Leana de Villiers Art: Day 2 Of Lock-down, Updates And Past Creative Projects

Day 2 - Saturday

We woke up later than normal, which helped a bit after I experienced another restless night. Being able to take an afternoon nap was very welcome and for the first time this past week I could say I felt more rested. It was the first day I felt I could really sit down in my studio and do some intentional mindful creativity in my art journal. It felt freeing to create with no specific image in mind, no thinking and just playing in my Art Journal. As artists we need to play more. No judgement, it doesn’t matter how good or bad it is, more importantly it is to just play with colours, shapes and patterns. After all it is not the end result, but the journey that is the most important.

Art Journaling on Day 2

In the evenings when I sit on the patio and look up at the stars in the night sky, one is so aware of the silence. No noise made by humanity. The only sounds that exist are the beautiful sounds of nature, which normally gets drowned out by the sounds of humanity...the discussion between two owls, the crickets singing their night song, the plover parents talking to its chick which is a couple of weeks old, teaching it to hunt for bugs. There are small, beautiful blessings in every day.

The plover parent with its chick.

The plover pair have been nesting in the communal garden of our estate for a couple of years. We have seen quite a few chicks hatch. They hatch two eggs at a time, but sadly the one chick didn't survive.

So why have I been so quiet on my blog this past year or more? Almost 3 years ago I started working at our local Art and Craft Shop in our village to be able to financially assist our household. I also started presenting workshops once a month on a Saturday morning at the Art Shop. The workshops I presented were Acrylic Pouring, Colour Mixing and Theory as well as a Beginners Lino Cutting and Printing.

Our son and daughter-in-law have been living with us as they were both struggling to find employment. The end of February 2019 my husband resigned from his job and we used his pension payout to start our own family business, De Rooi Bosch, our speciality tea shop was 'born'. We believed that starting our own business will enable us to create employment and a future for our children and future grandchildren. The business was registered and the hunt started to find suitable premises for our Tea Shop. A huge amount of time, effort and creativity went into our business. Each one of us has been working very hard and our son and daughter-in-law have been manning and managing the shop at a small local shopping center. I did acrylic pouring on the counter top and display bench. Designing our business cards and drawing up excel documents to keep track of weekly and monthly statistical data. We do not have an automatic point of sale, thus everything needs to be captured manually.

Above is a watercolour painting I painted of the rooibos flower, which was used in the design for our logo by our graphic designers.

Our business logo

Below, keeping in line with the logo colours are the counter top (1,2 m long) and display bench (90 x 60cm) shortly after the acrylic pours were done.

Our son and daughter-in-law came up with the brilliant idea of a "teacup notice board" and I made it into a reality. Below you can see the different stages of the work in progress.

The bare essentials

Knotted the handle from cotton twine. I painted the signage on the notice boards, which will be

glued back to back.

Painted the inside of the cup white. The handle of the cup was painted black and then gold paint dry brushed on top of the black. Once the paint was dry I added gold leaf to the rim of the cup as well as highlighted areas of the cup handle.

The finished Notice Board

Photograph taken by my husband in front of our shop with the Tea Cup Notice Board.

Thank you Jason and Alicia for your brilliant idea for the notice board.

De Rooi Bosch Tea Shop

On Friday, 27 March 2020, South Africa was downgraded to full junk status by Moody's Investors Service, which has placed us further into an economic recession. So between this further down grade as well as being in lock-down due to the Covid 19 Virus, it will truly test the financial market in South Africa. We hope and pray that our business will survive this as we have invested everything into it.

So between the Tea Shop (once it opened officially on 1 June 2019) and working at the Art Shop, I was left with little time for my own creativity. Creativity feeds my soul. Towards the end of last year I have been taking part in various creative mini online retreats, which has kept me going creatively. Wonderful magical mindful and intentional creativity. Below you can see some of the projects of the online art retreats.

Part of Magical Mandala's retreat. Here you had to cut out random words and then make up a sentence.

Magical Mandala's - Mandala based on the area in which I live. Table Mountain, the ocean, fishing and the winelands.

Magical Mandala's - You start with staining the paper with watercolour. Once dry, you draw a small circle...and around this circle you follow with another circle and repeat this process trying to avoid touching any lines of the previous circle.