may i introduce to you another small installment in my virtual world travelogue..? here is another mixed media abstract on paper on canvas, in the ongoing series of diminutive travelling icons or iCons. this one is entitled venezia...
venezia, 2010, 13cm x 13cm x 3cm, intaglio collagraph on paper on canvas
venezia is one of a new series of very small works (virtual travel 'iCons') that focus on colour and visual associations with locations around the world - but i never quite know where i will visit next. this one is quite formally patterned as an object and i have begun to envisage it as work in textiles, perhaps as a woven wall hanging or a rug.the dark brown recalls the damp wood of mooring posts and the striations echo shop front canopies, and also the mineral traces of waterlines on the buildings. the very small but perfectly formed venezia iCon is up for some real-life travelling should anyone wish it to give it a room...so, a virtual weekend break, spent in venice, italy... well, not exactly (if only), but this is where i landed...
however, venice is presently in my thoughts, as i recall memories of when i first visited, many years ago on a journey through italy. we arrived aching & mildly dazed after a through-the-night train journey (in economy class, naturally), venice shrouded in an early morning mist which mizzled on for most of the day - but venice seemed like a very accommodating place in which to get slightly disorientated...
venice also reminds me of my first experience of italian ice cream (or gelato) and the visual array of textures & colours on view along the counter. i was amazed to discover that ice cream came in so many flavours, and then i savoured my first taste of the very aromatic pistachio. it was lighter and more crystalline in texture than british ice cream and i marvelled at the sophistication of its presentation, elegantly scooped up and served atop a stylish cone. it was something of a glacial epiphany when all i had previously known was raspberry ripple in a large tub (re-used as a lunch box when empty), cinema choc-ices and maybe a wall's funny face...venezia now joins tuscany, pompeii, milano and roma in a somewhat unplanned & erratic virtual tour of italy... these very small travel iCons (visual shortcuts, suitably squared, the equivalent of pixels, as small mementos to my virtual journeys) will continue the cause & effect - that of the aesthetic of colour leading onto faraway places; the subtext needs no futher explanation......so, i found myself being taken back to what seems to be the very source of things again, the endless fascination with the signs of weathering, neglect and decay. i took a lot of photographs during my inter-railing journey through europe (about seven rolls of film) - of the cities and their buildings, the doorways, windows and walls - and even the pavements - any structure or surface which seemed to exhibit the textures of time, the evidence of history that didn't require a tour guide...later that year, during my art & design diploma (the pre-requisite qualification prior to embarking on an art degree) i first encountered etching. the printmaking workshop was a small but brightly lit room, with windows that overlooked the museum next door. in the centre of the workshop was a very old star-wheeled etching press. this seemingly archaic contraption of print technology was a much revered object, a prized antique (which, of course, it was). our printmaking tutor would often play old jazz records to jolly us along, so the atmosphere was more convivial and relaxed in comparison to the painting & drawing studios...this is my first ever etching (1985), very simply titled 'a door in venice'. the subject matter of an old, weathered door and crumbling, decayed brickwork seemed perfectly in tune with the intaglio etching processes of open bite and aquatint...
a door in venice, etching, 1985is it really twenty five years since the not-so-grand european tour?it's strange how the tide of time affects the memory of things, how those memories resurface when you least expect them to, when you come across something, a photograph or an object, something that both creates & completes the connection to the past, that takes you right back there, in an instant, and in that instant everything that has happened since seems to make perfect sense...
when the wind blows
Another abstract in an ongoing series of small mixed media works on canvas...
[Pompeii, collagraph and painting on paper and canvas, 5" x 5"]Wikimedia led me to this pictorial reference for the above abstract (titled after its original creation) since these works are entirely about colour and texture, yet with a little analysis they link back to another place, another time... in this instance, to the remains of a villa in Pompeii...
Wall frescoes in the house of Lucretius, Pompeii (image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)
The red (Pompeiian red is also a pigment) and grey stripes appear to reference the patterned wall frescoes of the ancient villas, and of the stonework and structure of the interconnected streets and avenues of ancient Pompeii.Many years ago I visited Pompeii... Although I didn't realise it then, the ancient relics and the eroded, weathered facades of Italy, Greece and Turkey were to become a creative muse of sorts... I would love to go back to these places, with the benefit of wiser eyes... but I would probably take far too many photographs...
These are from an old photo album (I wonder how many people still compile photographs in albums these days, after the advent of digital photography and online sites such as flickr?). That's me in the lower left picture, drinking from the water fountain (of youth!)... which prompted another visit to everyone's favourite photo album Flickr to see how many others had recorded this very same location at Pompeii...
Google Maps has recently visited Pompeii too, so I persevered with Google's virtual Street View and retraced my steps back to the original site of the water fountain...
Even with these many thoughts of distant travel on my mind, I would like to be homebound for a while... (if only to get on with some more artwork).I had a horrid drive home from work the other evening, in what at first seemed to be sporadic snowfall - but about two thirds into my homeward journey it turned into a heavy blizzard. The falling snow quickly compacted to a sheet of ice under the weight of the rush hour traffic, as the main road had not been salted or gritted. My journey, which normally takes about an hour, in the end took three and a half hours. The queue of traffic slowed to a near standstill about ten miles from home, as the drivers ahead were finding it increasingly difficult to drive with any degree of control or safety.The road was becoming near impassable - after two hours slow-driving on the most nervous of tenterhooks I didn't want to have to drive any more. A couple of miles further on and I decided to abandon any hope of getting home by car and parked my vehicle on a wide bit of the roadside verge. I could see that some cars ahead were sliding on the ice and a large articulated truck had got into difficulty going uphill, stopping any flow of traffic - it was fast becoming an accident zone (and I do blame the council and those who said the snow and ice wouldn't amount to much). Lots of cars were stuck in a static queue (myself included), occasionally crawling forward feeling the ever-present danger of the inevitable wobble and slide.After I had parked up, I walked along the snaking line of the (now) stationary vehicles, and, as you do in a crisis, you empathise with their dilemma and then share a little rant about the council not gritting the roads (yet again) - but this time it was serious. Taking a slightly safer snow-underfoot path, I walked the half-mile or so into the nearby town, where a good friend and now saviour (after providing a much-needed cup of piping-hot tea) decided they would take the risk and drive me the last few glacial miles to my door - the drive was quite dicey in places, but arriving home has never felt so good.I declined the early morning lift to pick up the car on the way to work, and decided I would instead walk the four or so miles back to the roadside verge later in the day. It was very cold but sunny as I set off and much of the snow had already melted - belying the ice-frightmare of the night before. Aside from the hassle of passing traffic (climbing high up onto the verge is always the safest procedure), the walk was quite relaxing - and not entirely without incident. A few minutes into this bracing midday stroll, I passed the small boatyard by one of the nearby lakes and was instantly captivated by the most unusual tinkling sounds coming from beyond the roadside hedgerow. A strong breeze, blowing through the hidden tangle of ropes, wires and chains of the boats' fixtures and moorings, had made an uintentional but quite magical melody.
Click to listen to the breeze-created tinkling sounds from the boatyard...[audio mp3="http://www.jazzgreen.com/journal/swfs/boatyard.mp3"]The same wind that brought in the blinding white flurry of a blizzard the evening before, that forced the wind-chill that plummeted the temperatures to below zero, that created the perilous sheets of ice on the roads, the very next day quietly sang to me when no one else was around......This weekend is the last chance to see the contemporary art exhibition, Elements: Man and the Environment, at the Forum, Norwich (read more about my work in the Elements exhibition).
the Italian job
I've snatched another title for this piece (and one for the post), again just using my colour values system...
[Tuscany, mixed media collagraph and painting on canvas]I got carried away, taking these photographs, using some rough-prepped canvases as a backdrop...
As luck would have it, google images returned a suitably idyllic vista as visual reference, a Tuscan sunset...
And all this brought back some memories. Although I have never stayed in Tuscany, I once travelled through it. At the age of 18 (although I think I must have been 19 by the time we returned), I back-packed with two other friends across Europe, travelling through Italy by train, stopping off at Milan, Venice, Bologna, Pisa, Rome, Naples (and Pompeii), and then on to the port of Brindisi... I don't remember the landscape looking like this...I managed to complete three more of these collagraph canvases today, their titles and back stories to be revealed in future posts. We have had three days of intermittent power-cuts, for no apparent reason, resulting in having to heat water for tea in a pan on the fire and toasting hot-cross buns, which taste so much better in a crisis...