Is this the “calm” before or after the storm
June 27, 2010
for the last couple of weeks my home and my mind have been a state of chaos. Have been wanting to decorate my flat for a long time, but have never really made a concerted effort to do anything about it. However a few weeks a go, enough was enough, have been selling and recycling everything I feel I have “attachments” to. My B+B Italia sofa which was such an effort getting in though my window 11 years ago was finally taken to with an axe and taken to the refuse tip in several large blue ikea bags…………. My pair of white Barcelona chairs sold and gone to Cornwall, couple of antique Horseshoe style chairs sold, a variety of console tables, large coffee table, footstools and cubes gone to YMCA. In the meantime I have decorator in who has started with the lounge, completely sanded down everything including the floor and has repainted.
BIG CHALLENGE is wall colour, I love colour and sketch and paint with oil pastels and sticks in bright clashing shades, but when it comes to my surroundings, I just don’t want to be surrounded that makes too much of a statement……… So I am being challenged here, cant seem to make a decision that feels right totally, have feelings of “if I am having redecorated I may as well have a colour” , but making a choice that calms my soul but that reflects something about me is keeping me in a state of anxiety . I can do it for others, this is my job! but when it comes to me, it’s not so easy.
I find this self-same issue in my clothes, black, white, grey, dark blue, severe, sombre colours…………….. that’s not what goes on in my head, its like a rainbow in there, but outside that’s so different. Today I have been sitting with shades of grey, from pavilion to downpipe, black painted floor, ivory paint work. Lucky that I live in a flat with really beautiful proportions, high ceilings, windows that come down to floor and detailed Victorian mouldings. It seems to be gelling more and feeling a tad more calm about it all, bit I have the whole flat to do, hoping this will get easier as I go along.
Can’t seem to upload any images at the moment, keeps freezing………. will have another go soon.
natures wonders
June 26, 2010
Isn’t this just amazing, such beautiful colours, soft gauzy almost felted wool like texture. And all this is mould. Been a busy week, not eaten at home at all much this week, and today I went into the kitchen to have sardines on toast for my lunch…….. my organic rye and sunflower seed bread had grown these amazing “flower” like mould pattern all over it. Have done some quick research as I doesn’t look the the blue/grey mould that normally appears on stale bread. It seems this is a penicillin type mould and grows in moist conditions. My rye bread is kept in a large glass container with a tight lid, guess in the heat the moisture in the bread grew warm and these marvellous shapes appeared.
King of the castle
June 24, 2010
I took this image some weeks ago of a friend of mine, he is on this thing about wabbits, even started a facebook group about them……….. I look a this now and that saying KING OF THE CASTLE springs to mind. Someone who has reached the pinnacl, above everyone, the boss, the leader……… Well I am a boss, I have been driven to succeed, it can be lonely up there and not sure if being the “king” of the castle was all that it was cracked up to be. Guess I thought to achieve financial success was going to be answer to my own feelings of insecurity, that if I had lots of money behind me I would safe. I can tell you now, feeling secure does not come by having tons of money in the bank, money can give you more freedom of choice but it cant fill that “black hole” that for some of us has been there since childhood. Abundance is a frame of mind, its about feeling there is alway enough, always enough to meet ones needs. With these thoughts life just flows, wherever one finds themselves, at the bottom of the hill or the top, its just as it should be.
on my way to work
June 11, 2010
How I love it when I walk to work, sometimes I am in a rush and drive down in my car, but when I make the effort to walk I always thoroughly enjoy it,
Today was especially nice, everywhere was fresh and green after the nights downpour, the birds were singing ( hear my video clip, i phone takes v clips portrait as default, why cant I turn it landscape? Oh well at least you can hear the birds singing)
Looking all around me, the greenness was overwhelmingly cheery, the elderflowers are just beginning to bloom, how I love that very distinctive flavour, it tastes green to me, that wonderfull, gooseberry sharpeness, elederflowr cordial so summery and a delightful drink with a handful of basil leaves, all chilled with ice cubes in a huge glass jug. Summer in a glass……..
The lime flowers too just beginning to unfurl and nesteled at the base of a fallen tree (leftover from the great storm of 1987) a small crop of wild alpine strawberries, some already beginning to form.
How wonderful it is to have this all around me, I am so fortunate to be able to walk amongst nature like this. I perhaps need to remind myself of this when I daydream of livng elswehere, why would I want to, the town is a stones throw away, the common just across the road, the flat large and spacious. Why do I think of moving? because I dont have a garden or or somewhere to sit out and have a coffee and read a book. Yes I can walk across to the common with a deckchair, but its not the same. I am decorating with the view of perhaps renting or selling later in the year, who knows If I will? Selling all my furniture, sorting through books and all my belongings so that I can feel freer, more streamline and start to find pieces that really mean something to me. Most of the items came from my business as in interior designer, things left over, etc etc. I want to create a space that lives and breathes me, simple, creative, functional, easy and comfortable, and above all a space where my creative outpourings can be displayed.
I am here to speak, please listen
June 10, 2010
Just 5 mins of your time
twins
June 7, 2010
Click on the image to see much larger format
something quite disturbing when I look at this image. ”Derek Bird” came to mind, a placid friendly family man on the surface, the face put out to the world on a daily basis, the other hidden from world, full of anger, rage and fury that drove him on a murderous shooting spree…………. Why, what happened? Underneath the surface something was boiling and raging and it spilt over into uncontrollable rage killing 13 people. I find it hard to believe that nobody could believe it of him, you cant hold all this in without it leaking out somewhere. In time, looking back, its more than likely people will see in retrspect the tell tale signs and will begin to put all the pieces of jigsaw back into position…………..
Image was created from a photgraph of exposed tree roots taken in Yorkshire. I duplicated and flipped the layer, then joined it together on photoshop. Low and behold this face appeared, I added the eyes, and tweaked a little but the face is very clear to see.
Inspiration came to me this morning in many forms
June 5, 2010
wow I came across a link to an exhibition called FASHIONING FELT at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York. The beautiful textural image on the flyer I found out was created by Claudy Jongstra and was actually a huge wall mounted piece for a public library in Amsterdam. How amazing is that !! so inspiring, her work really moves me and from my one small piece of felt I feel really moved to scale up, be experimental and felt, felt, felt. i can feel this is going to keep me occupied and find ways to be creative and install large pieces into my interior projects………….
Something about Claudy’s whole ethos of felt making and dying, she even has her own flock of rare breed sheep and an herb and plant garden for experimental work with dying, using Weld for beautiful shades of yellow and Madder for rich earthy reds. Such an inspiration to me this sunny morning……
shed writing
June 4, 2010
What a very interesting time spent with Tony Gammidge and Jane Fox writing about their installation at the Pheonix Gallery in Brighton last night. The exhibition ” dream home” inspired their installation called the shed. We were invited along to explore the piece and write its story post complletion. Their collaborative work had no real narrative, they assembled the pieces with “no story” attached, apparently the first time they have produced a piece without being inspired by a storyline, other works they have produced with name s like,”who killed cock robin” and “Baba Yaga” for instance.
Confronted by a candle lit structure, dismembered pieces of discarded matter from homes around london and brighton, mainly window frames in an assortment of sizes, broken glass, old mirror, a piece of a newel post, streams of candle wax from the many candles and old cutlery box with rusting knives. I instantly felt it was screaming at me, luring me in, it wanted to tell me something and it felt very urgent. We were asked to take some paper, and sit and watch for awhile, absorb the structure, take in the detail………..
My thoughts were instant, I didnt need the detail, so with my pencil and paper I scribbled down a kind of mind map of words and ideas, it was like the structure, its dismembered pieces all held their individual but collective story and it had been held in for so long that the need to express it was so strong, the energy was puling at me, I could feel a real gut wrenching uneasiness, a real sense of foreboding, I new that concealed in the glass were the reflections, the eyes of so many frightened gazes…….. the candles are a way to lead me to it, they are illuminating the way into the darkness. As I started to write, strangely I became the structure and the saviour, a dailogue appeared on the paper and as I stared towards the journies end it was becoming more illusive, a mist, a fog descended, would I never know? Would I reveal the attrocities I saw to my saviour, would I the saviour be able to help ………………… then it was time to close.
So much came up from the vision of ”the shed”, today I feel like I need to write its story in more detail, will I? remains to be seen.
Tears, did this man make me cry or laugh?
June 3, 2010
I saw Taylor Mac last night at the Soho theatre, he was amazing, so colourful, full of passion and joy, and very surprising to me, he was so tender, vulnerable and showed great compassion for life. I was really touched by him in a way I had not at all expected…………. For all his clashingly vibrant dress and his sparkly bejewelled make up was a man that not only made me roll up with laughter but bought tears to my eyes with his honesty.
In his own words ” I believe the more personal risk I take in the work the more the audience will relate and see the whole of their humanity reflected back at them. So, through art, I try to be as masculine, feminine, ugly, beautiful, intelligent, base, chaotic, graceful, joyful, sorrowful, perfect and flawed as I am in real life” and Taylor you achieve all you set out to do and so good to share my evening with you.
