So I have been pretty busy the last wee while. The charity art auction for The Brightest Star raised just shy of £500 so I am pretty pleased with that. So glad so many artists committed to take part and donate a piece of work for the auction.

I have 6 paintings up in Touched By Scotland in Oyne, which is away up in east coast of Scotland north of Aberdeen. Its for their Christmas exhibition, so we shall see how that goes I’m pretty excited. I chose 6 paintings, three Blossom themed ones from April, two from The Bird & Moon series from Easter and Hide Away Tiny Creatures from last year.

Its been a while since my work has been up in that area. I once took part in a Christmas Craft Fair in the Woodend Barn in 2005 I think, and I also rented the scout hall in Banchory for a wee exhibition around that time.  So a few of my paintings are in the area and quite a few glass hangers.

At the end of September I bought a new soldering Iron to get back into doing some glass work. So over the last few weeks I have put together a nice collection of hangers which are all up on the webpage. Normally at this time of year I would be frantic in preparation for Craft Shows, but this year I am not doing any. Just playing it quiet and if people are interested there is a small selection available online.

It was the first year anniversary of my Web page a couple days ago.So I’m just pleased I have not messed it up or deleted anything important! a ha ha ha…. And getting to grips with photoshop was a pretty steep learning curve. Very pleased to have sent work out around the country and abroad this year, this hopefully is the beginning of laying some substancial foundations for the future.

I also started to deliver my work by hand where ever possible in the Glasgow area after taking a painting and then a hanger out to customer’s homes I have decided that this is now company policy.

Excert from Facebook Sept 20th – ‘Whitebridge Night’ went to its new home last night. The buyer asked me to come round and hang it for him which I was only more than happy to. His gran once bought a painting and asked the artist to come and hang it as she thought it was ‘appropriate’. He remembered this and shared the sentiment so I took the painting round and we put it up and had a couple drams of fine rum. Aside for my gladness of a sale, it reaffirmed my recent thoughts on seeing art in the home. The process of painting, and reaching the ‘finished’ stage is followed by the framing where it becomes a finished piece of work in my mind. Then it goes to a exhibition where you see it for the first time hung in a clean environment with fancy lights and it becomes something else. Then, eventually, it finds a buyer and it goes into a home. This is where the art work becomes complete in my mind. A home environment, surrounded by personal belongings it becomes a item someone owns. This painting from that moment forward has a new story, not my story, it has a new birth and the story starts from that day with the new owner. This is the thing I think I most enjoy about art. Seeing a painting in a home, and especially when it feels like the right home, its a very special thing. So thanks Patrick and who knows the story that will now come with that painting in years to come. A story that started with very nice rum as I suspect the best stories do.

As far as new work goes its mostly been glass work since the end of September. I have been working on this multi panel painting that when framed will sit as a whole with division bars between the 3 sections. Its 30 inches high by 60″ wide so its pretty big. Its nearly complete, just a few more branch details and some more blossom detail to go in. Due to finish hopefully before Christmas.

Do have a look at my web page www.gilliesart.com and if there are any questions you have do not hesitate to contact me.

Cherio

And I’ll leave you with my favorite bit of music just now

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krSst6_voEQ&w=420&h=315]

Image bellow – close up from a hanger. To put into perspective the green Maiden Hair leafs are no bigger than a finger nail.

Camera Phone technology got fancy eh!