Road Kill and Pukana pots...

Thanks for the comment Tim- good advice!

I bit the bullet and went out to the workshop with Theresa Reihana today - she was doing a painting of her neice as a model so as I wanted to look at how she works I did the same thing (what her neice is doing in the photo next to the pots is called 'pukana' - where the eyes pop out almost and it's kind of a challenge)

I have too many paintings in the house so I decided to take the opportunity to paint up some large terracotta pots i was given last week along with some date palms to put in them. The palms are really pretty so decided they needed a stunning pot to each go into rather than uninterseting terracotta. With Pukana the face looks quite angry so am calling these my 'Guardian Pots' and they will go at the front entranceway. Did not get finished today os hoping to be well enough to go out tomorrow.

Not sure what conditions date palms like so hope that is OK

Pots are painted with resenes acrylic. Base colours are 'oil' and 'kaitoke green' (?) Each pot also has a green koru design on the back.

Oh - the Road Kill.... On the way I noticed a large turkey on the side of the road. The Marae hosting the workshop has a strong group of the top weavers in the North and I knew they could make good use of the beautiful black and white feathers so turned the car around and picked up the turkey. MAN what a HUGE bird and in very good nick (must have been run over at night or early morning) A BIT pongy though. Have come home with three of the enormous black and white striped wing feathers. The weavers put the birds in the freezer until they are ready to use them (The black feathers especially would be beautiful in a korowai I think or round the top of a Kite or woven basket). Everyone laughed at the workshop when I appeared dangling a dead bird!