Whilst on Oxford Street today, Twinkle discovered this amazing original acrylic painting by an unknown artist. It’s enormous at about 3 and a half feet tall, and thus forms the largest painting in our ever growing collection. The girl in the shop knew nothing about who painted it and it’s not signed, but she told us to pop in next time we were passing as she’d try to find out for us. Rhett is totally entranced by it, favouring this new addition over his beloved Delores – I’m sure once the novelty has worn off he’ll be back grinning at her though Anney!

UPDATE:
So, after a little digging around, it seems we have a fake on our hands! Not that we’re too annoyed, as it didn’t exactly break the bank like the original by Yue Minjun would have done, which was listed by Christies in 2008 with an estimate of $400,000 – $600,000! It’s called ‘Overlook’, and can be seen here.

We’re not fans of fake stuff, especially art, when there are so many talented people out there selling their work at very affordable prices, but at least we’ve now discovered another amazing artist we love! Based in Beijing, the majority of works by Chinese Cynical Realist Yue Minjun are in oil, depicting himself frozen in laughter. Discover his amazing work here.

On Saturday at 2.18pm, Rhett, our Son was born! Here’s some pictures!…

We bought some new art today – a squashed concrete can by Will Coles. We’ve admired his work for ages, because it’s found all over Sydney, glued to pavements and curbs in all sorts of well hidden places. The first piece I ever saw was a mobile phone which I thought was real, and as we saw more, we realised this man might just be a little crazy. TV remotes, teddy bears, can’s like this one, and even a football (chained to a street sign in the CBD) are all cast from concrete, helping them to beautifully blend into their surroundings. I tripped over a piece near Central Station on my way home from work a few months back. See more of Will Coles’ work here.

Yes – we have secured a Print Gocco! After discovering that there are none left in Japan, we sourced one in Chicago via the wonder of Etsy. The only thing to work out now is how it actually works – because, of course, the manual is all in Japanese!

Art Osaka wasn’t easy to find. But once we did, what we discovered was an amazing Japanese art fair held in 47 rooms across four floors of the Dojima Hotel. Amongst the hundreds of pieces to choose from, we singled it down to the wonderful work of Hiroyuki Toi, and this charming oil on canvas (which incidentally, was still wet). On our anniversary (2 days later), we went and collected her from the Tezukayama Gallery in Sumiyoshi-ku, whereby she was firmly fixed into a custom made box to ensure her safe transit back to Sydney. She arrived in perfect (and slightly drier) condition. Check out more work by Hiroyuki Toi here.

Well, having spent several days hunting high and low for a Print Gocco in Osaka, we can today confirm that there are officially none left anywhere. Not a single machine in any of the stores on Twinkle’s carefully constructed and well researched list. We managed successfully to locate stores selling the inks, the meshes, and even the bulbs, but alas, in each and every case, we were told ‘they are no longer being made, we no longer sell them’. So, for now, eBay it is…

More on our Japanese travels to follow…

Our latest acquisition, Delores, by the very talented (and ever so slightly crazy) Anney B. Part of an exhibition entitled ‘Sexy Librarian’ at the Kinokuniya Books Gallery, we fell in love with this delightfully painted lady, and Twinkle had the pleasure of meeting Anney when she delivered Delores to us last week. For more on Anney, click here.