Category Archives: Animals

BACK FROM TASMANIA

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Our last week in Tasmania was spent along the north coast. We camped on the beach a few kilometres east of Stanley. What an amazing sight early in the morning as the sun came up.

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We met Gus in Bothwell. He is from Bend in Oregon where we have conducted a couple of workshops with Art in The Mountains.

Gus came to Australia, got himself a 1956 Landrover and is in the process of taking it to all the extremities of the country. Cape Byron, Mt Kosciusko and the Southern tip of Tasmania have been ticked off the list so far. When he leaves Tassie, he’s off to Cape York via Shark Bay, WA. Good luck Gus!guss

This outdoor kitchen seems to have escaped all the workplace health and safety restrictions. They did save a lot of space by installing it the electricity metre box.

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Oatlands cricket nets

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Sunrise Reeds

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Tasmanian Lawnmower

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Camped by the river in Rossross

No matter how hard we looked, we couldn’t find a Thylacine, but we did stumble across these little critters in our search.

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goats

budgie

horses wet horses

 

Shooting things is popular in some areas of Tasmania – maybe thats why we had such trouble finding a thylacine.

hunter

 

Back across Bass Straight, we spent a few days in Melbourne before heading home via the Hay Plains, One Tree Hotel and Bourke.

one tree

 

The weather turned foul north of One Tree. Pulling off the road quickly bogged us down to the axle. A shovel, frantic digging and a lot of encouragement and advice from the passenger window, soon saw us on our way

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The further east we travelled the more saturated the country became. From Brewarrina home all unsealed roads were closed so it was a quick trip back along the bitumen.

floods

MALDON AND THE MOUNTAINS

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With 5 days up our sleeve before the Maldon Workshop started we decided to slowly plod our way down to Victoria via backroads and out of the way places rather than race down the highway.

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We camped behind the pub in the little town of Goolma, where the publican spun us a great tale about his favourite dog staring down a possum – neither would give in and they both died without ever moving.

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This is the possum

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…and this is the dog

mitsubishi canter 4x4 motorhome

Foggy morning behind the pub

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We wound our way down onto the Murray River before heading across to Maldon. Great to see the river with so much water and the country in such good condition.

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Julienne, the workshop coordinator in Maldon, arranged for us to stay in this fantastic little farm house – complete with chooks and a veggie garden.

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Maldon is a beautiful little town protected by a heritage listing to preserve the unchanged character of the place.

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The 5 day workshop was a lot of fun. We met some fantastic people and really enjoyed the quiet little country town.

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Melbourne was in the middle of the Spanish Festival in Brunswick and the Polish Festival in the City, so there was a lot happening.

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After a few days in Melbourne we took off towards the Snowy Mountains via the Sale Wetlands…

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…a spectacular series of swamps, creeks and billabongs just out of town – made even more dramatic by the approaching storm clouds.

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From Sale we drove up towards the Snowy River and took the long windy track down to McKillop Bridge.

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The mountains were magnificent and the road signs basic.

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MacKillop Bridge across the Snowy River. First built in 1935 and washed away a few days before it was due to open.

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Mmmm – Jindabyne Steak, 4 minutes each side, Yum.

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Above Charlotte Pass there were still patches of snow on the ground.

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Snow Gums

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Thredbo River

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Platypus in one of the small creeks.

mitsubishi canter 4x4 motorhome

Stormy night up near Kiandra

mitsubishi canter 4x4 motorhome

Creek on the Long Plain Road

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Home via Washpool NP.

THIS LITTLE PIG

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Down the road from Chateau de la Fleunie, where we spent the last week of our workshop in France, were two pigs penned up and being fattened by the local farmer. They were like a pair of friendly dogs – running around and getting into as much trouble as possible in their small wire enclosure.

I’ve been looking forward to painting them since we arrived home. They look so pink and meaty – just like bacon running around. They have no idea of hygiene, make amazing grunting sounds and seem really happy locked up in a tiny wire pen. I’m sure they’d make better pets than breakfast.

Alizarin Crimson, Permanent Rose, Quinacridone Gold, Ultramarine Blue and, in the background, Phthalo Blue. Opaque washes of tinted White Gouache were used to loose the back end and some scratchy white charcoal pencil marks break up the surface.

NEW CHRISTMAS TOYS

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Santa Claus was good to me and left a box of shiny new paint from Japan. These trays of  watercolor are handmade  by the Ueba company in Kyoto. They were established in 1751 and still operate out of the same premises, so they must be doing something right. The main ingredient of the paint is finely ground scallop shells. The process they use to create these paints can be seen on their website (click on Factory Tour)

To experiment with these new paints I painted this Barramundi.

Starting with a loose charcoal line drawing, I then washed in some shadows with a mixture of the rich purple color and the yellow ochre. The pigments are very intense and more transparent than I expected, considering the high ground shell content.

After the first washes dried, more detail was built up with Indigo and the pale Turquoise. Scale shapes were painted on and some fine detail marks were applied with a rigger brush. A patchy wash of the orange/red was worked through the upper half of the fish before some spots of the white pigment were applied. I expected the white to be similar to white gouache, but it is more transparent  and dries to a beautiful, pearl like sheen. When the white is used to tint other colors the resulting mixture also dries with this unusual sheen.

Finally, because the Barramundi is an elusive, almost mythical fish, I decided he shouldn’t be presented so blatantly. A big rough brush full of gesso and some scribbly white charcoal marks pushed him back into murky water. A green/grey wash around the head suggests the milky green of a tropical waterhole.

I love these new paints and look forward to playing with them some more. My only fear is that I’ll become hooked on them and then they will run out!

CHATEAU DE LA FLEUNIE

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After our stay in Aix en Provence we boarded a coach and made our way through the French country side to Chateau de la Fluenie. The Chateau was built in the 1300’s and extended in the 1600’s. It is a beautiful old building set on manicured, spacious grounds just outside the small village of  Condat in the Dordogne

The main dining room

After a hard days painting it was nice to relax and enjoy drinks on the terrace as the sun went down.

We were fortunate to have access to a large conference room,should the weather turn bad. Fortunately we had only one foggy morning where staying indoors made painting a lot more comfortable.

The Chateau had its own heard of deer and a collection of very small goats.

Further down the paddock were a pair of friendly pigs

The small village of Condat, just down the road from La Fleunie, was a great place to paint. There was a bar, coffee shop and restaurant in the village, so we were well looked after.

Lunch in Condat

Butterfly disguised as dandelion.

Hand hewn timber in the roof of an ancient Condat farm building.

Trees in the region were getting ready to loose their leaves – some were bare, some where still green and some had fantastic colors.

We visited the medieval town of Sarlat – beautiful old buildings, markets, shops and restaurants, plus a wealth of painting subjects. A great place to spend the day.

Behind the Cathedral we found a quiet spot with a great view of one of  the towns Medieval houses.

La Roque-Gageac was another medieval town tucked under a cliff on the bend of the Dordogne River. It seemed a strange location for a town, but looked spectacular reflected in the water. We spent most of the day painting there, then went to visit the Lascaux Caves. No photos due to copyright restrictions according to our guide?!

After the workshop we traveled to Bordeaux airport where everyone headed off in different directions.

Dianne and I stayed a couple of days in Bordeaux and after the luxurious accommodation we were used to, the view from our room came as a bit of a shock.

Bordeaux has some beautiful buildings, but not far from where we stayed was the building below. It must be the ugliest building in France, built from checker plate metal, freeway crash barriers and funny little windows.

Bordeaux fruit stand

HUNTING MUSEUM PARIS

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62, rue des Archives, Paris

The Hunting Museum in Paris (Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature) is a fantastic mixture of artifacts and art work relating to the killing, eating, stuffing and preserving of animals.


There is an incredible collection of elaborately decorated and beautifully engineered devices for hunting animals, and a trophy room chock full of just about everything that moves (or used to move)


These beautifully made timber cabinets display various hunted animals – from a stuffed example to bones and droppings in tiny pull out draws. A number of slide out drawings and a video peep show visible through a pair of brass binoculars complete the display.


The glass storage cases for guns sit on top of numerous drawers crammed full of related hunting paraphernalia …


…even knives and forks for eating your kill.


Unlucky rabbit


Even unluckier Fox


Handsomely stuffed leopards


Hunting dogs and Wolf


Stuffed fox still looks cautious


Stuffed hunting dog with poorly fitted false teeth

Heavy duty iron hunting dog collar.

The Museum is housed in a beautiful 17th century building renovated and decorated without compromise. The more you look the more magnificent detail you will find.

THROUGH THE NORTHWOODS

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After our workshop at Dillmans in Wisconsin, we picked up a hire car from Rhinelander airport to drive up to Sudbury, in Canada, and visit my brother Wayne and his family. We ordered a mid sized sedan but ended up with a Mercury Grand Marquis  with all the electric fancy bits, a big V8 engine, full leather lounge chairs and shiny wood trim that looks like plastic (or maybe plastic trim that looks like wood). Anyway, it takes up a lot of road, gulps down gasoline and would have looked really ugly, even in the 1980’s.

The Northern region of Wisconsin / Michigan  is known as the Northwoods. It is a flat, green maze of lakes and creeks. Much of the country is covered with heavily wooded forests of birch, maple and a variety of conifers. In winter the region is covered with feet of snow and the temperature stays below freezing till spring. The green grass and  dense growth of the woodlands was a surprise in such low temperatures. We managed to spot a coyote, many squirells, chipmonks, deer and loons, but bears and moose have evaded us.


Northwoods towns are quaint and tidy


Patriotism is always evident.

The rural properties try to out barn one another.

Waving Chipmonk