Mystery tree

Mystery seed pod

In the grounds of the ASTT building in Federation Park,  there's a tree with an unusual woody seed pod or capsule. I picked one up from the ground under the tree some time last year and asked around but nobody knew what it was. This is the seed pod:

I was there again a couple of weeks ago and tried to reach a sprig of leaves to help with identifying the tree. The branches were just beyond my reach but fortunately there was a man nearby and I asked him if he could break off a piece for me, which he kindly did. Not only that, when I asked him if he knew what the tree was, he absolutely did ... he said it's a Mahogany tree! This was a great surprise and unexpected, like meeting a famous person. I looked it up later on the internet and scanned the leaves as a record.

http://theplumtree2.blogspot.com/2012/04/mahogany.html

http://www.arkive.org/big-leaf-mahogany/swietenia-macrophylla/image-G15435.html

Evidently mahogany in general has been overlogged and is on the verge of extinction in many areas.

(P.S. If the blog seems to be more about botany than about art lately, this is temporary, just a few observations which I wanted to share).

A drawing of trees

Mary Adam, Savannah Trees, pen & ink on acid-free paper

This drawing was intended for a linocut but so far I haven't been able to make it work in that form and have used (i.e. spoiled) two lino blocks or is it three? So for now it's a drawing on its own, in Indian ink on acid-free paper.

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Drawings from Scotland and Ireland

Looking around the internet for interesting drawings I found these. 

Angela Palmer, b. Scotland 1957, makes her drawings on many sheets of glass, building up map-like linear patterns which have an other-worldly clarity. The subtle shapes remind me a little of ancient Greek sculpture. More info at http://www.artnet.com/artists/angela-palmer/

Angela Palmer, Robert Harris Portrait 3

Ink drawing on 16 sheets of glass, 34.5 x 29.5 x 24 cm.

Lucy McKenna is a young Irish artist who studied at NCAD in Dublin. The drawing is from a series called "The Darker Wood" which arose from a residency in Canada and which includes photographs and paper sculptures. 

More info at http://www.lucymckenna.com/art/thedarkerwoodgallery/index.htm.

Lucy McKenna, Tree VI, 35 x 30 cm, pencil on paper

Thanks to both artists for permission to post.

Trees and foliage

Two logbook pages from March 2010. These are about Van Gogh's trees and the marks he used to show the foliage.

Right-click and "open link in new window" to enlarge.

Dream on

Pink Poui, acrylic and oil pastel, 9 x 12", March 2010

Last night I dreamt that I had a show at a restaurant which I had never been in before. I can't identify the place though I might be able to draw it, it was L-shaped with a side room. Neither can I remember ever meeting the gallery owner who was in her forties and blonde. At the end, as everyone was leaving, I asked her how we did and she said everything sold out!!! And then I woke up.

First reasonable screenprint

It's taken a few months but I've finally got a reasonable silkscreen print, in fact four of them. I made the stencil with drawing fluid and screen filler and printed the image onto Grumbacher pastel paper which took the acrylic ink very well.


Each of the sheets of paper measures 18 x 12" and is a different colour. I hand-coloured one with metallic inks (below).