Jessica Says, Pen on watercolour paper, 100 x 80CM

I completed this one a while ago, the human part as the easy part. I’ve never drawn a cello before and the cello in this drawing is the size of a guitar. It proved to be quite a challenge but I very much enjoyed it.

The model is a musician from Melbourne Australia, Jessica Says: (LINK) I’m really into what she does as I think she’s quite unique in her approach to her music and I find that inspiring. I took a number of shots of her while I was in Australia in January this year and I think I may be turning her into a painting at some point down the track.

Enjoy!

I’ve been trying to work out what to say to the world but too many ideas came and went and then I couldn’t form words. So let’s look at the past few weeks in pictures.

This is a beautiful cemetery that I have taken many photos of before but I have never photographed the watering cans; even though they are one of the first things that come to my mind when I think of this place.
So here we are, watering the dead.

European winters have taught me what cold light looks like. This is the cold that penetrates seemingly warm coats, hats and mittens. It also has the habit of burning the tip of your nose, your ear flaps and forming ice on moustaches.

Dawn from my lounge room window. We’re up pretty high.

Pen cacophony. Isn’t cacophony a wonderful word.

First snow of the season, occurring on Friday the 16th of December at roughly 14:00. We got off the train and walked in it, I have never seen Kotti look nice yet alone beautiful.
Then we got too wet and cold.

Coal heater in Mitte.

One photo of my exhibition I had this last weekend.
It was amazing.
Thank you Christian and thank you Gene.

I am, I am, I am
60 x 50 CM
Oil on canvas
This painting is for a show early next year in L.A the theme is Femme Fatal.

Sophia
60 x 50CM
Oil on canvas

I’ve been painting Allison Browning, an Australian writer. You can see her work here: LINK! I met Allison on my brief trip to Australia earlier this year. Her house was full of beautiful things and she was really lovely to speak to and work with. I originally wanted to use this as a drawing but with the colours of her skin, dress and the other objects in this image I really felt it best to explore it with paint.
So, I have been working on this painting for the last week and a half. It’s exciting as I rarely put my subjects in a space and I am really enjoying exploring this and the different textures, in particular the lilac lace on her dress.
By the 31st of December I leave the Bethanien and I aim to have this painting finished by then.

It’s Saturday night and I am up as someone is having a party in my building. The music is at such a level that the noise carries itself all the way up in our walls. So I woke up at about 2:30AM and I can’t sleep as this sort of thing sets off a panic button within me.
I moved to a 50 square meter apartment in Kreuzberg in June, which I only just recently moved out of. Anja was still quite small at that point but in the place previous we had just gotten her to sleep the night though as Gene and I had moved into the lounge room. Sharing a room with her became impossible as she was aware we were there and we all kept each other up. But just as we had worked out this harmony, we moved into a small apartment with only one room.
We moved as it was closer to my studio and Gene’s work. When we had inspected the apartment I only cared if the place was quite,of which I was assured it was. I really should have taken in the construction site that was the hoff but I just didn’t.
A few weeks in and the drilling and hammering were at such a level I had to co ordinate my day to get Anja out on a pram for her morning and then afternoon nap, as there was no way she could sleep with the noise. Just when I thought that was loud, I had to avoid certain streets as the sirens of the ambulance/firetruck & police cars are at such an volume here, it’s fucking painful. Then I had to avoid certain other streets as there was loud construction going on out in the streets.
The drilling can go on here until 10PM. They’re allowed. So even when I had done my day with Anja and was so exhausted from not only the usual exhaustion Mummas have in the evening, but I had been out walking all day to get Anja to sleep, I’d still have to listen to drilling, saws, hammering, men yelling back at one another.
I don’t remember when it was but I began to crack and unravel. The noise would start up at 6:30 to 7AM and I would be shaking. I began to have panic attacks as I had so much to co ordinate and was running at such a high stress level sometimes I found it hard to do things as I was shaking so much.
When I had worked out all the noise was making me crazy, people just seemed to tell me to close my window, or listen to music, or put in ear plugs. Have you ever had jack hammering in your building? It’s the kind of noise that penetrates a buildings foundations. Like the drill of a dentist, there’s no escaping it it is in your head.
I finally contacted our landlord and he had been told the construction was meant to end in June, it was September at this time. He said he’d come by and tell them to stop at 6:30PM. But then he gave up and told me I’d just have to go downstairs and tell them to be quite. Taking a baby in mid evening routine downstairs to find were the men are to tell them to shut up is much harder than it sounds.
Then not only did I have that but my neighbours across from me would drill and hammer to all hours. Once I was up until 4AM. When I asked them to stop they told me proudly they could go until 10PM. On the verge of tears I explained that I have to listen to the construction in the hoff all day. But she closed the door and they kept going.
Sometimes I’d here hammering and run wildly up and down my building trying to find the noise and couldn’t. I’d panic so much as I’d had barely any sleep for who knows how long and I’d freak out I was never ever going to get sleep again. My routine for sleep was 2 to 3AM until 5 or 6AM, as Anja would wake up.
Then we moved here. There is a very drunk bunch of people next door, construction and parties. I try really hard not to panic as it isn’t as bad as the last place but I can’t help but wonder that there’s a reason people do things they way they do things; You get married, buy an ideal house, nest, make baby. Not marry, move overseas, get pregnant, have baby, move to Berlin. The city where no one can shut the fuck up and let me get some sleep!!

(Will spell check & edit later, it’s 4AM dammit)

I have mentioned previously that I collect old photographs (here) I just thought I’d share this sweet little one I picked up recently in Berlin from the markets on Bergmann Straße on Saturday mornings.

It has a few scrawlings on that back of it which looks to me like someone was practicing writing with the hand they don’t usually write in. One of these scrawlings says ‘im hauß’ but I can’t make out what the others say. It’s dated 1943 and is smaller than the size of a playing card. I ripped it when taking it off my studio wall but it’s still one of my favorites.

Here are a few drawings I have been working on lately. I have been exploring new textures and backgrounds as I usually just work with solitary figures. These drawings are a part of an extremely large and daunting project I have taken upon. I will write more about it later, when I have more of it completed, so I have visuals to help me explain things!
All drawings from this project are on 30 x 30cm pieces of water colour paper and all are drawn in fine liner pen.

“BlueCrib”

“Crawling”

“Marks”

Enjoy!

It’s less than a month to Christmas! It’s getting cold cold cold in Berlin and the sun is setting about 4PM. We have moved house again, but this new place is a treasure. It’s in a very old building, I have eight flights of stairs to carry a baby up but we get allllllll of the light that this city has to offer at this time of the year.

Here are some photos I have taken of late:

Mitte.

Hasen Heide, Neukölln.

PHIA in Hasen Heide on an Autumn afternoon.

Outside my front door I can check out my neighbors shoes.

Today Anja goes for a walk with her Daddy & Sam.

Will art write soon.

I think about blog posting more than I actually do, it’s a combination of not having enough time, being very focused on making work rather than talking about it and this computer is slow and is prone to making me feel annoyed. I don’t like that feeling so I try and avoid things that invoke that awfulness within me! (Grrr, slow computer rage!!)

So here I am, Monday morning.. Not my favorite of times but I think this is a widely shared dislike. Toddler is sleeping, the man should be bringing me lunch soon, I have already eaten all the cheese in the house and writing to you, dear reader, and to myself.

My studio flooded on Friday; it’s not the greatest thing to happen since I am right in the middle of building up a series of paintings mostly on the floor as the canvases are so large and my time is so limited, but you know, when is it a good time to have a flood?!
A few drawings went for a swim, as did my over head projector and so did a couple of canvases but I think overall it is ok. I am just left a little nervous about the space and the safety of my work.
So apart from having to clean up someone else’s mess I have managed to salvage most of the large canvas I am working on. I’ll just post a sneak peak of it:

I also did this sketch a few weeks ago of PHIA, who I have mentioned before.

I just learned that PHIA (Sophia) was the recipient of the Lionel Gell scholarship for music, whilst I received the one for art. Go Lionel! Bringing us gals together in Berlin!!
I plan to use this sketch for a painting but I have a few other shots of her that I also liked, we shall see.
She’s pretty clever and a unique musician, so I thought I’d share this video that was made of her in Iceland recently.
Enjoy!

Halloween slipped past me as most things tend to do at the moment. I’m getting through each, long day at a time. Berlin is beautiful in Autumn, but the leaves are falling in great gusts now as winter makes it’s cold way toward us.
This evening the sun started to hide at about 4:45PM and there was a mist about.
‘Nuff about the weather..

So I am still painting, I finished two paintings last week and thought I’d share them here.

“Lucy”
Oil on Canvas
(measurements to come)
This painting was a challenge for me; the first one of this series, ‘Cinnamon’ seemed to come quite easily (as much as an oil painting can come easily) but this one I had to really work for.
For starters this is the second copy of it. I abandoned the first version even though I had spent weeks on it trying to make it work, however somehow I managed to make this beautiful young woman look like an old man. I guess on the positive side, that does require some skill. But I had to cut my losses and try again.
Which I am proud of as I used to just give up and not go back to something.

“Magdalena”
Oil on Canvas
100 x 80
This painting took me two weeks and is the largest painting I have done in almost three years.
Through all the painting I have been doing this year, I think I have finally found a process that is allowing me to produce my work at a faster speed so I can get my work out there!

It took a few paintings before an artist friend of mine, Amelia Carson, asked me if the theme of this series was that the subjects eyes were all skyward. I hadn’t been aware that I was doing this. Originally I was just getting Australian’s I had met living in Berlin to pose for me (we’re a nice little/big community here) but it seems the series is developing into something else.
When I am beginning a series I always like to keep the concept quite broad and allow it to change while I am working on it. Because if I write and think about it too much, then in my mind it’s already done.

Currently I am working on pieces for group exhibitions I have in L.A and New York next year, as well as more for this series.. The Berlin Series. Drawing has come to a halt at the moment as I am without a drawing board (damn stupid false ‘move’ back to Australia this year- my original drawing board is stored in a barn in outer Victoria ) but I hope to get one soon.

Ciao.