Sunday 21 February 2016

Motels and hotels

We were staying at a small hotel in Sydney recently. Some of the guests seemed to have strange nocturnal habits. Lying in bed in the early hours of the morning, I was trying to figure out what on earth people could possibly be doing, by piecing together all the noises they were making. I worked out that a young couple staying there were in the habit of taking their pet goose for a drive every two hours throughout the night.

It was incredibly humid in Sydney, as is fairly typical of February. It's always interesting though. We checked out Kinokuniya Bookshop in the city. They have a huge range of art books and great air-conditioning. I bought a book full of Art Nouveau patterns.

Motels are on my mind again as an idea for creating images. I've just finished a repeat pattern painting of motels, inspired by kimono fabrics. The image below shows another of my motel paintings:
The Citysider, gouache painting by Alisa Perks
Image: The Citysider by Alisa Perks. Gouache on paper.
PS. Check out this link to the Australian Bookplate Design Awards for 2015. My two entries are shown among many other fine bookplates. There were hundreds of entries for this popular competition. One of my entries shown on the site appears in an earlier blog post, and the other features a gentleman wearing a panama hat and trying to read amid cement mixers and barking dogs.

Saturday 6 February 2016

Carpark

I recently had the pleasure of receiving a Special Recognition award for my entry in the Painting section of the "Cityscapes" art competition, at the online art gallery, Light Space & Time. You can click here to view all the entries which received recognition in this competition.

For the "Cityscapes" theme, I chose the image below; a painting of my impression of one of the main carparks in our city. I was learning to drive when I painted this image, and I was beset by the idea of being trapped among all the concrete kerbing that interlaces carparks.
Carpark by Alisa Perks
Image: "Carpark", by Alisa Perks. Gouache on paper.