New series - "Symbols of China"

I downloaded the Adobe Illustrator program in Creative Suite 4 and I joined an online forum to learn how to do the vector diagrams, all to no avail - the jargon and the degree of difficulty was just too much for me! So for now I am just completing these designs "Symbols of China" as paintings and I will learn how to "vectorise" them at some later date. Maybe when I go back to Australia I can do a course that will explain it all to me!

This painting is inspired by the Chinese Opera Masks that you see all over China. Once completed I looked at it and thought they could be masks from many cultures, but I do think they have a distinctly Chinese "feel".

A portrait of Ron

Thought I would have a go at painting a portrait. This one is of Ron from a photograph taken just before we left Vanuatu. OOOps I haven't signed it - must do that!

The bridge at Huang Cun

The Bridge at Huang Cun

It took me a while to get this painting going. I loved the little village of Huang Cun at the foot of the Yellow Mountain - Huangshan in Anhui province in China. I am not confident of doing landscapes and I need lots of practice because I don't have the skill to produce something photographic and I just play with impressions. Still it is OK and I have put it in Ron's study. More practice will get me more motivated to paint more in this style.