Happy blog birthday!

Today is my first blog birthday! Yay!!! A whole year of blogging - Wow! I never realised when I first started how much I would enjoy it and what friends I would make through it.

And what a lovely way to celebrate it by finishing dj kirkby's erotic painting! And she's as delighted with it as much as I am, so that's two of us happy! Its been an interesting way of painting a picture, since all of the planning has been done by email. Its certainly been a very interesting painting to do because I had to first find out exactly what dj kirkby was thinking of when she suggested it, and that took quite a bit of time of emails back and forth as we both asked questions of each other and explored possibilities. Then I drew a few sketches and sent them to her to make sure I understood what she had described to me. She told me her thoughts. More adjustments were made, and I sent her some more detailed drawings. Again, she wanted changes and adjustments, and I found it quite a challenge to do what she had asked, but I worked though it and had a moment of pure creative brilliance (even I was impressed with it!!) and came up with the final design, and even the title for it, all within the space of one evening. Wow! And I know when that happens I'm on the right track, because the creative ideas flow and that means the painting will too. And dj kirkby was delighted with the result too - great stuff! From then, I just had to work out the colours and send her a working painting so she could see the final colours before I actually started the painting itself. And all this took a couple of months, on and off. But then, and only then, I could start the painting. But when I finally started it, I knew exactly how it was going to be laid out, the exact colours, the tones and where they would be, the interest, the artistic tricks that make the painting look interesting and as I painted it, it flowed and I could concentrate on getting the paint down and hopefully making it all pull together as a whole painting. I finished it and send a copy of it to dj kirkby and she requested a couple of final touches, which I did after checking with myself that it would add to the painting and not deter from the overall feel of it. And now its done. Finished. Another WOW! I've sat and looked at it since I've completed it, and would be very happy to have it hanging on my wall. I've put many long hours into it, both in physical design and in mental thought. Does it illustrate that? Yes it does. It's a clever painting. It both looks like an erotic couple AND it looks like a landscape. That's a huge challenge to do, but I've done it! And today's the day it's finished, born on the blog, and finished on my blog birthday! A good sign!


And cos I'm in a good mood, and I'm sure dj kirkby won't mind, I'll show you a few bits of it. You'll have to wait a while til I'll show you the whole thing, cos it was to be a secret until then. But, as a taster, here are a few poignant bits.........