What I’ve Been Up To

Family Reunion in Malaysia

My biggest adventure since my last newsletter was a long-awaited trip to Malaysia. It is where my Dad is from, and where I lived as a child. Not only did a dozen of my family from New Zealand travel over to reunite with our family still living there, but we also reunited with family from Australia, Switzerland and the United States.

It was a time for connecting, for exploring, for relaxing, and for eating as much of the local food as we possibly could, including durian, crab, nasi lemak, papaya and char kuey teow.

It was also a time for reflection. Having lived between two countries and across five cities and four different schooling systems as a child, I’ve often felt a bit adrift and disconnected to place and culture. However, time spent with my extended family on this trip made me start to think that perhaps being diasporic is my culture – aunts, uncles, parents, cousins, siblings and great grandparents who have adventured across oceans, embraced different religions, learned different languages and enjoyed different foods. It is giving me lots to contemplate and I expect these ideas to make their way into my art.

Sketching

As the cricket season came to a close, I enjoyed sketching the players. At first I attempted to draw them from life but found it easier to take a few photos and refer to them. It still felt like a plein air experience, as I sat at the boundary amongst the gear bags and scoring books, listening to the batsmen calling to each other and the fielders appealing.

Workshops

It’s been a busy season of workshops, with regular lessons in my studio for a great group of wāhine, plus watercolour at Leeston and stamp carving at Lincoln. I absolutely love empowering others to find effective and enjoyable ways to create art.

Creating Art

What with the trip to Malaysia, the workshops and the general busy-ness of life, including a new part-time job concerning methane inhibitors for cattle (something completely out of the blue and a good challenge for me), there has been little time in the studio. However, I’ve still thoroughly enjoyed creating the two prints that I have, which you can see here.