acrylic – Kirsten Bailey: Art

Posted on July 29, 2017 by Kirsten

Heart Felt at :the mezzanine: @ Entangle – Living Art

The Heart Felt exhibition at :the mezzanine:, Entangle – Living Art, is happening in just under a week and I’m starting to get ~~nervous~~ excited!

Heart Felt Exhibition at the mezzanine, Entangle - Living Art, Dayboro

This is the first time I’ve been involved in an exhibition since before my daughter was born, and I think the theme fits perfectly with my painting style. Many of my paintings, especially my ‘family tree portraits’, feature hearts and convey feelings of belonging, love and connectedness.

Hope Within - Original watercolour painting by Kirsten Bailey — “Hope Within”

I really enjoy being involved in exhibitions. Not only do they give me an opportunity to showcase my work, but they also allow me to see the work of others. My husband is staying home with the kids on Friday night for the opening, so this exhibition will also an opportunity for a kid-free night out!

If you enjoy my work, I really hope you’ll take this opportunity to come and see it in person. I do my best to scan or photograph artwork carefully, but seeing it in person really brings it to life. There are also 6 other artists showcasing their work, and from what I’ve seen of their work so far, I’m extremely honoured (and maybe a little intimidated!) to be showing my work alongside theirs.

“Heart Felt” opens at 6pm on Friday 4th August at :the mezzanine: @ Entangle – Living Art, 38 Williams St, Dayboro. The exhibition runs through until August 27.

Posted on February 27, 2012 by Kirsten — 7 Comments

Getting My Groove Back

In the last couple of weeks, I’ve done more painting than I probably did during the whole of last year.

There were lots of reasons for it including work (my day job is teaching) as well as some difficult things I was going through. I just wasn’t in the mood to paint, and when I did give it a go I wasn’t happy with the results.

For one reason or another, I seem to have gotten my ‘groove’ back, and have lots of new ideas for paintings running around in my head. I’ve decided to finish off any unfinished work before I get to the new stuff.

You might remember a while back that I started a commission for some friends of mine. The challenge was to create a large acrylic on canvas version of my painting Colours of Nature. Well, I finally finished it! All those little swirls took quite a while but I’m very happy with the result. I can’t wait to see it hanging up!

After finishing this painting I felt such a sense of accomplishment, I wanted to do more!

First I painted this one, which I’m calling “Rainbow on a Cloudy Day”. It’s a LOT smaller than the one above – it’s only 4″ x 6″. It can stand up on its own so can be put on a shelf instead of hung on the wall.

After completing this one I really wanted to have a go at some other new ideas in my head (and play with some new paints) but I thought I should finish off some unfinished work. So…

I finished this one, which has been sitting and waiting patiently for more than a year for some attention. Well, it’s nearly finished anyway – all I have to do is spray on a coat of sealant and it’s done. I have done many watercolour paintings in this style, but it was a challenge to create the same effect with a canvas! I’m eager to try to do more like this.

Finally, I also finished this painting:

There was really no excuse for not getting this painting finished earlier, as all that was left to do was the tree trunks and branches – all of the detail work in the swirls was already finished. I’m very happy with how it turned out in the end!

Hopefully I will be able to keep you up-to-date with lots of new work in the future!

Posted on August 31, 2010August 31, 2010 by Kirsten — 1 Comment

Illustration Friday – Immovable

This week’s topic over at Illustration Friday is Immovable. The first idea that came to me was stone – but then I got to thinking that even stone isn’t really immovable. Sure, it might take a long time but even stone is worn away by weathering and water. So that was my inspiration for this painting – stone being worn down by water:

Please forgive the horrible photo – I took it at night without flash so it’s pretty grainy. I’ll try to upload a better version when I get time to take a good daylight photo – but that probably won’t be till the weekend and I didn’t want to miss out on Illustration Friday!

One of my favourite books of all time is First Light by Richard Preston, which is about the Hale Telescope (and is a fascinating read for anyone interested in astronomy). One of the passages that stuck with me was this:

“There is a saying among those who polish astronomical mirrors for a living that an optician never finishes a mirror – you take it away from him.”

I think that pretty much sums up how a painting like this is for me – I can’t guarantee the picture above is the final version because every time I walk past it I think about adding another brush stroke here or there, another layer or another detail.

I managed to remember to take pictures as I went for this one – here’s how it looked as it progressed:

What do you think?

Posted on March 28, 2010 by Kirsten

My Latest Work…

My latest work is an acrylic on canvas, the first I’ve done since completing a commission last year. It’s taken me a few weeks to finish, because I just didn’t want to let it go – I kept adding more and more detail. I finally put the finishing touches on it today. I’ve titled it “A Winter Memory”.

In other news, my painting “Persistent Illusion” has been featured on the blog Pardalote Flits. You may remember I was paired up with Michelle from Pardalote in our most recent DUST swap. Her hand-beaded jewellery is gorgeous and I’m honoured to be featured on her blog!
I’d love to hear some feedback on my latest painting 🙂

Posted on February 28, 2010February 28, 2010 by Kirsten — 1 Comment

A Productive Weekend

It’s been a great weekend for me art-wise!

Yesterday I presented a talk and tutorial to the lovely ladies of the Springfield Lakes Art Group. I demonstrated some of my watercolour techniques to them, and talked a little about my keepsake boxes and promoting art with Etsy. I was really nervous but had a great time.

This is the painting I did as part of my demonstration:

Today I finished and delivered the commissioned piece I was working on for a dear friend of mine. It was very satisfying to see it finally hanging on the wall:

As one door closes, another opens they say – well, as I completed this commission, I received a new one – a customer wants a personalised painting similar to a painting I sold titled “When it is Dark Enough”. I look forward to the challenge of creating a piece she’ll enjoy!

I finished two other watercolours this weekend too, titled Poppy Field and Winter’s End. I also started work on two acrylic paintings which I hope to include in the upcoming Abundance exhibition.

I got a print done of my Sunset Storm painting for a customer in the US, and at the same time did some 4″ x 6″ prints of various paintings to make into cards. I also put in an order for some new business cards from Moo.

As you can see, I got a LOT done this weekend – I didn’t get any housework at all done besides cooking dinner tonight, so I owe it all to my wonderful husband that I got so much arty stuff done 🙂

Posted on February 1, 2010February 1, 2010 by Kirsten — 2 Comments

Works in Progress…

It’s been a productive weekend!

I’ve done lot’s of work on my lastest commission, a painting for a friend:

Paulas Garden work in progress

There is a lot of detail in this one, and it is HUGE (I can only fit one panel at a time on my easel), so it’s taking me a really long time to finish, but I hope the result will be worth it in the end.

I completed another painting this weekend, and thought I’d show you the stages it went through:

Step One: Painting taped down and ready to go. I've also used tape to separate the four panels (as opposed to wrecking another brush with masking fluid).

Step Two: Spring colours - I decided on pinks, greens and yellows to represent spring.

Step Three: Summer is orange, yellow and green. You can see the paint was still wet when I took this photo.

Step Four: Browns, oranges and reds for Autumn

At this point, I left the painting to dry before removing the tape. I painted a tree branch going across the top of the painting. Here’s the result:

I also made some more art pendants this week, but that’s a post for another day!

Posted on January 11, 2010 by Kirsten

How I’ve Been Keeping Busy…

I’m lucky enough to be on holidays – so what have I been doing with my time?

I finished off a commissioned painting, and delivered it to my happy customer:

Now that one’s done, I’ve started working on another commission, this one for a friend:

This is just one panel of a triptych. I’m looking forward to seeing the finished painting on her wall! Also a big thank you to my wonderful husband for the new easel it’s sitting on, which I got for Christmas.

Finally, I’ve also been working on some new pendants – these ones are squares and rectangles:

I’m offering a discount to my facebook fans this week – buy a keepsake box and a pendant in your choice of design for $50. Become a fan of KL Bailey Art on facebook for more details!

Posted on March 1, 2009November 16, 2009 by Kirsten — 1 Comment

Inspire Me Thursday: Moon & Springfield Lakes Art Group

This week’s topic over at Inspire Me Thursday is Moon. I immediately knew what I was going to paint (although the finished product varied slightly from what I had in my head, as is often the case).

I have titled this work “Tipped with Silver”. It doesn’t show up too well in this picture, but the edges of the tree branches have been given a very thin silver outline.

Tipped With Silver - Acrylic Painting by Kirsten Bailey

This Sunday was my first visit to the Springfield Lakes Art Group, and I had a great time! This week Sally Harrison came along to teach us all some techniques, and our focus was colour mixing. We were given a strip of paper from a famous painting, and our task was to try to make the strip “disappear” by matching the colours. I found it very challenging! My strip of paper was from a painting by Camille Pissarro, although I’m not sure which painting it was. This is what I came up with:

Reflections on Pissarro - Acrylic Painting by Kirsten Bailey

I had a lovely time and learned a thing or two. Many thanks to everyone at the Springfield Lakes Art Group, and especially to Sally Harrison – you can check out her beautiful artwork here.

Posted on November 19, 2008November 16, 2009 by Kirsten

Gallery Open and Upcoming Exhibitions

My online gallery is officially open! I am still in the process of uploading images of my work, so please check back regularly.

My next exhibition is called Spirit Matters:

Posted on November 8, 2008November 16, 2009 by Kirsten

Welcome!

Thank you for visiting. It’s been a while coming, but for my site is finally up and running. It’s not quite the finished product yet – there’ll be lots of little changes and updates to polish things off – but all the important stuff is here.

I’m also working on getting my gallery of work ready, and it should be available soon. In the meantime, please visit my deviantART site to view lots of examples of my work.