Black and White

Well, it has been over a month since my last blog. I was distracted with fabulous trips to Minas Gerais and beyond, during the Christmas holidays. Now we are on holiday again. We are at the beginning of Carnival and I am off for a 12-hour viewing of Rio's fabulous samba school at  Rio's Sambadrome. Stay tuned for photos.

This week has been a productive week. I started to paint black and white portraits. I'm using acrylic on canvas. They are different from my full-faced colored portraits and simpler. Plus I snap only a section of the face, concentrating mainly on the eyes. I am starting with family members as my subject. I intend to display all the individual 12 x 12" portraits along side each other as one work of art. So far I have a self portrait done and a portrait of my sister Claire. There are many family members to consider so I have a lot of work ahead of me. I would like to be commissioned to paint black and white portraits. These would make great personalized gifts.

Take a look.

 Self Portrait

Portrait of sister Claire

Energetic and Creative

Well so much for thinking I could blog and paint everyday. Things are still hectic in Brasilia. Everyday something comes up and I spend half the day trying to sort it out. But I am happy. Lots of creative ideas spinning around my head.

This week Luka and I made a Christmas tree out of an old umbrella stand. We added paint brushes for the branches, crayons and potpourri for the decorations. On top we made a simple angel out of wire. It is very gaudy but brings extra humor into our daily life's.
Yesterday I decided to capture the orange, yellow and red colors in those glorious mangoes which have become part of my everyday diet here in Brazil. And it is not even mango season yet! We'll be having mangoes for breakfast, lunch and dinner in January when the mango season begins. There are a wide variety of mangoes in Brazil but I choose to mainly paint the Haden .
In my painting I also wanted to capture a little bit of the grey sky we see a lot of during the rainy season. The Brasilia sky is amazing. It changes so often in one day. The dramatic sky after a storm is my favorite.

Our puppy Xavi was covered in paint by the time I finished painting. He kept running for my paint brush as my hand moved up and down the canvas. He also caught a tube of paint and squeezed it open with his teeth. I put him in front of my painting so you can see the grandeur of the canvas. He has his eyes on a bug.

Bye for now.............

Bring on the Creativity!

                                         Well, it has taken me 9 weeks to actually be able to sit down and blog. I have been busy with our move to Brazil. We are renting a new house and being the first tenants to live in it has been a bigger responsibility than I had ever imagined. The rainy season has begun and we have discovered major leaks in the house over the past few weeks. One leak through the ceiling of the studio comes down the light socket and when the lamp shade fills up with water it causes a short circuit that trips the electricity for the whole house. Fun, fun, fun!
                                         Besides the house there is the surreal world of Brazil's horrendous red tape. Brazilian bureaucracy is worse than the leaking house. No matter what you buy or which foot you try to put forward you have to sign papers, show all forms of identification and go from one office to the next to get stamped by notaries. They made me photocopy all the pages in my passport including the blank ones. Hilarious but very time consuming. Well, enough complaining as there are so many wonderful things about Brazil. You will get to see those through my paintings, so stay tuned. I've made a promise to myself that I will paint everyday so my future posts will be filled with color and creativity.
                                         Today I started my day by recycling furniture that was damaged in our shipment. There is no point in going out to try and replace them as furniture here is so expensive and the style is generally plastic and glass, very 80's. You can find fabulous solid wood furniture but one needs to go to Tiradentes to get the bargains as shops charge an arm and a leg in Brasilia

The color scheme and patterns of my bedside table coincide with the bed covers and the overall color scheme of our guest bedroom.

Acrylic and Varnish on pine wood.

                                         

















I also painted portraits of two dear friends. They will receive them as a surprise for their birthday this Saturday.

Acrylic and Collage on Canvas

 




  Go to my website if you would like a portrait!

Acrylic and Collage on Canvas