Author: Anna Cull

A Little Further Down The Road

| Anna Cull
‘A Little Further Down the Road’ — acrylic on unstretched canvas, 255 x 255 mm, 2020.

This little landscape was inspired by a detail of my coloured-in Port Chalmers colouring page ~ now completely reimagined. 

I really didn’t like my first attempt (see previous post). It wasn’t fun to paint and I didn’t feel connected to the end result. So I stopped painting from the reference and started looking at what was in front of me on the canvas… exploring shapes and colours and remembering how it felt when we first came upon this view back in 2017. And I had a ball.

I was at the point of deciding whether or not to paint the house in the foreground a brighter red when my husband walked in and said “it’s finished” 🎨 …and so it is.

Onward and upward (and possibly sideways)

| Anna Cull

The inspiration for this painting came from a detail of my coloured-in Port Chalmers colouring page but I have been struggling with how I want to paint it. If nothing else, it has been useful as a background for a great quote by Rob Bell (my painting study WIPs are included below).

study work-in-progress
study abandoned

It looks better on screen than it does in real life and even though it is what I set out to paint, I really do not like it. What worked as digital art simply has nothing to offer as a painting. It feels very ‘meh’ to me. Which is great. Because now I know what not to do. Meanwhile I have already painted a second version of this little landscape and it is COMPLETELY different, but I’ll write more about that in the next post : )

Magnetic art (…also known as fridge magnets…)

| Anna Cull
‘Be Yourself ‘

It has been fun making these teeny tiny art prints and turning them into magnets (that’s proper magic, that is : ) I have listed a few over on Etsy and will make more if they are popular.

The hardest thing about the process was deciding on the colours for the stick figure magnets (final image below) and then coming up with names for them. Happy colours deserve happy names, so I have ended up with Sky Blue, Violet Blue, Strawberry Pink, Pumpkin, Sunshine Yellow, Spring Green, Lavender, and Midnight Blue.

‘Through the Trees’
‘A Quiet Corner’
‘Blue’
‘Butterfly Catcher’ ~ ‘Flower Gardener’ ~ ‘Stargazer’

And now that I have the little magnets all sorted, I think it must be about time I started painting again…

A change as good as a holiday

| Anna Cull

Okay, this particular change is probably nowhere near as good as a holiday, but I have just changed my WordPress theme and moved things around a bit. You may not notice any difference if you’re only viewing my posts in the WordPress Reader, but it looks much fresher on my website…

The Art Cave ~ homepage screenshot

My new theme is Sketch, a responsive portfolio theme that is perfect for showcasing art and design projects. It took a lot of trial and error to get my portfolio page looking like the demo but I got there in the end. I had been using the same theme since March 2012 ~ so, yes, definitely time for a change : )

Let it snow…

| Anna Cull

❄️ Winter Sale ❄️ 25% off selected paintings including ‘On the Road Again’ (20 paintings are on sale this month and there will be a different selection of 20 paintings next month) ❄️ 

P.S. ‘On the Road Again’ has now SOLD : )

Leaving home

| Anna Cull

‘Endless Possibilities’ and ‘Curves Ahead’ in the Drawing Room

I’m saying goodbye to a couple of paintings that sold on TradeMe (NZ) last week: ‘Endless Possibilities’ and ‘Curves Ahead’ ❤️❤️

Time for a makeover

| Anna Cull

My online profile picture has been the same since 2013! It really was time for a change…

  • original
  • 2013
  • 2020

The original illustration was drawn in 2010 in the comic book style made famous by American pop artist Roy Lichtenstein:

Pop art self-portrait, vector illustration, 2010

In 2012, I replaced the dots with plain colours, added a background pattern and used it for the first and last pages of my Design & Arts College Diary:

It has been my profile pic ever since (with the occasional tweak now and then). And in case you’re wondering… yes, the new look was inspired by a recent real-life makeover : )

Our 2020 makeover

Love Birds

| Anna Cull

‘Love Birds’ art print in the Drawing Room

This ‘Love Birds’ design was originally created for a student project in 2011. It was part of a boutique brewery branding campaign (yes, really) and was inspired by the textiles of William Morris. With a few minor tweaks and new text, it is now a quirky little art print.

‘Love Birds’ art print

Below are some of the original images that I created for the completely fictional Old Mill Brewers. The idea behind the campaign was that the brewery was located in a converted textile mill, a sophisticated venue where boutique beer is savoured like good wine.  As well as coming up with the name of the brewery and designing the logo and bottle labels…

Boutique beer branding campaign (student project, 2011, Design & Arts College)

…I also invented the six flavours: Red House (pilsner), Honey (lager), Vanilla (pale ale), Spice (witbier), Black Cherry (porter) and Chocolate (stout). Yum!

Boutique brewery logos (student project, 2011, Design & Arts College)

I even added the bird logo to the barcode on the back of the labels : ) It really was one of my favourite projects (as you can probably tell).

Barcode design (student project, 2011, Design & Arts College)