On 29th July, Shona and Sharon's birthday, I had planned to chat with Shona on Yahoo Chat. Unfortunately, although I now know she was logged on when I got there, it wasn't for another half an hour that I found her. I said one sentence (along the lines of 'Have you been logged on long?') and she replied (roughly 'What do you mean?') and disappeared. I later found out she had an appointment elsewhere. But I was cross I hadn't figured out how to find her sooner. Still, we will find a better way to chat and catch up again. I then tried ringing them both to wish them a happy birthday, but had no luck in that department either.
So, Mike and I pottered around until early afternoon, then headed up the A40 to Balsall Common near Birmingham. I had seen an article in NZ News UK that said this art gallery was displaying pictures from a Dunedin artist until the end of July. As this was our only free weekend, I snapped it up and said we had to visit the exhibition. Well, it had finished by the time we got there, but the pictures were still in the gallery (just not all on display anymore). So the owner fished them out and placed them around.
We had a good old chat with the owner. He had a friend bring back a picture from Dunedin by Lindsay Crooks and had decied to see if Lindsay Crooks would have an exhibition in his gallery. He must have agreed, as the pictures we were seeing was the result of that exchange. The exhibition was all on one theme - beach culture. And we ended up buying a pastel of Lawyers Head, and an oil of the hot salt water pool. In a years time, we have to get the oil varnished (this process probably has a technical term, but I don't know it. When the art gallery owner was saying we needed to do this, he said we could varnish it ourselves. I was pleased to see Mike cringe at the thought too. I had visions of the Mr Bean movie - where, if you've seen it, Mr Bean accidentally wipes the face off Whistler's Mother (a famous American painting) and he paints it back on with a paint-by-numbers set of something. There was no way I was going to wipe anything over any artwork.
So, we have made a note in our diaries to take the painting back at the end of July 2001 to get done professionally. And we will also get a new frame at the same time. The current frame was a freebie for the exhibition. Mike has seen a blue-ish frame he wants to get for it as the most striking thing about the picture is the brilliant blues of a Dunedin summer day (just as I remember the bright days down at the hot salt water pool when I was younger. I especially remember the blue sea in the old pool, over the wall. The kelp would move when the waves broke over the old crumbling concrete walls, the wavetops brilliant white against the deep blue pool. I remember seeing little octopuses in there once. This is where I learned how to snorkel - Moana pool didn't allow snorkelling, but the Salt Water Pool did. Much better place to learn than St Clair surf beach! Snorkelling and surf did not go well together.). The pastel of Lawyers Head is very nice, and hanging in our hallway now. It has brilliant greens in it and a different feel.
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