more painting activity, paintings that are resurfacing again, breaking the surface tension in the matter of paint - developed from a liking for lichen-ness, off the wall and onto canvas... unearthing new content, in the source/subject of the painting and in the actions/processes of painting...currently defined as paintings, given the use of traditional painting media and their appearance of something painted, in their overall flatness of the surface, but the surface textures discord with the formality of the painted surface, in the visual plane which denies perspective, in the containment of the square - a little disorientating in scale, disconnected from reality, but still a mirror of nature, one that could trick the eyes into seeing elements of beauty therein... and i find myself still consumed by the concept or dichotomy between perceptual depth and physical flatness in my work...i have been considering the issue of them seeming to be contrived, in that i have, deliberately so, set out to achieve something that is expressing the wonder of the elements of nature in a manmade environment - and i have visually recorded and thus blogged some of those steps in the process. it seems to be in my character to be meticulous, in the attention given to the details - this may be an overly controlling approach in my painting, in that it offsets the possibility that some other form of art could arise out of the accidental outcomes of a series of processes - as nice as they might appear to be, they would not be driven by the original concept...how ever art is made, constructed, modelled or fashioned, it will be in some way contrived and artists will seek to express content, meaning, emotions or philosophies through the outward appearance of their art... the artificiality of art (as object or process) is surely at the heart of any conceptual content... i once called it just smoke and mirrors but there is more to it than that... perhaps it is this very contradiction, between an earnestness to convey or express something unique, individual, with a desire for it to be perceived or valued as an object in itself, which informs the necessary requirement for an objective title, a lichenscape or liken-scape...enough words; some images perhaps... these are proving to be quite difficult paintings to resolve, but i have the underlying matter of the content to remind me where i am duly headed...if you don't want to see the results, look away now......lichenscape I
...lichenscape II...
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...you can see previous working states of these paintings - achieving a perfect lichen-ness part one, part two and part three - the small discoveries & minor incidents within the wider process of creating a painting (or object of art)...Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty if only we have the eyes to see them.John Ruskin...current exhibition: Rebirth, curated by Lorraine Cooke, is an exhibition of Contemporary Japanese Art inspired by Ancient Jomon culture and Japanese aesthetic, in collaboration with the Unearthed exhibition at the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts. The Rebirth exhibition features works by Sahoko Aki, Megumi Baba, Shaun Caton, Veronica Grassi, Jazz Green, Tsunaki Kuwashima, Barbara Leaney and Keika Sako. Rebirth, the exhibition, is at the gallery Art 1821 in Norwich and runs from 29th July to 8 September 2010....
rebirth at Art1821: a private view
i received some photographs of the rebirth exhibition at gallery art1821 in the e-post today.... would you care to take a look?
please mind your head on the low beams...
fabulous dogwood sculptures by barbara leaney, referencing the natural environment and the interstellar world...
one of my abstract paintings, the edgescape rost...
looking back through the main gallery space; shaun caton's paintings are on the far wall...
another one of my edgescape paintings, corros, surrounded by two framed works by veronica grassi - note the whitewashed, cobbled wall...
a full-on view of corros; there are surprising similarites in both colour and texture between my work and veronica's... and more evidence of those cobbledy, flinty walls..
veronica's work on the other end of the wall; also shown are two small works by sahoko aki...i don't have a list of works so can't supply information on medium and titles - there is much more to see in the exhibition; this is just a small snippet...rebirth: an exhibition celebrating Japanese aesthetic, in collaboration with the Unearthed exhibition at the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, at the gallery Art 1821 in norwich, from 29 July to 8 September 2010.the gallery art1821 is situated in the cellar in one of norwich's finest medieval buildings, augustine steward house in tombland, reputedly built circa 1549.
[image found on flickr]please visit the Art 1821 website for more information on the rebirth exhibition...last chance to see… textures, traces & elements at beyond the image gallery – the exhibition closes at 4pm on sunday 1st august 2010...coming up: the 11th annual Artworks exhibition at blackthorpe barns, 11 September to 3 October 2010 ... and guess what, i will be hanging my work on yet another medieval flint wall...Artworks is an established group of thirty professional East Anglian visual artists, with the environment and mankind’s impact on it as the broad theme of the 11th Annual exhibition…...
more grey sky thinking, out of the blue
more cloud gazing this week, torrential rain all day on tuesday (a typically british summer's day) - this was the view from the window at about 6pm...
a room with a viewi hadn't really noticed how prominent these power lines were before; my days must be slowly draining of any meaningful structure if i get distracted by this visual discordance with nature's billowy curtain... today when i awoke, i did, for a brief moment, wonder what day it was, whether it was saturday already, and that a day of more domestic to-do-tasks await me, tasks which fuel so little enthusiasm as to be remotely filed and archived for just such rainy days...in the manner of these featureless, grey days i have been feeling somewhat melancholic in heart and the vast canvas of the sky seemed to be a reflection of the reality of recent events...thus, i have not been motivated to paint much, well perhaps for an hour or so, here and there, when the mood takes. it seems too self-indulgent to 'just paint' when real-life concerns pile up like the laundry, and then there has been the issue of the quality of daylight...here are a couple of close-up images of one of my current paintings, lichenscape II (a work in progress), taken earlier on today...
detail of the surface of the painting, lichen on stone texturesi had a rash moment of destructive thinking when evaluating this canvas (perhaps inspired by these photographic reframings, seeing paintings within paintings), deciding that i might cut up the canvas into nine smaller ones - the lack of a decent-sized studio space to work in is almost unbearable at times...i have found that in attending to these two large canvases (aka the lichenscapes) it has clouded my creative process - i realise that i am trying to condense into these two paintings a subjective concern which would be better pursued over eight or ten (or even more) paintings. myriad other thoughts (too nebulous to be proper working concepts or ideas) also run daily through my mind, and then i have to remind myself to just focus...
another detail of the textured surface of a lichen-esque painting...exhibition newsyesterday evening i attended the private view of the exhibition rebirth. lorraine cooke, the curator of the exhibition, has done an amazing job in bringing this show together. i feel most privileged to have some of my paintings included in this art exhibition.i realise that i am still reticent in 'working' the private view scenario, as i slowly perused the exhibition on the opening night - this is probably due to: a) being very slight and thus am always less 'visible' in a busy gallery crowd, and also b) a (now) love/hate relationship with my new dr marten boots. i walked to the gallery from the train station and worked up some fine blisters - such small injuries can really be the breaking of the spirit.i also met and chatted with the artist veronica grassi - she has some quite beautiful textural, sculptural pieces in this exhibition. barbara leaney's dogwood sculptures are also quite spectacular, as are the smaller, detailed works of the contemporary japanese artists included in the show. i urge anyone passing through the fine city of norwich to go and see the exhibition at gallery art1821 - it is open until 8th september 2010 - you can also read more about the rebirth exhibition on art 1821's website......to further the idleness of my daily musings and observations, dear reader, may i introduce to you my humble sketching kit? (i always like to travel light, a habit instilled in me since my inter-railing journeys across europe)
my winsor & newton sketchers' box of watercolours
a tiny tiptree jam jar (for water)
an assortment of stubby sketching pencils, mostly derwent & caran d'ache...and here is a composite image of my sketchbookiness of the last few days, 21-29 july, 2010...
skies and clouds sketches
monday, mid afternoon, looking east across fields towards marshes, high up in the sky, grey centre... in graphite, pencil and watercolour...
wednesday, early afternoon... looking east, cooler, bright, clouds moving fast... in graphite and pencil...
thursday, late afternoon, slim, dark clouds moving laterally, about 5pm...this is becoming slightly obsessive; i have a mild desire to master the morphing art of the east anglian skies...and i penned another haiku style poem, or my own ode to a cloud...a cloudtarnished silverdarkening the weeping willows...i am now thinking of joining the cloud appreciation society, whose pledge is to fight the banality of blue-sky thinkingsee my cloud drawings animation from last year: the art of idleness...last chance to see… textures, traces & elements at beyond the image gallery - the exhibition closes at 4pm on sunday 1st august 2010....The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.Marcel Proust (remembrance of things past)