Buried Treasure - A Trip down Memory Lane

If it's July, then it's time for a treasure hunt - Seth Apter's Buried Treasure. Here you will find the links to all the blogs featured in this year's hunt. This is a veritable Aladdin’s Cave of Blog treasures. Artists are invited to search for favourite posts on their blogs to share with others. The first year I took part, Buried Treasure led me to an artist and friend here in Brisbane.

In the true spirit of nostalgia I am re-posting A Trip down Memory Lane. This was written during preparations to pack up and leave South Africa and move to Australia.

Then I thought I would add a couple of links to other posts you might enjoy:

Different Times, different media

and your all-time favourite post - More drawing: Vernon Ah Kee  - these drawings never cease to fascinate me.

And I have re-discovered inspiration for some new drawings - watch this space...

Thursday, 28 October 2010

A Trip down memory lane.

The process of moving involves so much more that clearing cupboards and sorting cups and saucers. It is a time for reflection. Frequently one is brought face to face with people and events from the past. Another box  brings all manner of memories to the surface.

You discover that you have a box belonging to your Mother filled with her treasures – the lace handkerchief from her wedding day, a birthday card you had made, a photograph of yourself in a mermaid costume. The costume was a work of art – made of sea-green satin with a carefully stitched tail and cellophane scales. Photographs of our home when I was a child were also tucked away in a small album. You realize that these were kept with love.

You come across a photograph of a bride bending to greet a little boy – it’s your mother and perhaps an older cousin – it’s an evocative image and you realize with surprise that you had forgotten how beautiful she was.

It’s impossible to simply throw these away, but it can’t all go with me. Modern technology comes to the rescue, allowing me to scan the images and take them with me in digital format. Now I think of ways the images could find their way into future drawings. 

Then, in the last packet of documents and photographs, I find a leather document case belonging to my father. Inside are letters of reference written to my paternal grandfather from companies for whom he had worked – in the most beautiful copperplate handwriting – and one of the few photographs of him, striding down the road in Bournemouth – a stern figure, much as I remember him.

A few days ago, a friend who lives out of town phoned me to say she had found letter from me. She had been trying to clear out a drawer. It was jammed and when the drawer eventually opened there was the letter.

It was something we rarely see  today, a proper letter - on paper - written with a fountain pen, thanking her for her support and friendship after I had spent some time on her farm. I hadn’t dated the letter but I knew exactly when it had been written as I had some entries in an old art journal describing the time on the farm. The journal had drawings that echo current ideas, similar themes and ideas, and the ongoing struggle to be creative.  

Then I found something quite different. A slip of paper was among the usual debris that gathers in a bedside table drawer. It was a diary page from 2003; scrawled on it was the title and author of a book that I’d been trying to remember for years. It’s the most amazing story of Christina Dodwell’s journey across China, A Traveller in China .

Now I will be able to read the book again, knowing what to look for. You discover that the important things find you when you stop looking.

Buried Treasure 2013: Making Friends - Online and in Real Life.

Four years ago, Seth Apter from The Altered Page - started Buried Treasure. It’s a way for bloggers to re-post a favourite post to share with the blogging community. A list of  Buried Treasures will be posted on his blog.

The online community of artists is a source of so much support and encouragement to artists in all parts of the world. Artists are incredibly generous with their talents, sharing tips or doing video demonstrations of techniques often with no tangible reward.

My participation in Buried Treasure last year has resulted in the formation of a wonderful, talented group of artists here in Brisbane - and I am privileged to be part of cARTwheel collaborative brisbane.

This is the story….

Last year while reading the blogs on the Buried Treasure list, I came across an artist who lives in Brisbane. I wrote her name down on my notepad next to the laptop and thought no more about it.

The following weekend I visited the Brisbane Art Fair. One booth in particular caught my eye and I spent some time chatting to the artist and admiring her work. We exchanged cards and I came home.

When I sat down at my desk, I saw the name I had written down - and stopped…this was the artist I had just met in person. 

The rest is history - eight of us will be exhibiting together in October.

My re-post this year is about a commission that I loved painting called Memory Wall. 

Another commission that was a great experience was painting a Paris street scene for my local coffee shop Deja` Bru Cafe`. You might also enjoy Magic and Fantasy about a wonderful exhibition at GoMA, Brisbane.

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Memory Wall

Memory Wall - 40 canvases 8" x 8" oil on canvas Carol Lee Beckx 

A recent commission to create a wall of paintings proved to be an inspiring experience. 

There is an album of some of the paintings on my Facebook Fan Page. 

Some years ago, I took part in a  project called The Artist's Blocks. Each artist received wooden blocks, all the same size and approximately the same dimensions as the current work. My work consisted of ink drawings on carefully prepared gessoed blocks.

Some of these botanical elements were used in the commission and painted in oils instead of ink.  Replacing the wooden panels, the supports are 8" x 8" canvases.

As the work progressed, the client found various images from their family album that were then incorporated into the installation. There is a small part of the wedding dress and veil; a grandmother's Paragon China teacup; the family crest and some family silver. 

Since the work was to be large - installation size 1.85m x 1.15m some abstract elements and single colour blocks were used to balance the composition. 

The Wedding Dress - oil on canvas 8" x 8"- Carol Lee Beckx

Brown Spotted Eggs - Oils on canvas - 8" x 8" Carol Lee Beckx 

You can commission your own Memory Wall. More details about ordering these can be found on the stand alone Page - Memory Blocks. 

They are the ideal gift for many occasions - birthdays, weddings, a new baby in the home. At my Etsy Store (see the side bar for the link) you will find some of the blocks as stand alone paintings or as the basis for a group of Memory blocks.