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A (little) Thursday pick me up...

I'm not sure about other countries, but in Australia this kitten is too young to drive...

An afternoon stroll...

It was such a fine day today that I went for a walk this afternoon straight after work. Actually, it is these glorious jacaranda trees that got me out the door. I have been meaning to photograph them for a while now and they seemed to be at their peak, blossom-wise, this afternoon! This one above is a beauty.

After that my boyfriend and I went for a stroll in the pretty afternoon light. I just love daylight saving - the long evenings are the best ever in my opinion! Below are a few of the sights we saw on our walk.

No walk is complete however, without the furry purry ginger tom running out for a tickle and hello just as you get home. I'm sorry these photos of Jaffa don't show his pretty face but every time I get the camera out he goes all shy! At least you get a good idea of his lovely plush ginger coat! You can't hear him purring though - he is spectacularly good at this!

Thank you to everyone for all the lovely comments about my work! It's very encouraging! ...and don't forget the COMPETITION!! It finishes on Sunday evening and on Monday morning I'll be using ye olde Random org thingy to choose who the winner is!

Happy Thursday/ Friday everyone!

YIPPEEE! It's Friday!!

 

Happy Friday one and all! How good does it feel? It makes me feel like dressing up like one of these eccentric Sock Monkeys! 

These images are actually from a mini-calendar / bookmark set I bought on my travels during the week. They are so fun and imaginative and full of personality. There's a different Sock Monkey for every month of the year. This is the link for the company teNeues that produced it.

...and pardon me for not visiting blogs and replying to comments - I've had terrible internet trouble but all seems to be well now!

I hope everyone has a restful and relaxing weekend!

Birthday Books (part II)

 

Here are another couple of books I got for my birthday. The image above is from Dali: The Impresario of Surrealism by Jean-Louis Gaillemin. Again it is a compact book full of his work and terrific photos of Dali at various stages during his life. It's great seeing all his work together - he really was the prolific genius in my opinion. There's also plenty of biographical info about him too from cradle to grave so to speak.

To the left is the cover and the painting on the right is one of Dali's with the impossibly wonderful title: Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bumblebee around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening, 1944.

The next book I am very much looking forward to reading. It's called Me Cheeta The Autobiography and it's by James Lever.

You remember seeing those old black and white Johnny Weissmuller Tarzan movies on TV in the wee hours of Sunday morning? No? Well a whole bunch of Tarzan movies were made in the 1930s and 1940s in Hollywood and the Cheeta of those films wrote this book (ahem). Anyway, it's supposed to be utterly hilarious and a gripping read! I'll let you know! The image on the Left is the book's cover and the one on the right is a painting by Cheeta called Study in Purple and Turquoise #6: 'Water'(2001).

I trust everyone is having a lovely restful and relaxing weekend!

P.S. The lovely Christina of Down and Out Chic is having a fabulous giveaway of Diana's (City Lights) photography! I suggest you hot foot it over there to enter!! Just think...you could win this gorgeous "Couch" print! 

Stefan and La farfalla rossa...

 

It's Monday!! Well, actually it's Monday night down here in Sydney. So here are two drawings I managed to do over the weekend: there is Stefan the rather pretty yellow birdie and below him there is La Farfalla Rossa or The red butterfly in Italian. Both are now in my shop as small prints!!

I hope everyone had a refreshing and relaxing weekend - very much looking forward to catching up with everyone's blog today!!

This is Max.

Max was the creation of master cartoonist and illustrator Pericle Luigi Giovannetti. Isn't that a wonderful name? Anyway, Giovannetti started drawing for the now defunct Punch magazine after World War One and launched little Max in April 1953.

Max was such a hit with his wordless pomposity and general shenanigans that Giovannetti even wrote several books starring the one and only Max himself.

(Image from: Non-Stick Plans)

Unfortunately, all the Max books are now out of print but I've been surfing Amazon and I think I might have found a second hand copy...

Here's another Max story:

Both cartoons are from the book: Punch, All Creatures Great and Small published by Prion.

Happy Thursday evening everyone - hope your weather is a little tamer than it is here in Sydney! I am currently listening to 100 - 120 kilometre icy gale force winds (blown directly off the glaciers of the Antarctic) rattle my windows! And to think last week was a sweltering 34 degrees!! Go figure!

What I've been up to...

Apart from drawing, I've been having a fine old time in Sydney town of late. Last Friday I went for a glorious walk (as previously mentioned in Shadow Shot Sunday) around the foreshore. This is a shot of one of the five or so charming islands that sit in Sydney harbour. This one is Shark Island. You can see the city behind it.Here's another (less romantic!) view of it:

Below is Strickland house. I was more or less standing in front of this historic and famous building when I took the photos of the island. Did you see Australia with Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman? Well, this is the house in the beginning of the film that everyone is running in and out of!

Apart from going for walks I've been reading. As readers of this blog might recall, I am head over heels about Mad Men. I remember watching it and the big big boss said he was reading this book:

So, being a good Mad Men follower I picked it up the other day when I saw it in my local book store. So far it's proving to be quite the ripping yarn! At 1168 pages long I think it will be keeping me entertained for a couple of days to come. I have been reading quite a bit of it recently because my internet service has been appalling of late and when it goes down I have been dipping into old Atlas Shrugged to fill in the boring bits! Thank you Ayn Rand for preserving my sanity!

Lastly, I'm not sure if anyone recalls seeing this series or not. I certainly didn't watch the first run of it on telly (1969 - 1970) but I adored watching re-runs of it in the 90s.

(Image from Manny the Movie Guy)

Be still my beating heart! UFO! A while back my boyfriend saw my eyes light up like pinball machines when we chanced upon the 26 episode box set of this piece of fantastic retro goodness in a favourite record store. He hadn't actually seen it but my "oohS" and "AHHHHs" were a good enough selling point for him!

It's a series set in 1980(wow!) about UFOs (obviously!) and a secret organisation called S.H.A.D.O = Supreme Headquarters Alien Defence Organisation. This organisation lead by Commander Ed Straker, seen here on the left, has the mission of protecting earth from organ harvesting aliens that are hell bent on - well, abducting humans...to...harvest their ...organs. It's pure GOLD!!! I read that they are even going to make a movie of it quite soon as Paramont have bought the rights and it will instead be set in 2020!

One of the best bits is of course the moon base and these ravishing gals in purple wigs that run it. Gosh! Below is the very cute Lt. Gay Ellis (Gabrielle Drake) and there she is again with one of her "men". I can't tell you how on the money and capable this woman is!

Finally I'll leave you with a link for the opening credits of this glorious show. I drive my boyfriend to distraction by whistling, humming and la, la, la-ing this theme tune at inappropriate times of the day. He's very good natured and puts up with it!

Here's the LINK!

 (Image of Ed Straker from Den of Geek, Lt. Ellis and the two gals from Original Rocket Dungeon.)

Happy happy joy joy - it's Thursday!!

P.S. Thank you everyone for all the Jeremy love!

The Four Seasons.

I finally completed Jeremy modelling the four seasonal looks for '09/ '10. You can find them in my shop from top to bottom: The Look this Spring, The Look this Summer, The Look this Fall, and The Look this Winter.

I think Jeremy has a big career ahead of him as an international catwalk model, don't you? I've already fielded some calls from Lagerfeld's people and really, when Lagerfeld says you're OK you're already on your way in my opinion.

Happy Hump Day all!

Dogs in Vogue.

While surfing the internet last night I chanced upon this delightful book due to be published on the 8th October: Dogs in Vogue. It has all the classic pup shots plus a whole swag of others. I love this one of Lee Radziwill (above) taken in 1960 with her pug Thomas. Here are a couple of others...

Aren't they gorgeous? I love the expressions on some of the pooches' faces - bless! They really are the stars! From top: Lee Radziwill by Henry Clark, Balanciaga hat by Henry Clark, Jean Shrimpton by Eugene Vernier, model and ball and dog by Gjon Mili, another Henry Clark and smart suit by Karen Radkai.

You can find more Dogs in Vogue here.

Happy Monday everyone!!

Warhol's cats, cats, cats!

It's another crazy Spring day here in Sydney. From 30+ during the week to blustery windy and chilly! Ah Spring! I think there's a Chinese expression which says something along the lines of "Spring is like a child's face". I think it means it's pretty changeable!

Meanwhile, I have spied an enormous Andy Warhol book in my favourite bookshop which chronicles practically everything he did throughout his career. I'm particularly drawn to his early magazine and advertising work. I think he had a terrific sense of composition. The book is incredibly expensive so I'm enjoying the more modest picture books that were given to me as a present a few years ago. These drawings here are all from the book "Cats, cats, cats".