Having only JUST landed in the Bay of Plenty to live with my family… i was very lucky to get involved with this local mural festival at the very last minute….
I left almost all of my creative intention back in the UK, with the hope of making our transition into an entirely new way of life on the other side of the world a bit less complicated. Art in all it’s forms is essential to me but also comes with a lot of invisible, and relentless work, ( like updating websites for example!). I was planning on avoiding the ups and downs of creative living for a while, especially having left ALL of our free childcare back home…. BUT…. all of a sudden i was being sent photos of big walls and being invited to opening ceremonies and artist’s breakfasts. 16 other artists were to be painting murals around Tauranga and Mount Maunganui at the same time as me and some of them had been flown in from the US and Italy.
Stumbling into my biggest project to date, with no time to prepare was a bit nervewrecking of course but having the support of a team of organisers and working literally alongside lots of other artists, was a real help. I had 5 days countdown untill NO childcare so the pressure was really on and the ladder i was using was heavy!!
The theme of the Festival was
“ Although small, its is precious”, which luckily fit in with the plant and seed observations me and my daughter had been making since arriving in this new home of ours. I didn’t have any time to delve deep and theoretically into the brief, So i used a tried and tested pattern forming method of overlapping and intersecting botanical shapes using a cool colour scheme. As usual tried not to complicate things, but most probably did . I have been wondering alot about this since my brief conversations with artist Askewone (NZ/NYC) over mushroom dumplings at one of many artist dinners we had during the week... Bringing art back to its simplest form is probably the hardest. The greatest abstract art looks simple but most definately isn’t, mainly due to the long road the artist has been down to get back to basics.
Alot of the other murals were portrait based which is totally awe-inspiring and followed a general theme of most street art here, of honouring your ancestors in order to reconnect with lost or hidden culture.
I was trying hard NOT to think about connecting with my own culture or roots as clearly i was no-where near South West England. Had i neglected the binds i had created over the last 4 years of being based in Glastonbury by coming on this adventure? Or was what i’d learnt from those more stable years enabling all of this?
I listened to Brene Brown podcasts and tried to think broadly about human nature and just kept painting in the lines…
Here are some of my favourite shots taken by a variety of people whilst i was busy up the ladder, or busy eating vegan burgers or taking breaks in the air-conditioned gym whos wall i was painting.
Amazing work by all involved, and incredible effort by Jah and Lovie Smith of Street Prints to get this kind of project funded 5 years in a row.
Mural is located in Phoenix Lane , Mount Maunganui behind the Natural Fit gym and Save Mart op shop.
for further info and lots of amazing pictures visit www.streetprints.org
Watching Italian artist MILLO painting, actually painting as i watched, was a mega highlight of my year . Shame i didnt get to hang out more with him and the rest of the international team due to toddler duties
such a gentle man, making such gentle art, in such a brutal medium.
look at his work here > www.millo.biz