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A Little Background...
04/18/2008 15:22:57 / full of life
Hi,
Since I created my site here I've had a few people asking why I moved to Africa, how I paint in the bush and why I paint African wildlife. All good questions considering I am English and didn't even go to Africa until I was in my late 20s. So I thought I'd try to answer some of the questions...
My parents moved all over the world so I really have no 'home town'. I met my husband while at college in the UK. He was studying engineering and I was studying international relations & history. After college we lived in London for 5 years, I worked as a computer programmer (yes, really!) but we always intended to travel, so when he was offered a transfer to Zimbabwe we jumped at the chance even though we had little idea about the country and continent that we were moving to. In late 1994 we arrived in Harare and proceeded to spend the next 18 months traveling all over the country & loving the freedom, the wildlife and the lifestyle. As a child I was always drawing but since my late teenage years I had hardly drawn a single piece. That all started to change as I found the time and inspiration all around me. Soon I was painting watercolor landscapes and then I moved on to the wildlife.
In 1996 we moved to neighboring Botswana, a country of similar size but less developed & with a much smaller population. In Zimbabwe most of the national parks had excellent, basic accommodation but in Botswana we spent more time camping in remote areas. Most of Botswana is covered by the Kalahari Desert and my first impression was that it was hot, flat, dusty and there wasn’t too much wildlife. It is strange how time changes your views - now it is the Kalahari that springs to mind when I think of Africa. There is certainly not the same quantity of wildlife that you find in the wetter northern parts of Botswana but the space, the silence, the stars, the remoteness and even the harshness of the place all draw you back. There is no water so you don’t find elephants & buffalo but you do find all the big cats, wild dog, giraffe, numerous antelope species, brown hyaenas and other desert-adapted species. Your campsite has a dirt track leading to it, no fences, no water, no facilities of any kind. You put up your tent under a thorny acacia tree and at night you sit around your campfire watching the moonrise and listening to lions. Absolute magic!
So, as you can see, I quickly settled in. We stayed for nearly 7 years in Botswana and then moved to New York at the end of 2002. Now I am a full-time African wildlife artist. It might seem strange to leave the place that provides the inspiration for my art (I don’t paint from zoo animals and only paint species I have spent time watching in the wild) but there are frustrations in living in Africa and there is a better market for my art here. Also, my paintings are slightly impressionistic so I don’t find it necessary to be in the bush to paint them. In fact I find it easier to be away from the bush and all the distractions. Then I can concentrate on my composition and exclude all unnecessary details. When I’m in the bush I sketch in detail. Its like a life-drawing class. But when I get home I don’t often use those sketches as the basis for my paintings. Instead I come up with ideas while walking my dog.
I hope that answers some of the questions but I’ll keep blogging so let me know if there’s anything you’d like to know about living and painting in Africa.
Alison
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