This painting was such a delight for me to paint with the blue, blue sea in front of our house and the sailing boats for inspiration, added to some photographs of the beach area  locally and then my imagination did the rest.  Obviously it is a really windy day and the title of this painting is “Holdfast at Holdfast” as Holdfast Bay is the council area that takes in the beach suburbs from Kingston Park to Glenelg.

SUMMERTIME ART EXHIBITIONS

Now it will be part of an exhibition organized by the Holdfast Bay Discovery Centre in Mosley Square, Adelaide, South Australia which opens this coming week and will continue until March 2014 called the Bathing Box Project and the Sea Change exhibition.

Some of the other artists taking part are Jim Kinch, Margo Miles, Cat Leonard, Tim O’Shea, John Hamilton and a couple of artists still in school Macy Newman and Anna Foley who already shows great talent.

ARTISTIC SEA CHANGE

This ART exhibition celebrates the local beach environment and that summertime feel and the launch will include the reprint of the book produced by the CHB History Centre titled Sea Change as well as the opening of the Bathing Box Project.  Which is a bathing box from yesteryear that has been lovingly been reassembled on site and features vintage bathing costumes and paraphernalia and beach shades.  You are invited to dip your toes into this snapshot of seaside life from the 1900 to the 1960 for the price of a gold coin donation.

BATHING BOXES AND BEACH HUTS

Bathing Boxes, beach cabins or beach huts as they are often referred to are a small often brightly coloured wooden box which featured on the beaches in Australia an idea the settlers took with them from England originally.  These beach huts can be privately owned or owned by the local council.  The privately owned beach boxes can sell for an amazing amount of money and in Melbourne they are priced between $60,000 to $210,000 dollars.  However take a couple of hours drive from there to Portsea and the bathing boxes the size of a small garden shed will set you back nearly $600,000.  The same sort of money needed to buy 2 modest houses in the outer Adelaide suburbs!

That’s a lot of money to pay for what is essentially just somewhere to change into and out of your swimming cossie, perhaps spend a little time sheltering from the sun, wind or rain and also storing your belongings whilst you cool down in the sea.    Some people have more money than sense I think!

THE ART OF MORALITY

The bathing boxes in Brighton, one of the seaside suburbs in Melbourne famous for them, are known to have been there since 1862.  They originally were constructed to preserve the modesty during the Queen Victorian period.  Just recently in 2003 the Queens beach hut in Norfolk was destroyed by fire, this building had been in the Royal Family for over 70 years.

ARTIST TRACEY EMIN AND THE SAATCHI ART COLLECTION

Also recently the British “bad girl” artist Tracey Emin sold her Whitstable beach hut to ART collector Charles Saatchi (Nigella Lawson’s husband) unfortunately this hut was later destroyed when a fire broke out in the warehouse where it was stored.   Tracey is a very interesting and confrontational artist, part of the group known as the Britartist or YBAs (Young British Artists) she has used a lot of different mediums in her art as well as tried many art forms such as painting, photography, fabrics, bronze sculpture, neon, monoprints and found objects but is probably most known for her installations.  The most talked about is “My Bed”, an installation consisting of her own unmade dirty bed featuring stained bed sheets, used condoms, empty cigarette packets, dirty knickers – this was also bought by Charles Saatchi for the Saatchi  Art Collection as were her famous “tent” called “Everyone I Have Ever Slept With 1963-1995” which was a blue tent where the names of everyone she had ever slept with were appliqued all over it (this work also perished in the Saatchi warehouse fire).  So her artwork is always controversial and challenging and Tracey is collected by many well known stars such as George Michael, Ronnie Woods, Madonna, Elton John and models Kate Moss, Jerry Hall and Naomi Campbell to name a few.

SELF PORTRAITS AND BATHING BOXES

So going full circle which brings us back to the subject of the bathing boxes  where Tracey took two self portraits naked inside her beach hut, a diptych called , The Last Thing I Said To You Is Don’t Leave Me Here I (2000) and The Last Thing I Said To You Is Don’t Leave Me Here II (2000).

I can assure you though that the bathing box on show here in Glenelg is tame by comparison but certainly worth a look and reminisce about times gone by.

Till next time happy painting, sculpting or just reminiscing!

Love Marie xxx

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALEand SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.

Ever since I started painting I have been a big fan of Henri Rousseau’s work. My father said that the art I was producing had something in common with the naifs and bought me a couple of art books; one on Grandma Moses and the other on Henri Rousseau.

HERO ARTIST

So Henri has been one of my heros for such a long time, so you can imagine my joy when I was invited by the organizers of the annual Henri Rousseau exhibition in France to participate. I jumped for joy! The curator is Jacques Dubois who also is involved in the Art Naif Festival in Katowice, Poland which I took part in last year. Jac is very heavily involved in promoting Naive art in Europe and throughout the world really and his wife Martha Dubois is a very well known and talented naive artist herself.

FRENCH EXHIBITION
This year the Henri Rousseau exhibition will take place in the Abbey of Montivilliers in Normandy opening on Saturday 21st January until 19th February with an auction of the paintings being held on 12th February at 3pm. The exhibition itself is open 7 days a week and it is not to be missed.
Henri Rousseau was called Le Douanier which translates to the customs (or customs officer)a name he got from his job as a tax collector on goods entering Paris. Henry married twice, first Clemence Boitard with whom he had six children and after she died he married Josephine Noury.
Henri also tried his hand at music and writing but it was painting that was his first love, which he started doing seriously in his early forties and by the time he was 49 he retired from his job to pursue the art on a full time basis. Rousseau was represented in the exhibitions of the Salon des Independants from 1886 onwards, and his pictures hung side by side with Matisse, Cezanne, Toulouse-Lautrec, Van Gogh and Picasso.

INVITED ARTISTS

This year 2012 there were 88 artists invited from around the world with 20 different countries represented among them France of course and Spain, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Cuba, Belgium, Italy, Japan and “moi” from Australia just to name a few.
As this is an exhibition in homage of Henri, most artists are sticking to that theme and I had so much fun painting “You Rock, Henri Rousseau”. I wanted to do a contemporary celebration and incorporated elements of Henri’s art into it by putting in a detail of “The Dream of Yadwigha” (the naked lady lying on the couch).
The Dream of Yadwigha was the last painting that Henri painted before his death in 1910, in it the lady in question is laying on a red velvet sofa with a luxurious jungle behind her listening to the notes of a single magic flute. I of course painted a myriad of musicians and singers, artistic license and all that, LOL. If you look a little closer at my painting you will also see the influences of two other of Rousseau’s work in “The Sleeping Gipsy” which is the woman sharing the couch in the striped outfit.

HENRI ROUSSEAU ORIGINALS

In Henri’s original artwork a lion is standing over her as she lies dreaming under an ancient green sky in the solitude of the desert. Some say this is the lyrical prelude to Surrealism, with a mandolin and a jug which stands beside the sleeping figure, these objects would inhabit the dreams of the Surrealists and the space of the Cubists.
The third painting of Henri’s represented in my artwork is of Henri himself, from his self portrait painted in 1890 “I – Myself Portrait-Landscape”, he is holding a palette of paints and a brush and in the original painting he is standing on a road in front of a bridge, although he does look like he is standing in mid air, lol.
NO ART RULES

That is the naive charm, us naives are so lucky that we can just paint whatever we feel and see without having to worry about rules and other people’s perception of how things should look. As the whole idea of perspective is totally lost on me that is really lucky!!
Thank you Henri Rousseau – you gave me the freedom to be me, to paint in my own style and not to be embarrassed by the child in me. Instead my childishness it is something that I celebrate and hope that I will never grow up, or out off- but wake each day full of wonder and excitement.
So Henri I hope you approve of me painting you like a Rock Star, complete with women swooning at your feet and throwing their knickers at you. There is wild music supplied by a rock band and a brass band as well as the choir and Can Can girls dancing and pirouettes by ballerinas and of course no party is complete without balloons.

So here is a quote I like by another Henri – Henry Ward Beecher who said;
“Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures”

Till next time happy painting and sculpting to you all,
Love Marie xxxx

If you have enjoyed reading about this artist perhaps you may like to see this art blog too; 91 He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother, the Artist

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALE and SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.

This painting is a self portrait of me a couple of years ago when I had viral meningitis,(that itself is another story)  but what I want to focus on is the book that I am reading in this acrylic on board artwork, this painting which was bought by a psychiatrist  funnily enough.  Anyway the book is called “From France with Love” and is written by my dear friend Nadine Williams.

We  have been friends ever since she did a story about me in the South Australian daily newspaper The Advertiser where she had been a Senior Journalist for the last 20 years.   Here is a link to some of the stories photos from the Advertiser on my website News and News Archive

Over the years I have lost count of the number of times I have been interviewed, both as a model and an artist and I have meet lots of great reporters, but Nadine was really someone special and we immediately struck up a great friendship.

I think I liked her right away because she is such a warm hearted person, another generation up from myself but very young in her thinking, with an open mind and knowledgeably in just about every subject having dwelt into stories from around the globe at some stage or another.  Now Nadine has had some amazing things happening in her life lately.  Firstly she fell in love with a wonderful Frenchman Olivier Foubert.  He is quite the business man in his own right being the man behind the famous ‘Caleche by Colette Foubert ‘label, with a wicked sense of humor for a soft spoken very French kind of guy.   He totally cracks me up with his sly and dry remarks!

THE ART OF WRITING

Nadine decided to write about their love story with ‘baggage’ as she calls it, love in mature years and all that entails, and including a road trip in France.  The book became a best seller and the rest of course is history, as the book has now been optioned for a movie by acclaimed film producer Peta Astbury.  Peta shopped the possible film around Cannes recently, with quite a bit of interest, ”as there seems to be a gaping hole in the market for films targeted at baby boomers”,  she says.

ARTIST WEBSITES

Nadine and I have been on this website journey together as our websites were being designed at the same time, both of us with no knowledge in the world of the web or even with technology as our long suffering husbands know.    However, never say never,  because here we both are making quite an inroad on the net and getting some very good traffic numbers too.

So perhaps you may like to check out Nadine’s site, she is writing hers in a magazine style, offering up a regular blog on the delights of the French Kitchen, as well as covering everything from women’s issues, spirituality and sexuality, yes you will find articles on all matters, love, loss, relationships, family dynamics and divorce, gossip and book and movie reviews.  The age group she is aiming for is the 50 – 100 but I know it would appeal to a younger audience too.

So check it out www.nadinewilliams.com.au

Nadine and Ollie

But hey, don’t forget to come back and visit me too lol.

Here is a quote I like from writer Katherine Mansfield:

“Make it a rule of life never to regret and never look back.  Regret is an appalling waste of energy; you can’t build on it; it’s only for wallowing in.”

Till next time happy painting,sculpting and reading to you all,

Love Marie    (c)

(As you can see the book I painted and the one Nadine is holding in the photo below looks quite different, well that is because they changed the book cover for the second edition.)

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALE and SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.