Finally, a presentation..

On Friday,6 May I gave a short presentation on my Daily Painting PPI to the Applied Positive Psych class at Sydney U. It went over very well, I think because mine had more pictures in it than other presentations, all of which were very good in my opinion but more cerebral and required more thinking. No one wanted to think because we were about to sit an exam and already had too much crammed into our brains. Thanks for your help Shirl! I learnt heaps about art and about me.

Mind Flowers 1

21x30cm Pencil - unfinished. After Shirl's advice I might redo this in pastel, or.... oil. But that will have to wait. Now I have to put all this together and present to the class at Sydney U. a poster of my expeience of this Daily Painting PPI and any benefits I've noticed.

Nobbies Head 3

21x30 cm pencil. Great using pencil again. I am still perplexed how the sky merges yellows directly into blues without a hint of green.

Nobbies Head 2

Pastel on 40x30cm board.

Nobbies Head 1

21x29cm water colour

Newcastle Beach 1

Pastel on board, 30 x 61cm.

Poppies 1

Pastel on 40 x 30 cm. board. I just loved doing this and wanted to go on forever playing with the hues.I prepared the board with dark blue gesso.

Kathmandu 1

Water colour on paper, 30x20cm. Bauddanath Pagoda near Kathmandu, Nepal. From a snap taken in 2002.

Tugboat 1

Coloured biro, 15 x 12cm. ... because there's no rules.

Sunrise 1

Watercolour on paper, 30 x 20cm. Sunrise at Newcastle on 3 January 2010.

Buddha Bird

Pastel, 40 x 28cm. Found my pastels. Found a prepared board. Then struggled to choose a subject. This was a snap I took inside a derelict monastery in Tibet in 2008. I loved the little bird, and the tell-tale straw from something behind the sign.

Newcastle Harbour 1

Watercolour on canvas board 25 x 20cm. A beautiful day looking out over the harbour to Stockton. Started without planning; wanted to do a pastel but couldn't find my new colours. So began using paint, then dscovered it was not prepared with gesso.

What is a PPI

Positive Psychology Intervention

My top VIA strength is 'Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence', but I'm neither confident nor competent as an artist. So I decided to create a PPI that will help me align my abilities with my strength, simply by doing a painting every day, posting it here and exposing it to critique from anyone. Please feel free to comment on anything that I post in the coming weeks.