Please click picture for larger view

 

Campsites in Africa are home to many scavengers and red-billed hornbills are among them. Unlike some others though, these aren't pests but they are gorgeous to look at and observe. Scratchboard 8" x 10"

 

 

 

 

 

Same school as some of the children's portraits below, this girl was absolutely radiant and made me think of the title "Hope for Africa". It's an 8" x 10" scratchboard done with a different technique to the portrait directly below. That is a series of random squiggles whereas this is called 'feathering' where straight lines are scratched at a slight angle to the previous set to create lighter areas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I stopped at a school to hand over pens and paper and other things that they needed in the back blocks of Namibia, all the kids came and sang to us. Once the show was over, they all wanted their photos taken. They are so exuberant. The girls all do some kind of modelling pose and the boys all do some kind of 'gangsta' pose. It's the same all over Africa for some reason. They check their picture on the back of the camera and then dash off to allow someone else to have his or her photo taken. So much fun!! This kid is no different giving me his version of the thumbsup sign, but in Gangsta fashion with his finger extended.
8" x 10" Scratchboard

     

"Zambia" is a scratchboard (12" x 16") of another lion I met in Zambia. She was cute and cuddly and would probably have loved me for lunch (though I'm not sure which side of the plate I would have ended up on)

 

 

 

 

 

"Tacugama Dreaming", chimp 8" x 10" Scratchboard. I had the Tacugama Chimp sanctuary in Sierra Leone in mind when I created this piece.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Australian Black Swans are aggressive birds but this one was simply checking me out. 12" x 16" Scratchboard

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My first portrait in oils, a school girl in Namibia, 18" x 18". I really enjoyed doing her hair which was quite a challenge

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Old men of Springbok. When I travelled through this little north western South African town, I was freezing. So were the locals as these two guys sitting on the side of the street showed

 

 

 

 

 

My first ever oil painting, Impalas 17" x 13"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

An experiment, white scratchboard with coloured ballpoint pens 5" x 7" Cassowary

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     

"I can see your soul", Gorilla, scratchboard 8" x 10"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At a place called Spitzkoppe in Namibia, a bunch of school children sang songs of welcome to me and the group I was with. This is the girl who led the singing and she was full of life, energy and zest.

 

 

 

 

 

Whilst on a recent trip to Africa, I had the opportunity to go ‘walking with lions’ in Zambia and this scratchboard is the result of my time with a couple of gorgeous ten month old girls.

 

 

 

 

 

 

"African Man" 8" x 10" Scratchboard. I needed to include the ubiquitous fly that seems to be on everyone's face in Africa. No wonder there are so many gorgeous birds that eat these things - they are everywhere!!

 

         

 

 

 

 

Here's the latest in my 'Homeless' series. This is scratchboard, 8" x 10".

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had never been much of a fan of Leonard Cohen's music but my wife was. She dragged me along to one of his concerts recently and this 74 year old completely turned me around. He was amazing on stage and just about every woman in the crowd was swooning after him - heck, I nearly was too haha.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This was a fun piece. A group of us who put our work on a scratchboard forum decided to do a recognition challenge where we all did a piece from the same photo and then tried to recognise who did what. It wasn't easy. This was my entry

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Buffalo are imposing animals, mean and nasty, and strangley beautiful. I've tried to create a 'get out of my way' moment here by making the buffalo look imposing and it's titled "We're not moving! You Move!!"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This was an experiment with different tools on scratchboard, trying to create a moment of panic where a gorilla is fleeing from a forest fire, an all too common occurrence in the natural world, let alone a world affected by man. It's called "Running the flames"

 

 

 

 

            

I couldn't resist the title of "Why" with this scratchboard image. This gorilla could simply be looking up at a plane which would give me a great reference to the film "The God's must be crazy", but "Why" creates so much more emotion in a world where primates in general are being destroyed at such an alarming rate by all sorts of pressures.

 

 

 

 

This is a drill. It's related to the baboon and even more to the Mandrill (think Rafiki in the Lion King), hugely endangered through - you guessed it - illegal trade and deforestation in Cameroon and Nigeria, both west African countries. Still, there are great organisations trying to do great work with them. There's always the good guys trying to fix things that the bad guys mess up. Ok, a little less simple than that when you live with no money but still.....

 

 

 

 

 

Zebras are wonderful creatures and their markings make great raw material for artists, and definitely for scratchboard art. I've chosen to colour this one and it's called "Colourful Love", 8" x 10"

 

 

 

 

 

"The Drifter", soft pastels, 16" x 10". I liked the challenge of this guy. He has that rugged, almost homeless, yet handsome look and I wanted to see if I could get that across.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

With this guy, I just want his image to say "It could happen to you too".

"Homeless" 8" x 10"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These two pieces which will be mounted together tell the amazing story of Kusasi, "the Orangutan King". This guy was orphaned about 40 years ago (mother shot by hunters) and ended up at a sanctuary in Borneo at a very young age. At the age of three and a half, he disappeared from camp and since orangutans need mother's milk until five, he was presumed dead. He turned up 18 months later at age five none the worse for his escape and proceeded to grow and become king of the jungle, the dominant male in the area. His cheek flaps grew with the new testosterone that dominant males get flushed with and he's a sight to behold.

I call it "Kusasi's Hope" because he started out in a box, peering out at the world with young eyes and no mother, and grew into a world famous celebrity and an awesome sight to behold.

 

 

 

"Recollection", scratchboard 8" x 10". He looks like he's recollecting a lifetime of memories. I was tempted to go along the lines of the previous portrait with a title like "Bad year for corn" considering he looks like he's gazing out, looking a bit disappointed, but I felt I was getting too negative and went with something more wistful instead.

 

 

 

 

This image just screamed at me the title "No Fish Today", in his wet weather gear and that disappointed look on his face. It's 8" x 10" in scratchboard, an experiment to test whether portraits and scratchboard are a good mix for me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A couple of chimp sketches in biro, Lika and Zac, both from the "Jane Goodall Institute Chimpanzee Eden" in South Africa.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is Abu, a recently deceased chimp from the "Jane Goodall Institute Chimpanzee Eden" in South Africa. The staff there were all saddened by his loss, dieing of congestive heart failure on August 1. Abu was rescued as a youngster from Angola about 12 years ago, and because JGI SA had no sanctuary then, was cared for at the Johannesburg Zoo, until the Eden was opened by Dr Jane Goodall in March 2006. Abu went on to become the alpha male in the first family group at the Sanctuary, which had grown to eight by the time of his death. Sanctuary manager Phillip Cronje has known and looked after Abu since his arrival in South Africa aged about four. He had been rescued from living in a cage at a business in Luanda. At Abu’s postmortem Dr Andre Beytel discovered that the chimp’s heart was abnormally small and one of his valves was malfunctioning. When Abu picked up a cold, his heart could simply no longer cope.

 

 

Meerkat, 5" x 7"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another cheetah commission to a great person who said this about it - "I recieved the cheetah today, it arrived safe and sound. Plus it took my breath away. Its just so much more awesome when you see it as artwork not just an image on the computer. I'm totally in love with it." (Many thanks Helen)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This was my 'demo piece' on the opening day at my Monarto exhibition, a cheetah in scratchboard, 8" x 10", and below, another piece called "The Stare". For my piece at right I gratefully received this comment from the client "I have received the cheetah and he is absolutely glorious!! I can't thank you enough for him as he is unbelievably spectacular. I am sure I will contact you again if thats ok, to get another masterpiece." (thanks Fran). I also received this for "The Stare". "Well done, I have forwarded the cheetah to Vicki and I know her response already. She will be over the moon with it. It looks sensational, again well done." (thanks Chris)

 

 

 

Orangutan, a miniature scratchboard coloured with watercolour. I wanted to try an experiment. I knew from bitter previous experience that marker pen on scratchboard bleeds when you spray it with varnish. It mucked things up before, but this time I wanted to see if I could make it work 'for' me. I went over the background with marker pen, then fuzzed it out a bit just to get the look of bushes (hard at this size) and then sprayed with varnish in the hope that the marker would bleed and create some bush shadow over the animal. I think it worked to a certain extent, though it's something you have no real control over.

 

Something a bit different for me, a clown in scratchboard with the goal to make him look a little sinister. I've used watercolours to colour where I've scratched.