Workshops and progress photos

My monthly workshops in the Gardens are going swimmingly with no shortage of participants. The full complement of 12 has been reached and surpassed every time, with a few on the waiting list managing to sneak in also.

The topic for September was "Tips on Composition" and there were many practicing artists or sketchers who attended.

The outdoor component was held in the Aboriginal Trail area just off the main road. Plenty of shade in this spot.

It was quite a complicated lesson but putting it into practice outdoors consolidated the concepts.

Perfect weather for working outdoors. 

Not a great photo of the sketchbook throw-down due to the shadows but it just started to rain slightly so people were scurrying for cover.

The drawing above was done in the City Botanic Gardens as I do try to spend some time each month there also. The trees there are older and thus much more established. You can see distant vistas also through the different grouping of plants.

I just couldn't go past this tortured specimen of a Fig tree just up from City Hall. It's not actually in the Gardens of course but the drawing is certainly inspired by others I have been working on that are.

Robyn Bauer sketching on location

Here I am working on my very long concertina sketchbook, the results of which will be revealed shortly.

Every part of the book has been drawn on location in the gardens.

A studio shot of a small part of the book.

Above shows several of the pages collaged into one photo.

Still working on others like these!

Weeks 5 and 6 including Workshop 1.

Robyn Bauer Workshop

Finally some welcome rain! Unfortunately though it was the day of my first workshop in the gardens. I had several contingency plans for light rain, heavy rain or just spitting. Luckily for an hour or so it held off and we could draw outside.

My first workshop was entitled "The Body Language of Trees" and we worked with charcoal.

We started in the seminar room for the overall teaching component and then headed to the Australian rainforest area and Aboriginal trail. Here are a few pictures from the day.

Robyn Bauer Workshop

Robyn Bauer Workshop

Robyn Bauer Workshop

Robyn Bauer Workshop

Robyn Bauer Workshop

Apart from the teaching, I have spent several days in the Gardens drawing on location as usual.

I am still formulating ideas about how these observations will translate into much larger works. I have started a couple. But in the meantime, still drawing. Drawing is the basis of everything.

Week Two in the Gardens

Everything living has its own momentum. Seasons change, weather shifts and things gradually alter. They grow, develop and eventually decay. Each of these phases can interest me as an artist. Week two of my residency in the Gardens, I spent a lot more time just looking and thinking. The initial excitement of getting out there and drawing as much as I could in a week has been replaced by a quieter sense of things fermenting in my consciousness. I am looking deeper and closer and finding lots of tiny botanical treasures on the ground that I have brought back to the studio to examine in closer detail. I have done quite a lot of walking and have been to parts of the Gardens that I had never explored before.

Robyn Bauer Botanical Drawing

My subject matter this week has been various materials found in the Australian plant areas.  All of these "bits" I have discovered, are in various stages of decomposition. The shapes are what interest me the most. Such diversity and all found within the one week of February.

Robyn Bauer Botanical Drawing

This one above includes a large Bunya nut and one of its spiky leaves. Other berries and pods are in various stages of drying out.

Robyn Bauer Botanical Drawing

In some of these drawings I have traced around the leaves and used colour to indicate my delight at my discoveries. I am in a sense, interpreting what I find through the filter of myself. They are responses to the plants and to the settings in which I find them. There is quite a bit of fine detail and some of these objects are tiny, such as the white pods at top right.

Robyn Bauer Botanical Painting

I have used a colour overlapping effect that one finds in the Garden landscape, while at the same time giving each object its own space. I hope this makes sense to people reading this, because the real analogy is my life generally.  To really give this residency my best shot, I have attempted to make space in my own life to allow the response and creativity to happen. I have made a few sacrifices and given up a few other commitments to allow this to take place and I am happy to do so.

Robyn Bauer Botanical Drawing

The one above is mostly about the flowering stenocarpus sinuatus. There are a few other silhouettes of leaves behind the realistically painted ones. I can't resist a bit of pattern making as well.

Robyn Bauer Studio Shot

Finally a picture of my table where I am currently working. I have some botanical and Japanese prints as inspiration above the collected green paraphernalia.

I am fully aware that I am trying different approaches, media and techniques before I create some larger paintings where hopefully it will all come together. I am happy to share this journey and this process. I have never been more fully aware of the true value of process over results. I think that if I embrace the fact that I don't know where all this will lead, it will lead somewhere truly unexpected and worth arriving at!

See you next week.

Gardens Week 1 - My new best friends

I can honestly say that I have hit the ground running with my Artist-in-Residency at the Botanic Gardens. I have been there every day and have done a sketch on location in charcoal. Obviously this involves sitting very still and being very quiet. And the wildlife have come up very close to check me out!

I don't know what sort of snake this is. Maybe someone can tell me? I could see about one metre of his body in the open.

This little guy was more persistent. I think he could smell the banana in my bag. He didn't get it though! Nothing would frighten him off, no matter how much I shuffled my feet.

There were dozens of these guys but they didn't come too close. Too busy scratching around.

I was happy to get a photo of four of these busy birds in the same shot.

And this rather well-fed guy was pretty good company in the City Gardens.

So these are all my new best friends! We will have to get used to each other.



I feel I am really being a witness to the Gardens and everything that is going on there.
To quote Mary Oliver (1935-2019)

"To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work"

I am being a witness from a space within my own imagination. I am also pursuing beauty and I am fortunate enough to be surrounded by it.

Robyn Bauer, charcoal drawing

I can chose a subject such as this textured trunk in on the Indigenous Plant Trail and while it is my main focus, everything around it opens up for me while I am sitting there.

Robyn Bauer Fig tree drawing

Most of the week I concentrated on Fig Trees and Australian plants while pondering possibilities of turning my responses into much larger and colourful paintings. Watch this space and these will eventually appear.

Robyn Bauer rainforest drawing

I chose a wider angle in this drawing and my main focus was the moving stream in the foreground. It was an extremely hot and humid day and hopefully that shows through too.

Robyn Bauer, tree drawing

This magnificent specimen is phaleria clerodendron which I spied in the Australian Plant Communities when taken on a guided tour by one of the head gardeners. It has tiny white flowers growing straight out of the trunk as you can see in the photo below.

phaleria clerodendron

I believe that because of the extreme heat we have experienced lately it is putting on a more elaborate show than usual. I used a range of ink dilutions to get the detail I needed in this drawing.

Robyn Bauer, Fig tree drawing

My final drawing for the week was another Fig tree, ficus sycomorus and it also has fruit growing straight out of its massive trunk. Quite thrilling to see and hard to believe unless you witness it.

I said in last week's blog that my reading was getting more scientific , but I haven't let go of poetry either.

Another quote from Mary Oliver -

"Let me keep my distance, always, from
those who think they have the answers.
Let me keep company always with those
who say "Look" and laugh in
astonishment and bow their heads." 

Well I'm pretty astonished at what I am finding and it is only week one! I have 51 to go!


I plan to update this blog weekly.