Has been moved to my official art blog – a.k.a soulkyrie – THANK YOU!

Has been moved to my official art blog – a.k.a soulkyrie – THANK YOU!

Tonight I’m going to be whipping up a couple of flyers to post on the Community Boards in town to get people clued up and interested in the Simply ART Maungaturoto website.  Given my only real role in the arts community will be of the promotional kind, I don’t really as mind and I’m looking forward to getting the website up and running so artists can use it.

The whole idea for an arts website came about from two different angles, one being our coastal neighbors over the hill in Mangawhai and the other by way of a personal Art Gallery as I have mentioned before.  From my perspective, artists can never have enough support and promotion and this is where Simply ART Maungaturoto will come in handy for them.

So right now, I’m putting a little something something together and hopefully it will attract some interested parties!  I’m very keen to get our art folk on the map and out in public.  And on Sunday we have our very first Art Meet in Paparoa and if all goes well I hope I can make it so I can put the idea of a local arts website to all who are attending.

 

Things have been a little slow on the art front as of late but over the Labour Weekend I went and visited the Peoples Choice Exhibition by the Mangawhai Artist Association, held at Bennetts Chocolate Factory in Mangahwai Village to see what artworks were on display.  Albeit a small exhibit there were nonetheless some great pieces and as with all things some that were…not so great.  As is the way of the art world.

Before I even began to wander around and get a good look at what was there one or two pieces immediately caught my eye the minute I walked through the door.  A painting by Glenis Trueman titled – Untouched – was a rich blend of greens depicting an untouched piece of native bush or forest.   Glenis is a self taught artist who began her career and journey as a painter four years ago specializing in  oils and creating a diverse range of subjects – portraits, landscapes and still life.

While managing to drag myself away from her fabulous painting I came across a copper and wood three tiered water feature which was magnificent and I can honestly say would have made any person (including myself!) very happy to have in their back-yard as a center piece.  The feature was worth a total of $3,000 and quite rightly so it was a beautifully sculptured piece.  Unfortunately I lack the memory of who the artists were which irks me to the nth degree.

My 12 year old daughter was immediately taken by a sketching of two Tui’s while my 13 year old was also absorbed in the the paintng by Glenis Trueman.  My partner who was also a big fan of the Untouched painting.

One other painting of the acrylic / textured kind caught my eye was by artist Gailene Marsden, with its wonderful blend of colors, amid musical notes.

Our vote as we were all handed a small piece of paper to write our choice on went to Untouched by Glenis Trueman.

All in all, although the exhibition was small it was to browse the artistic talents of Mangawhai.  My only regret was I never had my camera with to take some photos for show and tell.  You can however visit the Mangawhai Artist Association for a glimpse at some of the artists and their work – www.mangawhaiartists.co.nz

Whoa ho!  So my “Call for Artists” may not have yielded any response but my asking for one phone number has, which is very cool indeed because Simply ART is about to move forward in a BIG way!  I’m very excited to have been talking on the phone with a local artist by the name of Anne Shanks who does paintings and Mosaic workshops and who is also very much involved in the art scene of Maungaturoto and along with others working toward getting it back on its feet.

For me, I get to promote all these people by way of the world wide web, something I’m totally keen on doing.  Promote promote I say!  I found out so many interesting things about many of the artists in town and in the surrounding area’s and the different kinds of mediums they are all into and I was shocked and pleased to find we have writers amongst us.  I’m literally in art world heaven!

For a place that is especially small there is a ton of artistic diversity, which as far as I’m concerned is positively brilliant because it will be that diversity and mixture of mediums that will give Maungaturoto’s art community a real boost, not only with the artists but those who choose to partake of the workshops, I hear, are going to be made available.  The art scene is not only for the artists but is also being aimed at the younger creative people or emerging artists of the town and there is one artist in particular I aim literally dying to meet and browse his work.

Otamatea High School student – Ron Archer, whose work in the future will take him to some very lofty heights.  With a fascination for a surrealism and a enjoyment of Salavdor Dali’s work, Ron Archer is an emerging artist to keep an eye out for.

Unfortunately I am not able to show you any of his work due to permission issues but I can give you a glimpse.  Click HERE (scroll down to page two) for a small taste of Otamatea High School student Ron Archer’s work.

So all in all, there is progress albeit small but it’s progress nonetheless.  Keep an eye out for the official launch of Simply ART Maungaturoto website!

Ok so my ‘Call For Artists‘ is yet to yield any responses from the local artists in this har fair town I live in…BUT ITS EARLY TIMES YET!!

I’m hoping to sweeten the pot a little and coax them out of the wood works by giving them what was going to be my own website and as time went on, what would have ultimately turned into my official Art Gallery website called Simply ART. Now I have both selfish and non-selfish reason’s why I’m doing this the selfish reasons being I want to meet people, curb the boredom and I want to hop on-board the gravy train that is Maungaturoto’s Art Scene, because I have heard little whispers that is really quite good.

Non-selfish reasons?  Well, it’s my way of helping out my fellow artist and as I know what it is like to struggle to get your name and your work out there to the general public and beyond and to give back to a community that has been completely awesome since me and my family moved here.  This town is full of people who love to smile, and are friendly and yeah…the list goes on.

So I will be tweaking the website to fit with the local art scene, and officially launch it in two weeks time to coincide with the Northland Lifestyle Field Days which is on the 7th November.  So here is a glimpse of what the home page will look like of Simply ART Maungaturoto.

Simply ART Maungaturoto
The little town on the hill

CALL FOR ARTISTS!

Okay all you creative people of Maungaturoto this call is for you! YES YOU! I know your out there, I’ve seen the awesome artwork hanging up in Tony’s Lotto Shop, seen it at the Maungi Market day and have been told about you from the locals.  I’m putting out a call for you!

I’m looking for artists that are interested in having themselves and their work displayed on the Maungaturoto Website as well as a new website that has been designed specifically for the creative talents of Maungaturoto & the surrounding areas.  Whether you are an emerging artist (like myself) or an established artist and whatever your medium is I would like to hear from you!

This is a great opportunity to get your work out there to the general public, meet other artists in the area, and maybe band together to form an Art Group or Association.  If this sounds like you then please EMAIL me for more details or visit the Maungaturoto website – www.realtownmaungaturoto.co.nz

Has been moved to my official art blog – a.k.a soulkyrie – THANK YOU!

An interesting conversation ensued about a month ago while darling hub and I drove to the local dairy to pick up a few essentials, about magazines. It was mainly instigated by myself and it was purely to see and hear what the hub had to say on the matter and much to my surprise he had a good deal to say! The conversation went a little like this…..

Me: If you had the chance to put together a magazine what would it be about?

Hub: I don’t know…about the country. Lifestyle living, that sort of thing.

Me: Yeah but what kind of stuff would you put in it?

Hub: You know, country stuff. Sustainable living, Whats the best tractor to use for this job, How to..You know stuff lifestylers want to know about.

Me: Oook. What would you call it?

Hub: What would I call it? I would call it…Country Folk!

Of course he was quite chuffed with himself and his idea and quite rightly so because it completely laid waste to my idea of a magazine I would put together and even made the name I had chosen look ten kinds of lame in comparison with his! So being of the female persuasion and the ever dutiful girlfriend I laughed and gave him a sky-ward eye roll. I love it when my man wows me with his intellectual prowess and sometimes I tend to forget that he is a country lad underneath it all.

This conversation ended up being a hot topic that we talked about well into the night and again, to my surprise I had fobbed off my idea for greener pastures – his! If you can’t beat them then what the hell…you may as well join them. It got to the point where I didn’t know who was worse, him or I. At some stage I found myself doing the usual online checks, trade mark checks both National and International and was pleased to find no such thing in NZ but a variant in the US. I had in my mind a complete schematic of the magazine layout, photographs, article writers, website designs, a couple of browsers open on how to start a magazine, while my hub happily rattled off all the different types of goodies he would have to offer to his readers. YES! He did say – his readers!

There was even talk of a center-fold spread for the guys show-casing the latest and greatest John Deere tractors, women in gumboots, an article on fertilizer and ride-on mower races! Hub was practically drooling over that idea and in my mind I could definitely picture men and their ride-ons gearing up for the big race, it made me laugh. It was a fabulous way to spend the evening listening to my man spouting out all these weird and wacky ideas the very next day I just had to register the domain name www.countryfolk.co.nz – just in case.

I don’t know boys and their toys!

Photo – ride-on racing from the Wetass Chronicles
article Kiss My Grass – by Tim Zimmerman