Kirsten Bailey: Art

I love painting in watercolours – it’s definitely my favourite medium.  My watercolours are a bit unusual compared to many I’ve seen, as many of them are abstract or naive in style.  I love making abstract watercolours because it gives me a chance to let the paint have a ‘mind of its own’.

Many of my favourite abstract watercolours are inspired by science, like my ‘Moons of Jupiter’ series:

“Moons of Jupiter – Callisto”

“Moons of Jupiter – Europa”

Some more ‘space’ inspired works:

“Imagination Encircling”

“Persistent Illusion”

“Red Planet”

From the very big to the very small – some of my other abstract watercolours are inspired by microscopic images:

“Filtered”

“Needle”

But I think my favourite overall is this one – it’s only a tiny painting, but it has a lot of detail:

“Subterranean”

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So I haven’t posted here in a while, for a lot of reasons – I haven’t had much time for creating since I had my kids, and I’ve had even less time for the more tedious aspect to having an art business: promotion.  I’ve completed a few paintings since I last posted, but just didn’t get around to putting them up here.  I’m also hoping for a long-overdue overhaul of this website, but I’ve decided not to wait until that’s done before I start getting organised again.

My latest painting is called DFTBA, and I think it’s very fitting that this is the beginning of my creative revival.  I hope you like it!

Don’t forget to be awesome

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Here’s my submission for this week’s Illustration Friday topic, ‘Atmosphere’.  For once I’ve taken the topic very literally, and I’ve painted a picture of the Earth’s atmosphere:

The weekend just past was super-busy for me.  I had a stall at The Handmade Expo, which was great fun as always.  We had a great turn out this month with people out and about voting.  A big thank you to all those who stopped by my little stall!  After the Expo we visited family and then the next day attended a birthday party.

With a weekend like that, I was very pleased to be able to get a few evenings to myself to get some painting done!  Of course, sleep is overrated 🙂

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I just got an email from a customer I created some commissioned artwork for.  He contacted me a couple of months ago about a set of 4 paintings I’d done, titled “Moons of Jupiter”, which I had already sold.  I suggested I could paint something similar for him.  I was quite happy with how they turned out, and today he emailed me a picture of how they look framed together on the wall:

If your favourite painting is one that is already sold, let me know and I’ll paint something similar, just for you!

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Those who know me know that I have an interest in science.  I believe it’s the most under-taught subject in the primary school curriculum, and I think that’s because a lot of people (and teachers) either don’t understand it and therefore are not confident teaching it, or they simply think it’s boring.

One of my favourite things to do is paint science-inspired art.  I think if people can see that science is interesting and beautiful, it’s got to be a step in the right direction.

With that in mind, I painted this yesterday:

Painted on two sheets of watercolour paper (each one measures 25cm x 35cm), it is inspired by the planets of our solar system.  Poor Pluto isn’t included because it’s no longer a planet.

I really enjoyed painting this – it reminded me of looking through my neighbour’s telescope when I was a kid and seeing jupiter for the first time.

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I would like to share with you a new series I have been working on – “Moons of Jupiter”.

This is a set of 4 watercolour paintings based on the 4 Gallilean moons of Jupiter – Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto.

Io:

"Moons of Jupiter - Io"

Europa:

"moons of Jupiter - Europa"

Ganymede:

"Moons of Jupiter - Ganymede"

Callisto:

"Moons of Jupiter - Callisto"

These paintings have been framed, and are $100 each, or $300 for the whole set.

"Moons of Jupiter" series in frames

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This week’s topic over at Inspire Me Thursday is Albert Einstein.

This topic fits in perfectly with my ‘Science in Art’ series of works.  I decided to paint a space-inspired watercolour, and give it a title based on a quote by Albert Einstein.  This is what I came up with:

Beautiful Mysterious:

“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed” – Albert Einstein

I had so much fun with this topic that I had to do a few more paintings with the same theme:

Persistent Illusion:

“People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion” – Albert Einstein

Imagination Encircling:

“I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.” – Albert Einstein

If you would like to purchase one of these paintings, or see some of my other work, please check out my gallery.

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