Small But Perfect

 The 'Small But Perfect' exhibition is launching at the Babylon Gallery in Ely tonight. There are apparently 300 works of art, all hoping to be sold before Christmas.

I've just put one tiny canvas in - a preliminary study from my 'Dreamtime' series (see my latest Facebook and Instagram posts)

I'm not sure anyone will want a picture of a disintegrating Victorian puppet theatre, but you never know.

The idea came from a nightmare I had in Lockdown about being trapped inside a toy theatre and I couldn't get out.

Last Will And.....

 Recently I've been making an inventory of all the fifty five family paintings I've produced over the years. Notes on the first thirty nine were covered in the tour guides I'd written (see picture on latest Facebook and Instagram posts) but after that it was all a bit spasmodic.

Some paintings had quite detailed notes written about them while others were missing.

I wanted to get everything up-to-date for two reasons. One,  to give the Norris Museum information should they require it for my exhibition next year. The other was more practical. To make it easier for my children to sort out my stuff after I've died.

I still need to number each picture though, otherwise they will have great fun trying to match the canvas to the title!

Only A Preliminary

  I've finished (I think) my current painting 'The Counsellor'. Giles has put  the eleven preliminary canvases produced during its creation, onto my website on the WORK FOR SALE page.

Prices range from £40 - £60 and who knows, someone might like one for Christmas?! They show my experiments with colour, texture, composition and trying to work out how  I was going to make the final piece.

You can also see a selection on my latest Instagram and Facebook posts

But Shadows

 Our contribution to the Window Wonderland event last weekend was to put examples of my shadow puppet collection on display.

When I took part two years ago, I used some of the smaller puppets from various parts of the world. This time I displayed three larger ones from Java, Indonesia and India respectively.

I also snook in the Laurel and Hardy puppets I had produced in 2014 in preparation for my painting 'The Rashamon Effect.' Partly to give a sense of scale (these figures are small in comparison) but also because its lovely to see them back- lit for a few hours.

You can see our window and the painting on my latest Instagram and Facebook posts.

A Damp Tale

 What happened to me this week seems very unimportant when so many people have suffered from terrible flooding.

I was preparing for a booked tour of my pop-up gallery last Sunday. We had blue skies and I put out my Visitors book on the garden table in the hope that someone would sign it. Unusually for me, I left the book open at the next available page (normally I would leave the book closed)

I was too preoccupied with final arrangements to notice that it had started to pour with rain! The pages were fast turning to pulp and the lovely comments were disappearing.

I managed to gently dry the pages by an electric heater while the tour took place, in time for one of the now, crinkly pages to be inscribed.