One complete, another begins.

Barn Owl Portrait - size approx 14x11"
NOW SOLD

After a long 4-day weekend of demonstrating at a show, here we have the completed Barn Owl portrait.  I wanted to go for something quite different with this barn owl, concentrating on the face and wing.  Some people may say they want to see the talons or the entire owl, but i've been there, done that - I wanted to get closer to the detail with this one.

This barn owl is now going to be locked away as I need to save it for an exhibition in July at Talents Gallery in Malton.

Harrogate Flower Show

Harrogate Flower Show set up

There hasn't been much progression on the barn owl of late.  I have been busy getting ready for the Harrogate Flower Show which ran from last Thursday through to Sunday.

The flower show is usually the start of the show season, so it's always a relief to get there and know that the quiet months are over.

The show was a bit of a strange one this year.  Usually, Saturdays and Sundays are the best 2 days, for me at least, with a relatively quiet Thursday and Friday (lots of coach trips - they don't tend to buy much more than greeting cards from me).  This year, Thursday and Friday were by far the better two days.  Saturday was very busy, but not in terms of sales.

Any of you out there that regularly attend shows know that exhibitors spend a lot of time questioning why a show, or a particular day, is good or bad.  We seem to need reasons for success or failure, probably so we can reproduce the successes and avoid the failures in the future.  The general consensus amongst exhibitors was that it was the weather (always a reason for something at a show).  The marquee, which is massive and holds hundreds of exhibitors and thousands of visitors, was so hot on Saturday that people seemed to be looping around and heading for the door as quickly as they could, only stopping at the ice-cream stand.  Of course, had it been raining, we would have blamed the rain for the low sales!

Of course, who cares which days work and which don't, as long as the overall outcome is one of success, and it was!

Now back to restocking for Easter!