About Me
Stormy & Me
My name is Mollie Lennon and I am 20 years old!
I live on a 100 acre farm in the Hunter Valley NSW Australia though I grew up in Cairns QLD.
I have always loved animals and had lots of pets!
My favourite animals are horses, koalas and birds
I love chocolate, tea and sushi.
My pet peeve is people spelling my name with a ‘y’!
I love the worlds of Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings!
We have horses, cats, dogs, cows and more on our farm, scroll down to meet them!
Meet Our Animals!
Amber
Morgan
Tilly
Merlin (left) and Felix (right)
Stormy
Jane and her chicks
Lewis
Our many Chickens
Tinkerbelle
My Art Journey
The three artists I have learnt so much from are Lisa Clough @Lachri Fine Art, Bonny Snowdon @Bonny Snowdon Fine Art and Alisa Burke @Alisa Burke.
2016 - 2017
I had always loved drawing, painting, sewing and creating in general but it wasn’t till early 2016 that I actually started to attempt to draw in the style of photorealism. I started drawing my many little model horses in graphite and critiquing myself to try and define what made something look realistic. I leant a lot off YouTube but my main teacher was practice! I continued these drawings until my mum found a horse painting course on ‘Craftsy’ then I was hooked on acrylic painting!
2017 - 2018
I learnt so much from acrylic painting as it gave me the freedom and forgivingness that allowed me to really started getting an eye for composition and played around with all sorts of subjects from sea creatures to red pandas! It was at this point that I really decided that I wanted to be a professional, full-time artist as a career. After a couple of years of acrylics my mum could see I was struggling to get the detail and realism that I wanted. She bought a 60 set of Faber-castell Polycromos Coloured Pencils and I was like: ‘Yep, this is it!’
2018 - 2022
I rapidly improved and by September 2018 I won my first Art Competition in the ‘Senior Youth’ Section! I then started doing Pet Portraits and I loved doing them so much! I continued evolving my work and doing lots of commissions till Oct 2020 when I did my first market. I am an avid birdwatcher/photographer so I gradually progressed to drawing more native animals, specifically local birdlife! I now take most of my reference photos and I love being inspired by the natural world around me. I do markets a few times a month, at these I sell my originals, prints and advertise my Pet Portraits.
Why my brand is called Painted Harp Studio:
My business is an art business , I play the harp, and I work in a studio! Technically I draw more then I paint but ‘Drawn Harp Studio’ sounds terrible!
Hobbies and Passions
Harp
I wanted to play the harp ever since I was 8 yrs old when I went to my friend’s Irish Dancing concert and I saw two girls playing the harp. It wasn’t till I was 12 that I had my first lesson and I loved it! I rented one of my teachers harps called Honey for about 3 years before buying my own harp Cherry (pictured on the left). I have been playing the harp for 7 years now, Cherry and I have busked at lots of markets as well as played at many nursing homes, one concert and my Grandad’s 90th birthday party!
If you want to learn more about the harp, and hear me play you can find it on my YouTube channel.
Birdwatching
As you may have already worked out I love animals, but I had never really done any birdwatching till some friend’s of ours invited us to come and see some endangered Swift Parrots that had been spotted nearby! That certainly sparked my interest and they introduced me to the world of birdwatching! I had already had a love for photography so I combined these passions into doing bird photography. Now I use all my bird photos as reference photos for my original artwork too!
I have lots of my bird photos on my Photography Instagram account!
Photography
Photography was another creative outlet which I found growing up and love doing! I mainly photographed our pets until I started birdwatching then it became a whole lot harder! I bought a 200mm-600mm Telescopic Zoom lens and I was off! I spend at least one morning a week going off up into our bush and tracking and photographing birds, always hoping to find a new species or getting a good shot of an elusive bird!
I have a Photography Account on Instagram where you can see some birdlife and pets!
Horses
Ever since we moved onto a 100 acre farm when I was 10yrs I wanted a horse! I took riding lessons for a couple months before I bought my first horse Esky for $1! Esky (pictured right) was a 23yr old retired school master but wasn’t getting the care he needed so we took him home and he taught me so much! Almost a year after I got Esky I realised he was lonely so we asked around for any miniature ponies who needed a home and that is how I got Stormy! Stormy (left) and Esky (right) became best friends but after a few years Esky started slowing down so we decided to get another horse Morgan to be a companion for Stormy. Then there was drama! Esky and Stormy were geldings who were super calm but Morgan was a mare and she took the lead and completely shook up their world! A few years later Esky passed away and I still have Morgan and Stormy and they are going well! I also worked at a small, local Thoroughbred breeding stud for a few years where I gained lots of useful knowledge and experience!