Idle Sappho - hand painted portraits
Idle Sappho lives in Waihi in the Hauraki Gulf and she paints watercolour portraits. She take commissions through her website www.idlesappho.co.nz.
“My main medium is pen and watercolour and I also work in pencil. I chose portraiture as an expression because I can create something individual and meaningful to each person who commissions a piece.
I am a watercolour portrait artist from New Zealand. I studied at Hungry Creek Art School and went on to own a small business hand sewing for designers. I am currently living in a little country town in the Waikato, living my dream of being an artist.
I have been drawing and painting my whole life and love to capture people's personality and uniqueness in art form. I paint my portraits as if they are illustrations in someone's story.”
Lisa was born in Auckland at the start of the 1970s, living in a small campsite community on the North Shore called Browns Bay. She spent a significant part of her life with her grandparents, often hanging out at the beaches. Lisa has many happy memories from those days at Browns Bay beach, where fish were plentiful on the point and the ocean was rich in seaweed. She played in the water for hours, going home totally “sun-kissed.” “An adorable time to grow up,” Lisa tells me.
Lisa enjoyed many sports; she was a keen tennis player and netballer, playing in the top teams for her age right up until the family moved to Wellington. Lisa was fifteen years old, which unfortunately marked the end of her sporting career. Local teams were well established in Wellington, and her attention was drawn elsewhere.