Welcome to the official first post from The Rooky Wood Newsletter, timed to coincide with the “going live” of my website which I hope you’ll find time to visit. I am immensely grateful to Kath Boyd from Rocketspark and to Leonie at Nga Toi Hawke’s Bay, for helping peel an old limpet off her rock to adventure on the wide sea of technological terror and get the show on the water.
To give you an idea of just what kind of a limpet I am, I still do not own a cell phone! So I’m justifiably proud to have built my own website and also paddled my way around some of the features of Substack.
For those who don’t know, my name is Kate, and the ratbag at the top of the page is Ru. I call her the executive director of The Rooky Wood but she’s really the muse and poster child for an obscure cause which grabbed me by the ankle a few years back and became the overarching theme by which I work as an artist. Everyone has their people, Ru’s people have been here, in New Zealand, for 160 years and I feel duty-bound to tell their story through my art and writing.
Ru is a member of Corvus frugilegus, otherwise known as a Rook.
One of the nice things about research is all the gold one digs up. Did you know that rooks engage in whiffling? I’d never heard of the verb before in my life. To whiffle means to fly downward in an erratic leaf-fall manner which makes it difficult for predators to get a line on you as you return to your abode of an evening after a long day at work. Another fact I have learnt is that rooks can catch peanuts thrown from as far away as 20 feet.
I began drawing at the age of 8, and in many ways drawing saved my life. It was a place to escape during the long yawning years of school, it fed me for four years while working (illegally) in Ireland as a book-cover illustrator, and it’s the reason I’m writing to you now.
My work experience, since being 8-years-old, includes showing paintings in over 40 group exhibitions and having held 11 solo shows. I have run a market stall, painted murals in acrylic, and painted cats, dogs, horses and children in pastels. This year will be my 12th as Auckland Thoroughbred Racing’s Derby winner portrait artist.
The Rooky Wood Art Studio is based in Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand, for those whose seasons might be doing other things.
This Winter for me has been variously electronic and earthy. To anchor myself to the natural world I go out into the garden as often as possible- lessons in life everywhere:
📌…these beautiful forms will become teaching aids for my second class teaching drawing at the Hastings Women’s Centre- The Rooky Wood Art Class from 10am-12pm on the 2nd and 4th Thursdays of every month beginning July 24th. The cost of each class is $20. The materials are very basic- charcoal and newsprint, and the emphasis is on process and grubby fingers!
📌The Rooky Wood Winter Collection will be showing at Creative Arts Napier (CAN), 16 Byron St, opening 5-7pm Friday the 25th July to the 7th August in the Winter Collective Exhibition, a 6-artist show in the Main Gallery. (My theme is hibernation).
📌I will have two pieces of work showing in the Art Exhibition at Hereworth School: opens 6.30pm Friday 29th August and runs to Sunday 31st August, at Hereworth School, Havelock North.
Other projects on the float:
📌I am working towards three pieces of romantic work I will be submitting for consideration for the Hawke's Bay Art Review which opens 3rd October at CAN- will keep you posted on how I get on in subsequent newsletters.
📌Keirunga Gardens is kindly allowing a group of us artists to run our pop up studios onsite during the Hawke's Bay Art Trail in November and The Rooky Wood will be there on the 9th and 16th of November (both Sundays), as well as running a Small Wares market stall at the Taikura Fete on Sunday 16th (have roped in some help).
📌My third solo exhibition for this year will be open at CAN from 28th November- 11th December.
📌And lastly, due to being hunched over this computer navigating my website for the past month there has been a bit of a backlog at the easel and I have some longsuffering clients waiting for their commissions to be completed (I am hoping by the middle of August). After that the Studio will be open again for new commissions.
Well, a gold starfish and two pearl earrings to anyone still reading- thank you so much for your attention thus far. I’m very new these missives and appreciate your patience with my learning. I will post an update on the journey before long. It would be lovely to see/meet you at any of the events above if you get time. Please do forward this Newsletter to anyone you think might be interested (subscribe button below).
Slán go fóill!
(goodbye for now in Irish)
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