Spring in My Step © Jane Davenport - to purchase, click on image
How I wish this were the case. It feels as if spring had arrived! So i can make myself feel warm by looking at sunny summer memories….the ladybirds will be here soon….
Blue Suede Mantis © Jane Davenport
I was wandering aimlessly through my photo library as I searched for images, ideas and inspiration, and meandered into my praying mantis file. I have quite a collection! Looking at the images, I had the stories and location associated with each one jump into my mind.
This may be because they are so tricky to find with their perfect camouflage. Also, as the top invertebrate predator in the garden, they are relatively scarce in number and probably quite territorial. But I think the majority of the truth lies in the fact that I just like them. I admire them. I can relate to a mantid (yes, you heard it here first). I would be hard pressed to bring back such clear recall for every bee I have seen for example, even though I am very fond of them also!
The most recent mantis I worked with was the Jade eyed gargantuan a few months ago (here). The first mantids I worked with are featured in the featured image . In between are dozens of other individuals. I just really love photographing them and I think it shows! I have been asked to put a proposal together for an exhibition, and well, the answer has just presented itself – well, to me anyway!
I would love to see these charasmatic creatures staring from gallery walls en masse. I have had mantids feature in a few of my exhibitions…but I think they deserve more than that! I did have one of my mantis images towering over the entrance to “What’s the Buzz?” exhibition at the Perth Zoo. The magnificent 2m mantis was a favourite with boys!
Anyway, I will send of my proposal and let you know what happens…
Jane
I Give You Butterflies ©Jane Davenport. Love it? It's available in my store!
- Sophisticated Ladies © JAne Davenport
It’s been a full-on week! I have had some BIG creative projects to kick of, which always take herculean strength to get rolling. Of course once the ball is on the go, it’s easy to pick up the pace, slow down a little, alter course or change direction! But I feel as if I have been trying to shape all my creative energy into the actual ball itself. Scattered energy, Aaaaaargh!
So at the end of my mental gymnastics week, I got ‘told off’ by an associate. I could hear in the person’s voice and the chaotic background that they were under pressure, and our conversation just kept on esculating until the person became aggressive. When I say ‘our’ conversation I am being generous, as I didn’t get to chime in…yes, we had a problem to sort out, but I was addressed as if I was a naughty child. It’s been a looong time since I have been spoken to in that tone. I was too shocked/tired/scared(!) to stand up for myself, explain or state my version of events, so I took on all the venting and finger wagging and slung away with my tail between my legs. I wonder how long I will be mentally hiding under the bed from this person!
I was worried that the situation would totally derail me from my other projects, because I felt really bad about the way I had been spoken to, and why I would not ‘fight back’. I am just not good at confrontation and I will go a long way to avoid it. It freaks me out. I need time to think about things. I like to ponder all the angles. I take everything personally. Blech!
Anyway! pretty pink saved me from fingernail biting. I didn’t have time to worry about it all day yesterday, as I was in my Byron Bay gallery. It doesn’t happen often, but I enjoy it when I am working there! Seeing my work on the gallery walls, chatting to people, seeing what they like, what images people linger in front of, answering curious questions about my artwork. Helping people make selections is fun!
And maybe because I was still feeling a bit shakey in the back of my brain, I was really attracted to the soft pinks and greys of, the above images “I Give You Butterflies’ and ‘Sophisticated Ladies’ hanging in the gallery. They comforted me. I am feeling a whole new level of love for these images – some of my most popular. They reminded me how lucky I am to do what I love and how hard I have worked to achieve a level of technical proficiency that allows me to get to an image I see in my head! I feel the need to create some friends for these two. Yes its winter, so finding bugjects will be a challenge, but where there is a will there is a way, right?! So after my lovely Gallery day and this chat on my blog, I am feeling all better now! Yay!
I hope you are having a lovely weekend (and nobody gives you a ticking off!)
Choose Happiness,
x Jane
You can tell when I have a commission / exhibition/ project that I am really excited about because my studio gets super-clean and totally reorganized. Instead of getting down to work and actually being productive, I start on all the little ‘chores’ that have been lurking around at the periphery. Things that are ‘sort-of’ important … really tidying my studios, labeling/categorising images from the past months, scanning/ photographing artwork and journal pages, priming canvases, reshuffling inspiration boards, watching podcasts and queued YouTube videos…blah, blah,blah.
All this cleaning and shuffling is an important part of my creative process.
In the distant past, I used to get tempted during this phase to watch TV series and -gasp- play video games…now that really is a waste of time!….lots of fun, but a waste of my life! So I curbed that wicked addiction through massive willpower and now I practice what I call Active Procrastination. While I am gathering and sculpting my thoughts under the surface, I do all the ‘sort-of’ important things. They need to get done eventually as they are beneficial, but they are not ‘red-hot’ important.
So although I am not actively doing my most important work, I am doing good stuff! To the onlooker, I still look productive. But inside I feel like I am dawdling and pottering around. I am organising, tidying, preparing, cleaning up. I am not wasting my time. I relax into this process now because I know I will have my internal processes in order, my thoughts sculpted and eventually get down to the real work – usually right before the deadline - and pour forth in a great creative deluge. Aaaah the relief!
I know that this is about to happen in the next few hours. I was invited to present a proposal for the most EXCITING commission two weeks ago. And I have since moved my whole studio around, finished a sketchbook (really!), filled my entire art journal with backgrounds and learned how to use three software programs. In the past I may have paniced a bit and beat myself up worrying about why I can’t get started on my ‘proper’ work. ! But now I understand my creative process and I have been whistling away as I Actively Procrastinate.
And today I am feeling ‘angsty’. I am getting annoyed at everything and everybody because it feels as if they are blocking me from focusing on my Proposal. My poor husband just came up to my desk, and his footsteps drove me crazy! I was SCOWLING WILDLY by the time he got to my desk – my look said “WHAT DO YOU WANT! LEAVE ME ALONE! AAARGH!!!”. And now I feel so mean, because he was very kindly bringing me a delicious coffee…! Luckily he has been on this creative path with me from the beginning, so he understands the process!.
Once I finish this post, I will have to go completely radio silent as I begin to poke, squeeze and meld my ideas/thoughts/ideas into something I can comprehend. I am often frustrated and a bit manic during this phase – the whole world stops and condenses to just me and my work. And then Once I have bought my ideas into a coalesced form, I will shape them into the Proposal. And once I have finished printed, PDF’ed and posted the proposal, the dancing around will commence! YAY!
What is your creative process? Have you noticed your creative patterns? I would love to hear them!
Wish me luck in creating an amazing proposal for my next large-scale outdoors art installation – it’s soo exciting…must get to it!
Choose Happiness,
x Jane
"Everyone always referred to her as a bright girl." © Jane Davenport
I am feeling very BRIGHT today…I woke up this morning with the rising sun, leaped out the front door for a 5km run, (is this rhyming? ), then I swam for an hour…KIDDING! It is so cold today (granted it’s only Byron Bay cold – not snowing in the mountains cold) and its reminding me that the ladybirds and most of my insect friends are in hibernation or hiding…so there are few of my Bugjects to photograph. And I miss my little insect buddies!
Having a small pine-full moment…so I had a peep through my huge library of ..sigh… ladybird images ( it’s gargantuan actually , but don’t tell anybody) , and this one caught my eye. I created it in the middle of summer at the Chicago Botanic Gardens. There were flowers everywhere, it was hot and the air was buzzing with little creatures. Nice ones, not the bitey variety. Spring through summer and into the turn of autumn you will find me outside, in the gardens, poking my nose into flowers and looking at the little life. But not in winter.
HOWEVER! that means there is more time to draw and paint, and there has been a lot of that going on…. AND lots of technological advances. The Institute of Cute has a Facebook page and went from 4 friends to 160 (and counting !) in a few days with a bit of effort. AND there was the videos of course, on the IOC’s own YouTube channel (!). And today I start building my Etsy store. The excitement is palpable here in ladybird land…
Of course, there has been a little assistance. I have a magical fairy called Erin helping me. She comes in to the studio 1 day a week and it amazes me the difference in energy it makes. Angus an I both get prepared for ‘Erin Day’ in advance, and we are making videos and thinking about ‘the business end’ of the art studio which adds to the momentum. Even just the tidying up for our guest worker is of huge benefit! And on the day she is here, I think we work harder, just to ‘set a good example’.
…so I am feeling like a Bright Girl too.
Choose Happiness,
x Jane
(click here if the video isn’t showing - )
Yesterday afternoon this was my studio. Overlooking the famous surf break called ‘The Pass’ at Byron Bay. How I LOVE my home! Love, love LOVE it. Angus was out surfing, and I sat and painted at a picnic table with the birds twittering all around me and a few curious onlookers. I intended to do some writing, but painting is all that happened!
The Magician is on the new journal I made myself (hello!) with a canvas cover and lovely water colour papers interleaved with glassine and tracing paper. I drew her that morning as a preliminary sketch for a series of paintings I am working on. I plan on doing the front cover tomorrow…!I might draw the little bird in the nest I photographed…or maybe transfer the photo onto the canvas and paint parts of it…or not….hmmm…some more experimentation on the way. Lovely!
The little girl with bugs-on-a-string is a sketch i drew ages ago. I transferred her into my Moleskine journal to test making a gesso transfer (fun!) and painted her all pretty. I have no idea what will go in next to her, but she will wait until she is just the perfect background for some written thoughts.
I am just ENJOYING drawing and painting so, so, so much. My Art Journal is full of sketches and painting experiments, and that is why I started making my own journals as well- so I could include different papers to play around with. I love combining it with my photography. While the paint is drying I flit over to my camera and set up a scenario to shoot…flit back to the canvas…draw, mix paint, make marks…delicious stuff.
Choose happiness
x Jane
P.s. Also! I found an echidna in my driveway at the studio! After a bit of gentle persuasion, we coaxed the little guy into a box and returned him to the bush! Pics coming….
Why does working on a Sunday feel so great? I feel as if I am ‘catching up’ and ‘getting ahead’ ..which is so weird really, because I work for myself, and I can only get ahead of me!
So It has been a super-productive day (to make up for my super-UN-productive day yesterday. I went shopping at my favourite paper crafts store – oh, it was awesome and I came back with such a haul of goodies. Why do art supplies make me so happy?). I have been drawing all morning, and finishing the BEST drawing of my life (I’ll wait to show you it until I’ve painted it…)…plus a few other drawings spilled out (see below). I really like drawing in my Daler Rowney A4 sketchbook. The creeeeeeeamy pages WANT to be stroked with my pencil and petted with my kneaded eraser…
Reading in the Grass. Illustration © Jane Davenport
And then I had to photograph lots of my bigger artworks. I like to record each piece at various stages of completion. I find that recording the painting frees me up mentally to fling paint with wild abandon (or thoughtful posturing – depends on my mood du jour!) because I have a backup point. It must be from all my years of using Photoshop. Works for me!
And I also started work (finally) on an idea that has been RATTLING around in my mind for a while. So I was very fixated on carrying the concept over into reality ….so when my photographic studio lights weren’t bending themselves to my will with ESP and telekinesis (oh, how I wish I had those skills!) … le freaking out… And just as I was teetering on the Brink of Tantrum…I stepped away and saw this email:
” Hi, hope fully this email will reach Jane!
I just have to say after a recent visit to the Perth Zoo, I am absolutely blown away with the displays provided by you.
I am a professional photographer, and can only say that you have an amazing gift – I can honestly say that I (and my kids of course!) absolutely loved the photos as we travelled through the zoo.
Please keep up the good work as it is appreciated very much!
Chris
CK Images
www.ckimages.com.au”
aaaaawww, cool stuff. So that bad tanty Jane instantly dissolved and smiling happy Jane, emailed to and fro with Chris and then I easily rethought the lights and moved on with resolving my project (it’s all secret, hush-hush for now… let me marinate it some more, cook it a little, simmer, bubble, sautee.)
Choose happiness
x Jane
art journal page by Jane Davenport - "Why Bugs?"
I really enjoyed posting some of my journal pages a few days ago! I carry mine with me everywhere I go. I catch ideas and pin them down before they flit away again….sort of like a flower pressing book. Anyway, I liberated some insect pages from an old World Book Encyclopedia (remember those?!!) and made a collage a while back. Played with some bright colour and shapes (messy and scrumptious). And that was it for the time being.
Someone asked me “Why bugs” the other day…and when I was manically flipping through my journal in the attempt to distract myself on the ROUGH flight home last night from Sydney (we didn’t hit any stray tornadoes though! Wild and weird weather…hope the Lennox Head tornado was a one off – NOT a sign of things to come!), the answers to why I just love wrangling insects for my art practice flowed on to the uncannily prepared surface.
i love these moment when ‘things’ just flow…
Choose happiness,
x Jane
Angus and I are venturing to Sydney tomorrow for a very important meeting with my favourite creative cohorts. I will be approving calendars, diaries and other exciting developments. And we are going to squeeze in a plethora of other things and meander around the exciting city.
I have to admit that I would never even consider leaving Byron Bay even just for a few days, if the weather had not finally turned to winter. It has been just so delightful…a chilly evening here and there, maybe…but love lovely loveliness….
Winter page from my art journal
But the rain has arrived, the slippers and doona are out of the cupboard!
Oh yeah! the journal! I started keeping one this year. I did a workshop with fellow Byron Bay artist Zom from pinchmetoseeifyouaredreaming. And I love the process of filling a book with drawings, thoughts, things. I sit on the beach and sketch, ponder, write lists, scribble in and tickle my cute art journals. They have become so precious and I delight in the time I spend working in them.
For some reason I decided to test every pen, pencil paint and marker. I filled many, many pages and it was a delicious experiment!
Here are a few…I just loooooove looking at the colours…rainbows
So every now and then I might share a page with you…
It feels like the year has only just started (yes, I know we are nearly halfway through! Time flies when you are having FUN!) and here I am showing you 2011 calendars…but I was so excited when they arrived from the USA today! I work with Leap Year Publishing, and have 4 titles with them for 2011..
In the Magic Garden
Love & DevOcean
The Sea Party
LadybirDelicious!
The WONDERFUL and EXCITING thing about having my work in calendars each year is that the images are reproduced in full blazing colour in a lovely large and juicy format. Delicious!
When my Australian calendars with OzCorp Publishing are ready to show off, I will let you know!
The drive home from Sydney to Byron Bay can be a real drag…time is measured out in coffee stops and toilet breaks. So any excitement along the way is always welcome, especially if it is of a close encounter with a giant bug!
As we passed a new sushi roadside diner at Coffs Harbour, my eyes clamped on a HUGE insect sitting on the lime green wall. Can you imagine how BIG it was to see it from the road? So I commando rolled out of the moving vehicle to dash over and have a close-up look…I split with excitement when I saw her huge pregnant belly, flourescent green eyes, and splashes of emerald down her wings. A magnificent site. And my mind started racing over the photo opps as I darted back to the now safely stationary car to grab my camera. And then I remembered…my camera was in Canon hospital getting repaired (the lens had locked with the camera body!). OK, not to worry, I will take her home. A quick google check (love my iphone!) revealed she was a species that lives in my area as well, so I could relocate her without guilt.
Now what to put her in? Well it just so happens that I never travel without a bug house in the car. Oh, right, it’s full of baby stick insects ( a gift from one of my art collectors in Sydney – really!) and the mantis will definitely polish them off. So into a rinsed-out drink container she goes. I could hear her scrachety-scratching for the rest of the journey.
The next day, safe and sound in her own bug house, the mantis layed her eggs (told you she was preggers) and looked at me hungrily. I have been hunting grasshoppers for her ever since. And managed to find a rocket frog, damselflies and a plethora of other little critters for lots of photographic fun over the long weekend!
Tenodera australasiae – aka: The Australian Mantid or Purple Winged mantid
As you can imagine, I have been very careful with my large guest and I prepared the studio carefully for her photo-session. I planned the images I wanted before picking up the camera (which arrived back safely – thanks Canon!).
Get rid of that ugly camera strap that your camera came with. Especially the type that have your cameras brand on it! They may say “Canon/Nikon/etc Digital Camera” but they also shout “oooh, look, person with expensive, new camera. Come steal me”.
I have tried the techno, load bearing neoprene-type straps, but the tend to bounce around and I found them more annoying than shoulder saving.
A few years ago, I saw a young lady with a GORGEOUS camera strap. My antennae went wild! She directed me to Etsy.. and a search later, I had my own customised camera straps being made and sent from the USA. Ladybirds on one (of course), and red with white polka dots on the other – with a ribbon corsage! I got mine from shabby straps.
Go to Etsy here and search for ‘Camera Strap dslr’. Or you can opt for a padded strap cover. I noticed at Sewtamz you can have your initials embroidered on the straps. You can also get a strap for your point-and-shoot camera. Lots of delectable delights!
The added bonus of this splash of individuality, is that your camera is very easily recognisable, and less likely to disappear in a crowded situation. Have fun!
The Reference shot : remembering scale
Not every shot I take is aimed at being an aesthetic wonder! Reference shots, which are seldom attractive, are hugely important for many reasons, and one is scale.
It is actually very hard to remember the correct size of something after the event. In my mind’s eye at least, my subjects bugjects grow in stature! And I am often surprised when I find a beetle or bug that I have previously photographed, at just how small it actually is! My recollections are tampered with because I am looking at my images at many times magnification.
So I find it really helpful to take a reference shot just to indicate the size of my bugject. A ruler is most accurate, but my phone, hand, sunglasses and toes all make appearances. If my bugject’s patience allows, I try and get them in the reference shot, but sometimes that is impossible, so in amongst my lovely close-up shots of a butterfly, you will find a random, uncomposed shot of the whole plant it was sitting on. With bigger subjects such as birds, I always try and get a shot of the whole tree, preferably with a person under it, so the scale is recorded.
Reference shots to show the 'scale' of your smaller subjects are important and helpful!
I learned this trick from studying my grandfather’s slides. He was a ‘Gentleman Collector’ and fortunate to be able to indulge in a pastime passed down the ancestral line. As ‘landed gentry’ it was respectable to devote time in naturalist pursuits such as fossil, butterfly and orchid cataloguing, observing and collecting.
Thankfully, rather than killing hordes of animals to display, he used the camera to collect and record the nature around him. Amongst his thousands of his slides and films, there are many of family, but the overwhelming majority of photos portray a passion for wildflowers from the south-west of Western Australia. The slides themselves are not aesthetic wonders, but a determined and loving effort to capture the amazing breadth of variety and detail in his lens’s gaze. What I find most fascinating is that each one has an everyday object, such as a coin, matchbox or match ruler, placed alongside the subject so that the scale can be seen. Without this attention to detail, there really is no way of telling just how tiny these flowers are, unless you look up the size in a reference book!
I blogged earlier in the week about a Giant water bug that I found, and included one of my reference images, which is a more rarely seen beast than the secretive, mud-dwelling creature! But to show how big the subject bugject was, it needed a reference point, so I used a pen. I certainly won’t be using the image for an Art print, but a wonderful reference accessory.
