I lost 80% of my vision suddenly and unexpectedly at the age of 33. At first I feared I’d have to give up my love for art-making because I thought that seeing well was integral to art-making. Clearly I was wrong about this because famous and talented artists like Claude Monet and Edgar Degas both had significant vision-impairments!

Purple has never been a colour I’ve loved, but I’m really enjoying purples these days, and feeling very inspired to incorporate purples in my artwork. Perhaps it’s because of my recent Jacaranda commission that has me painting with all the purples. Or perhaps it’s just that purple is a pretty rare colour for blossoms in South Africa (outside of the Jacaranda blossoms, of course!), and I’m blown away by the variety of lovely blue and purple blossoms here in Europe.

My recent Jacaranda commission took me on quite the journey that had me reflecting on how I feel about mistakes, repair, big change, and risks, and how much I back myself and believe in my own creativity and resourcefulness. Here’s a little 3-part video series that tells the story. (Click on the video images to watch the videos on my Facebook page, and while you’re there, click “like” to follow my on Facebook, if you aren’t already!)

When we began planning to move from South Africa to the Netherlands, we knew that one of the changes we’d have to adapt to is the weather. In South Africa it’s sunny, mild, and pleasant for most of the year so we could afford to have a weather-dependent mindset.

I’ve abandoned the first rendition I painted for the Jacaranda painting commission I’m working on. It was too busy and too dark. Sometimes I have to get through a few attempts first in order to find my vision; the core experience that I want the artwork to invite the viewer into.

Earlier this year I had the good fortune of getting to create a unique commissioned artwork for friend and fellow artist, Lisa Reardon’s beautiful home in California. Lisa is a ceramicist who creates wonderful intuitively and iteratively built abstract sculptures.

This quote reminded me of the time when Zola was about 5 years old and I was rushing him to get his shoes on and he admonished me with, “I’m doing my best, but you grownups have had a lot more practice at hurrying, you know!”

We’ve been settling into our new home and I’m loving living right on the water. The sky here in the Netherlands is often moody and busy with beautiful shapes and colours, and I love the way that the water reflects and repeats all the sky beauty down at ground level.

My fun day of outdoor creative “play” culminated in an artwork that I love in many ways. And now I’m at that point where I wonder how I’ll know when it’s finished. Here are two methods I use for assessing when my art is where I want it to be, and therefore “finished.”

My next commission is an abstract in blues, but Yellow insisted on playing too. She said she’d promise to be shy and stay in the background if I let her go first.

I painted outside again the other day. At first I was a bit annoyed that the trees were casting shadows on my artwork, which changed the colours and the dark/ light values, making it difficult for me to assess how the work was developing.

Your art doesn’t need to match your decor. Of course, it can if you’d like that…

This morning I traveled by train to Almere, to take my artwork to a fine art scanner so it can be digitized for printing. It’s my first solo train ride, so I was a little nervous about finding the right train and being on time for my appointment.

There have been so many new beginnings over the past month. My art-making and life feel full of new possibilities. There’s also so much I treasure from previous chapters and want to make sure to bring with me into this next chapter of my art (and life.)

Something surprising and hilarious happened in my studio and I have to tell you all about it because it delivered me a perfectly-timed and much-needed truth-bomb, and it’s all still giving me the giggles…

Both my art-making and life-making these days are asking me to stop over-functioning and let go of my training into the idea that understanding and being understood are required in order to enjoy art (and life).

If you’ve spent any time around here, you’ll have noticed that I really LOVE South African flora, especially Proteas. I was reflecting the other day on how many many different versions of Proteas I’ve created, and how exploring their quirky shapes, colours, and textures never gets old.

I spent the morning playing with different media and versions of a beach landscape, exploring different media, line, light, color, space, texture, edges, and shape.

I was struggling to start making art on a large canvas today so I tried a trick that’s worked before… instead of trying to make art on the prepared canvases, I got out some Gesso and prepared some more large canvases.