The sunsets out over the Tasman Sea here on the West Coast in New Zealand have been just stunning lately. The sky is so clear, and the colours are so very vivid – the light catches on the sea and can be quite dazzling. Sometimes I watch out our kitchen window and just think “if I paint that exactly as it is, no one will believe me!”. I guess that is always one of the challenges for an artist; to take what they see and to make it believable even when it seems to defy logic. Or, as I usually do, to skip the reality and instead capture the feel of it; to capture the song it sings in your heart.
I think one of the things that I really value about living in rural New Zealand is the clean, fresh air – our sky is so clear that sunrise and sunset can be just amazing. I’m not much of a morning person so it is rare for me to see a sunrise. Okay, very, vary rare… On the other hand, I am a terrible insomniac. Some nights, when I’m up at 2 or 3 in the morning drifting round the house, I sit and watch the night sky – clear and bright and full of stars. How incredible is that?
I have just completed two new paintings, both abstracting the view and colours I see from our house in the evenings. Do they capture what the view from our house looks like? No they don’t. Do they capture the colours of the view? Yes, I think they do. Do they capture how the veiw makes me feel, the joy it brings me? Yes, absolutely.
These are 6×6″ on gallery wrap canvas and are for sale on my Etsy site and on TradeMe
Cath Sheard 