A child sitting on steps looking out. I just adore this work of Margi Larlham’s. It was created from a photo of her when she was much younger. It reminds me so much of a photograph I have of Emily, her daughter, taken in 1982. Excepting this is a picture of the child from the front. I wrote to Margi asking if her painting was for sale. She told me she had already given it to her niece but sent me a beautiful print. It now sits in pride of place in my lounge.

Looking at her works online, I was both delighted and moved by what met my eyes. 

The spray of water jets towards you, making you want to duck!
This amusing yet masterful painting, Gleeful Spray, by Margi of her mother takes me back…back…back… to 1981 and 1982.

I was at University and I stayed in a cottage at the back of the Larlham’s garden. Margi was my movement lecturer and her husband, Pete, was my Drama coach. We became great friends and I adored their children, Daniel and Emily.

I loved the way Margi danced. She dipped, twirled and stamped her body into graceful spirals that leaped upwards towards the sky. Indeed she seemed to freely embrace the air around her. Jil Hirst was my other movement teacher and together they formed the Barefoot Dance Company. I found an old photograph of me and two other members doing a dance at a shopping centre with harmonicas in our mouths. Seeing that photo bought the taste of that Dance Company into my mouth, into my mind. I couldn’t help smiling.
I initially knew Margi as a dancer. It was only as I got to know her more intimately, that I discovered another side to her.
Margi was an artist.

In Margi’s first year as a student at KwaZulu-Natal University, she took a course in architecture. This simply blew her mind because she was introduced to the art of Cezanne, Picasso, Gauguin, to name but a few. Naturally she had heard of these creators but to study their paintings in depth was electrifying.
The seeds were sown!

Margi has restless hands that are never still. They need to be occupied. I often walked into her dining room and found her seated at her table sketching or painting. Apparently she began painting simple watercolours while her babies were sleeping. I have this image of Margi at 2 o’clock in the morning enthusiastically discovering the joys of watercolour whilst all around her the world slept.

“I think my painting was not a sudden decision on retiring but an ongoing process,” Margi said. “I took opportunities to learn more about painting in my free times. In between classes at KwaZulu Natal University, I attended a painting course at the Tech in Durban. Between semesters, visiting England, I did an Intensive Watercolour Course. While waiting for my green card in America, I took classes in the Art department at San Diego State University. For portrait and figure, I learned recently from master painters in short courses at the Florence Academy of Art. I now finally have my own studio in the garden – so I paint all day!” Margi finished with delight.

This was one of her first paintings. While at University, I remember Margi painting this chair with the pale mauve shirt thrown over it. I was totally amazed that such a simple thing could be made into such a beautiful creation. I remember their wonderful kitchen floor which comes to life in the painting. When I left to go overseas for six months, Margi gave me this painting. It now sits in my room and is a radiant part of my past.

About eight months after my fall, the Larlham’s returned from America where they had settled and came to visit me on the farm. Whilst there, Margi did this painting which she gave to me.

I call it: Two Figures. It depicts our farm with the clementines ready for picking. In the centre, are two figures. At the time, I didn’t understand the painting properly. I do now.
One figure is lying face down, her arms spread as if she has just had a fall. The other figure has her arm reaching towards her and seems to be running in a carefree manner, almost beckoning. I think Margi was painting the two Gaynor’s. The one that fell and the one whose spirit she knew. I am so fortunate that I am no longer the first figure, barely able to walk, talk and hear. I look at the painting and I think it was prophetic. The second figure has risen to take the first figures place.

Margi’s paintings are uniquely incredible!
This is what the eight year old Daniel from my past has grown into. There is an alert watchfulness about this beautiful portrait. It is done in pastel. As Margi says: “I love all art mediums but I seem to be more adept at pastel. It may be the old movement bias – holding the pigments in one’s hand and applying it in various energies – a dance on paper.” 

I love that! My eyes move on to other ‘dances’ of Margi’s.
I have often looked at the bark of trees and so wished I was able to paint. The colours are often indescribable to me. Margi feels the same way about her world. Only she is able to capture and translate onto canvas. Last year, during the Borrego Plein Air Invitational, Margi did a painting  in the Anza Borrego Desert. It was an incredibly intense week, painting from dawn till dusk. She created a wild and unruly whisky tree that flowers magnificently after rain. She was painting amongst artists of high renown and was totally delighted to win First Place.

Creative.
This word so aptly describes Margi. At University I was exposed to her imagination and vision. Her choreography was inventive and stimulating. I was in the first production for children that Margi ever directed, Old King Cole by Ken Masters. I played this hilarious character, Twoo, who was dressed in a long coat comprising of a mass of pockets. Everything came out of those pockets!
The Larlhams moved to California and Margi taught dance and directed numerous productions at San Diego State University. There her painting flourished, truly taking off when she retired from teaching.
She is one of those people who will be creative until the day she dies. She is made that way. What is so unparalleled is that she is creative in the friendships she forms as well. She and Jil Hirst had an unusual and unique relationship. I am just so sorry that Margi and her wonderful family now live in America.
I miss them all.

Maya Angelou’s words are so appropriate:
“You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.”

I look at ‘The Shirted Chair’ Margi’s first work and contemplate one of her latest paintings ‘Wild Spring’.
I marvel!

The post A Dance on Paper! appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.

We received this Facebook message from my sister, Liz, saying: “Look at this post. It says that a beautifully painted rock is in a ‘little coffee shop in York Street, George.’ 

You’re there! Please find it. It is just stunning!”

I looked at the picture and said: “Mums, that’s Beans About Coffee, I am sure of it. In fact, I often sit facing the ledge the rock is placed upon. Come on, let’s go and see if I’m right.”

We walked into Beans About Coffee and I instantly looked at the ledge where I thought the rock would be lying. It was completely barren and bare. 

“Can I help you”, Leese, my friend at the till asked.

A little sheepishly, I said: “Hi there, Leese, I am looking for a painted rock. I thought it would be sitting on this wooden shelf, but I was wrong.” 

My mother was not prepared to leave it there and bought out her iPad: “See, it looks like this. And it appeared as if it was sitting just there. Have you seen it anywhere in the coffee shop?”

Leese smiled and said: “I wondered what that stone was doing perched on the parapet. I don’t know who placed it there. Obviously it was waiting for the two of you,” she laughed as she reached under the counter and produced our purple flowered stone. She placed it into Mums’ cupped hands and we both marvelled at it’s artistic delicacy and finesse.

“This calls for two cafe lattes, please, Leese?” I said as Mums and I collapsed with relief at the nearest table. 

We studied the rock carefully. The decoration was stunning. It had purple flowers interspersed  with wonderfully painted dots. The dots varied in colours from yellow, green, mauve and pink.

On the back was written: # SVP Cape Town Rocks, Keep or Re-Hide.

It had a blue FB sign and next to it was written: Post a picture of it on FB.

We phoned Liz and told her. She was totally delighted.

“I am a member of Cape Town Rocks and that’s how I got to know about the rock hidden in George. Take a picture of you both with the rock and I will post it on Facebook.” 

We were so thrilled we had found this beautifully painted rock.

“It says on the rock: ‘keep or re-hide.’ Gaynor, I would really love to keep it. It will look magnificent at my 80 birthday party.”

“You keep it, Mums. It can be your 80th Birthday Rock!”

For the last couple of years, Liz has been painting stones. She ambles along beaches collecting pebbles of every kind. 

“The kids have got a school fete coming up. I have some free time and I thought I would see if I could create little rock animals they could sell.”

I marvelled at my my sister’s creativity. Big eyed hedgehogs and droopy eyed owls, busy bees and ladybirds, yellow faced stones with goofy grins and red faced stones with yellow noses and ebullient smiles. To this non painter, I thought they were magnificent. Other people did too. Her painted creations sold like hot cakes. 

Liz had told me that she was a member of Cape Town Rocks. Intrigued I ‘Googled’ them. What a delight awaited me. Their goal is to encourage creativity, being outdoors and community involvement. How many times, has my heart sunk at the sight of five friends clustered around an outdoor restaurant table with their heads buried in iPhones or iPads. Forget about conversation, laughter and enjoyment of each other. The media held far more relish and pleasure for them. Now here was an organisation that encouraged people to get outdoors, search for ‘treasures’ and on finding them, indulge in a glorious hiding spree. They also stressed the importance of tidying up the places where the rocks were hidden or found!

Cape Town Rocks was started by Barbara van Rijsewijk. At the beginning of 2017, she was preparing for the 100 Day Project which is a yearly creative project based in New Zealand. She thought that she would paint mandalas on rocks and that she would practice first. The practice rocks piled up and she discussed with her sister what to do with them. They decided to leave the painted pebbles in public places for people to discover by chance. They could then keep them or re-hide them. Surprisingly they discovered that rock painting and hiding was already happening in America and Australia. South Africa didn’t seem to have a site and that was how Cape Town Rocks was born.

I studied the back of our exquisitely painted jewel. At the top was written #SVP. Was that the name of the painter of our rock, I wondered. I discovered the answer on Cape Town Rocks. SVP was actually the name of Susan van Pletsen. 

Susan did matric art. Then she attended a few night school lessons. It wasn’t the painting that drew her but her delicious boyfriend who attended the same classes. All worked out well. Her art improved and the boyfriend became her husband! She was overjoyed when the Cape Town Rock group popped up on her Facebook feed in 2017.

“I love painting rocks, I find it a kind of meditation. I adore the joy the rock gives to a complete stranger. I always hope the rock is found at a time when the finder needs some happiness. The kind of rock that your mother and yourself found certainly ended up giving great happiness!”

Susan created this utter gem. I wondered whether she planned her painted rock on paper first? Susan laughed at my idea.

“No, there was no planning at all. I just started with a few flowers randomly painted on your rock and the rest flowed from there. It takes me about a week to paint an intricate rock, the size you and your mother found. This is mainly allowing for the paint to dry so that I don’t smudge it.”  

I just adore the creativity that goes into rock painting. My sister, Liz, came up to George for two weeks before my Mums’ 80th birthday party. Every day she worked on this pile of pebbles that she had collected on the beach. She used the images that Barbara van Rijsewijk has used on Cape Town Rocks. Painstakingly Liz copied the patterns and beautiful designs onto sixty of her beach pebbles. On the back of each stone she inscribed short, meaningful sayings. They were totally delightful! Next to each of the sixty place settings at Mums’ 80th birthday party, a painted stone was placed. People were able to take them home as a momento of her wondrous occasion. 

It was a marvel finding that beautiful gem of a rock painted by Susan van Pletsen. It formed the centrepiece of Mums’ 80th birthday party display. This was surrounded by Liz’s rocks. And Susan, I am afraid Mums is not giving her 80th birthday rock away. It means too much to her! 

Susan, Barbara and Liz formed a large part of the happiness that engulfed Mums on her 80th birthday. I am so tremendously admiring of such creativity. And I love the ‘giving’ that lies behind it. Creation and giving equals love. 
I thank you all, from the bottom of my heart, for the love you so freely gave away.

Speaking of ‘giving away’, I am going to take one of Liz’s beautifully painted pebbles and hide it. I don’t know where yet…….

The post Hidden Treasures! appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.

‘In the absence of sleep, my restless nights have been fuelled by my overactive imagination, weaving waking dreams onto the canvas of conception. Filling my head with lots of ideas waiting to be born into reality. I am eager to return to my beautiful mistress, Creation!’

Jaeda DeWalt

I love the sky.
Every night at about 10.30, I take Perdita, the Wire-haired Dachshund who shares my home, outside for her late night ablutions! I look up at the sky hanging luminously above me. So vast and wide. The stars seem to blink and glitter their acknowledgment of small, insignificant me. It is at that time that I always speak to God about my day. Last night I looked up in eager anticipation of seeing the twinkle in ‘God’s eyes’ but it was a cloudy night and the stars were covered.
“I see you’re wearing your sunglasses tonight, Lord,” my heart remarked laughing.

It’s strange how skies change in different countries. I have just been in Norfolk, England. There the skies are vast, wide and open. Clouds play a perpetually changing part. The sky is either cirrus streaked or else dotted with cotton wool hummocks that constantly glide into new ever changing patterns.

If I was a painter, skies would form a large part of my paintings.

In Norfolk, I met Sally Temple. In the 60’s, she would definitely have been a gregarious, fun loving hippy! She is Bohemian in her manner and dress. I liked this wide smiling person instantly. She was wearing this gorgeous straw hat which I coveted! She is an artist and her love of the changing sky is clearly evident in her work. As she says: “I love the sky. It is dramatic with the light always changing. So much scope for an artist!”

At college, her art teacher played an incredibly important role in Sally becoming the artist she is today. He blindfolded his students and passed them each a bag. In their bags were items like spaghetti, jelly, rags and mud. They had to put their hands into their bags and paint what they felt. Sally found this a marvellously liberating experience. There were feelings and emotions within her fingertips that she hadn’t been aware of. That day she began painting with her fingers rather than the expected sable brush. And she has never stopped. She had found her niche!

She went on to study art at university. Unfortunately her lecturer was a dour traditionalist in his teaching methods, being particularly keen on still life. I would hate to have to paint a still life. It has no vigour and energy to it. Unless I was Picasso. Then a jug, orange and a litchi can turn into items magnificent in their shape, colour and size! Sally is not Picasso. She found her creative juices were being stunted and impeded. In utter frustration, she quit her course.

Fortunately her aunt, a discerning woman, commissioned a painting from Sally. Tentatively Sally began. As she worked so a smile appeared on her face. She was doing what she was meant to be doing. Her fingers moved with an enervating joy. Her aunt was so delighted with the result that two more paintings were commissioned. Sally had lost her zeal for painting during the ‘still life’ period. Her aunt believed in her. And with this belief, she gave ‘the painter’ back to Sally. She began to paint with a vigour and an exhilaration that had been lost for a long time.

Sally looks on painting as a kind of therapy. The creative process involved in expressing herself artistically is often a healing process. It reaffirms her self esteem. She has become more aware of colours and shapes. She feels the world in a different way and is then able to transfer these emotions through her fingers onto paper.
“I find the painter, Turner, so inspiring. His use of light is breathtaking. I can learn so much from him. When people look at your work and come away with certain things in life reaffirmed or changed, then your art has accomplished it’s purpose. Change, reaffirmation, seeing with new eyes. Those are things that I hope to bring about in my work.”
One of the highlights of a recent exhibition, was the comment made by a visitor: “Your painting is very Turneresque!”
Sally felt she had finally arrived!

When I was 21 in England, I came across rolling hills peppered everywhere with an array of daffodils. Sally’s painting of yellow flowers beneath a massive sky, brought that long forgotten scene into focus with utter clarity. Wordsworth’s words instantly tumbled into my mind:

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Unfortunately that painting had already been sold. Or fortunately for my pocket!

From an early age, Sally’s dream was to be an artist. Today her beautiful pictures grace peoples walls. Dreams are vital to us. They are what make you wake up in the morning and try again. I believe that they are what make your whole life worth living. I remember dreaming that I would walk again when the doctors had given up hope. Today I walk with a limp but I am walking. I dreamed of going back onstage once more when I was unable to talk, walk or hear. Four years after my fall, you can only imagine the joy I felt bowing at the end of my performances. Sally has always dreamed of painting. So much delight has entered the world because of that dream.

Without our dreams we are nothing!

The post Sky Dreaming! appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.