Uncertainty 1965

With the space race in full flight by the mid-1960s, stepping outside an orbiting capsule and seeing what would happen became a massive hurdle to leap. The brave USA astronaut to make this great leap was Edward White, on June 3, 1965 - 47 years ago this week, as part of the Gemini space program.

The extra-vehicular activity (EVA) started at 19:45 UT (3:45 p.m. EDT) on Gemini IV's third orbit, when White opened his hatch and used the hand-held maneuvering oxygen-jet gun to push himself out of the capsule. The EVA started over the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii and lasted 23 minutes, ending over the Gulf of Mexico. Initially, White propelled himself to the end of the 8 meter tether and back to the spacecraft three times using the hand-held gun. After the first three minutes the fuel ran out and White maneuvered by twisting his body and pulling on the tether.

I have painted his first moments in space, hurtling at 17,000km/h above the USA. The photographs on which it is based were taken by Commander James McDivitt.

Ed White died in the tragic fire on board Apollo 1 in 1967. One of the bravest ever.

Uncertainty
Oil on Canvas
1230mm x 1230mm
Melbourne 2012

Family

Here is a sentimental piece of work. It was my Mother's 80th birthday recently and I painted this for her. It is from a photo taken in 1965 with Mum and the six of us in the snow in Ohakune. I love the way she looks so lovely and all of her children look so dopey. That's me - the chubby one on the right.

The Man in the Moon - a life size painting of a US astronaut

Here is my new project, following on from the success of the Lunar Australia painting at the St Michael's Art Awards, and the recent forays into abstract astronauts, I am painting a life-size portrait of an astronaut on the moon.

It is an ambitious project, and will likely take hundreds of hours to complete.

I am especially grateful to the team of passionate experts at HC Pro in Horsham, who provided me with the enormous digital prints I am using as a guide for colour and detail. They are works of art unto themselves.

The slideshow will progress as I work on the painting over the next months.

Lunar 

Oil on Linen

1500mm x 2400mm

Melbourne 2012

2011 Albert Park College Art Show

The 2011 Albert Park College Art Show was a great success raising funds and linking many of Melbourne's artists to the new school community, with the school only opening this year. APC is an arts-based College, and the money raised will go a long way to supporting the germination of an ambitious arts program for the next few years.

Organised by Trudy Rice, Lisa Thornley and their band of helpers (me included), over 270 artworks were exhibited and many were sold. The show also raised money through an auction on the Gala Friday evening event. It was supported by a vast array of supporting workshops including the musicians of APC hosting a public workshop and performance, painting, woodwork, graffiti art by aerosol one and cooking with a Master Chef style cook off for kids.

The large scale painting below this post of a pixellated Buzz Aldrin was one of the many sold.

Here's a link to a 360 panoramic version of this photo of the show on Saturday - click here to view in a browser.

Buzz 2

Buzz 2
Oil On Canvas
920mm x 1220 mm
Melbourne 2011.

Another look at the Apollo series. A radical chance from my last photo realistic image of buzz.

Ongoing Apollo Series.

Buzz
Oil on Canvas
500mm x 700mm
Melbourne 2011

Closeup of above painting.

Buzz with a wink to van Eyck.

Who was the Winner of the Archangel Prize 2011? Me.

Progression of Lunar Australis.

With most of my works I probably spend just about as much time thinking about what I am going to paint as actually painting. Lunar Australis took several months to complete. It is lucky I can think and paint at the same time.

Late Light

Late Light
Oil on Canvas
500mmx x 400mm
Melbourne 2011

This work is based on a photo taken from our time in Wellington. It is looking over Wellington harbor from Seatoun to the Orongaronga range of mountains as the light fades in the late evening.

Portrait: Boy on a Queensland Beach

Boy on a Queensland Beach
Oil on canvas
400 x 300mm
Melbourne 2011.

Serendipity.

Man on the Moon
Oil on Canvas
900mm x 900mm
Melbourne 2011

The intention was to continue on the Lunar theme I have been working on for a while. A friend kindly lent me an overhead projector that had been rescued from a rubbish skip and I copied the image onto acetate to project onto the canvas - but I bought the wrong acetate. The ink did not set but separated out and slowly degraded. It looked far more interesting so that's what I painted.

Things to Do With a Women's Weekly.

Things to do with a Women's Weekly
Paper Mosaic
500mm x 700mm
Melbourne 2011

Side view showing pins the that suspend the tiny ripped squares of paper above the base board.

A competition by the Hobart City Council caught my eye. It called for works out of paper or wood. I have never been to Tasmania and thought if I got a work accepted it would be a good excuse to go south.

My starting point a fantastic App called Lego Photo that converts any photo from your collection into a Lego photo, i.e. it breaks it down into simple blocks of colour. I have used this a couple of times to make patterns for cross stitch works.

I then took an Australian Women's Weekly (Christmas addition) and started ripping. Each square is 7mm across and each one of those is suspended on a pin, held in place with a tiny blob of glue. It was not until I quite a way into the project that I actually took time to work out how many squares that I would have to find/sort/rip/pin/glue the components. That number is approximately 2300. Needless to say, it took a looooong time. So long in fact that I managed to miss the deadline for submission into the competition. Darn.

Lunar

Lunar
Oil on Canvas
200mm x 300mm
Melbourne 2011.

This is a small painting achieved with a palette knife.

Lunar Australis

Lunar Australis
Oil On Canvas
1200mm x 800mm
Melbourne 2011.

Lately I have been reading about the Apollo missions of the late 1960s and early 1970s.

There are many iconic photographs of the missions. A shot taken in 1971 on the moon's surface showing the Lunar Lander, Lunar Rover and an astronaut saluting the American flag I found compelling.

The act of planting a flag somehow implies ownership in Western society, an alien takeover - similar to James Cook at Possession Island in Australia, almost precisely 200 years before. It lead me to think what if Australia got there first?

Recent Work

Spring 2
Oil on Canvas
455mm x 450mm
Melbourne 2010.

Storm 2
Oil on Canvas
1010mm x 760mm
Melbourne 2010

Night Moon
Oil on Canvas
305mm x 230mm
Melbourne 2010.

Lake 2
Oil on Canvas
250mmx x 250mm
Melbourne 2010.

Lake
Oil on Canvas
255mm x200mm
Melbourne 2010

Storm, Small
Oil on Canvas
200mm x 200mm
Melbourne 2010.

New Work. New direction.

Storm
Oil on Canvas
Melbourne 2010
102mm x 760mm .

Maybe it's spring in the air. I have a feeling of change overwhelming me. I have not been spending much time in the studio in the last few months until this week when all of a sudden I cannot get out.
The catalyst was taking all my painting off the wall and resolving to start again in filling them up. It is the advantage of having a good hanging system that it is no real commitment in hanging anything on the wall - it can easily be changed.
Maybe I am feeling a little NZ home sick but I seem to be inclined to landscape right now. I have also put away the brushes and resolved to only work with a pallet knife. It is wonderfully messy and immediate.

St Michael Archangel Art Award

Here I am trying to look nonchalant at the St Michael's Archangel Award. I was really impressed with the calibre of entrants and very proud to get selected.

I guess it's OK to lean on your own paintings at an exhibition.

The catalogue looked great - I got a double page spread.

The Boneyard, Tucson Arizona.

Boneyard Tucson 2
Oil on Canvas
1210mm x 760mm
Melbourne
2010

Boneyard Tucson 1
Oil on Canvas
1210mm x 300mm
Melbourne
2010

Where do all the planes go when they die? The Boneyard, Tucson Arizona (officially known as 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group). US military aircraft are dumped here for scrap and spare parts. They are laid out with military precision. On first view I marveled at the pattern they made. This soon moved to being horrified to the waste of it all with the total original purchase price of the 4400 aircraft is estimated at 27 billion dollars. It dawned on me that the pattern of the assemblage had a resemblance to a Persian rug which given that some of these aircraft probably spend some of their lifetime bombing the Middle East there is some irony there.

The Door.

The Door
Oil on Canvas
360mm x 460mm
Melbourne
2010

Landscape - SFO

SFO
Oil On Canvas
900 x 900mm
Melbourne
2010

We lived in San Francisco for a year and it was a monumental year for us for lots of reasons. I have mixed memories of San Francisco Airport - arriving for a new adventure and the trepidation of having to find my way out of the place through a snake pit of road lanes and into the city, driving out to pick up much missed friends and family and being amazed that after a while I was not so overwhelmed by the place. San Francisco was becoming home.

SFO from above looks very surprising. It is a tartan pattern but the spaces between the runways are desolate, scorched earth. There is no effort made to make it look pretty.

The New Age of Landscape - smaller works

I have been working on some smaller Google Earth-inspired landscapes in the series - 2 drawn from the larger works of JFK and Heathrow airports, and one from the view of Williamstown harbour in Melbourne.

Williamstown Harbour
Oil on Canvas
340mm x 340mm
Melbourne
2009.

Heathrow Small 1
Oil on Canvas
340mm x 340mm
Melbourne
2009.

JFK Runway
Oil on Canvas
340mm x 340mm
Melbourne
2009.

See the earlier works here: http://lesleymelody.blogspot.com/2009/05/new-age-of-landscape.html

Report from the AIR - Artist in Residence

Week 4 as the AIR in Melbourne Central

Being at the new studio/gallery every day for a few hours is a very productive habit, after over a year of being away from my main studio and painting in the corners of the kitchens of rented cottages in Melbourne's bayside suburbs.

The location attracts a diverse range of people - though not many in the serious art-buying market, and a fair population of the bewildered wandering the mall on cold autumn days.

The light is great with the big windows overlooking Little Lonsdale Street, and the white walls make the paintings really stand out.

This painting is the latest in a long series of spheres emerging within surreal landscapes.

Having multiple pieces of work on the go at one time enables me to get a break from each style - the result of the first few week's work is therefore incredibly diverse.

People ask me "what style do you paint?" expecting a single genre or method. Not this artist!

Blue Rising
Oil On Canvas
Melbourne
2010 .

This is the newest in 'The New Age of Landscape' series, a detailed part of the much larger 900mm x 900mm Heathrow Airport satellite view on Google Earth.

Using incredibly fine brushes the progress you see here represents about 20 hours of painting. (Note: see the finished image here).

Lesley Melody on Goollery - the Google Gallery

People have been Twittering and blogging the amazing website Goollery.org, where a collection of the best Google-derived and inspired works of art, science and software have been showcased.

The great news is that my new series of landscapes inspired by Google Earth images has been selected to feature in the Goollery Earth section.

The initial works are quite large and extremely time-consuming, so I have started working on some smaller, more practical sizes.

Take some time to browse through Goollery and see the amazing things that have been inspired by all the different tools and services that Google has brought to our world.

Artist in Residence, Melbourne Central

Over the weekend I moved into a space in the giant Melbourne Central Mall, on Level 3 diagonally opposite the main cinema complex.

With expert help from friends and family getting the former fashion boutique ready, the shop has been transformed into a modern looking studio where I will paint from 11 -3pm most days for the next few weeks, joined by some fellow artists for company and creativity.

Painting in public will be good practise for being rubber-necked by passers-by at the new studio in Middle Park, which should be ready in only a couple of months from now.

Thanks Fashion Incubator!


Special thanks to Trudy and Artists on the Move (see http://trudyriceart.wordpress.com/) for finding the opportunity, Glen (trades - wicked with a power drill), Rani (paint, creative collaboration) and Amanda (everything else, plus coming by to be creative) for making this possible over 2 short days.

Blue Red

Blue Red
Oil on Canvas
750mm x 900mm
Melbourne
2009

The New Age of Landscape

Heathrow
Oil on Canvas
900mm x 900mm
Melbourne
2009.

JFK
Oil on Canvas
1010mm x 760mm
Melbourne
2009.

I have always loved maps and have enjoyed the new world according to Google Earth. It's a great thrill to look at places I have been around the globe from a birds eye view. Looking at airports , I have been struck by the elegance of these totally functional man-made landscapes. Some of them have an element of tribal art. Without the cues of aircraft and land vehicles the space is very abstract.

The latest work in progress is a portion of the Heathrow Airport depicted in the major work above (340mm x 340mm). The finished painting and 2 more in the series are on this blog-post.

Heathrow 2
Oil on Canvas
340mm x 340mm
Melbourne
2009

Night Sky

Night Sky
Oil and Crayon on Canvas
300mm x 300mm
Melbourne
2008

Large spheres

Large Sphere 4
Oil on Canvas
610mm x 610mm
Melbourne
2009

Large Sphere 1

Oil on Canvas
610mm x 610mm
Melbourne
2009.

Large Sphere 2
Oil on Canvas
610mm x 610mm
Melbourne
2009.

Large Sphere 3
Oil on Canvas
610mm x 610mm
Melbourne
2009.

I keep coming back to spheres. I do not know why. They seem to be getting bigger and will one day take over the house. I have on exhibition in Wellington, New Zealand in June with my fellow former students of Roberto and I think I will be taking these.