I’m so excited to have won the People’s Choice Award at the Sooke Fine Art Show! There were a lot of gorgeous pieces at that show, I feel very honoured to have been chosen. The piece that won is a new painting, called A Secret. Here it is:
She’s 36″ x 36″, oil and acrylic on canvas. SOLD
I’m participating in A Loving Spoonful’s Project Empty Bowl Art Auction again this year, with another Bird painting. The Loving Spoonful is a charity that helps provide nutritional food for people living with HIV/AIDS. Here is an excerpt from their website:
The role of good nutrition in the management of HIV/AIDS has become increasingly important over the past two decades. Access to nutritious food is one of the most powerful weapons available to fight the devastating effects of AIDS.
I decided to participate in this cause after a friend asked me to donate a piece last year. When I travelled in Africa, back in 1997, I saw people who were clearly affected by ukimwi, “the skinny disease”. It was frightening and sad to see people with no resources suffering in this way. This is my way of giving back closer to home.
Last year, I’m proud to say that the sale of my painting raised $2000 for this worthy cause. This year, they asked me to be their feature artist. Let’s hope this new painting, called Flight, Oil on canvas, 36″ x 48″ will bring in the same generous amount. I’m quite pleased with the way this piece turned out.
It’s such a joy to paint birds. The crows and swallows that I paint are so social. I recently found my first Bird moment in an old sketchbook from when I was 19. I clipped out an image of seagulls, and wrote a quote beside it: “We are all angels of but one wing, only by embracing each other can we fly” ~ Luciano de Crescenzo
Last January, I was a approached about lending my paintings to Lifetime Network, working on a film in Victoria called Stranger With My Face. I also ended up doing some hand-double work for the main character of Laurie, played by the lovely and multi-talented Alexz Johnson.
I found the film on YouTube a while ago and watched it. I hadn’t realised that the opening shot would pan over some New York buildings, and back into a room (on Yates Street) and that my painting would be the first thing you see, followed shortly by my hand!
So, all the painting and drawing closeups of the girl’s hand and her paintings are in fact my hand, and my paintings. Oh, how fun!
You can watch the first two minutes here on YouTube.
The opening shot...
My hand tickling my painting
Gotta love the framing
Birdies!
Not one, but 3 paintings in this shot...My NSCAD studio mate Daniel is in the centre one
They had me re-draw the portrait on camera. The whole thing! I was cross-legged on the floor and it was freezing in there, then it cut straight to here...
Magic! It's instantly done! Yeesh. That was high-pressure drawing.
We'll give you a million for it...
Tickle tickle... They also had me re-create the "evil twin" portion of this piece on camera from scratch. This time there were about 20 people around, and the camera rolling. It was hard to keep my hands from shaking. And they cut that footage! Oh well.
"Oh, Honey, look what you did!"
I included this one, cause the clever props people snuck in my self-portrait into the background. I like that.
All images copyright Lifetime Network. Don’t sue me.
I’m working on some more pieces for the Bird series (up on the site again, as of today). This series started with a very small painting: 5 x 7 inches, back in 2003. I’ve gone bigger and bigger with them, now up to 48 x 48.
Birds (Rain) 48" x 48" copyright Lisa Hebden 2010
The subject matter of these pieces is almost secondary to what goes on in the negative space. In these paintings, I manipulate paint somewhat differently from that in the Girls series. It’s poured and splattered, and I let it take on its own life to create the illusion of rich, undulating skies. It’s terribly satisfying, I won’t lie.
Birds (Rose Gold), 24" x 36" copyright Lisa Hebden 2009
Birds (Aqua Green) 24" x 36" copyright Lisa Hebden 2009
Then the birds go on somewhere in the middle of this maelstrom of colour, and they dictate the direction of the paintings’ finishing stages. I know a painting is finished when I come in to the studio and my eye flicks around the canvas to each little moment of colour. Then I hang it in my living space for a week or so, and I really start to see where to go next. Writing about this makes me want to get off the computer and go paint. Till we meet again!
So it’s been more than a month since my last post, and I am a neglectful blogger. For good reason, my friends–I’ve been painting up a storm, though not on canvases. My hubs, my very obliging mum and I have emptied almost a dozen cans of paint onto the walls of my soon-to-be-new house. I’m very excited. Just the bathroom and the trim to go, and it’s all done.
January 3rd was a sad day, as I was required to vacate my lovely downtown studio to make way for the wrecking ball. The leak in the roof was enough to convince the building owners to push forward their plans to convert our lovely space into several condos. Sigh.
However, I have a new space to work in. And it’s warm and sunny, so to be honest, I’m much happier. Painting in gloves and a down vest (with a hot water bottle shoved in it) was far from ideal!
Inspiring books I’ll be leafing through:
Lisa Yuskavage: Small Paintings
I can’t wait to get started in my new space. I hope 2010 is a productive, inspiring year for everyone.
Yet another lovely, visually inspiring film: Jane Campion’s Bright Star lives up to its name. The imagery was just as beautiful as Keats’ poetry. “A thing of beauty is a joy forever.”
Coincidentally, the star of Bright Star, Ms Abbie Cornish (above) was half of the influence behind this painting.
I’m back! I went to Hong Kong for a week (fun!) and now I have some pics of my new paintings…they’re all updated on my website, here.
My work is somewhat influenced by fashion photography. I have hundreds of tear sheets I’ve collected over the years. I keep them in a fabric grocery bag (not so great–I keep meaning to put them in sleeves in a binder, but who has the time?) and add to them constantly. When I stumble upon images like these by Anna Wolf, (found via Visuals) I’m just so inspired to paint!
Photo by Anna Wolf
The soft-focus on the hair in the one above just gets me every time. And that eye. So creepy and lovely.
Photo by Anna Wolf
Photo by Anna Wolf
This one is my favourite, but then I’m a sucker for beach images. Especially with a 50s bent.
A side note: While I’m influenced by fashion photographs, I respect the author of the image, and never copy it. Sometimes I’ll use an image to get a hand at a certain angle, or to see how light hits different noses differently. But I have to say, those peonies in that first photo would be delicious to paint—all that pink!
Here’s the painting I made for the Body Language show at Martin Batchelor Gallery for Suddenly Dance Theatre. It’s called Tiny Dancers, and is 16 x 20 inches, oil on canvas. I had a great time making this painting. There’s an interview with me here about the piece. There are three days left for the show; an eclectic mix of beautiful dance-themed paintings, photographs and sculptures by talented artists like Phyllis Serota, Joe Coffey and Frances Semple.
This weekend, I’ll be participating in a group show at Martin Batchelor Gallery to benefit Suddenly Dance Theatre’s ROMP! Festival of Independent Dance. I’m working on my piece, a wee painting of fledgling dancers, to comment on my love of dance as a child.
This marvellous image is by the multi-talented Miles Lowry. My painting isn’t finished yet…
If my sister and I were taken to a place that had a large wooden floor, it was all I could do not to practice my pirouettes and jettes across it, making a spectacle of myself. I had a pair of black pointe shoes that I played with, but I fell in love with modern dance before I got that far in ballet. Bare feet and big sweeping motions and Al Green … all these components pushed ballet right out of the way. But I love to watch it.
The show, Body Language, opens on Saturday October 24, 7 - 10 pm at Martin Bachelor Gallery, 712 Cormorant Street, Victoria BC. It runs until November 4.
