The Art of It

Constantiaberg Art Society will be holding their Spring Exhibition in the Sanlam Hall, Kirstenbosch from the 26th August to the 9th September. The opening by Fiona Chisholm will be held at 6pm on Friday the 26th August. Anyone who would like an invitation, please contact me or email Constantiabergartsociety@gmail.com.

Constantiaberg Art Society is holding an exhibition in the Sanlam Hall, Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens from 16 January to 25 January 0900 to 1730 every day. Entry into the exhibition is free and on Tuesdays entry in to the Gardens is free for Pensioners.  Members will be exhibiting some wonderful art at very reasonable prices.

The first of two Members Exhibitions was opened on Saturday 28 May at Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens, Cape Town.  This exhibition runs until Monday 6 June 2011. I entered one of my en plein air paintings done at a private home at Marina de Gama. The whole painting was done on site, I didn't touch it at home in case I messed it up.  I hope I have conveyed the tranquility of this beautiful venue.  What a place to retire to!

I just found this painting I did while sitting on my own at Kirstenbosch. Only two of us pitched up for this Plein Air outing at Kirstenbosch. I am glad I went though. While sitting there, the cloud got heavier and heavier and it started spitting with rain. Tourists poured past and it was difficult to just focus! Isn't it wonderful to be able to create out in the midst of this wonderful world we are so lucky to live in?

At the beginning of October Carol was exhibiting at the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens . We took the opportunity to take a walk around the gardens and I spent some time examining and photographing the work of a number of Zimbabwean stone sculptors . I find this work extraordinary and in everyway comparable with some of the best work produced anywhere in the world. Although the work on display in the gardens is recent it has it roots in a tradition dating back many centuries. The stone carvings found at the Great Zimbabwe, an archaeological site dating back to about 1200 AD, are quite similar in character and style. Carving in stone began to experience a revival in the early sixties. Artists working from small workshops, with encouragement from the director of the National Art Gallery in Zimbabwe, began producing a substantial volume of work, much of which was sold to tourists by informal traders operating at places like the Victoria Falls, the Great Zimbabwe Ruins and at sites in...

I recently joined this Art Society after being on the waiting list for a year! They only take 120 members due to the venue being very small. I hope it has been worth the wait. I am exhibiting two small paintings this time, feeling my way.

I have been so sick, Bronchitis, and really not in a creative mood at all! I did play around with my water colours a bit though and here is the result. They were photographed at Kirstenbosch on exhibition day.

The South African Society of Artists Annual Exhibition opened at Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens in Cape Town this morning. The paintings on this exhibition are those picked at the selection I described in a previous post. After weeks of rain and miserable cape winter weather, we were blessed with a magnificent sunny spring day. Kirstenbosch was at its best, full of colour with lush green lawns and Table Mountain rising majestically above. A perfect setting in which to display the work of some very talented people. Virginia MacKenny, senior lecturer in painting at the Michaelis School of Fine Art, UCT, opened the exhibition and gave an inspiring speech encouraging all of us to continue expressing our individuality through our art. She advised us not to use the selected works as defining what is good art and something we have to copy. The exhibition is well worth a visit and will be open until the 10th October. Lynn Brown, President of SASA, introducing our speaker. Jessica Brown,...

An enormous emotional and physical experience! For details of this SASA event go to The Art of Intuitive Painting . Di McNaughton has posted a brilliant article on her Blog describing the procedure and the emotions that go with it. I just feel so desperately sad about the huge quantity of quality work that was turned down. Only about 300 out of 500 paintings could be selected due to the available exhibition space at Kirstenbosch. I was very happy to have one painting accepted. It’s a portrait called “Jessie” that I did with a life-painting group in Pinelands. It got a high enough score to be included in the approximately 300 works selected for the exhibition. One of our top Cape Town artists, who sells her work very successfully at high prices, didn’t score enough for any of her paintings to be accepted. I am proud of my achievement and consider myself very lucky. I was one of the helpers on the day and when I climbed into my car, sometime after five, I felt totally shattered; o...

The South African Society of Artists is holding their 2008 Members' Exhibition at Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens. The exhibition will be open from 9.30 to 17.30 daily from the 7th June until Sunday 15 June.

Wow!!! I did a photo shoot of two kids aged seven and two at Kirstenbosch on Monday. Firstly I haven't been to Kirstenbosch for years and my, one forgets how beautiful it is. We used to go there often for Sunday champagne breakfasts and a walk with the kids. That was in the days when it was a lot less costly to get in! Hell of a price it is now and not something I will do that often - wonder what the price of an annual ticket is? I must look that up. I took Bryan's camera, a Canon Power Shot S3IS with 12x optical zoom and 6 mega pixels, as well as my own little Fujifilm Fine Pix with a 3x optical zoom and only 2 mega pixels. I have never done portrait photography before but jumped in headfirst. Well I was very excited and nervous and oh boy, one forgets how active a two year old is! After about two hours I left not knowing what I had in the bag. Getting home we put all the photos onto the computer. I had used Bryan’s camera for most of the shots. What a beautiful camera! I don...