I'm having a brief foray back into blogging from my 'summer break' today for two reasons -
1. The weather is absolutely awful and
2. I was thrilled this week to finally complete a collection of Zodiac illustrations that I previously owned and loved as a child. (I have been searching for these for years!) Mervyn Suart's sumptuous paintings have such a magical quality - I've always found them very special. My collection is now complete thanks to Debbie at debsj267 . Her eBay shop is well worth a visit as it also has some very tempting cross stitch pattern magazines and Debbie herself is a lovely person - very helpful and friendly..
When I was a young girl I thought Europa in the scene above was the most beautiful and glamorous princess I had ever seen. Looking at this picture again for the first time in 40 years I'm thrilled to find it is just as lovely as my memory of it.
I do have to apologize though for having to show each image in two halves. My little scanner only takes A4 size documents and all of these are considerably larger. Besides having to cut them in two I also had to lose some of the top or bottom of each picture. Unfortunately some of the nicer detail as in the picture above is therefore affected. I hope despite this that you enjoy what I have been able to put together.
I have included a post on Mervyn Suart before (back in February last year.) In it I also mentioned that the Look and Learn website has some of these images. The direct link to the art of Mervyn Suart includes 9 of the Zodiac paintings.
From my own collection the 12 signs of the Zodiac follow:
I see Blogger have been messing around again with everything and my 'Followers' gadget is no longer working. It is fine in preview but not in the published version. I'm hoping its a temporary problem and that they will sort it out soon. If anyone has experienced the same thing and figured out a way to fix it please let me know as I am stumped!
Yay, you’re back! Did you manage to get much writing done? I won’t ask about the gardening! Much of our garden has been under water for the last three weeks, so I’ve given up on doing anything outside.
ReplyDeleteThese are such lovely illustrations. My favourites are Virgo (my birth sign) and Capricorn.
It looks as though your follower's button is working OK now, or at least I can see your followers and the ‘join this site’ button is available.
Welcome back! The pictures are wonderful and how great to have the complete set. XO
ReplyDeleteWhat beautiful pictures. Not believing in astrology doesn't stop me from enjoying them.
ReplyDeleteOh my, I absolutely love these, but then I love, love, love the Zodiac. I particularly favor the Leo one. I live with a lion. Trust me, they're tough critters.
ReplyDeleteHow wonderful! I know what you mean about loving something as a child and finally finding it again after years of searching in shops and online!! :-) Hope you follower button gets sorted out soon.
ReplyDeleteNow, its curious that you can see the follower gadget Barbara but Gayle (like myself can't)! I've tried everything I can think of, even changing the template - hopefully it will be sorted out next week.
ReplyDeleteGardening - not much - I've snatched what sunshine I could get which has been precious little. Writing - some - I've finished 3 chapters of my book so that's a start!
How exciting Donna to live with a lion - I'm sure they are strong characters too and I appreciate that.
I also like the Virgo picture - I mentioned in the last post I did on this that she reminds me of my mom!
Like Roger I'm not a follower of astrology and don't know much about it but when I was younger I was fascinated with Greek/Roman and Norse mythology and what I love about these paintings are the stories they tell from Greek myths.
Great to get comments from all of you - I probably won't be posting as much yet as I did before but I've enjoyed getting back to it again. (Darlene I'll still be taking a rain cheque on the Plum Tree but I haven't forgotten it!)
Welcome back Sharon! I too can see your Follower gadget so that is strange. I very much enjoyed viewing your Zodiac paintings. I'm a Scorpio! Do you also like Greek Mythology?
ReplyDeleteHi Sharon, you follow gadget is still displaying perfectly for me – how very odd!
ReplyDeleteI hope you've got some sunshine now. It's been absolutely lovely in Somerset today - warm and sunny all day.
So pleased the writing is going well – I can’t wait to own a signed copy of your first book!
These are beautiful! Thanks so much for sharing them! :)
ReplyDeleteSharon, love this post! Gorgeous images! Somehow your blog and a couple of others got dropped off my blog list even though it shows me as a subscriber. I can see your follow button and followers fine. It seems this happens from time to time and it eventually works itself out. ~Diane~
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