pretty, pink and a little bit punk ♥

Happy hump-day peeps and squeaks!

Just thought I'd share a snippet of a drawing I've been working on this week . . . oh, and any excuse to fiddle around with Instagram! Only a week has passed since I finally gave in to the iPad craze and as Dave will testify, I am already addicted to those gorgeous lo-res, faux Polaroid effects!

Thoughts?

Mel x

♥ Time for Rabbit-Tea ♥

Hullo you wonderful people!

Well, after a few weeks filled with all sorts of pleasant diversions and distractions, I can finally share my 'Time for Rabbit-Tea' series with you, as promised, whittled down to 3 and in full colour.

While the Blogger format dictates that I must put these in a particular order, I originally drew these with the idea that viewers could create their own order and narrative for these characters. They sort of began a full year ago, in their black-and-white forms, as a surreal interpretation of the way I often feel, waking up groggy from a long afternoon spent dreaming and napping. I wanted to create something beautiful and fun, and of course impossible in the way that only dreams can be.

These are of course available in my Etsy and market shops; $50 each or for a special price of $120 for the full set!

I would absolutely love to hear your thoughts on these. Which is your favourite of the three? Do you have a story of your own about these characters you'd like to share?

Love and bunny snuggles,

Mel x

their hearts ran away with the circus

Meet Gabrielle and Rosalina, the star act at the Patchwork Circus!

At the precise moment I captured them here, Gabrielle and Rosalina have just performed their famous Glitter Jitterbug dance. Their little cheeks are flushed with happiness as they curtsey and are showered with roses, heart confetti and wild applause. Wherever the circus may go, everyone who sees it cannot help but fall in love with the sweet dancing sisters and their rosebud smiles.

It was a lot of fun as I drew them and got to know them to imagine how they live, and their hopes and dreams. They've been a part of the circus for as long as they can remember. Though they're orphans, they have hardly wanted for anything at all in their young lives: they love the circus and are utterly adored by their patchwork family. Gabrielle is about 15, and Rosalina 13. They looked much more alike when they were younger, and perhaps they don't share the same two parents, wherever they might be, but in each other's eyes and hearts they will always be sisters and the very best of friends.

They have always shared everything in life, including Gabrielle's Roberts Revival radio she got for her 8th birthday. When Rosalina reached double figures at the age of ten, her circus family presented her with a tiny little bundle of blue-grey fur with a heart-shaped splotch over one eye. Louie got his name later on that evening, when the famous Toots and the Maytals song, 'Louie Louie' came over the radio and the sisters discovered their new little kitten loved to dance! Every night he sleeps exactly between Gabrielle and Rosalina, at the foot of their huge feather bed, where they dream of singing and dancing and running away with the circus.



I'd love to hear your thoughts! And, if you love it, you can snap a print of 'A Patchwork Circus' for yourself for $50 on my Etsy Shop; just click on the link marked 'shop' at the top right of this post.

Have a wonderful day my little dancing liebchens,

Mel x



alicia of hearts

Hullo again dear readers!

My show 'Strange Creatures, Sweet Allsorts' has now been hanging merrily for a little over a week, and I am very happy to tell you that it has been received fabulously well! Friends, family and everyone else in between came from all corners of our fair city to support me, wish me well and make my night so wonderful.

After sixteen months of working towards it, it's so satisfying to know I don't honestly feel I could have put on a better debut show. Everything looked so smashing thanks to Paul and Don at Don Whyte Framing, who have spent weeks working with Dave and I comparing and ordering mouldings, talking tonal values, offering framing advice and just generally being wonderful.

To accompany these gorgeously framed pictures, I wrote stories about each of the images and how they came from being ideas in my head to pictures on paper. So many people commented on my writing, which is humbling and wonderful, because I do love words, and it's nice to make good sentences when one can manage it.

Everyone lingered long and attentively, reading and looking at my pictures carefully in the same way I look at my children's books. This, I think, is the very highest compliment- to watch people give themselves over to something, to stop whatever else they're doing to study something- to know it's something I've made myself that they're looking at- is so affirming. It is wonderful to know I can do something I love and to be able to share it. A couple came into the gallery yesterday and the gentleman said to me by way of goodbye: 'I came in feeling quite grumpy, and now I feel really relaxed. Your work has taken me somewhere else'.

Dave was not without his fair share of admiration on the opening night either: toiling well into the previous Thursday night to prepare no less than 150 macarons, (only one of which was left uneaten at the end of the night very probably because it was smooshed up in the crush to stuff salivating gobs Darwin over); he was rewarded with the sound of many ladies sighing in plaintive tones: 'I wish my husband made macarons for me!' Dave and I are so compatible that way- he cooks and I love eating, so all is as it should be.

And now, with around half the exhibition promised to happy buyers at the end of the week when it all comes down, my mind is already on another, and other projects besides. Stay tuned!

In the meanwhile, here's a little something I managed in between times that didn't make it to the show. 'Alicia of Hearts' is already on my market shop table in a limited edition of 30, and would make the perfect present for every little girl from 3 to 103 who has a fondness for all things pink. She is of course inspired by that wonderful little girl who falls down a rabbit-hole and captures the heart of everyone who remembers what it is to be a child in a world of adults who talk a lot of nonsense.   

All nice things for a wonderful weekend wherever you and your heart might roam.

Mel x

pink hearts and brollies

Darwin might be a small pond, but I am realising more and more what a lovely place it is for us artists and how lucky we are to have such a fantastic creative community. Tonight Dave and I toddled along to the Artist Trading Card Exhibition opening at DVAA (well, actually, we had to get there early so I could hang my work and then reward myself with some tasty Spotty Dog ice-cream from Trampoline!).

And, in other exciting news, here's Miss Rainy Day, all finished and splendiferous in the rain!

Nighty-night!

Mel xo