Out of step with time

Study for Love Art, 2008, charcoal on paper, 20x25cm

Earlier this week I turned 46, that number 46 doesn't seem real, it's as if I'm out of step with time. 46.......shit! I can almost hear Margaret Olley's words in my ear "Hurry,...Last Days"

Hurry? No, I want to slow down. Slow down, as in take the time to do things right, make the paintings count, hopefully worthy of lasting? What's the point of another painting, or another exhibition unless you test yourself as an artist? With 35 solo exhibitions in the bag, it's not as if there's a gold watch waiting for me if I rush my way to 50 shows? I've never been a prolific artist and I feel that after going throught the labourious of making a painting, then hopefully it'll be seen in a decent exhibition

With that in mind a letter arrived on my birthday from Charles Nodrum Gallery inviting me to partake in a large exhibition at the gallery to coincide with the Melbourne Art Fair ( 12 July - 7 August ). The gallery wants to show all 51 artists, preferably new work for those who can and it will produce a 56 page catalogue with an image & text on each artist. The calalogue will become a small book which the gallery will then use to show clients the scope of it's artists.

A great birthday present......3 weeks to when an image will need to be ready for going to the printers. 3 weeks to come up with a single painting that will be used to define me as an artist. A catalogue that'll be used for the upcoming few years to to show people what it is that you do and an opportunity for me to show where I'm going, not where I've already been.

I took me 1 hour to work it out, 3 thumbnail sketches from a handful of photos I've been mulling over for the past few years and unable until now to resolve how to use them. I walked into my studio, looked at the wall of photos, reminders of images to consider for paintings and settled on a photo of a sign against the sky.

Love Art ( open 7 days ), so appropiate. I've been taking photos of this sign for years. I needed to add a new facade at the bottom, put in a church spire and a new sky....Just 3 weeks to paint.

But first my birthday lunch. Dianne took me to the Grange on the foreshore of Grange Beach. Perfect weather, sunny and 28C, a good table with unobstructed views of the jetty and beach and a lunch of oyster for entree and a serve of King George whiting. Afterwards a walk on the jetty and a sighting of a pod of dolphins swimming by...Dianne went silly on the spot.

Exhibition at Charles Nodrum Gallery ; Update

The Parched land, 2008, available from The Small Paintings Project

My exhibitition dates at Charles Nodrum Gallery have been changed to 16 SEPT - 11 OCT, with the opening being on the night of Wednesday 17th September. This suits me to a tee, especially after the recent heatwave slowed down my ability to paint. 16 consecutive days above 35C, most over 38C (100F), so much for it being Autumn.
Eugene, the curator of my exhibition with Charles Nodrum Gallery was here last week to see how it all was coming along and also to escape Melbourne's Grand Prix. After a few hours of talking in the heat of the studio we went off to dinner and then joined the Adelaide Festival/Fringe crowds at The Garden Of Unearthly Deights. We ended up being part of the sweating audience in a tiny tent to see BADASS BURLESQUE and I had the great pleasure of seeing my dealer manhandled by a male S&M performer who lept from the stage grabbing him. The following night we were back to see ACROBAT, "SMALLER, POORER, CHEAPER" where predominantly nude acrobats did the most amazing death defying stunts under the stars. The third day was far too hot, but we visited the Robert Hannaford exhibition at Carrick Hill, Lunch in the Adelaide hills, the McLaren Vale wineries and finally driving along the coast from Aldinga to Adelaide showing Eugene the locations of some the vistas I have painted.

Empty Magazine & David Kassan

This post is a shout out and plug for a friend of mine, the young Brooklyn artist David Kassan. I caught up with David at Byron Bay last April and he's one of the best portrait artist I know of. He's made the cover of Empty Magazine which is out now with a handful of full page glorious reproductions of his paintings inside. Furthermore he's also just started blogging, so check out his new blog Kassan Studio News.

David is one of those one in a hundred artists destined to make it.....see video below from Art School Confidential on how hard it is to make it as an artist.

New exhibition dates for my Melbourne show.

I'm back from my Christmas break, which unfortunately really wasn't much of a break. No trip away just every second day taken off to do nothing other than stumble about and maybe a short drive into the country to pass the time away. When I did have some studio time most of it was taken up with cleaning it to get ready for the year ahead.


Just prior to Christmas I recieved notification that Charles preferred to move my exhibition dates forward a month. The exhibition now opens on the EDITED 16th of September and runs until 11th of October. The plan was to send the finished painting to Charles Nodrum Gallery by the first week of May. That hasn't changed, but now there is no room for error. The pressure will be felt more with publishing the catalogue in time and particularly with advertising in quarterly art magazines. Moving the exhibition from July to June means any advertising will need to be in the April/May/June issue. That takes 3 months off the time to decide on the key painting for publication and brings that deadline to this month.


I am trying not to panic despite the new year heatwave that made it impossible to work during it's peak of 4 days in a row above 40 C. However I did make the first batch of cradled panels and they are ready to paint on. The process of their making is time consuming, but so is their potential lifespan. Cradled panels made this traditional way can outlast the best canvases and reduce cracking of the paint over the centuries. Hopefully they will be wanted for so long?


For those interested in the making of these panels I used 3mm Birch ply (aircraft grade), on Oak and coated with a traditional Gesso made up of whiting and rabbit skin glue. After gluing the ply & the oak with a waterproof glue the grain of the oak was filled and sanded back. A single layer of rabbit skin glue was used to seal the surface then 8 layers of warm gesso was applied. Between every second layer of gesso the front and sides were lightly sanded and after the final coat of gesso the panels were sanded as smooth as glass. The back of the panels were then sealed with a layer of shellac and the front & sides were given a very watered down layer of shellac to reduce the absorbancy of the painting surface. Finally the sides are painted with 2 layers of a dark primer so as to blend in with the dark wall and to seperate the painting surface from the edges.

Making the Simple Difficult

This last week I decided to paint one of the walls in my studio display room near black to see how my paintings will look in the dark room at Charles Nodrum's Gallery. A simple enough task, but as always, I made it difficult. After not being satisfied with the colours at Porters Paints, I decided to get them to customise one, roughly between 2 of their existing colours. Not happy with the result I got them to adjust the colour adding a bit more of this and that. After half an hour of tweeking the assistant added my colour to their custom colour chart and asked me to name it. I chose "Dumbluck"as it's name.
I took the tin of paint back to the studio, tested the colour and then spent another half an hour further tweeking the colour, much to the amusement of Dianne.


As part of my exhibition I have an idea to hang a cluster of small oil paintings in the dark room. These are to be painted on cradled panels made of Birch ply and Oak and coated with a traditional Gesso made up of whiting and rabbit skin glue, then sanded perfectly smooth. The sides of the panels will be painted dark and they'll protrude from the wall about an inch, making the glowing paintings float in space.


The panels are still being made and me being impatient, I hung a few of my paintings from my Small Paintings Project that were about to be sent off to their buyers. They are smaller and flatter than the cradled panels, but they did give me a fairly good idea that as a large cluster they will work.

My next exhibition

Last Light,
Oil on linen panel, 10.2 x 20.4 cm (4x8 inches)
From the Small Paintings Project

Whilst in Melbourne I met with Charles Nodrum and Eugene Barilo von Reisberg to talk about dates and ideas for my next exhibition in Melbourne. Charles is of the opinion ( and I have to agree with him ), that many artists and galleries put on too many shows, often for no other reason than it's time again for an artist to have a show. Charles belives that an artist must have a reason for having an exhibition, ie a new development in their work, a specific project or a tight conceptual reason for a body of work being made and needing to be exhibited together. Also, if it's worth doing the show, then it's worth publishing a full colour catalogue with it. The other important element is to have the paintings ready and in the gallery a couple of months prior the opening. It seems as if most of the promotion and sales occur leading up to the opening and not during the exhibition, so the sooner the gallery has the work, the sooner they can invite people to preview it.

It all made perfect sense, but the hardest part for me has always been meeting deadlines. I usually work right up to the last minute, which in reflection isn't good for me ( ie. stress ), or my work, nor does it give the gallery enough time. Prior to this year, during the previous 4 years I had 13 solo exhibitions. The net result was exhaustion to the point of illness and burnout. This last year without a solo exhibition has enabled me get back on track and work through some new ideas.

The exhibition at Charles Nodrum Gallery opens on the *EDIT* 5th of June and the paintings will need to be in the gallery by the end of the first week of May. The exhibition will be upstairs at Charles's gallery in two large rooms, one of which has the walls painted near black. In the nearly 15 years I've been this gallery I have always showed downstairs in the main space. Not that the upstairs galleries are small, the two rooms add up to slightly more wall space than the main gallery. The exhibition will comprise of about 12 oils on canvas and a cluster of about 12 small paintings on cradled panels.

That is enough to make panic set in. There is a lot of pressure on me to get this exhibition right and also make sure the publication of the catalogue goes to plan. The example Charles gave to look at had roughly 40 pages to it and he suggested that mine should also have a couple of essays in it. One on the last 20 years of my work, showing the progression to now and including photographs of key works. The other essay to be about the current paintings and Charles suggested that seperate writers be found for each essay.

The plan is for the gallery to do less shows, but put more effort into each one and this is where Eugene Barilo von Reisberg comes in. He's in charge of all the organisational aspects of the exhibition. Meanwhile, I have already started work on this show before going to Melbourne and over the next month or so, the show really needs to jell into a cohesive body of work.

All I know is I'm going to have to pick up the pace and not slow down over Christmas, New Year and Summer.

Trip to Melbourne 2

Dianne and I departed Adelaide like bats out of hell, leaving at 4.30 am and taking the Great Ocean Road to Melbourne. As with everytime I leave Adelaide, I was excited, doubly more so for going to Melbourne. Taking the scenic route and dawdling, we eventually arrived at the point of utter exhaustion, soon after 9.30 pm. Along the way there were stops for Breakfast, Lunch & dinner, visits to galleries like Wishart at Port Fairey, QDos at Lorne and a substantial amount of time staring out to sea, as if we were employed to count the waves.


This photo is of a very blurred tree sitting in a field of fog before sunrise. Taken in a rather lazy manner, whilst the car was moving. We weren't going to stop until we were safely 200kms from Adelaide. After sunrise, feeling safe from Adelaide, I was on my mobile phone to an artist friend who lives in New York. To while away the monotomy of being in the middle of nowhere, I was describing to him what's it's like to be in the middle of nowhere.
Soon after I saw the largest kangaroo I've ever seen, lying on the opposite side of the road, facing me and trying to get up. It must've been hit only moments before and as I started to slow down our eyes met. It was a weird experience as if in slow motion, passing by, looking at each other, I saw that it knew it's time was up. There was nothing I could do, middle of nowhere, with a dying kangaroo, larger than myself...and that's big & still very dangerous!


The image above is a painting from what I thought was the best show in Melbourne whilst we were there. Julia Ciccarone at Niagara Galleries. Titled The expedition, 2007, oil on linen, 91 x 198cm.


The second best show in Melbourne ( if you can judge such things ), was Nick Cave : The Exhibition at the The Arts Centre


Other shows worth a look were Philip Wolfhagen at Christine Abrahams Gallery, Loiuse Hearman at Tolarno Galleries and Abstraction 6 at Charles Nodrum Gallery.


Then again, the graffiti in Melbourne's famous laneways is just as visually exciting as any exhibition.

It was also so wonderful to catch up with friends and fellow artists during this trip. Beer & Breakfast (two seperate occasions) with Louise Blyton & David Coles of ST Luke Artists Colourmen. A great lunch at Loco with Triecia Gibney and the artists showing there Daniel Sanger & Michelle Giacobello. An alcomoholic night out with Amanda van Gils at the exclusive The Blue Diamond club. A wonderful dinner at Harvey's with the delightful Eugene Barilo Von Reisberg who'll be organising everything to do with my next exhibition at Charles Nodrum Gallery. And of course it was good to see and talk with Charles Nodrum about my next exhibition there.



This chap is the great sculptor & fisherman Clive Murray-White in his studio at Cowwarr. Carolyn Crossley, Clive's partner is the director of Cowwarr Art Space in the Gippsland region of Victoria. We had a wonderful time there and they are the most hospitable people in the world. Dinner after the opening was superb ( as usual ). Clive's fish were cooked to perfection, as was everything else and after sobering up enough we managed to drive back to Melbourne.



Dianne's paintings at Cowwarr.


A few more paintings


Back in Melbourne on the day we were to drive back I was out taking photos for the hell of it.


This one is my favourite. Looking for a cool shot of some interesting graffiti, I came across these two business execs eating their lunch whilst standing & using rubbish bins as tables. Raised by wolves? Click on the photo for a closer look at them and the fantastic graffiti.


Later on the day on the way back to Adelaide we saw a huge amount of smoke on the horizon. Turning off the freeway to explore the bushfire we soon realised it was quite large. You never know what photos you might get, maybe a painting, maybe burnt to a crisp? Anyway it soon became apparent it was a controlled burnoff with a little bit of "out of control" stuff.


Managed to get close enough for this shot before turning around and driving back home.

Trip to Melbourne

I'm off for a much needed break to Melbourne, my favourite city in Australia. The weather is going to be perfect so Dianne and I have decided to take the longer but more scenic way via The Great Ocean Road. Even taking the ferry from Queenscliff to Sorento rather than the direct way.

The main reason for this trip is Dianne's exhibition at Cowwarr Art Space. I also am looking forward to catching up with some good friends, relaxing and taking photos that could end up as paintings. The drive starts before sunrise and we'll reach Melbourne after sunset, taking time to stop and explore all the towns along the way.

Launch of the Small Paintings Project

Burning Sky, oil on linen board, 12.7 x 17.8cm ( 5'x7' )
I've finally launched The Small Paintings Project and here's the first painting "Burning Sky". An appropriate title to start with, as there is a saying that if the sky burns red tonight, then tomorrow will be a fine day.

The Small Paintings Project is an ongoing online exhibition of my small oil paintings. I will be adding new paintings here on a regular basis and these works will not be exhibited, nor able to be purchased anywhere else. These small paintings are studies and explorations of subject matter & ideas that may lead towards larger studio paintings.

I also wish to make these paintings affordable to collectors. Currently, my paintings are priced between $2,000AUD to $24,000AUD, with the average work at about $10,000. As a solution for making these really affordable, I've decided as an introductory offer to price the paintings at about 1/3 what they should be. Over the coming months, I will increase the price gradually until it becomes more equitable with my normal pricing. The paintings will be priced, not auctioned, there is a flat rate of $10AUD anywhere in the world for postage and first to fill out the "Buy Now" button, is the one to purchase it.

All the paintings are painted with the finest oils ( Vasari, Blockx & Old Holland ) and are painted on Art Boards™ Archival Oil Primed Linen Canvas Panels that have slots for easy hanging.

Love Art

These last few weeks I've been working on new images. Nothing new with that, but this time I've gone through photos looking to find a greater variety of subject matter to paint. One of the problems with constantly focussing on a particular subject, ie, capturing the subtle colour shifts in the sky at the end of the day, is you might end up painting yourself into a narrow corner.

So, I have been revisiting sites and seeing if I can make something of them. One place ( the photo above ) is a street sign for a porn shop less than a mile from the studio. I am thinking of using the lit neon sign at dusk against the sky and not with the church as a background. That sign influenced an exhibition I curated about 5 years ago titled "Love Colour" of abstract colour-field paintings. The invitation cover had a pink heart with the words "Love Colour" inside it. Everybody loved the show and the invite except for a major local art dealer who rang me just to tell me that it looks as if I am running a brothel. Gotta love the artworld!

The opening was wild, we served nothing but coloured Daiquiris on the night and everybody got smashed. The next day an art class dropped by and helped finish off the Daiquiris before going back to art school quite drunk. And of course the show was a huge success.

Another thing I've had fun doing is photographing my hand against the sky for a series of paintings. Don't ask me why, it just came to me as a good idea? I haven't painted the human form since artschool, so it'll be interesting to see how they turn out. The first one is a small study for my upcoming new blog The Small Paintings Project, scheduled to start the middle of next week.

Artist Profile : New Australian Art magazine

I picked up the first issue of Artist Profile, the new quarterly Australian Art magazine yesterday and was pleasantly surprised to discover how good it is. It's always exciting to find a new art magazine, the last major art magazine to start up "Australian Art Review" showed a lot of promise whilst being edited by John McDonald. However, soon after his departure, it went downhill fast.

The editor of Artist Profile, Paul Flynn, who worked ( or still does? ) at Michael Carr Gallery in Sydney, states:

"Artist Profile is a fresh new quarterly magazine that takes you into the studios of artists working today, watching their processes and listening to them discuss their ideas, inspiration and the technical and mental challenges they face in realising their visions."

True to Paul Flynn's word, this inaugural issue has good articles on Nicholas Harding (cover boy), Alan Jones, Peter Sharp, Karen Standke, Reg Mombassa, Ian Smith, Koji Ryui, Julie Frager, Master printmaker Thomas Goulder working with Dane Lovett....as well as many other articles including a transcript of a speech given by the English artist John Hoyland, to National Art School Students in Sydney. What sets this magazine apart from others currently available are things like the article by artist Steve Lopez, "Painting without fear" and even a couple of pages on the technical apects of painting "Know your colours".

It'll be interesting to see if this magazine continues focussing directly on artists and their work? At this stage the magizine is full of articles, with a modest amount of advertising. Unlike Australian Art Collector, which if accidently dropped on a cat, would surely kill it. So full of advertising is it, that it's near impossible to find an article and when you do, it reads like a public relations media press release designed to make you believe you need to "collect" whatever they are touting.

The Exquisite Palette painting

This painting is my contribution to the Exquisite Palette show at St Luke Colourmen which opens tomorrow night. I flipped the palette around, as I am left handed. Actually, I recently started using a hand held palette again when I worked on a 5 x 10 ft painting. It was much easier carrying a hand held palette that wheeling back and forth my trolley palette. My next purchase will be a beautiful left handed palette with a lead counterweight balance built in it from Cornellisen's of London. I saw one when in London a few years ago and I'm kicking myself for not buying it then.



Meanwhile, I have always found that laying out my palette like this allows me to mix more complex colours. If there are more colours readily available then you are more likely to use them. Over the years, the act of dabbing more oil paint on the same spot has created a palette that is almost a work of art in itself. There have been offers from collectors of my work to buy it which I've found rather odd.

The Exquisite Palette exhibition at St. Luke Artist Colourmen

I rarely get involved with group exhibitions which have prescribed themes or set sizes, but when invited to by good friends Louise Blyton and David Coles ( proprietors of St. Luke's ), to participate in the Exquisite Palette exhibition, I gladly accepted. David & Louise are a rare beings in the artworld, both are fine artists in their own right, run the best art materials shop in Melbourne, as well as manufacturing many of the products they sell. But their true worth is their knowledge, which they impart freely. Between them they know more about painting materials and how to use them than anyone else in Australia. Enough of that, anymore plugs to St. Luke's and people would start to think I have shares in the business.

(click on image to enlarge)

The Exquisite Palette exhibition, on show at St. Luke Artist Colourmen (the only place to get your art materials in Melbourne!). The show opens on Friday night, the 7th of September with works by over 150 artists, including David Band, Graham Fransella, Louise Hearman, Melinda Harper, Paul Boston, John Young, David Bromley, Christine Johnson, Juan Ford, Katherine Hattam, Jeremy Geddes, Jeff Makin, Dianne Gall, Triecia Gibney, Irene Wellm etc etc ( and of course Louise Blyton and David Coles ). Its going to be a massive show with the artists all presenting work on kidney shaped Palettes ( that St. Luke's supplied ), ranging from the exquisite to the bizarre!


(click on image to enlarge)

The Exhibition runs from 8th September-20th October Monday- Friday 10-6 Saturday 10-5 @ St. Luke Artist Colourmen 32 Smith St Collingwood

Port Adelaide at Dusk

Port Adelaide at Dusk, 2007, oil on linen, 60 x 150cm (24 x 60 inches).

This recently completed painting is of a view of Port Adelaide. It's another painting to come from the many hundreds of photos I took last Christmas/New Year. I've wanted to paint this derelict building for many years, having taken so many photos from all sorts of angles, however nothing quite worked. On the 27th of December, the evening sky was incredible so I sped to the Port and set up on the middle of the Birkenhead bridge.

The Birkenhead bridge, besides being a major road, tilts and opens upwards at the middle allowing ships through. Hoping that no yachts would force me to move, I stood there with my back facing the traffic, being shaken by every truck passing by. As always there were the usual numbskulls who had to press the car horn, let alone about half a dozen clowns who hung out the car windows and screamed obscenities as they sped off into oblivion.

I don't mind, I just wish they had the wit to say something funny to help me pass the hour perched on a bridge that could open at any minute. I suppose it beats the usual harassment by over zealous security guards wanting to know if I'm a terrorist taking photos of industrial sites? Nowadays, when I see them coming I pretend to photograph them and that really annoys them.

Finalist : Sunshine Coast Art Prize

Into the evening 2, 2007, oil on linen 111 x 137cm ( 44 x 54 inches )

I have been selected as one of the 40 finalists for the Sunshine Coast Art Prize to be exhibited at the Caloundra Regional Art Gallery in Queensland. The exhibition is on from August 15 until October 14, The opening and the announcement of the winner is on August 23, 6.30pm ( all welcome, free event ) . If you find yourself in Queensland in the next few months, drop by and have a look.

SALA Festival : Open Studio

As part of Adelaide's SALA Festival ( South Australian Living Artist's Festival ) Dianne and I opened up the studio for the first and last time to the public. For 2 days people wandered through, politely looking at our art and studio. Mostly frightened to ask questions, they wandered about inspecting our painting rooms and gallery space ( some 60 linear metres or 180 ft of wall space ). It often felt like an open house inspection, people whispering to each other, others inquiring about the furniture. Some wanted our books, others my art toy collection ....Grrr!

A few of the art toys ( Gary Baseman, Tim Biskup, Jermaine Rogers etc ), a print by Jeff Soto and those 2 oils are early works by Dianne Gall ( owned by me ).


It was a big exhibition, we had 72 paintings, spanning more than a decade on display and if you included the art from other artists ( from our collection ) scattered around, the total was 87 artworks. The arts editor and photographer turned up from Adelaide's major newspaper. After an hour plus of chatting and posing for corny shots they left and so far nothing in the papers. Oh, well, at least I refused to be photographed next to a finished oil painting holding a clean brush, pretending to paint.

A good friend ( and art collector ) of ours helped out on Saturday, manning the desk and making sure no one walked out with anything they weren't supposed to.

Open Studio ; Jim Thalassoudis & Dianne Gall

As part of SALA Festival ( South Australian Living Artist's Festival ) Dianne Gall and Myself are opening up our studio to the public. 2 days only, August 4th & 5th, 11am-5pm.




On view will be a selection of new paintings in the main gallery as well as our studio spaces.





Also there will be a stockroom sale of older paintings.


August 4 & 5 , 11am to 5pm

Trip to Cape Jervis

After completing the painting "study for the wind farm" ( previous post ), I became obsessed with going back to Cape Jervis to rediscover it as a source for new paintings. Cape Jervis is about one and a half hour drive south from Adelaide, at the bottom tip of the Fleurieu Peninsula. Over the weekend I made 3 trips there, compelled in the feeling that I'll find something there that will make a subject matter for a painting or a series of paintings. I've been there probably twenty times in the past, only taking photos, but never using any for paintings.

Squared

I have two paintings in an exhibition named Squared opening this week at Greenhill Galleries , Perth. "Squared" is an annual exhibition of 30 x 30cm artworks, allowing collectors an opportunity to purchase affordable small-scale works. This year 10% of all sales from "Squared" are being donated to the Princess Margaret Hospital for Children Foundation.

Opening night is 22nd June 6-8pm at Greenhill Galleries, 37 King St, Perth.

My two paintings are titled, Study for The drive home & Study for The wind farm, both oil on linen and both 30 x 30 cm.

If you are in Perth, check out the show, it's on until 6th July.

Painting of McNaught's Comet

View of Comet McNaught from Thompsons Beach, South Australia, oil on linen, 90 x 145 cm
I haven't bothered to enter any art prizes for over a decade, but this year, I thought I might try my luck in a few. The above painting of McNaught's Comet has been entered into The Waterhouse Natural History Art Prize. I'll find out at the end of the month if it is accepted to be hung in the exhibition.
Regardless of whether it makes the shortlist, the challenge had it's own rewards. The brief, to depict a natural history topic without any human influences is not as easy as it seems. Most of my paintings show the human touch in the landscape and even the pollution discolouring the sky.

The subject matter, the comet, wasn't the initial concept for the prize. It all started in the usual adhoc, whim that most things that are good come from. Late February, hearing on the radio that a comet can be seen in the night sky, I decided to check it out that night. However that night, Dianne and I had arranged to have a few drinks and a light meal in the studio with an artist friend of ours ( Aldo Iacobelli ), who was about to leave again for Barcelona.

Without giving Aldo the bum's rush, I kept an eye on my watch, keen to drive north to St Kilda Beach, hopefully to photograph the comet. As it was, as soon as Aldo was out the door, I said to Dianne "let's go!" and we sped into the evening.
The result was this.




Far more spectacular than I ever thought it would be, especially as I still remembered the disappointment of Halley's Comet.

It was only after seeing the results of the first night that I thought this could be a subject for the Waterhouse. Over the next few nights I went further afield, until reaching Thompsons Beach. Far away from Adelaide's light pollution and also far from anything man made. The last glow of the evening was so incredible, I just had to include it. The photo below is to the right of where the comet appear and shows the moon.



The end result is a painting created from 3 source photos, of the comet that night, the last light of the evening and a photo of the comet to show the placement of the stars.