Jinx in the Sky

News from Mr. Sir & friends

2012-02-23T21:35:00.001+13:00

A little update on our curious, naughty pigeons and their friends :)

Remember Mr. Sir & Belinda?

They're always around...

...wherever you look.

As of late Mr. Sir has been very interested in spiderwebs. At first I thought he's stealing the yummy flies in there...

... but then I found out he just enjoys eating whole webs! Belinda doesn't seem overly impressed.

She prefers the worms in the weeds...and the weeds themselves. Omnomnom!

When there's nothing left to eat outside they like to have a peek inside...

They've actually really been COMPLETELY INDOORS a few times now! At first they were very sneaky about it and left again before we saw them, however we did find some bird poo presents in out kitchen floor... %^@^&#*!
The next few times they were less secretive and Mr. Sir even bumped into the window twice when Hadley shooed him out. Luckily not with full force.
And last week he was just chilling in the middle of the lounge almost asleep. I calmly walked him to the door and then he flew out.
I never had the camera handy tho, either that or I was preoccupied with getting them out.

I never used to feed them until this little guy arrived and started being very loud begging for food.

I gave in a couple times and he remembered. Afterwards he always sat on the plant right beside the glass door peeking in, making noise, checking if I'm in there and when he detected some movement indoors (me getting some crumbs cause I was sick of his constant noise) he'd fly down to sit and wait right outside the bottom of the door.

Neverending chirping...

...until he gets something! Turns out he breaks the crumbs into even smaller pieces, then scoops them up to take them away presumably to feed his little ones :))))
That was a while ago now.

After Mr. Sir has collected all the sparrow's takeaway leftovers he likes to get comfy and nap.

Do not disturb :P

This big seagull is another bird that was a temporary resident on the roof for about a month. It liked to sit on top of the skylight and bang its beak against the window. The first time I opened the front door because I thought someone was knocking. It must've had a whole family up there or something because every day at the crack of dawn there was heaps of trampeling noise up there.

Glad it has moved on :)

See you next time when it's newstime again in the world of Mr. Sir & friends ♥

Camp A Low Hum 2012

2012-02-20T20:51:00.001+13:00

Through fortunate (but also unfortunate) circumstances Lucy and I were given free tickets to Camp A Low Hum! It's a 3 day festival amongst beautiful nature and you don't know what bands will be playing until you get there, but they're always interesting choices and there's something for everyone :D

We had our base camp (Cruizy Suzie the travelling home & my tent) at the best spot overlooking the small lagoon stage!

It all didn't look so bright when we first left Wellington trying to get there still during daylight hours (so we could have the van in the camping area). Lucy said "It's still sunny outside if you take the clouds away" which was true, on a sunny day it wouldn't have gotten dark so early :P
We got a bit lost but finally arrived with just enough light to set up camp when it started pouring down and we spent 2 hours trying to set up our awning. We finally got it up - both soaking wet when it stopped raining...$%^@#*&!

We wandered around the area in the dark and found the karaoke bus in which (at a later hour) we stumbled upon our new friend Damien the Devil's Dolphin (who will be mentioned again later).

The above 2 pics pretty much sum up the rest of the first night. A blur of lights/rain/fog/music. We retreated into Cruizy Suzie and stayed up talking until 5 am apparently the last people up in our area. All was quiet outside.

The next morning we were awakened by sunshine and the hauntingly beautiful voice and guitar melodies of Castlecliff Lights. By the end of the performance Lucy and I were so in love with her we both ended up buying the album ❤

Here's Lucy with Damien the dolphin :)
We lazed around our fortunate lagoon spot which at lunchtime always became the center of attention for the daily lagoon-party gig.

Another one of the outdoor stages set against a hill of fern trees.

Around the forest stage :)

Heaps of loud cicadas!

Drinkholder creativity :P

Waiting on the beautiful zodiac blanket while Lucy is pottering (new fav word) around the van making food for us <3

Yum!!

We ran out of rope...

Check out our spiderweb construction madness!

Lagoon sunset of the 2nd day.

Very much in love with Kirin J Callinan ❤

And night falls... it was freeeeeeeeezing cold both of the last 2 nights because there were no clouds trapping the warmth.

At least there were heaps of stars to see which I love because in town you never get to see them so much because of the city glow.
The red cloud thingie is me dancing in the sky.

Lucky we had Lucy's cozy home to retreat to with hot drinks :)

Day 3!

I went for a morning stroll and decorated our pole with my findings...

A makeshift slide was created right outside our spot!

In front of our base camp :)

Kikuyu playing at the forest stage.

We decided that Damien needed a leash!

Family portrait :D

Some glittering threads and orange flowers in the trees!

Damien was very excited...

And so was I :)

An eye for an eye. My new jewellery range is definitely waterproof now it survived this festival!

Damien crossing a bridge.

Me crossing the bridge. It's a very shaky one...

Oh hai!

Lucy = Kali

Me = huge insect chewing on something

We lay down in the afternoon sun under the trees of the forest stage and waited to see Glass Vaults play.

Found red glitter on a tree stump.

A girl with the coolest hat ever sat next to us.

I'll leave you with a lung of smoke. The camera battery went flat at this moment which was alright I guess. Gives you a chance to carry absolutely nothing around for a while and let go.

We loved camp! Definitely going again next summer!!

Weird & Wonderful # 27 INTERIORS special

2012-02-08T19:02:00.002+13:00

The Shark House (Mexico City/ Mexico)

Havana by Michael Eastman

Lenny Weiner's Apartment (NY City)

Nautilus House (Naucalpan/ Mexico)

The Pale Blue Door (various locations)

The Madonna Inn (San Luis Obispo/ California)

Wholeo Dome (Summertown/ Tennessee)

Havana by Michael Eastman

Alice in Wonderland Restaurant (Tokyo/ Japan)

Atlantis, the Palm (Dubai/ United Arab Emirates)

Bellesguard (Barcelona/ Spain)

Casa Batlló (Barcelona/ Spain)

Costa Rica Beach Tree Houses (Punta Uva/ Costa Rica)

Granny's Empire of Art (San Francisco/ California)

Hotel Fox (Copenhagen/ Denmark)

Hotel Tassel (Brussels/ Belgium)

And lastly some Gypsy Caravans:

"It's only the rain"

2012-02-08T15:33:00.001+13:00

So finally, this is the painting I did on top of the one I painted over recently... :D

I was trying to paint realistic looking waterdrops which was interesting. Each drop is like a 5 step process and it will look terrible until each drop is finished but I was even fooled myself with how real they look because at one stage I glanced at the painting quickly and thought "Damn, I've spilt some water on it!" :P

You can get a postcard of it too!

Some details for you:

She's wearing my jewellery :DDD

Progress :)

The original sketch. There wasn't even any rain yet...

Going bigger...

Paint spiral :)
This kind of spiral (like the Nautilus shell)is called a logarithmic spiral, is a special kind of spiral curve which often appears in nature.

"Paint, magic, paint!"
Tonight I'm going to an outdoors screening of Labyrinth in the botanical gardens yay!

Jewellery SALE! One week only!

2012-02-02T14:22:00.000+13:00

For one week only I'm having a jewellery SALE! Browse the selection here: Click!

The jewels are now water resistant too so you don't need to worry about taking them off when washing your hands :)

Here's Xoe with one of my eye rings! Boom!!

I've got large pendants now too to channel your third eye!

Gina wearing my eye pendant on her own chain :)

There's also horizontal pendants in store now!

Coloured light writing

2012-01-30T10:54:00.001+13:00

Found a colour-changing light and put my camera shutter to long exposure :)

Can you read my secret message? :)

"Etheral" Shoot + behind the scenes! ♥

2012-01-26T13:09:00.002+13:00

I was lucky to be part of a magical photo/ video shoot for hair salon Willis York!

Xoe & I were on set to cover the models (here our beautiful friend Gina) in diamante crystals!

Gina's hair being styled by Jordan.

Verity Griffiths (amazing woman!) touching up.

Team Bedazzles is recognizable by a diamante on the forehead :P

Spare time? Let's dye Xoe's hair purple with colour bug :D

... and bedazzle Gina again, this time the back!

Thinking about crystal placement :P

Voila!

We bedazzled the shaved sides of this model's head and as she was finished and the pics were taken she walked home wearing her normal clothes... with the CRAZY SPARKLY HEAD! ♥
(Gotta watch the videos below to get a better idea of the head)

Gina's second look by Martina.

The chandelier necklace I made from pieces my grandma gave me is in this look :)

Ok so you gotta see the videos!!! They're both equally amazing - shot by Benfo!
First one is the making of/ behind the scenes. And then "Etheral":

When a white canvas turns... WHITE! :(

2012-01-25T14:12:00.000+13:00

Sometimes things don't work out and we have to deal with it. It was never the case for me on such a large scale but it happened with a recent painting of mine...

It was 3/4 finished but I didn't feel that it was working. I hated the colours and all of a sudden the passion was gone. The painting didn't have a meaning to me anymore which is something I can't deal with. I started on it being inspired by armadillos, who are such cute, weird animals. And then I had this whole idea for elaborate hair of an outlandish queen...

...see?

I even took progress pictures, which I haven't done in a while.

I mixed colours...

Made a huge mess... ate where I painted...

But the painting lost its soul and I lost my trust that it would ever mean anything to me. (sometimes paintings unravel their meaning to me in the process). It all seemed to superficial. Yes armadillos are cute and yes I love crazy hair, but It wasn't what I wanted anymore. Plus I had another painting idea that was burning inside to get out on a large canvas. This canvas (so I was told by the art shop) was the last of it's kind and they'd stop making them. And I LOVE this kind of canvas so I didn't want to waste it on something meaningless... and I put white gesso all over it and started again with a new painting. Stay tuned :)

DIY: Bedazzled Detachable Collar

2012-01-23T09:40:00.001+13:00

I've seen a few cool detachable collars floating around the internet lately such as these.

While it's not rocket science here's a few steps and tips on how I did mine:

You'll need:

- A collar: Cut it off an old shirt or buy an old shirt for $1 from Salvation Army or so :)
- Rhinestones, diamantes or whatever else you wanna stick on it
- Strong glue of your choice

- a pencil and a cottonswab (optional)

It pays to play around and think about your design before you stick stuff on. I discovered these green leaf shapes and thought I wanna make flowers!
But if you're more a spontaneous type just go wild and see what happens :)

With a pencil I marked where I wanna put my design to make sure it fits.

You can place a drop of glue on the back of the rhinestones or...

...place glue on the fabric first and then add the rhinestones. This is less fidgety but it also means you'll have to work fast or the glue will dry.

For applying the tiny ones I first drew a line of glue on the fabric, then wet a cotton swab slightly on one end to pick the rhinestones up with and set them onto the glue. Easy!

I also bedazzled the bedazzles in the middle of the flower :)

Let it dry for a bit and ---- Done! You can go party :D

Bedazzle Test Shoot

2012-01-19T15:44:00.000+13:00

A while ago Bex and I had a little play with diamantes on my body.
We were testing the sparkles for a super magical photoshoot which will be revealed very soon :)

I look like an alien in this one :P

In front of Glitter Bowie by Xoe!

The background is actually the wallpaper at Willis York that looks like draped silk :)

Taupo, Mt. Maunganui & Napier

2012-01-16T23:37:00.003+13:00

A few pics of our week-long trip to Taupo, Mt. Maunganui & Napier...
featuring Noah's Ark, floating rocks and lots of wine :)

Some guy on the streets of Tauranga had a big sign saying "New Zealand's first 1:90 scale model of Noah's Ark" and there it was spread out on the table in front of him with dinosaurs (!) walking up the ramp. I asked what's up with that and he said according to some people's interpretations of the bible dinosaurs and mankind was created on the 6th day. O_o

Inside they all have their own little boxes. Look at the tinytiny doves! :)

Then we stayed in Mt. Maunganui near THE Mount itself but we had shit weather and no swim was taken in what would've been the coolest beach otherwise :(

Others still had fun until it got really bad the next day, heavens pouring down and we retreated to the cinema to watch Tintin in 3D which was cool! You should watch it! So much animation detail it's insane! :D

Then on the 31st we took the bus to Taupo with the hugest lake in the southern hemisphere (i like saying that). Look it's maaassive!

The weather there was misty/rainy most of the time. This is beautiful Whakaipo Bay.

Love black swans!!

Grumpy face...

Happy face... :D
My new years eve outfit: Vintage dress from a shop in Martinborough where the whole house is practically for sale. And beaded foot bracelets handmade by a girl in Taupo.

Whakaipo Bay on a nice hot day :D

Volcanic rocks called "Pumice" can float on the water :)

Another day we drove through mountain fog over to Napier/ Havelock North.

There's lots of vinyards there so we had a few tastings :)

Napier itself got a nice Art Deco flair and beautiful flowerbeds :D

Virtabrae?

As we stopped the car and I got out to take some pics of this awesome, dilapidated house a large dog approached me from the next house. It came closer and I didn't think anything bad because I had never had any bad expieriences with dogs before. I got back into the car and we slowly drove off when the dog suddenly attacked the car! He jumped into the side - and ran off again!! I'm glad I was back on the inside!

Cool Indian restaurant in taupo! Love the chairs! Food was good too!

Picked up a leaf that looks like wood grain :)

Found this cute baby mantis and after taking pics I put it on a nearby bush. 10 minutes later I felt something crawling on my shoulder and it was back!!! I swear it was the same one, same size and all :D

Weird & Wonderful # 25

2012-01-15T23:02:00.001+13:00

Detail of one of the mysterious paper sculptures left behind by "The Library Phantom" See more here!

Amazing beetle fossils: More info here

Erika Nakao and her crazy nails :)

FieldCandy tents: More

Jesus and Virgin Mary Toasters: Click

Sad but such a strong photo so I'm posting it: "A 22-year-old woman in a wedding gown is grabbed by Guo Zhongfan, a local community officer, as she attempts to kill herself by jumping out of a seven-storey residential building in Changchun, Jilin province May 17, 2011. According to local media, the woman tried to commit suicide after her boyfriend of four years broke up with her, just as they were making plans to get married. The woman did not sustain any injuries during the incident."

This crystal is a PAINTING! By Carly Waito

Walter Dymond, groundskeeper of Harold Lloyd’s estate, Greenacres, with the Lloyd Christmas tree.

Saoirse Ronan Photographed by Steven Meisel for the December Issue of Vogue Click for more pics

Random other headlines of the weird & wonderful world:

Biggest daytime fireworks show ever

Albino rarity: Glowing white snail

World's biggest insect can eat a carrot

Mixtapes of 60ies & 70ies music

Charcoal

2012-01-15T22:31:00.000+13:00

Sorry for the lack of art updates... had a major mishap.
However I found some charcoal pencils in my drawers...

Rainbow kite flying @ Oriental Bay

2012-01-12T14:59:00.000+13:00

One morning after a stormy night a kite was gifted to us by the wind.
It had landed on our deck overnight. It's Sandra's last week in NZ (I'm in denial... so used to her being here by now) so we took "Fridolino" the kite to the beach on a windy day :)

We walked through town like this, "Fridolino" flying behind/ in front of/ beside/ into us (and other people)...

Where did the wind go?

People were taking photos and grabbing "Fridolino's" tail :P

I was planning on giving it to some kids afterwards but a part of the fabric broke and so I wanna fix it first and then give it away...

X-mas, the New Zealand way

2012-01-09T19:48:00.000+13:00

For X-mas day Wellington had the most wonderful, hot weather so we spent lots of it at the beach :)

Before X-mas Sandra and I made some Austrian X-mas Cookies: Vanillekipferl

But the task was harder than we thought. Online converters were of no use (it's a long story) so we tried all sorts of other measurement options... Which item in the above picture is the odd one out? :P

Yep... I was trying to measure gramms of sugar with a ruler at one stage... we ended up calling a friend who brought round his scales so we could use gramms instead of cups. :)

Finished! They look like my tattoo!

We ate all the Vanillekipferl before X-mas though and so we made some rum balls (and Sandra's mum sent us some more yummy homemade Vanillekipferl from Austria. Crazy they made it through NZ's biosecurity checks!)

After eating heaps of food and drinking even more we headed towards the beach...

It wasn't long before we hit the water!

The evening was spent by the tree with the swing, which is now a proper swing again :)

Then we lay underneath the big fairylight X-mas tree in Waitangi park and enjoyed the colourful display.
Nicest X-mas ever! Thanks to awesome weather and friends!

Days of glitterdazzle fun with the girls :)

2011-12-22T22:45:00.002+13:00

"Got any holy bibles" I asked several vintage book stores and found a cool one which I then bedazzled.
Bibles are so surreal, I wanna read the whole one one day...

Got a few photos piled up from the past weeks! Here's Xoe and I showing of our MORTAL GODS gang patches.
It's Xoe's awesome clothing label taking off soon!

Gina, Xoe & I have magic gold ring powers!

At a cafe the other day I noticed a suspicious reflection in Xoe's sunnies...

...of these babies!! Xoe and I are obsessed with covering stuff in jewels and/or glitter :P

Found some cool scarfes at Emporium and turned them into quick turbans :P

Girl artist gang <3

We went to Hit the White and I wrapped myself with fairylights :)

My bible is for sale there btw!

2 of my rings places on top of someone elses necklace look like a little frog face :P
Hit the White pop up shop is open only 1 more week so check it out quick!

Bedazzling some sneakers...

And the heels of someone's Lita's! I wanna keep them!

I leave you with a random photo of one of my crystal balls...

...and my rainbow glitter manicure :D
(The thumb is supposed to be lime green but the camera didn't pick it up)

*** Merry Xmas! ***

Photoshoot on Mt. Victoria

2011-12-20T10:09:00.001+13:00

Had another photoshoot with Glenn McLelland. This time on Mt. Victoria :)

Getting ready...

HIT the WHITE opening night pics

2011-12-14T15:54:00.003+13:00

HIT the WHITE opened its doors last night. When you walk in you don't know where to look first, there's so much to see! Above is Jade Weaver and one of her cool ceramics ♥
Take a look for yourself:

Couldn't resist taking home one of these babies :)

Carol Brent with her works <3

Love the decorations...

...and the glittering floor!

It was too busy to do live-bedazzling that night but I did some today: I bedazzled a Holy Bible and parts of a sneaker. Tomorrow will be more! I'll be there around lunchtime. If you have something you'd like me to cover in rhinestones bring it in! :D
Corner of Victoria St and Manners St next to the old post office.

Mr. Sir & Belinda

2011-12-08T20:41:00.000+13:00

Let me tell you the story of Mr. Sir & Belinda, the 2 pigeons that have been living on our building since we moved in 3 years ago...

I went through some old photos I took of them back in 2008 to see if they were actually still the same pigeons and YES they are!

Belinda on the left here is easy to recognize because of the big white spot between her wings. Mr. Sir has more of the the "typical" pigeon colouring but he's always with Belinda so I always know it's them :)

They were just always around and I decided to name them. I remembered 2 kids I used to look after in Auckland and the random names they made up and one of the names was "Mr. Sir". It seemed fitting and a friend of ours who's also quite a fan said he probably wears a top hat when we're not around. According to him he also has a miniature bottle of whiskey that he carries under his wing.

They had a little hideaway in the drain pipe under the deck. :)

They do this all the time... it's hilarious!

They love spying on us through the window...

...and think we don't notice.

Last year we moved into the next door flat and... they did too :D

Mr. Sir napping with the top hat on. Our friend is constantly thinking of how to catch pigeons and to glue top hats onto their heads. I had a bit of a google and found that someone else has given this some serious thought :P

"Ooh piece of fooood, ooh piece of fooood, ooh piece of fooood, ooh piece of fooood..."

Today they were very interested in the pot plants on the deck o_O

Mr. Sir getting suspicious of me behind him.

Belinda hiding in the leaves.

Mr. Sir's uncle runs a small public transport company. Very environmentally friendly: it runs on bread crumbs. :)

Also: Mr. Sir likes to switch gender roles when it comes to certain things: Check it out

Photoshoot on the wild south coast ♥

2011-12-06T14:27:00.002+13:00

On a very windy day Glenn of www.supersharpshooter.co.nz took some photos of me around Island Bay. So much wind but also so much fun! :D

Check out my chandelier crystal necklace. I made it from pieces my grandma gave me in Austria.

Log lady :)

I made that see-through skirt by the way :)

Weird & Wonderful # 24

2011-12-06T11:04:00.004+13:00

A collection of weird and unusual USB drives: Click

Some cute identical twins. More about them here.

Watch the whole video of this dance here.

Above 2 via street art utopia

Baby dik-dik :)

A bizarre underwater "icicle of death" has been filmed by a BBC crew. Click.

Amazing make up skills: Watch Part 1, Part 2

This is carved into a pumpkin!! More here.

This castle is made from paper! More here.

The theme of this art exhibition was to recreate your childhood drawings. This one is by Harmony Gong.

Overstocked with a large supply of men’s spring and winter coats, a clothier in Copenhagen, Denmark, adopted a unique sales scheme. He erected a scaffolding around his store building and completely covered it from roof to sidewalk with more than a thousand overcoats. The novel display attracted prospective customers in such droves that police were summoned. Although the police ordered the proprietor to remove the display, he succeeded in selling all the overcoats.
Source

Screenshot from the beautiful film "Hedgehog in the fog" Watch it below:

Some cutesies:

My art as jewellery!

2011-11-29T15:46:00.001+13:00

I'm very proud to show you what I've been working on lately:
My art as jewellery! I've got rings and necklaces featuring
some of my most popular paintings :D

You can see every detail. I love how the bunny stares out of the ring :)

The green eye ring is a detail from "Lenja and the truth" and I've
made a purple one to go with the sister painting "Luella and the secrets".

The necklace chains are adjustable and you can even make them shorter than shown here.

If you wanna check them out in person I'll be selling them at the Mighty Mighty Market in Wellington this weekend 3rd of December together with some prints and postcards. Come say hi! I'll be sharing a stall with Xoe who will have art and awesome clothes for sale :)

For prices and more info click here!

New Postcard design!

2011-11-28T15:16:00.001+13:00

Added 1 new design to my artsy card collection. I painted it 2009 after a dream about my grandma collecting tiny bunnies in jam jars. She sprayed them with perfume and each one smelled like different types of jelly beans. When Grandpa wasn't around she'd let them out to hop round the house :)

My XMAS SALE is still on: Click

"The unforgiven"

2011-11-23T17:16:00.001+13:00

Click for larger

Our lifes are a big pond. Over the years stuff gets thrown in and it stays there until we forgive. It's hard sometimes to understand why people do the things they do. What turns them into monsters. We're all just humans in the end who come and exit through the same door. Don't make your pond a junkyard. We can all try.

Detail shots below:

"The unforgiven"

2011-11-23T17:16:00.000+13:00

Detail shots below:

"Beauty meets the Bizarre" Show this Weekend!

2011-11-17T14:20:00.001+13:00

Exhibition opens this Saturday the 19th at 3pm in Devonport, Auckland!

Click to view my contributions below:

They'll be for sale for $500 single but if you can give
both of them a home it's only $800 together!

Interested buyers contact me (theirea@gmail.com) or the gallery :)

Kaleidoscope Valley

2011-11-16T19:41:00.000+13:00

It's snowing in Kaleidoscope Valley...

I recently expanded my kaleidoscope collection. Many things live inside my latest addition...
Can you see the Viola flower in the middle? The edges of the image are guarded by red dragonfly eyes...

A lions head pops out of the circus tent.

Paua shell pieces surrounded by evil ice-blue cat eyes lurking in the dark corners...

What do you see...?

:D

Weird & Wonderful # 23 HAIR Special

2011-11-16T10:29:00.001+13:00

A lot of these are from here: Link

11.11.11 Art on the beach

2011-11-15T09:59:00.000+13:00

After an insanely curvy bus trip through windy mountain roads Sandra and I (and our
shaken up cider bottles which fell and lolled around the bus freely) arrived at Princess Bay.
The date was the 11.11. 2011. It was an exhibition by Tyrone McCarthy (Boltorious) on the beach!

His annual exhibitions always take place on dates like 09.09.09 etc.
This was the perfect day for it with lots of sunshine :)

This was a favourite of ours. We see a devils head
looking down with dark eyes. Can you see it?
Eyes start in the lower middle of the picture.

Brought along my huge hat to protect myself from New Zealand's ozone hole...

Snow capped south island mountains in the distance <3

Sandra is queen of the rocks :)

Trying to get down again :P

:DDD

We were given spare art materials so we created some arrrt!

Sandra and I collaborated on this ~~Axylotl~~ Axolotl in a cave.
Later that night it took on a much different look but I forgot to take a photo...

Found some sea treasure for an upcoming project :D

A paua shell the size os Sandra's face!

It was getting a bit chilly and due to a lack of warm clothing we decided to head home.

Nice views of Lyall bay on the windy mountain bus trip homewards :)

Xmas Postcard SALE

2011-11-07T15:35:00.002+13:00

I'm having a Xmas Postcard SALE!
If you get 3 or more they're NZ$ 2 each plus free shipping worldwide!

To view the selection click here!

To order email: theirea@gmail.com

Paypal welcome for international orders :)

Dream paintings

2011-11-02T13:55:00.003+13:00

As you know sometimes I need a break from my usual technique and I just paint quite loosely and fast. This time I had a flip through this years dream journal and painted a few scenes. It's the closest I can get to taking photos of my dreams :)

Dream 1: A tower of deer

I was leaning against a towerlike structure in the middle of a downhill sloped field. There were lots of people, most of them coming down my way. I was starting to climb the tower when I noticed it was constructed of live deer - their legs tied to each other with ropes. They were rather uncomfortable. As I climbed higher the tower was also climbed on by other people. Among them were also a panda, a giraffe and as I reached the top I even saw an elephant sitting up in front with more people on it. The people on top of the elephant bowed to the crowds below and shortly after the whole animal-people tower collapsed and everyone landed on the ground.

2 MORE:

Dream 2: Bees & dead flowers

I was walking through a field of tall grass in which people lived in futuristic tents. I marched through the grass towards a big pile of dead flowers. All of a sudden I found myself right in the middle of it trying to get out and everywhere I looked there were lots of bees hovering around the dead flowers.

Dream 3: The horse walked through the window

Xoe had bought a new sewing machine and asked me to help her work it. So we went to her place which was a little wooden hut and sat down. An old lady who also lived there came and gave us each a big green ring so we could work better. I started threading the machine and after a while the mechanics of the machine turned into saddle straps and all of a sudden I was threading a big horse! We then went into my old room and opened the window. Outside it was night and lots of people were in the garden having a party. We let the big horse walk through the window and it ascended into the night sky.

Also: I will have a Postcard SALE coming up soon in time for X-mas!

Weird & Wonderful # 22

2011-11-01T16:38:00.001+13:00

NGC 7635, also called the Bubble Nebula :)

1925

The Isolator is a bizarre helmet invented in 1925 that encourages focus and concentration by rendering the wearer deaf, piping them full of oxygen, and limiting their vision to a tiny horizontal slit. The Isolator was invented by Hugo Gernsback, editor of Science and Invention magazine, member of “The American Physical Society,” and one of the pioneers of science fiction.
Source

Art by Ernst Fuchs

Art by Vladimir Kush

Halloweeeen!! :D

2011-10-31T10:36:00.001+13:00

"Come as your favourite DEAD singer" was the theme
of the Halloween party of our choice this year :D

Before I got my costume on we kicked off the night at
Most Wanted Vintage's Party! Joining me was Michael Jackson...

...and Kurt Cobain, here with Amanda :)

I borrowed someones awesome helmet!

Tannia and Xoe looking sad because the buckle of Xoe's new shoes came off...

Then we got ready for the dead singers party! A mess of cool stuff on my bed :D

Being Austrian I thought I should be Falco (dressed like
in the video for Rock me Amadeus) for the night :D

Xoe did an awesome job turning into Freddy Mercury!
That glitter bodysuit is quite an accomplishment!

She also made the crown from scratch!

The shoe buckle was fixed yay! Outfit complete with the "Another one bites the dust" cape :D

MJ Gina moonwalking ♥

Off we went to the party at Meow...

Polter was playing in Zombie attire, make up done by Xoe, see below:

Sandra having a blast :D

I found Mozart!

Cuuuuute ♥♥♥

Some more outfits, not everyone dressed for the theme as it happens when parties mingle...

A casual midnight stroll around Wellington :)

What did you dress up as? :D

Gypsies, tramps & artists

2011-10-27T11:46:00.000+13:00

It was Dave's birthday and I was invited to visit his and
Xoe's amazing 70ies house. While there, 2 friends and I
got sidetracked into the timewarp of Lucy's gypsy caravan...

Everything in there has sentimental value.

The sky mural was done by sister Xoe. If you look
closely there's a yellow plane flyine across it :)

Gina and myself in the back of the caravan, forgetting the meaning of time, day and night...

Finally we returned to the house - here's Xoe with one of her paintings.

The whole house is filled to the roof with art!

Wizard of Oz Colouring In Book! :DD

Xoe's glitter collection, which she uses to bedazzle many of her glitter pop art paintings.

A special type of glitter from I think Spain(?)

She turned Ken into Bowie with glitter pants! How cool is that?!

Harry looking at the stars...

More colourful hair :D

2011-10-26T10:28:00.001+13:00

I recenty got my OWN clip in hair extensions...

I got some blonde ones which I coloured with colourbug :D

Some I dyed red which is cool for when I've freshly dyed my hair and its very vibrant!

I will also have pastel coloured hair for my Halloween outfit
(theme is "come as your favourite dead singer"...you'll see
shortly) but I've bought a wig for that, which I dyed yesterday
using a very diluted mixture of acrylic paint and water.

The cat returns (and Samantha too)

2011-10-25T11:12:00.001+13:00

Samantha is moving to Australia in a few days so she came
down to visit one more time. We turned into mermaids and
did all sorts of other fun stuff :D

On muddy paths we walked up Mt. Vic to the big white tree with the ~~swing~~ rope.

Indulged in eating some strawberries...

The glitter earring Sandra and I found and put up on the tree's bark last
time is still there. I want people to add their random glittering objects! :D

I love this photo! Princess Samantha is looking out the window of her tree castle <3

Further down hidden in the tall grass some guy was ~~singing~~ chanting
and playing unplugged on his demonic looking e-guitar...

We made eye contact as we left the hill :P

We found this cute treeface smoking away as we walked down. :)

I want a big tree in my garden if I'll ever have one.

Found this old Mercedes in Mt. Vic. My grandpa had the same model when
he was still alive. I used to be freaked out by the batman/ devilish looking
headrests. When you're a small kid looking at the car from behind against
a light background it looks like 2 devils are sitting in the car. :P

Mural by Drypnz

I found the same wallpaper I have on my livejournal
blog looking in the window of this little cafe!

There was a cute kitty! :D

So it was predestined that we watched "The Cat Returns" that evening.

Sam has magical teapot earrings... They pick up colour code signals from outer space.

We made papercuts...

My one looks like a little angry forest gnome :P

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another day I took Sandra for a walk. This very touching memorial plate
for a tree can be found on the edge of the parking space on Waiteata Rd.

Everything was flowering :D

A magician kid wavies its hand and a huge bubble appears!

I tried it too with the use of sticks, a rope and soapy water :P

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On Sunday it was the final of the Rugby World Cup which has
brought many tourists into this country for the past few weeks.

Bex fishbraided my hair while we watched New Zealand win against France :D

Town was crazy afterwards!

Sydney & Gold Coast

2011-10-21T10:08:00.001+13:00

After Singapore we arrived in Sydney, stayed with friends
for a couple of nights and then headed to the Gold Coast.

Cool mural in a Sydney bar!

My friend the painting and I :) Check out my grumpy cat dress I got in Singapore :P

Kerrin is king of the castle!

Went for dinner at this place - I forgot the name- but it had a cute flower/ bottle arrangement :)

Bye bye Sydney!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Gold Coast/ Surfer's Paradise from the plane. Awesome
long white beach, sadly too cold to swim at the time...

Went on this ride at Dreamworld! It scared the shit out of me.
At 119 m it's the tallest and fastest drop tower ride in the world.
When it was over I really had to fight the urge to hug the
person next to me I was so overwhelmed we had survived!

This one was cool!

Find me! I'm hiding behind my hair :P

Some crazy birds chasing each other, also at Dreamworld.

Snkeaking up to a little Kangaroo <3

First Koala I've seen with my own eyes, awww cute!

I LOVE this bird! I saw it for the first time in a park near the
hotel and said "WTF? An ibis? I thought they live in Africa?"
They're very common there though and scavenge food, like pigeons.

So this sign cracked me up! Do not feed THE ibis! As if there was
only 1 naughty little bird sneaking around begging for peoples fries.

On the 77th floor of the Q1 tower!

I look a bit grumpy because I lost my favourite item of clothing of all time
at Dreamworld. My black leather jacket that I had since I was like 17 and
I wore it so much, it had so many memories attached and also a brand new
strong zip sewn in when I was in Austria which I worked hard for sorting a
billion zippers as a trade for having it put in by a leather specialist.
I had a bit of a cold and while waiting for the bus outside Dreamworld I didn't
want to sit on the cold metal so I put down my jacket. When the bus came I got
on without it... about 40 mins later, near the end of the ride I realized and started
crying like a baby. We called the lost and found and the bus company but noone
had dropped it off. I had some of my business cards in it so whoever fucker tracked
me back and didn't say a word can go to hell. I bet he/she doesn't even fit it or
need it or really like it like I did and it just sits there in someones closet.

I'm still so sad about it... I even had a dream that I got it back and it
was the exact one and I was so happy until I woke up :( I get reminded
of it everytime I see someone wear a cool leather jacket. I've
looked for some new ones but found nothing like it yet.

Bye Gold Coast! Probably won't return so soon...

Singapore Pt. 2: Of cute birds and glowing lanterns

2011-10-12T20:44:00.001+13:00

It looks like I've got fairy wings in this photo! Totally accidental and I love it!
Oooookay this is the second part of our time in beautiful Singapore:

Went shopping! One of the cool spots to shop in Singapore is Haji Lane,
a little alley loaded with the cutest boutiques ever! Most of them have got
tiny stairs - often wildly decorated- leading up to a second floor.

One of the boutiques had 2 cats that live there :)

Best lemon iced tea I ever had!

This cool mosque was also around there. It's a bit misty in that photo,
but it only rained twice for about 5 minutes the whole time we were there
despite the forecast being: thunderstorm, thunderstorm, thunderstorm,...

Then we found a cool secondhand shop in the basement somewhere on Ann
Siang Hill, where amongst other things I bought the shirt above which has a bloodthirsty
monster's face on it (but you can only see the eyes in this pic, blah) but it matches
the sticker on my beer, which they stuck on the bag my clothes were in :D

Wanderlust hotel has some crazy rooms (also crazy prices for the coolest ones of course).

The offerings for the gods contain fried noodles, cans of beer and coke, lollies...
I think most of it gets eaten by the stray kitties of Singapore when noone is looking. (Or
like my mum said when I told her: "Sie leben von der Götterspeise" Only funny in German)
They make an alright fed impression (unlike the ones I've seen in Italy or so...)

Delicious desserts at an Indian restaurant <3

This photo is for you Pia :)

We went to Jurong Bird Park where they have amazing orchid arches as an entrance!

They had lorakeets which you could feed. They're the same sort that
came to our house (and sat on my head) in Jervis Bay :)

Checking if theres any more in the cup? Hmmm? :P

Had some drinks and headed out into town...

First stop: The famous Raffles Hotel!

We had a Singapore Sling in one of their bars, yum!

They have a weird tradition there of throwing empty peanut shells
onto the floor. There's a bowl of peanuts at every table and as you
munch away the floor gets covered and everything's kinda slippery!

An the lobby bar someone was playing piano...

...and when he got up later I noticed his shoes were 2 different colours. I asked to
take a photo of it and he explained that God told him to wear his shoes that way :P

We ended the day at the lantern festival in the Chinese Gardens.

Fluttering away!

That was Singapore! :D

Weird & Wonderful # 21

2011-10-11T19:17:00.001+13:00

By Paul Rumsey

1926

This shot from the movie The General is the most expensive shot in silent film history. It was filmed in a single take, that had to be perfect, with a real train and a ‘dummy’ engineer (notice the white arm hanging out the conductors window). Some of the locals who came to watch the filming, thought the dummy was a real person and screamed in horror; supposedly, one person even fainted.
Source

July 21, 1951

The Althoff Circus organized a publicity stunt by putting a baby elephant on the floating train at Alter Markt station. As the elephant started to bump around during the ride, she was pushed out the wagon and she fell into the river Wupper. The elephant, two journalists, and one passenger received minor injuries. After this jump, the elephant got the name of Tuffi, meaning ‘waterdive’ in italian. Both operator and circus director were fined after the incident.
Source

Above 3: Yarn Bombing

I love you in your tragic beauty

2011-10-11T09:55:00.000+13:00

Click for larger

Click for larger

These 2 paintings are part of the upcoming group show
"Beauty meets the Bizarre" at the Depot Galleries in Auckland.

"A group exhibition of new work from emerging artists from Auckland and
Wellington exploring contrasting themes; from light to dark; the ethereal
to the macabre; the delicate and the disgusting – all on beautiful wood."

It's the second time I've painted on wood.
The first was the Skateboard for Te Papa in February.

I rarely paint guys I know, but it was necessary for illustrating
my thoughts and I liked painting him. He doesn't stand for a particular
guy but rather depicts a general picture of a lover/father figure.

The paintings are about past pain growing into the present. About
accepting/ loving each others and your own flaws. About finding your inner
wolf or rabbit, being the wild and the tame, the hunter and the hunted.

The title "I love you in your tragic beauty" is one of my favourite
songs by The Legendary Pink Dots. Click to listen.

Singapore Pt. 1: Of Ships in the Sky + Haw Par Villa

2011-10-10T20:04:00.001+13:00

After many goodbyes in Austria (I say goodbye with a straight face and after
the person is out of sight I shed a couple of tears) I flew to Singapore to meet
up with my boyfriend who was flying in from NZ! We had been to Singapore
before but only for 2 days and now we had 5, yay! We stayed at the Moon
Hotel, which is so new that if you googlemapstreetview
it there's a haunted dilapidated shed in its place.

Temple prettyness <3

At Fort Canning Park.

Afterwards we got talked into taking a very scary tuktuk ride to the Bugis
market, where I had delicious "fake meat", veggies & rice for $2.50!!

Dragonfruit! I like the look but the taste is a bit boring.

These innocent fruitz are Durians. They are banned from the subway system o_O

We visited Haw Par Villa, an old (haunted) themepark with heaps of statues.

The most famous attraction are the Ten Courts of Hell,
with gruesome depictions of hell in Chinese mythology.

This huge albino goldfish lived in one of the ponds.

I posted more photos of Haw Par Villa over at Curious-Places.

I love walking around Singapore. It's so colourful <3

Theres shrines in random places everywhere.

A ship in the sky!!!!! Singapore has some of the most modern architecture
I've ever seen shoulder to shoulder with beautiful old traditional buildings.

Drooling over some madnuts necklaces in Little India.

For one day we visited Sentosa Island where the new Universal Studios has opened.

They have some really great rides. This one (Human VS Cylons)
was my favourite along with The Mummy, which is all in darkness
superspeed backwards/forwards crazyness!

Afterwards we spent some time by the beach on Sentosa.

View over the city from the rooftop bar (open air!!) at Altitude on the 63rd floor!
The bright light in the background is an oil drilling tower burning.

This is the crazy ship in the sky again!

Part 2 will follow soon :)

Pastel coloured hair :D

2011-10-05T10:27:00.001+13:00

I had pastel coloured hair extensions for an impromptu nighttime photoshoot :D
All photos by the awesome Glenn McLelland

We were at a party playing round with fairylights and candles...

...then Bex busted out her clip in extensions, put them in my hair and coloured them with colourbug :)

And we went into the garden...

Cheers to spontaneous photoshoots :)

Austria Pt. 10: Last but not least

2011-10-03T14:56:00.001+13:00

This is my last and largest post about my trip to Austria.
An accumulation of the last days, parties and other various
curiosities that I came upon in my home country. :)

My dear friend Flo had his leaving party a week before I left.
He has moved to America since, taking a part of Vienna with him...

With Pia <3

With my brother :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Visited a cool garden!

A cool way to reuse old bags :D

They had some CRAAAAZY fish in the pond! They follow your fingers
and stick their mouths out of the water. One almost got me! :P

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I've been learning Czech for more than half a year now. My
grandpa (not my real one) speaks Czech fluently because thats
where his ancestors are from. One day as I visited him he busts
out this supercool 100 year old family chronicles that his great
grandfather started. Check out his handwriting above!
My grandpa is translating all his Czech writing into German.

There's even a very humbling letter that he sent to the emperor in
1901 to ask for monetary support to "ease the evening of his life" because
at the age of 86 he write he is "an old man, a cripple who lives of the
generosity of others". The emperor accepted his request since he had
served in the war for 18 years under general Radetzky in like the 1830ies.

A door to a house that is no more. They tore it down shortly after I left.

I opened the door and had a peek inside. My uncle had warned me not to go
in though because the whole thing could collapse at any point... You can see
a few more photos from the back of the house in this post: Click

Inbetween worlds. The walls of the old house and my grandma's (my real one :P).

Found another cool spider :)

My artistic grandma paints on whatever comes her way. This is the
coolest mug ever! When you drink out of it you can see rainbows :D

Early morning in a field...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Back in Vienna! The awesome mural behind me is by
Roa who was showing at INOPERAbLE Gallery.

Stan and I went to another leaving party of a friend's friend
whos flight was gonna go very early the next morning at 5 am.

Music by someone who knows what he's doing...

... and by us who didn't really know what we're
doing with the instruments we were given :D

We discovered fire (it took like 100 tries to get this shot!)
Check out the fire-elf we found in the photo! Looks like she's
holding a wand to the right and she's even got shoes! :D

Afterwards we squeezed into the tiny elevator...

...and wandered home through the streets of the forbidden city.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On what I thought was the hottest day of summer my mum made me
try on her old dirndl. I thought I'd melt in the heat of the summer sun
and the thick layers of fabric but we still got a few photos quickly :)

On what REALLY turned out to be the hottest day (the day before
I left) it was 41 degrees. (Some even say it was fortytwoooo omg).
Sweat was running down our faces, eww, so we decided to rent
a boat on the Danube river and jump into the water!

Normally the water is rather freezy but on this day it was just very refreshing!

We saw people climbing the bridge pillar and jumping off it!

This marks the end of my adventures in Austria...
It was a really cool time and I miss everyone already!

Stay tuned for pics from Singapore and Australia :)

25!!!

2011-09-28T10:37:00.001+13:00

10 days ago I turned 25 and had a party of course :) When I was 24 and
someone asked my age I always accidentally said 25 but now it's the other way
round. 25 feels like a good number! I've always liked the age I am... I remember
on every birthday since I was about 16 I thought "Oh 16/17/18/... is a cool
age, I think I could stay this age forever!" Let's hope this continues :P

The day was spent in the botanical gardens where the magnolia trees are in bloom <3

My austrian import Sandra, a childhood friend of
mine, is feeling at home in New Zealand's trees :)

Sorry about the flower spam but it was just so beautiful! :P

Evening came and I changed into my huge yellow petticoat-
turned-tutu and decorated the place with baloons.

After the first guests had arrived we had to evacuate the building because
someone set off the fire alarm on a different floor so we all stood outside
and watched the firemen find out what's happening. More guests
arrived and we had a little street party until the building was
pronounced safe again we went back up and continued :D

Tannia & Xoe (Check out her art!)

Lovely Lucy <3

Gina posing as my painting :) She's also an artist you should check out!

I had a great night (and even more tequila)! Thanks guys! <3<3<3

Sparkly iPhone cases

2011-09-22T10:18:00.001+12:00

A while after bedazzling my stoneage phone I
decided to do some sparkly iPhone cases which
are now up for sale in my Etsy Shop.

(Click to get to each individual listing)

They're handbedazzled with love and varnished for extra durability <3

Brno: City of weirdness :)

2011-09-21T21:22:00.001+12:00

Ghosts of myself in front of some sovjet-style theatre in Brno, Czech Republic.
It is a rather weird city! See for yourself:

A crocodile hanging from the ceiling in the old city hall.

Mummies of monks lying around in the crypt of the church of St Peter & Paul.
(Not my photo - no cameras allowed in cool places)

A smoking sign!? The pole was warm too!

Lots of houses have up to 3 different numbers!
Don't wanna be a mailman in Brno...

Looks like a nuclear plant in the middle of the city. (We later
found out it's something else but I forgot what it was...)

Starobrno beer was advertised EVERYWHERE but wherever we sat down
to drink they didn't have any (even though it was advertised on their door).

Except one hour before our departure the next day we got lucky!

Glad no fire broke out in our hotel or we'd have
had to organize buckets from somewhere...

Blocking the view to infinity :)

The view from Špilberk castle.

Not sure what this guy was up to, rolling round
on a wall that drops 10 m on the other side.

Czech version or Mozarella with Tomatoes (my favourite dish).

Brno's ideal of beauty.

The theatre from the first picture. (+ its overgrown lawn)

A puzzling sign on the train window as we were departing.
"Don't throw mugs of beer out the window"???

Oh it must be "Don't throw beer bottles out the window"

Na shledanou Brno! :D

Weird & Wonderful # 20

2011-09-19T17:03:00.000+12:00

Glitter Lady Gaga by my friend Xoe Hall.

Dylan Shaw Photography: More

An albino boy.

The Art of Pablo Amaringo: More

Insect Fairies by Tessa Farmer: More

Bathtub couches: More

Happy birthday to me :)

2011-09-17T09:50:00.001+12:00

This is the 5 year old me with one of my baby pet rabbits :D

Austria Pt. 9: Of Fog + Sauzipf Rocks Festival

2011-09-16T15:38:00.005+12:00

Friends and I drove down to Carinthia a second
time to attend Sauzipf Rocks Festival which I used
to go to back in the days when I was 15-17.

I got to catch up with old friends (and their cute dog). :)

This huuuge (like 10 cm) mole cricket was crossing the footpath!
I sat next to it while it was crossing and saved it from 3 bicycles.

My talented friends from "Lesson to be Learned" played.

Fun times! :D

We went backstage out into the forest where it is like
4 degrees cold because of lots of underground caves
exits in the area. Cold air streams out of the holes.
You can feel it the most near the ground.

It had rained just before and now the fog was making an appearance.
I spotted one of the securities in the fog and took photos because it
looked so cool. All rock n oll with his red bandana in the mist and the
yellow flowers. Back in the festival area we saw him a few times and
Pom and I speculated what his name would be. We thought maybe
something like Heinz or Roman or another strong sounding name.
As we ran into him again when the last band played I decided to
just ask him and his name was... Vally - short for Valentin :D

Pom working the hair!
Another friend was smoking into the camera so we had more fog :)

Foggy view from backstage.

Mely had the right idea of footwear :)

A girl drummer, yay! <3

We climbed up very high into a cool treehouse next to the festival.

Nice view of the stage from up there!

If you look closely you can see the stars in this picture.

It was nice and cozy up there.

After a more than adventurous descent we went
back in and saw Mignon rocking the fake blood.

Birthday PRINT SALE

2011-09-14T13:06:00.001+12:00

NZ$ 25 for an A4 plus size Giclée print + a free postcard of your choice!!
+ Free shipping worldwide!

My birthday is coming up so I'm having another PRINT SALE this year!
Choose any painting on my website for a print (so ANYTHING in 'Artworks').
The prints are A4 plus size, so a little bit bigger than A4.
They're Giclée prints, which means they're printed using archival
inks and archival paper, so they won't fade or turn yellow.

For the postcard selection go here.
Theres 3 new designs as well:

Sale ends Wednesday 21st of September midnight NZ time
To place an order simply send me an email: theirea@gmail.com
Paypal is cool for international orders.

Slavonice: Town of Valerie & her Week of Wonders

2011-09-12T13:16:00.002+12:00

While I was back home in Austria I had the chance to drive
across the border into Slavonice, Czech Republic, where the
1970s film Valerie and her Week of Wonders was filmed. It's my
favourite so I was very very very excited to visit this place!!!

This alley looked familiar...

...of course it's in the film :)

They have amazing ceilings everywhere!

The main square with the fountain, which now looks a bit different.
They left the tall middle pillar but removed the statues around it.

Here's what it looked like in the film.

It's such a beautiful little town <3

Sitting by a different fountain. Theres a few of them around.

This was up the top of the bell tower of the church.

Pia & I enjoying the view.

The main square from above.

In the film the market takes place there...

...and people try to burn Valerie at the stake.

To get in and out of town theres a couple of arches. I
think this one might be the one where Hedvica's wedding
entourage come into town at the start of the film...

...but it's hard to tell...

Going down, I think it was 170 steps or something?

Saw this in a window. It advertises the Czech online radio station www.radios.cz

Theres a nice antique store, check out the crazy floor! Amazing!
I spoke with the owner in a mix of Czech, German and English and
asked if he knew anything about the film being made here. He
said he has seen it and liked it and that a while ago they
showed it in town, I think for the films anniversary.

Goodbye Slavonice! I'll be back someday :D

Weird & Wonderful # 19

2011-09-11T20:40:00.001+12:00

A lunar rainbow or moonbow: More

Above 2: PET Project, Miwa Koizumi uses liquid containers
to make water animals like the jelly-fish or anemone: More

Beautiful: New Zealand Nudibranchs

Rainbow toad rediscovered after 87 years: More

Monkey borrows camera to take self portraits: More

Worlds highest tennis court in Dubai: More

Austria Pt. 8: Of castleparties + music + erotic novels

2011-09-07T17:05:00.002+12:00

With my friends in Austria we have this tradition
where we spend a couple of nights a year on an
old castle/ ruin and party through the night :)

View from the tower after arrival.

We searched the woods for some firewood (during which I fell
off a hill slope and got a few scratches in the brambles) and made
a cozy fire. I painted patterns into the sky with a burning stick. :)

The view of the Danube before sunset.

The fire getting low...

Finally the sun went up and it got warmer instantly!

Most people were asleep by then...

I went to sleep on the castle wall because it had the sun shining on it.

My view from my sleeping place.

My view after being woken up by the voices of tourists later :)

I decided to ~~walk~~ stumble around a bit and take photos.

Don't walk up the spiral staircase of the tower if you're claustrophobic ...

The surroundings of the castle in the Wachau region are
beautiful. Lots of hills with vinyards. In autumn you can
taste all the different grapes when going for walks.

We found this big shiny guy :)

After everyone was awake we walked down
to the Danube which was very refreshing!

Here's a little stop motion video of the night and
the morning after (mostly the morning after) :D

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another night my friends of Satara had a gig
which was cool! Their style is mixture of folk and medieval music
sung in German, Swedish, English or Middle High German.

Again we partied till the morning... :)

We found some old erotic novels! We all grabbed one
and took turns reading random paragraphs out loud :P

"Erzähl mir nichts von Dunkelheit - Don't speak to me of Darkness"

2011-09-06T16:56:00.005+12:00

(Click for larger version)

My largest painting to date and it's on canvas! I finished it before I left for Austria but wasn't able to find the time come up with the words describing what it means to me.

Almost everyone I know (including myself) has gone through a period of darkness and depression in their lifes. Before we go through it we sometimes see others who suffer but we don't understand. We can't perceive things the way they do until the dark blue cloud appears above our own heads and we cry for no apparent reason, only take negative things for the truth, only see the bad side of the world, feel helpless, see no point in life, think about suicide and for some of us this is the last stop.A single person in darkness thinks he or she is the only one who feels that way and no one else understands - that his/her darkness is an especially bad one.

Looking back you can see what you've overcome and it may help you if it returns in the future. I think I can say of myself that I can keep a secret. And even if I'm not particularly advised to keep things to myself about someone I still do. I have no need to talk about others much. Friends or even people I've only just met come to me and open themselfes up and tell me about their darkest times. I can see that many have come a similar or worse way than myself and that some are still fighting. Someone once said something like "If I was to throw my problems into a bowl with everyone elses, I'd grab mine back"

I started this painting when someone close to me was going through a very tough time. And I thought: Yes. I know. Even if you think no one knows. I've been there. I love you. I'll help you through.

The ghosts of this stay with you forever. Like past versions of yourself whispering into your ears. I'm listening, but I've heard it all before.

As you can see in the animation above this piece went through a lot of changes :)

Austria Pt. 7: Of carousells & candyfloss

2011-08-12T08:10:00.001+12:00

Friends and I spent a day at the Prater- Vienna's funpark! :D
This mural could be my own really...

Julie our friend from Prague and myself with our big green monster buddy.

We went on the the world's tallest chain-carousell, which
you can see in the background. It's 117 metres tall :)

Gettin ready for take off...

Taking off!

From the top you can see all over Vienna. I didn't bring my
camera but you can watch this video of the ride on youtube:

Candyfloss yay!!!!!!!! <3

I liked the reflection of the trees in the windows :)

On our last ride Julie was the ony one out of us 8 who got completely soaked :P

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

On another night it was Katalin's birthday <3

In the later hours we played with the toy helicopter :D

We turned off the light and everyone was screaming and ducking from the blue lit bat!

I took pics with my friend's old camera but we have to wait how
the film turns out. Analog cameras like to be so mysteriouuuus :)

Austria Pt. 6: Of horses + wild gardens+ the magic eye dimension

2011-08-01T08:51:00.001+12:00

The garden I grew up in is pretty big and it's a time consuming
job to keep everything tidy. Underneath this overgrown thing
there used to be a big wooden ladder to climb on for us kids.

Here used to be a pond with lots of tadpoles. One day my friend gave me some
dragonfly larvaes and I put them in the pond and since that day there were no
more tadpoles (they got eaten) but lots of dragonflies. They all hatch on the
same day and fly around the garden for an hour or so before they disappear.

I found an awesome white spider! It was a bitch to get a photo of it but I got my moneyshot!

This used to me "my" tree. My brothers weren't allowed on it
only on special occasions or if I needed someone to play with.
If I saw them sneaking onto it without permission I freaked out!

Surprisingly this swing didn't crash to the ground with me on it...

Tried to do some gardening but gave up after one bush. :P

Stan visited and we went for a walk in the forest. We found big leaves!
Let us demonstrate what you can do with them:
1. Use as an umbrella
2. Use as a hat :)

We were looking for snails all day but only found slugs and one small snail
with a house but it refused to come out so we waited and left and as we
came back it was gone. Then we found this one who was a bit more social. :)

Něco k jídlu - Etwas zu essen - Something to eat

The ruins of the castle of my hometown.

Went to my friend Patricia's place who let me hop on her horsie
which she won in a prize draw. My legs stick out the front because
that's the western riding style signal to slow down. :P

Not that easy to take control without proper reins or muscles...

A moment of surprise: Stan acidentally turned her back on the horse which is a signal for it to follow her.

We made another little video of our horse adventures:

Summary: I'm riding "Bluemchen" who prefers to eat grass instead. Stan accidentally
discovers a secret signal that makes the horse follow her voluntarily. Marie almost falls
off her horse which refuses to jump over the hurdles but in the end she gets help :)

We googled magic eye pictures. I had almost forgotten they exist!
The magic eye dimension is awesome! I wanna live in it.

The next day I went to a horse fair :)

But there were lots of other animals too! Rabbits omgomgomg I wanted to take them all home!!

Greedy goats!

And WTF is that dark animal????????????????????????????? A dog? A boar? A hyena?

I loved these 2!

Marie's horse had a bad day but she managed to stay on her!

Some people didn't have horses so they had to make amends... :P

Austria Pt. 5: Of glittering rocks + ghosts

2011-07-30T10:39:00.001+12:00

I'm waaaay behind with my updates but anyway: I went to Carinthia in the south
of Austria to make a family visit and to enjoy the beautiful lake and mountains!

Here's where I stayed! My grandma's house back in I dunno.

This sort of stuff is typical austrian countryside home decor...

The village lies on a beautiful lake which has a nice temperature for swimming in summer.

That's how we hunt ducks in Austria :P

My friend found a piece of grass that has grown THROUGH a clover leaf!!! :D

I swam out to this boat with my brother. This is a big deal! Not the swimming - I can swim for
ages in a lake (I'm careful in the sea though). The thing is that I freak out when swimming right
next to a boat or a buoy. This boat wasn't so big but still I kinda get the feeling that it drags me
under. And buoys are so slimy from the algae and the chain reaches all the way down to the
deepest bottom of the water and I think I feel like I'm connected with the monsters of the
deep when I touch the part of the buoy that's under the surface.

BUT as this photo prooves I even got ON the boat and I touched the buoy the boat was tied to!

By the lake we found the cutest little kitty, mwaaah!!!! <3

I had a few scratches after this close up tiger experience :P

I'll be on the water :)

Went for a walk up through the forest.

The soil and rocks glitter in that part of Austria. When we were kids we'd always collect bags full
of glittering rocks in the lake. They're very common though and it drove our parents crazy when
we smuggled tons of rocks back home on the 5 hour car ride. I can't remember why they didn't
like it. Maybe it made the car even heavier? Maybe the glittering remains all over the seats and
floor were rather undesireable? Maybe tripping over them at home all the time wasn't too much fun?

But LOOK they're so pretty!!

Short version of the legend of the Austrian flag: Guy wore white clothes and got them all bloody
in battle. The only part that stayed white was where his belt used to be. So red-white-red it is!

My brother destroying the trees :P

I haven't been down in Carinthia for a long time. The last time was straight after Fabian, my
ex-boyfriend had committed suicide. I had quite a few friends there but we lost contact and
many of them I hadn't seen in like 7 years. When I went down there I went to a gig where I
hoped to find some of them. I found almost all of them spread out through the venue and
walked up to each of them at a time and said "Hi!" with a big smile. It's a strange feeling
when you see them digging around in their heads for a minute, thinking where they
know you from and finally you see a light in their eyes when they remember :)
Some of them I didn't recognize, not even my own cousin, omg embarrassing!

While I was talking to a group of them I saw someone walk up to us from the corner of my
eye and my friend says "Remember David?" and I looked and almost dropped my drink. I
thought I'd seen the ghost of Fabian! But it was his little brother who after 7 years has
grown up and looks EXACTLY like him. The face and the long blonde hair, the style of
clothes and even the way he walks. I couldn't even manage a greeting, I just ran outside
and cried for a few minutes but afterwards came back in and gave him a big hug.

FUCK it was an intense weekend!

Austria Pt. 4: Of religious relics + climbing trees and statues

2011-07-21T22:47:00.001+12:00

After being in the country I went back to Vienna...

My cousin and I went for a walk through the 1st district and spotted austrian
celebrity Jeannine Schiller rushing across the Graben with shoppingbags.

In this building there's a fantastic chocolate boutique. See below:

Some crazy religious relics...oh what a word!

Went to the park where we saw a pile of ducklings :P

Climbed some trees :)

I went to the Dali exhibition a week earlier but forgot my
camera so now I finally got a pic of me and Mr. Surealism :)

On some nights I went out with my lovely glittering ~~sister~~ cousin Pia!

We arrived at this club that had a pool and while testing the water with my hand
my new ring slipped off and fell to the bottom. The waiters pretended they didn't
have a cleaning net cause they wanted to see us strip off and swim but it was too
early in the night for me so I ripped off a branch and fished around unsucessfully.
Our friend Melissa finally managed to get it out :)

Later that night we met some guys from Switzerland with whom we climned up to the
horses of this statue. By doing so I ruined my favourite wedges. They took some photos
but we forgot to exchange numbers and even names so you'll have to imagine that part.

On other nights I went on city adventures with Stan, one of the coolest girls in Austria! <3

Open/ Closed eye pic above. We took a lot of pics that we wanted to
make gifs out of but there were too many so here's a short video instead:

The Vienna International Dance Festival opened that evening at MQ.

Later we all went to Donau, where the projected wallpaper changes all the time!

Pia and Stan being colourful <3

Hangover food I made for Pia :P

Austria Pt. 3: Of water-filled tunnels + wild berries

2011-07-20T04:20:00.001+12:00

Yes we're in a little boat in a cave underneatha little village! Lets start at the beginning:

A week or so ago my brothers, cousins and I visited my
grandma who lives in a small village near the Czech border.

The village's annual farmers market was in full swing.
Here someone's carving a pig with a chainsaw :)

I used to be creeped out by these as a kid. They're in the "House of the Dead".
This illustration of my book is about that very house.

There was a flea market in the old antique store (which is gonna be torn down any day now).

Of course I had to buy shit! I got the lace scarf and an old perfume spray bottle
which is openable and I plan on using it for spraying water onto my plants.

Sooooo back in the war the whole village used to be connected by underground
tunnels that reached from cellar to cellar. Now there's only leftovers. We walked
down the steps into one of them which was hidden beneath a restaurant.

The ground water has come up and flooded a big part of the tunnels. They're only as wide
as both arms stretched out can reach but the whole thing is about 20 metres long I guess.

Melissa and I took the boat with no paddles and "at our own risk"
started dragging it along the cave walls by grabbing onto the rock surface...

In the tunnels it's pitch black! This photo was taken with my camera flash.
We only had a tiny torch and at times we felt a bit klaustrophobic ducking
in the boat, not seeing how much space there is above our head. You can
smell the cool cave scent and somehow the walls radiate a feeling of closeness
as if the tunnel is getting narrower and lower. Sometimes stuff growing from
the ceiling smacks you in the face. We crashed against the walls quite a lot :P

There's a lot of old houses in the village. This one next to my grandma's is gonna be torn
down too. It's completely dilapidated. My grandma took a walk in her backyard and the
wall inbetween the 2 properties fell over. Another time my uncle saw a part of the roof
collapse. Quite amazing that an old lady still lived there until her death a few years ago.

Here's the back of the house with the fuckedest car I've ever seen...

A snippet of grandma's extensive collection of holy Mary statues and other various religious stuff.
She used to drink holy water and tell me stories of the devil and the purifying fire when I was a kid.

We walked down to the river to cool down because it was hot as shit... Follow me!

More nature stuff to eat: Wild strawberries mmmmmmmh!!!
Passersby told us "Where there are wild strawberries there are wild snakes"
because they wanted to pick them for themselves on the way back :P

On our drive home we saw a hot air balloon. I've never been on one
ever but we used to watch them often as kids as they hovered above
our house. I thought if I was up in that baloon I'd always have heaps
of candy with me to throw down to the kids that are watching :P

Austria Pt. 2: Of plastic horses, human bones + medieval cities

2011-07-18T21:33:00.002+12:00

I found a barbie horse in my old room and combed its hair :)

This is our garden seen through my oldest glass crystal that I took
from the little chandellier in my parent's bedroom when I was 5.

Went to visit friends and again we stayed up till dawn :P

We went for an early morning walk with the whiskey
glass (and sunnies :P) and I picked some flowers...

Then I went to visit my mum who now lives in a medieval city. Pretty cute stuff!

We walked up to the vinyards and came past this old house.

When you go for a walk in rural Austria you find so much to eat for
most of the year! Berries, cherries, grapes, other fruit, nuts, herbs.
My mum has a huge herbal tea collection which she picked herself.
When you go for a walk in New Zealand you find nothing edible at all o_O

A lot of houses have the year when they were built written on the wall.

I look like the priest in "Valerie & her week of wonders".
I'm going to Slavonice soon too where the film was made!

Found some human bones underneath another church... RIP

My cousin visited and we went swimming. On the
way home it was too hot to wear clothes. :P

And we danceddanceddanced and we danceddanceddanced...

More soon! <3

Austria Pt. 1: Of beer + candles + the Austrian-Hungarian monarchy

2011-07-06T07:01:00.003+12:00

I'm in Austriaaa! (Drinking my beer in front of the Belvedere:
it's totally legal in Austria to drink wherever you want)

I arrived on Wednesday after 5 flights (2 of them in the largest double-decker
passenger airliner in the world) and stayed with relatives in Vienna for the first few days.

No, this is not where I stayed...but it looks pretty :)

The first thing I ate was mozarella & tomatoes which I MISSED SO MUCH in NZ!!!
You cant get standard mozarella in NZ. They only have some other heavily overpriced version.

My cousin Pia playing with the deco at Forever 21.

Lots of Vienna is paved like this.
I find it very annoying to walk on and I often trip over in my sandals.

I met up with my brother and we went to the cafe that my grandma grew up in. It's cute!

Then we bought some beer and walked to the Belvedere park.
On our way we saw this, hehe. The sign says "Cherries" :P

The Belvedere. It has a huge Klimt collection inside, which I haven't seen yet.

Afterwards we met Pia who was working at a catering event and she told us to
come and drink the leftover alcohol and eat the food. There she is looking out the
window. In old european buildings there's always 2 windows in one frame for a
double-glazing effect. I wish NZ was AT LEAST up to that standard...

She awaited us in ancient halls and we ate and drank but there was still so
much left so In the end I took a tray down and fed strangers in the park.

Photographic evidence! (People are very suspicious of free food!)

Then we had a bowl of punch which -added to my jetlag- finally sent me bedwards.

Another day we sorted all these zippers by size and colour for a friend. It
was an INSANE task after which we turned colourblind for a few hours :P

We went fabric shopping. They have the coolest fabrics there omg!!!

I met up with friends who I hadn't seen in years! Here they are in the disco elevator :)

I put a MankyChops sticker on the letterbox. See my jacket?
Patch by my friend Xoe Hall's Mortal Gods collection.

As we got home it was light again outside. :)

Austrian beer seen through my diamond!

There's a birthday candle glued to my finger with wax.

After staying in Vienna for a few days I took the train out into the countryside to see
the rest of my family. My aunt put me into a car with a lovely 70 year old chainsmoking
man named Leo who offered to drop me off at the trainstation. Upon starting the car
and lighting his cigarette he said he wasn't too sure where the trainstation was. He said
he can drive all the way down to Albania but doesn't know how to get to the trainstation.
I was worried I'd miss my train, but we got there in the end. On the way he told me of all
his travels which took him to the desert near Pakistan where it's 70 degrees omg! He also
said he was a "genuine leftover" of the Austrian-Hungarian monarchy and his grandparents
were from Austria, Hungary, Czech Republic and Slovakia and he grew up with all
those languages. Then I tested my Czech on him which was fun!

Austria is cool! I'll update again soon :)

Aotearoa - Land of the long white ash cloud

2011-06-25T16:27:00.001+12:00

I should've been in Austria since Wednesday but the volcanic ashcloud from Chile is
hovering over New Zealand which is why my Quantas flights have been cancelled for
the second time now. I'm due to fly out in a couple of days now (fingers crossed!).

At least I might finish my new painting before I head off. I've been working on
it for aaaaages now! It's quite big and an important piece for me. You'll see!

My friend lent me this cool old graphics book. The above one is my favourite.
It also features an alphabet. Here's a couple of beautiful letters below:

The show must go on!

2011-06-20T09:57:00.001+12:00

So while I'm away in Austria I won't be able to easily send out prints
and postcards, but people in Wellington can still get a good selection
of my A4+ Size Giclee Prints at East of Cuba on 150 Vivian
Street and at Manky Chops Gallery on 166 Cuba Street (Upstairs).
Limited edition A3+ Size Gicle Prints are available at Pixel Ink
Gallery on 219 Cuba Street (They also do online orders!).
Postcards are available also at Pixel Ink & East of
Cuba and original Paintings at all 3 places :))

I'll also have the following works in the New Zealand Art Show
(largest art show in New Zealand) which is happening at the
TSB Bank Arena from 28th - 31st of July!

(Click to view)

Weird & Wonderful # 18

2011-06-15T10:18:00.001+12:00

This image + below 2 are of works by the
amazing artist Andy Goldsworthy.

Insane underwater movie sets: Read more here.

"Double-exposure" paintings by Pakayla Biehn.

"Time Capsule Mansion Opened After 100 Years" Read more here.

This and below via ergotismus: Fruit carvings
by "The Carving Institute"! See more here.

Via ergotismus: This light phenomenon is called a Brocken Spectre.

Giant water bugs devouring snakes and baby turtles o_O Read more here.

Catfish being fed! Watch insanely weird video here.

Snub nosed monkey

Botanical Gardens & Brooklyn

2011-06-14T20:03:00.001+12:00

Sunday was spent hungover in the botanical gardens...

I found a strange looking fungus!

Here's me in front of a massive succulent + my litre of tomato juice (hangover cure!) :P

Cute kittycat by the treehouse.

It may be winter here but stuff still flowers!

By the magnolia trees, which look amazing when they flower but their branches are still cool bare!

Lou feeding the little sparrows!

**********************************************************************

On another weekend we walked up to Brooklyn. Nice view! There goes
the interislander ferry in the background. *seasick memories galore*

It was truly a cat day! I captured 3 of them... Check out camouflage cat below!

Walking through Aro Valley after the decent.

It's getting cold around here. Can't wait to escape into Austrian summer very soon!!!

A few outfits

2011-06-08T12:24:00.002+12:00

I'm bulk posting a couple of outfit photos that I took over the past
few months. Some of them are from when it was still warm here :P

Got this vintage bag at the Bondi markets in Sydney!

I made this skirt a while ago but don't think I ever
posted it. I fell in love with the flower-cake fabric!

My curtain tutu!

I got these for $1 at a flea market. Turns out the fleas really
chewed into it because shortly after the parts that keep them
on your face (don't know the english word for it) fell off :(

They make everything look wine-bottle-green :)

They suit the photo up on my wall! :P

My colourful kimono-dressing gown thing plus lots of
layers because it was a cold day. (at Manky Chops gallery)

I wear it with my glitter belt (which matches my
phone) which I got while in Auckland 2 weeks ago <3

What's with my hair? etc... :)

2011-06-06T21:15:00.000+12:00

You may have noticed my hair is looking a bit strange lately!
That's because my friend Bex did some crazy colour-blocking
with it for the L'Oreal fashion show I was in.

There were some really massive hairstyles as well, check out the girl next to me!

Bex owns a very cool hair salon called Willis York
which I recently helped renovate and I took some pictures:

See me on the left with the antlers :P

There's more photos on the website of the
wonderful Kerryn Dunshea, interior designer. Click!

Oh and I also built a tipi in there! It looks a lot better now than in this photo,
decorated with feathers and fairylights, but I didn't bring my camera last time...

Another newly renovated space around Wellington is Manky Chops Gallery,
which is currently a shop where every artist has a wall space:

"Mortal Gods" Tees by the amazing Xoe Hall!

I've got a few things up too! Go have a look :) Upstairs 166 Cuba Street.

I did not make this, it's from Sakura restaurant!

I found a stain that looks like a seahorse! :)

I'm going home to Austria in almost 2 weeks!!!!!!

Just for a visit though, I'll be back in Wellington at the start of September!

More Auckland times

2011-05-30T22:33:00.005+12:00

I was in Auckland for a couple of days for the exhibition opening but I also did a
few other things. Mostly I didn't take photos though, but here's a few photos that
I did take. Above we had mulled wine at The Wine Cellar. :)

Samantha is the cutest!!!!!! <3

Her beautiful bag again!

When I first moved to NZ it took me forever to remember the name of this road.

Cute kitteh hiding! :DD

In Albert Park on the first sunny day.

I've always loved this tower! I could photograph it over and over.
I want a cake made in its shape so I can eat it.

Other than that I:
- hung with the secret Auckland magic club!
- got lost on the way to the supermarket in which I used to buy food for 2 years.
- spent 30 minutes on a bus for a walking distance of 10 minutes (oh Queen Street). I
would've gotten off sooner but started chatting with a half Austrian seated behind
me (I've only ever met like 4 other Austrians in NZ).
- got rained on a lot...
- got followed by a random guy in the park and asked if I was vegetarian (which I am)
and if I knew where to buy soybeans. I told him to search the asian supermarket
and ran off cause he was creepy.
- got a free hot chocolate because of "Hug a Redhead day" o_O
- realized Sherry has way more alcohol % than wine....after Sam and I had drunk
the entire bottle in like an hour...
- bought a cool colourful kimono-thing in which I danced around town upon my return to
Welly for Saturday night. I will show you it if I ever find the time to post (or take) outfit pics again.

Love Auckland but feels good to be back too!

Opening night!

2011-05-29T15:41:00.002+12:00

Friday was the opening for "Not just another group show" at Te Karanga Gallery in Auckland!
I'm wearing a painting as a necklace. It's the ghost of the girl and the
rabbit in the paintings I had in the show.

MORE: (Contains nudity)

The art of Miss Mica Still!

Meghan and I spent 1.5 hours before the show speed-bodypainting!
Here's beautiful Ella, one of the girls I did!

Hannah (Meghan did a nice job painting her!) & Ella.

Wonderful Eve, the "Drink Me- Girl"! I painted her a bit in the little spare time that was left.

I adore this photo!

The paint didn't come off so well in a hurry, so I had to run around like this for the night. :P

Artist Kate Elise, curator Cleo Barnett & artist Meghan Geliza <3

Meghan the glitter fairy!

Sam and her pretty bag <3

It was a great night, thanks to everyone for coming along! It was lovely to meet you all!!

"Little Voices" A Series of Paintings

2011-05-24T22:45:00.003+12:00

(Click to view each painting)

Here's my contribution for "Not just another group show"
opening this Friday 27th of May at Te Karanga Gallery,
208 K- Road, Auckland.

Click here for the facebook event.

My artist statement:
"The universe talks to us in soft whispers telling us to
turn our darkened eyes to the light at the end of the tunnel.
These quiet voices -imagined as air bubbles- are coming from
the world around us. We need to be open and listen carefully.
The black rabbit functions as the girl's guard
dog who protects her soul from dying."

They're done in my "other" style.
This time acrylics & ink on paper.

Click here for the pricelist if you're curious! If you'd
like to buy some email me at theirea@gmail.com or
speak to the nice people at the gallery while visiting :)

See you Friday!!! :D

Weird & Wonderful # 17

2011-05-22T10:58:00.002+12:00

Bat orchid!

A list of the biggest insects in the world: Click.

Ceramic sculpyure by Bonnie Marie Smith.

"Invasive Crochet" by Crystal Gregory.

Supercute blog about the adventures of 2 milk teeth:
http://mymilktoof.blogspot.com/

Adele Enersen creates dream environments
around her sleeping baby: More.

The art of Lori Field.

More: http://fromme-toyou.tumblr.com/

This twitter page is quite funny: "My dad is 81 years old. I'm
teaching him how to use the internet. I told him twitter was how to
search things on Google. These tweets are what he's searching."

Group show preview

2011-05-21T19:26:00.001+12:00

A little teaser of one of the 7 new paintings that are going to be up at
Te Karanga Gallery in Auckland next week. I'll show you more soon!

Click to view larger.

Most Wanted Vintage's 1st birthday party

2011-05-17T10:24:00.003+12:00

Last Saturday was the 1st birthday of one of Wellingtons coolest
stores: Most Wanted Vintage!!
I'm wearing one of their vintage ball gowns which you can rent out!

The wonderful Tanya who owns the store was wearing
an awesome knit-dress with sequins and rhinestones and
other miscellaneous glitter on it :)

Awesome colours and patterns on everyones clothes!

Rob and my boyfriend Hadley with his awesome yellow tie! ♥

If you're in Wellington go check out
Most Wanted Vintage on 81 Aro Street, Aro Valley!
♥♥♥
All photos by Xavier Collin @ snapstar.

"Not just another group show"

2011-05-15T22:06:00.002+12:00

I have 7 new paintings in this group show coming up in Auckland and I'll be attending the opening night on Friday 27th of May!

I'll post sneek peeks for the paintings soon! (the one in the flyer is not one of them though)

Hope to see you all on the opening night!

Exploring the bays

2011-05-12T13:18:00.000+12:00

My friend Sam is still here in windy Wellington and so
her and I set off to explore Island Bay & Oriental Bay!

We found an old house with Freemason symbols on it in Island Bay.

One symbol is hidden up the top.

On the windowsill of the same house: a hippo???
Either that or some rotten kumara that looks like a hippo.

We found some lovely flowers which Sam
insisted on squashing with her amazing mane:

On another day we were sitting in the window of Midnight
Espresso and I spotted the blinking light on the truck parked
in front. I thought it was beautiful with its sparkly halo.

We then posed for outfit photos in front of the Te Papa diamonds.

Do you like my insane skirt? I got it from Recycle Boutique
last week and I never want to take it off again!

This cute bird/duck popped its head out of the water :)

There's this old boat down by the boat sheds between Oriental
Parade and the water. I think it looks like a ribcage of a whale.

The bottom side of the boat looks like art!

"Why don't you come with me little girl...on a magic carpet ride?"

Big starfish!!

That's it for this week :)

Houseboat cruise!

2011-05-08T20:03:00.002+12:00

Last weekend my friend Sam and I got
invited to cruise around on a cute little houseboat!

MORE:

It was quite a mission to get the boat all tied up! :)

Joni put some juice in the tank and off we went!

We climbed up through the hole onto the roof.

Captain of the Welly harbour!

It was a lovely afternoon! <33

"Narrative Playgrounds" - Group Show

2011-04-27T18:17:00.003+12:00

Group Show

29 April – 29 May 2011
Pixel Ink Gallery, 219 Cuba Street, Wellington 6011
Opening preview: Friday 29 April 5:30 – 7:30pm

Exhibition Statement:

Narrative Playgrounds is a visual arts exhibition of works by emerging and established artists inspired by stories and the imagination. An explosion of whimsey, fairy tale magic, imaginary landscapes and fictional characters. Artists from around New Zealand were invited to create artworks which encompass a story or account of events and experiences.

Featured Artists:

Ani Fourie, Autumn McGrail, Rebecca Robinson, Carmen Rogers, Charlotte Ellayne, Devon Smith, Florence Thornburn, Jinx in the Sky, KIRAN-X, Lucy Yu, Melissa McDougall, Rachel Walker, Trevor Kohing and Rosalind Clark.

I have the following 4 pieces in this show:
Click for larger version :)

See you there!

DIY: Jewel Jacket

2011-04-20T16:49:00.000+12:00

Maybe you remember me buying this bag of broken jewellery from
the antique shop a few months ago. Well, here's what I did with it!!!

MORE:

To DIY this you'll need:

- a jacket (mine is secondhand)
- various pieces of jewellery
- thread & needle
- superglue/ contact glue
- metal-cutting pliers (optional)
- patience!

When you're attaching the jewels fold the thread so you have 2 pieces of string at
once (like in the photo). This will save you time and the jewels will be attached stronger.

When you're doing larger items like the above bird chain (or many smaller items at
once) you don't have to cut and knot the string after every 5 stitches. You can
instead just cross it over on the backside and start stitching on the next item 5 cm
above, and the next... This has a time (and patience) saving advantage but it also
means that in case the string breaks, all the things that belong to it will fall off which
is why I also use superglue to attach most of the items just to be safe. :)

In some cases you don't even need thread and needle. These jewels above
are all earrings of which I cut off the metal stud with pliers and then attached
them to the fabric with a drop of superstrong contact glue.

Got any questions for making your own? Just ask :)

Lately

2011-04-19T16:37:00.000+12:00

This entry is about various things that happened lately
and photos that don't fall into any particular category :)

Today I went to the library and got a huge stack of books on Czech and Art
and Czech Art :P ...and on other things: one book is called "Fantasy Worlds"
and I'm convinced I'll find a lot in there to share on my other blog
CURIOUS-PLACES. (previously known as "awesome-places" on livejournal)

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Here's my favourite outfit at the moment. I bought all 3 items (except the belt)
in one day at Recycle Boutique and Paperbag Princess and I love them! The boots
are a bit dirty because I went stickhunting in the forest with my friend the other
day. We need sticks to build an awesome tipi for a cool project, more soon!

A (rather long) while ago I answered some questions about my art and dreams
over at http://rockingfem.blogspot.com, so click if you'd like to read :)

I bought crocodile lollies :P

I liked the orchid's shadow growing out of our guitar.

I don't have a hipflask but I stuck a big jewel on a tiny bottle which is a good substitute. :P

I twisted the jewel while glueing so you can read the number
in the middle. I thought it was a good idea at the time :P

Some sunny day in the botanical gardens...

A big tree growing out of someones grave. It pushed the gravestone
aside as if it was saying "I don't need you anymore, I'm a tree now!"
I want a tree to grow out of my body when I die.

Weird & Wonderful # 16

2011-04-15T14:18:00.000+12:00

Collage by Max Ernst.

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Painting by Nicola Samori.

The art of Paco Pomet.

Elizabeth I: The Rainbow Portrait c1600
See the eyes and ears on her dress? Click here
for the whole story of this mysterious painting.

Photo by the wonderful Alison Scarpulla.

The above 2 photos have a really crazy background. They show the body a man
sentenced to death some 20 years ago and afterwards his body got donated to science
and segmented. This year a photographer used some extraordinary methods to put
it back together resulting in these photos. Click here to see more and
to find out how it was done.

Above 2 images are from an exhibition by Kate Breakey at Etheron Gallery.

The EcoSphere is the world’s first totally enclosed ecosystem - a complete,
self-contained and self-sustaining miniature world encased in glass. Read more here.

Above 2 paintings by Chelsea Brown.

Pin up's and their photo references! More here.

The floods in Pakistan made the spiders crawl up into the
trees which they wrapped in their nets. More info here.

Above 2 photos by Alexey Titarenko.

"I'll hunt you down with one foot in the past"

2011-04-12T12:19:00.000+12:00

Click to see it larger.

I used to have pet bunny rabbits throughout my childhood and now living in an apartment
which is not ideal for keeping animals I miss having pets so much! Everytime I get to pet a
cat or any other equally fluffy, warm animal I feel very happy! A while ago out of desparation
for a pet I said "A cockroach would do. I'd keep it in a jar and stick jewels on its bum". Sadly (or
luckily for the roachies that don't wanna be bedazzled) I haven't found a single one.

So this painting is about trying to make up for loved, lost things we had in the past and to
what extent some people go (consciously or unconsciously) to find a substitute for it. The
cockroach has shiny jewels to make up for the fluffyness of rabbits etc. It could also stand
for prettyfying ugly things (making the best out of a bad situation) or the opposite: trying
to believe that things are good, not wanting to see the true dirty sides underneath.
It's a fine line.

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You are able to get an A4 Giclee print of it if you wish as part of my Easter Sale which ends this Wednesday!

"Dream Rider"

2011-04-11T21:30:00.000+12:00

So this is my contribution for the "Kustom Kulture" group show, which will still be on

until the 30th on April. Check it out at Rebel Yell Gallery, 203 K' Road, Auckland!

I'd never painted a motorcycle before, even though I like motorbikes and in fact I have a license

for riding them but haven't since I moved no NZ (not even driven a car mostly due to driving-on-

"wrong"-side-of-the-road-confusion). However drawing/painting them in all their insane detail is

a whole different story and I think in my case I made up a few screws and bolts but

it still looks like a motorcycle :)

My black rabbits are like the ominous black cat to me, which in some

cultures brings bad luck and in others good luck.

You are able to get an A4 Giclee print of it if you wish as part of my Easter Sale which ends this Wednesday!

♥ Easter Print Sale! ♥

2011-04-06T11:14:00.001+12:00

♥ Easter Print Sale! ♥ One week only:
Choose from ALL the paintings on my website:
www.diamondsoul.synthasite.com

A4 size Giclee Prints - NZ$ 20 - Free worldwide shipping!
You have one week to order, then I send them off in time
for the Easter Bunny :) Email: theirea@gmail.com

Australia Part 2: Sydney

2011-04-05T11:17:00.001+12:00

(For part 1 "Jervis Bay" go here.)

We arrived in the city at sunset! It was beautiful to see everything drenched in golden light!

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Can you see the Opera House? :D

The first animal we saw in Sydney was actually this dead bat hanging in the
power lines.. :((( We were trying to figure out how it would've died, because
bats have ultrasound so they wouldn't just crash into things. Our friend's theory
was that is was old and died in flight and then fell down into the power lines?

We met up with friends who joined us from Wellington and I was given this cute rabbit ring ♥♥♥!

We spent a day at Bondi Beach, which was most crowded but awesome fun to
watch the poser surferboys with their incredible bodies. We were lying next to
one and even when he was standing up just talking to his friends he was striking
Mr. universe poses (I should've snuck a photo) and then he grabbed his surfboard
and baywatch-gallopped off to the water. :D

Police on horseback! It's obviously the first time I've seen this :)

Posing at Bondi. My amateur pose is destined to show off my cool
bracelets which I got at the vintage Bondi markets for $1 each :DD

Another pretty sunset!

After sundown we went into town to the Absinthe Salon.
I was dressed inappropriately cololourful (last posts paisley
dress) for absinth madness so the photo is black and white :P

We went on Sunday (ahem) so the place was quiet, which was good because
we got to talk to the awesome waiter and learn lots about absinthe. We were
8 people and each ordered a different flavour so we could taste each others.
There was everything from minty/herbal over licorice to coffee!

I love how they all turn into different pastel colours once you let the water drip through.

They used an awesome old cash register!

After that we stumbled through Surrey Hills with the green
fairy in our blood and I thought this sign was hilarious :D

I wanna live in this overgrown terrace house! ♥

The next day I put on my artsy shoes I bought (from the Bondi Vintage market, of course!)...

...and matching bangles and we went off to see the Opera House.

We got shouted yummy food at Opera Bar!

It was tricky to take photos, because on that day the
sky was cloudy and the same colour as the opera house.

We then took the ferry that goes underneath the harbour bridge to Luna Park.

Can you see the people climbing over the very top? :D

We had dinner at the lovely Winery which had some crazy decor!

Another night we went up to the Shangri-La Blu Bar
on the 36th floor where the views were amazing!

On our last day we walked around Berry Island in the hopes of feeding
Koooookaburras, but there was only one hiding shyly somewhere. But cool trees!

And this! Wtf is it? Looks like a nest of some sorts??! They were all over the place!

I saw a big ship anchored next to us (it was way longer
than that, I could only fit half of it on my camera).

I have a phobia of big ships. I feel when I turn my back on
it it will jump on me. So I watched it and took photos instead.
My biggest fear is swimming out there in the bottomless ocean RIGHT
UP next to one of those big freighters. I'd faint and drown.I feel similar
about buoys with their slimy anchor chains that go way down, aaah!

Our friends and us went for a walk around Manly Beach where we
encountered this cute water dragon on the side of the path :DD

And pelikans! They're huge birds. I wanna ride one!

Sydney is beautiful! Would love to live there one day! :D

Paisley dress

2011-04-01T12:24:00.001+13:00

Paisley dress I made:

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Sneak Peek for "Kustom Kulture" Group Show in Auckland

2011-03-31T09:15:00.000+13:00

Here's a sneak peek of my painting for the "Kustom Kulture" group show
opening tomorrow, Friday at Rebel Yell Gallery, 203 K' Road, Auckland!

Hope all you Aucklanders will check it out. It will be on display until the 30th of April.
:DDD

50ies style

2011-03-29T09:50:00.000+13:00

I was part of a cute 50ies inspired photo shoot last weekend! Until I get the
actual photos I show you what my hair and make up was like. Hair is a bad example
because after walking home in Wellingtons moody weather it was pretty much
falling apart, but the make up was still good so I snapped some pics:

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I also bought this round diamond in a spur of the moment while
waiting for my friends at a market. A nice addition to my collection :)

Taking photos through it looks like this! Very confusing :P

"Kustom Kulture" Group show

2011-03-25T09:50:00.000+13:00

My art is coming to Auckland next week! I will have one piece in the "Kustom Kulture"
Group show at Rebel Yell Gallery on K' Road! All Aucklanders should check it out! ♥

Australia Part 1: Jervis Bay

2011-03-23T12:18:00.002+13:00

My boyfriend and I flew to Sydney 2 weeks ago to visit friends.
For the first 3 days we drove 3 hours south to Hyams Beach in Jervis
Bay which has the whitest sand ever. And the cutest parrots!!

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Upon arrival we saw a kangaroo in front someones house a few doors
down! I was so excited as I had never seen one before in real life :D

The first day was a bit rainy so we stayed in most of the time. We noticed
some birds sitting on the power lines and I tried feeding them...

Withing a few minutes they were all over our deck and sitting
on our hands and even on my head! (I put some bread on it :P)

This gif is my favourite! Notice how the parrot also turns its
head towards the camera when my friend's head pops in? Haha!

I almost died of cuteness watching them hold the food between
their toes and taking bites like it's a sandwich, awww <333

The plants there are so weird and beautiful!

On our way through the bush towards the beach I heard a rustling noise and looked
up and all I could see at first was this big brown bum with a long tail sitting there. Until it
turned around and I saw it was a wallaby sitting 2 metres away from me :D

This is Murray's beach. It lies inside a national park and is
so beautiful! I went snorkeling and watched some cute fishies
eat algae from the rocks wishing I had an underwater camera.

Mermaiding around... The water was so clear!

So many pretty shells but I couldn't collect any
because you can't bring foreign nature back to NZ. :(

We saw quite a few spiders too... I think this could be a golden orb spider. The big ones
apparently are able to catch and eat birds: Check this article out. There's a video too!

They were all up in the trees too!

I found wood with this strange pattern everywhere!

This photo was taken from very high up on a cliff!

A kookaburra, aww! I love these birds. Their laughing call makes me smile!
It kind of sounds like a mix between a monkey and a dolphin. One morning
I dreamt of dolphins and then woke up and saw it was just a kookaburra
sitting outside our house. If you've never heard their call before click here! :)

This one is Hyams beach which holds the record for the whitest sand in the world!

It creates a nice contrast to the black lagoon next to it.

My friend Emma's and my colourful toenails :P

Another beach around there had a cave in the rocks.

I found these strange looking caterpillars all sharing a leaf before
we jumped back into the car and drove 3 hours back to Sydney!

Sydney photos are still to come :D