Saturday …
Today I begin again! I would like to say I am excited or even happy but I am not! I really want to become a [better] printer and produce some desirable pieces. I can cut a bit of lino, make a fair representation of a few items …. tea pots, bikes and boots … no great shakes!
I can even make a pretty good print; my friend at Artichoke Press helped me with that.
I have the rollers, ink, paper, cutting tools and even a new apron; but somewhere the enthusiasm has gone, I am even fearful.
I am off to another art class this afternoon and it seems the lonely, new girl feeling is overwhelming … does being an artist [human being] always feel like this? Why have I not noticed it so before?
Friday’s Library Snapshot
This week l we celebrated the International Children’s’ Book Day recognised annually on the 2nd of April; the l birthday of Hans Christian Andersen. We have several books in our Children’s Collection by this famous author of folk tales and found this item not so readable for me.The illustrations are a little dull when compared with those of Mabel Lucie Attwell in a volume that stood nearby ( I don’t even know the illustrator) nonetheless they are beautiful in a granite sort of way.
Alphabe Thursday T is for Turquoise and Turpentine
T is for Turpentine and turquoise; I am so disappointed that there is no colour that begins with ‘T’ so I am clutching at straws this week.
None of the books I have relating to colour refer to turquoise. Is there such a pigment ?
Turquoise is an opaque blue-green mineral that is a hydrous phosphate of copper and aluminium according to Wikipedia. I have no reason to think that it is ground to a paste and used in painting.
So back to the drawing board. I remember my dad as a boat builder using Turps or Turpentine when varnishing the boats when they were completed. I can remember going to the ships chandler’s in the nearby shipyard to buy the turps ‘loose.’ I would take a medicine bottle or two and a few shillings to buy 1/2 a pint of turps, some methylated spirits or some boiled linseed. I remember the smell of the shop and my dad’s workshop with much pleasure.
Turpentine was also called spirit of turpentine or oil of turpentine it is a fluid obtained by the distillation of resin from trees, particularly pines. It is mainly used as a solvent and it is used by artists as thinner for oil-based paintings.
I hope next week I will be able to find a colour so I can continue my theme until the end of the alphabet
Wednesday’s Woman
Every other week I have an art class; with a teacher I learn all that I might have learned had I paid attention in school 1966!
My real interest is printmaking but have become more and more interested in mixed media. So I have a lot to learn as a result the process has been pleasantly slow and fulfilling. Mainly because my teacher is painstaking and knowledgable.
We usually spend time discussing artists especially those who excel in multimedia.This week as we discussed my new project with the book cover ‘teacher’ showed me a book about Nancy Spero while we glanced through I thought about my blog and Wednesday’s Woman; Nancy Spero would really fit the bill!
Nancy Spero (1926-2009) born in Cleveland, Ohio and lived mostly in New York City with her husband Leon Golub. As an artist and activist Nancy Spero’s career spanned fifty years.
She was renown for her unfailing commitment to political, social, and cultural concerns of the time. To this end she concentrated the depiction of women in all their guises; mythological. in the theatre those in highlighted (or not) in the media, tortured women. Inspired by classical and modern sources; she made prints and collages on to friezes and tapestries around museums and galleries. Her subject matter that range from the writings of Antonin Artaud to the Vietnam War that seemed to reflect her life. For some time Nancy Spero life and worked on Paris during what is best described as the cultural ferment of the 1950s and 60s. Later she moved to New York where she set up the feminist gallery A.I.R. and to join with artists and critics such as Leon Golub, Robert Morris and Lucy Lippard in forming the Art Workers’ Coalition. During the 1980s Nancy gained international acclaim; her heartfelt works giving recognition to feminist issues and new further critical discussion.
Nancy Spero said of her art “I’ve always sought to express a tension in form and meaning in order to achieve veracity. I have come to the conclusion that the art world has to join us, women artists, not we join it. When women are in leadership roles and gain rewards and recognition, then perhaps ‘we’ (women and men) can all work together in art world actions.”
She died of heart failure in Manhattan on October 18, 2009.
Weekly Photo Challenge … Street life
Not a great shot but I also didn’t want to upset the owner of the gates
I live a long way from semi-detached suburbia; as you can see. It is a tiny street built for the factory workers of the 19th century long before cars were commonplace. This enclosed space was once the backyard of a shop, now converted to student accommodation. This is now a little motorbike repair shop, the owner who lives nearby does come and go all day.
The street now is populated with cars. The residents who no longer work at the factory, as it closed years ago, commute to factories and offices built ‘out of town’.
Each morning morning the drivers leave home certain they will not enjoy their own ‘parking space’ when they return later in the day. But when they do they will find space politely, appropriately and obeying polite rules. If you disobey there are less polite unspoken laws and you will not do it again.
For over 25 years we have been careful not to break the rule. However those new to the area sometimes take a chance and 9 times out of 10 this is OK! However this weekend someone abused the situation and provoked the owner of the gates and garage to write a reminder across his windscreen, not indelible I hope but nonetheless not quite so polite.
The car owner no happy with this infringement of his rights to park where he likes; proceeded to empty his car of the litter he had accumulated for the last few years on the pavement in front of the gates. This is shameful and a pitiful reminder of how things can get out of hand … and real damaged caused.
Monday’s challenge
Oh dear the darkness took me by surprise. It is Monday after a weekend of much goodness so I feel able to begin the week. The exhibition was a joy although while preparing I had my doubts. However I am in a position to think about the future of my printmaking … without them being made for me. Had the response been negative I would have made the decision to stop and cut my losses.
The feedback was good although the poll was not a good representative I trust the opinions.
But still the answers are not cut and dried I could stay with things as they are comfortable and cosy. Rolling on to the next artist’s market .
Or I could I believe with more time and tuition go further.
So now I have to think of ways to find time and the resources to fulfil the next challenges.
But still the weekend was not all plans (or plans for plans)
Mother’s Day was a delight! Skype, food, tea, champagne and cassava cake yum!
Silent Sunday
Saturday on the see-saw of life
Today is my exhibition at the Rising Sun Art Centre it will be a part of my work in progress. They are of course finished pieces . Whether or not I consider them sell-able is up to potential customers.
For me they are priceless gems; little nuggets mined over the last few weeks. I have delved into the depths of my being during; a time of grief and despair. So while I will not sell much I will celebrate each precious piece that represents a time of tension; one side of the me sad and hopeless and the other being an artist asking the unanswerable questions: Where is the happiness? What colour? Its perspective? Its form? Where is the light? Shade? How do I do it? Is good? Bad? or indifferent? etc etc.
Of course being an artist doesn’t make me happy or even take away the pain but it does allow a window of respite.
While searching for an illustrator a while ago I came across Mary White the textile designer; I even found some scraps of her fabric on Ebay . Not enough to make anything of substance but plenty for this ‘installation’ that serves as picture in its own right but makes lovely backdrop for some of my early prints.
A little busy … but none the less a happy notion. when life is not always so.
Friday’s Library snapshot …
This week has past in a flurry of busy-ness. I wasn’t able to gather thoughts or doing any snapping for my weekly library post, while at ‘special collections’ this week and I have to result in a reblog. I hope you like it!
Jigsaw puzzles seem to have passed me by; in two ways. I don’t remember having them as a child; although my friends had them. So I understand the concept if not the attraction. I tried to help them complete the jigsaw when I visited. I was intrigued by the way the dining room table was taken over for days on end. Meals were served on laps. Or the jigsaw was man handled with great care to and fro and with much swearing even in the most genteel household; I noticed. Until the jigsaw was back in place and silence reigned again when the group re-camped hunched over the puzzle. .
Such an operation could not be considered when living on a houseboat. So this probably explains why we didn’t have a mountain of jigsaw puzzles beside our dining room table. As a result I am blissfully unaware of the rich history, the artistry and…
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Alphabe Thursday S is for Saffron
Saffron is a spice comes from the flower of Crocus sativus, commonly known as the saffron crocus. Crocus is a genus in the family Iridaceae. It grows to about 30 cm. and bears about four blooms each with a bright red stima; which are the distal end of a carpel. The stigmas are collected and dried and used for seasoning food and as a dye. Saffron is considered to be among one of the the world’s costliest spices. It is native to Greece and Southwest Asia and was first cultivated in Greece.
It was a medieval pilgrim who bought the saffron corms to Essex on his way back from the Holy Land in his hat. They were a welcome commodity; as Britons were now trying exotic spices bought from the South-East Asia. Although most people were still not using such delights because they were very expensive cooks in the big houses were enjoying cloves, nutmeg and cinnamon. Saffron was also used during this time as a cheap alternative to gold leaf when painting the illuminated manuscripts. A poor artist put a few threads of saffron in a dish with some beaten egg white to infuse until the the mixture became like the yoke of the egg. The ‘colour’ didn’t have lasting power so it was not popular as dye; it was used most frequently mixed with other pigments such as verdigris (blue) to make a perfect grass green.
Coat Hanger Doll's House 