We’re getting the band back together! The Art Heist crew has been invited to put up our collective works at The Little Guy in Glebe. It’s a fantastic little bar, I’m really looking forward to it so come check it out – on for one week only!

I am delighted to be part of the Heart of Annadale Exhibition and Prize this year! I have entered Rainbow Leaves and Spring and Chaos, as I felt they were the most appropriate to the theme of ‘future’ for the Inner West.

We attended the opening at the Village Church Annandale and were very impressed with the quality of pieces on show, friendly community and highly talented musicians providing accompaniment for the evening – a lovely night was had by all. I would definitely recommend visiting on one of the music nights this week if the opening is anything to go by. You should also vote for your favourite pieces in the various categories and join us for the awards night on Saturday!

I would like to thank the organisers for their great work and congratulate the Village Church on the success of the event in general – it is a lovely venue indeed.

… And now for something completely different.

Sydney’s Smallest Gallery opens this Friday as part of Art Month! I love this exhibition, it is just the coolest damned thing – designed and built on by an excellent trio: namely our captain Nat of Nauti Studios, along with the architectural skills of Steve and Michelle. Definitely do not miss out – it was a top pick last year and has already been featured by The Guardian again this year!

I am very, very privileged to have some tiny paintings on display, they were such fun to make! The first bunch I made, got lost on the bus and broke my heart but I did manage to capture some spectacular pictures of them (see above!). My place of work (day job) happens to have very high quality microscopes and we became curious to see what tiny paintings might look like at a microscopic level. The answer is – they look incredible, the pictures were taken fairly dodgily with a phone down the eye piece (the computer was down) and look great without even capturing the incredible amount of depth and texture that you get with your own eyes!

I am only just getting started with these tiny paintings, I do really love them – super excited to see what they look like on display on opening night!

Many, many months ago now, Amy came to us with an idea – let’s put on an exhibition! Hire a space, have some fun – we all had various artistic hobbies going on, why not?

Paul, Tom and I all said yes, and so the adventure began.

We had the space booked for a week and spent some time brainstorming ideas for various other activities to make full use of the space. Slowly, it emerged that we liked one idea the most – an Art Heist.

Think of your typical escape room, but instead of trying to solve puzzles to get out – you’re trying to get in, steal an artwork and make it out. We only had space for 12 slots so tickets sold out instantly! See a review of the game here.

Months of planning, building, play testing and work later – the time has come.

The exhibition opens on Weds 17th February, at the Stirrup Gallery in Marrickville. The exhibition is open during the day 18-21st Feb (Thurs-Sun) with the heist game running after hours.

We have a diverse range of artworks on display so come along and check it out – I am incredibly proud of the quality of work we’ve all come up with!

Special thanks to Nauti Studios without whom we could not have developed this event.

I was very excited to hear that my first ever oil painting received an award (Special Recognition) in the All Women online art exhibition held by Light Space & Time!

This is my first award so it is very exciting – I really do love this piece, it was my first ever indulgence in fingerpainting with oils and turned out so well that someone very enthusiastically bought it off me – sparking an interest in painting a whole lot more!

My day job is working as the Veterinary Manager at a medical research institute. We have an animal facility with a significant number of mice and I work with a team of dedicated animal care staff to make sure the mice are well looked after. Contrary to popular belief, an animal that is suffering does not lead to good research outcomes and so our efforts to keep the mice in a positive welfare state result in better treatments, preventions and understanding of diseases.

Thanks to the Mice by Rona Barugahare

Thanks to the Mice by Rona Barugahare

I (and many others) look forward to a day when animals are no longer necessary at all for medical research. Until that day comes, however, I am glad that there are people like myself and my team who have the compassion necessary for what we do, for the sake of the animals.

In memory of all the mice that have played a role in medical research discoveries, I painted this piece – ‘Thanks To The Mice’.

With eternal gratitude, for the human and animal lives saved and suffering eased worldwide as result.

Rona Barugahare

Yesterday I had the absolute pleasure of dropping in to Artsite Gallery.

The Gallery is located on Salisbury Road and most weekends I wander past it on my way to Nauti Studios after buying painting materials in Newtown. Yesterday I noticed they had some new exhibitions and finally decided to have a look.

There were two exhibitions on, I really enjoyed the works of both artists. Kate Jones’ Ornithology showed detailed and lively paintings of mostly Australian native birds – particularly interesting as the artist works with taxidermy specimens, some of which were the subjects of the paintings. It was difficult to tell which were of live birds and which were preserved, which is an testament to the artist’s skills both as a conservator and a painter.

Graham Marchant’s The colour of Light also greatly appealed to me, with his vibrant use of colour. I learnt to do very detailed still life pieces when I was learning in high school and it was delightful to see such richly detailed pieces, mostly collections of gorgeous poppy and iris flowers.

The real highlight of the visit however, was meeting the Director, Madeleine Tuck-field-Carrano. She very kindly took the time to chat with me and gave me bucketloads of great advice, from building a CV, to pricing paintings and then on to more technical aspects of how to create high quality paintings that will last. Her advice has been a great springboard and I have already done a bunch of research on local competitions, canvas, impasto techniques and ways to improve my website and online presence in general.

I am very excited to up my game and find out a whole lot more, so that ultimately I can start to create some really high quality paintings that are built to last.

I really like their website (and green policy!) it is really well laid out with the right amount of detail on their artists and exhibitions. If you have the time – definitely pop in and check out some gorgeous works in real life!

Rona Barugahare

This site is just getting started!

PaintingByDigits are vivid, textural oil paintings by Rona Barugahare.

This site compiles her latest works.