Exhibition in Dubai

Well I have been asked to share info about an exhibition in Dubai that is taking place next week. To be honest, I am not sure I totally get it. It seems to be about creating something around a  New Era 59FIFTY . I have no idea what that is but judging from the pictures it is a baseball hat. Not being a connoisseur of baseball hats without pictures I would not have known! Anyway, it seems the Middle East winner came from Sharjah and the winners are being displayed in this exhibition. An interesting concept similar to a few things that have gone on in the past in Dubai e.g. red bull, Johnsons and those little robot things (sorry can't remember what they are called!). Anyway there are some details here - https://www.facebook.com/New.Era.ME

Get 6% Off Discount Art Supplies

So I have already posted about discount art and that they are the best low cost art supplies site that I can find. I get all of my canvases from them and have not found anywhere that can beat their prices (unless you just want 1 or 2 canvases). But now if you join TopCashBack you can get a 6.06% discount on all of your purchases from discount art, making it even better value!

Get Cheap Canvases in the UK

If you are looking for cheap canvases in the UK then I have checked through quite a large number of websites and I have found that the cheapest place to buy canvases, particularly if you want to buy them in bulk, is Discount Art. You can check them out by clicking on the image link below. 

 I have ordered from them more times than I care to remember and they have also always given me a great service. Invariably my canvases will be sent the next working day by courier and so will arrive within 2 days of ordering. The customer service is great and the best thing is basically the prices. You can also order paint at a great price and in particular if you are looking for a large (5l) tub of white or black I would recommend them. 

Heading Back to Dubai

So I will be back in Dubai in February primarily to sell my paintings at the Dubai Jazz Festival. For I think 6 years I have been part of the arts and crafts village at the festival (a part that some people do miss) and have sold quite a few paintings there.

This year not only is the Jazz Festival bigger than ever but also the arts and crafts village is expanding and there will be at least 10 tents in the new location (Festival City) selling many different styles of painting. I will have at least 3 very large paintings up for sale (size 150 x 150cm) and have ordered my canvases from Jam Jar who will make custom sized stretched canvases for you.

Tickets for the Leonardo da Vinci Exhibition at the National Gallery

Well yesterday I went down to London with the intention of visiting the Leonardo da Vinci exhibition at the National Gallery as there had been so much hype and excitement about it. Unfortunately, in my naivety, I did not think that I might have to book tickets beforehand. So, much was my disappointment when i got to the ticket desk and there was a sign saying 'Sold Out Today'.

On further investigation it seems that the tickets for the da Vinci exhibition had been on sale since May 2011 and all of the online tickets and advance purchase tickets had already been snapped up - until the end of the exhibition! So the only way to get tickets now is either to buy them from someone who already has some but maybe can't make it (you could try eBay but they are going for more than £50 a ticket on there at the moment), or you will have to go and queue up at the National Gallery on the morning of the day you want to visit.

The gallery are releasing a limited number of tickets each day on a first come first served basis so if you get there early and queue up then you may be lucky!

However, if you are not lucky enough to get tickets then there is still a lot of amazing artwork by many great masters at the National Gallery - including van Gogh, Canaletto, Monet, Manet, Rubens, Constable, Seurat etc etc the list goes on and it takes hours to go through all of the halls and rooms. One of the paintings on show is one of van Gogh's sunflower paintings, shown here, and you really get a feel for the depth of it in real life than when just looking at a picture - the same can be said about a lot of the great masters paintings so if you do have a few hours free, go and have a browse.

UAE Art Competition

Emirates NBD are running an art competition in conjunction with Tashkeel (great place by the way) - where you can win cash prizes of up to 20,000 AED and membership of Tashkeel. There is not long to go until the entry closing date (they never seem to allow much time for these things in Dubai) of November 24th so get creating! Full details are on the image attached.

Quiet Time

So things are a bit quiet at the moment. Having headed back to Dubai for about 6 weeks i decided that it was now really too expensive to live there on my own and that i would have to come back to the UK. One problem was the lack of places to sell art anymore - previously Arte had been good with it's once a month art and craft fairs but now it was getting full of artists, a lot of whom were hobby artists and willing to sell their paintings for very little money. This then puts pressure on the professional artists, who have much higher costs to cover, to actually be able to sell and make money.

Another problem was with the general downturn of a few years where there were less hotel jobs around. It doesn't really help that I am not a salesperson and to be a success i think you really have to sell yourself.

So for the time being I will be based in the UK again, but available to go back to Dubai for any large jobs that may crop up. I will also likely be at the jazz festival again next February where sales are usually forthcoming.

This weekend I have 3 paintings in an art exhibition in Woodbridge, Suffolk so am hoping for a sale from there, and after that I have a possible craft fair at a local tennis club that I just need to confirm.