the help of a rather clever friend, I have found a way to hang these paintings, which involves just enough pain and obsession to be extremely satisfying.  So for now I will continue my small studies with much pleasure and small amounts of pain.