Thursday Thoughts...

"A long time ago a bunch of people reached a general consensus as to what's real and what's not and most of us have been going along with it ever since". 

Charles de Lint

I have always really enjoyed this weird little way of looking at things in the world and it has made me smile across the years. I thought to myself it was time to ponder it, and then as I began I realised that given the current political environment in places it has more than a ring of truth to it.

I'll start with the whimsical, then maybe move to the more realistic.

It amuses me to think that all that we know and believe to be is really just an agreement made up some long time ago and that it has been easy to accept it and just go along with it being real. Thinking about things like time - how we accept the order and length of its measure; how we all just go along with weeks and months and how many days and don't really need to question them.  

But then I think about how so much of our democracies are in fact based upon conventions.  That behind the conventions and the way we do things there isn't really anything firmer or more enforceable. We make so many assumptions about the way we do things in a democracy and it has been scary over recent years in any number of countries, to realise that in fact we have just been doing them that way because folk agreed a long time ago that that is how we would behave and act. It only takes a challenger to show how little force our conventions truly have.

So a whimsical pondering turned far more serious as I pondered.

Looking up towards the flag that sits atop Australia's Parliament House in Canberra - our seat of democracy...

Final exhibition prep

 We start installing the words on the wall for the exhibition on Wednesday, then the works are set up Thursday, with the official launch at 7pm on Friday night! It is definitely edging closer.

On Friday I delivered some cards and notes to folk in the village and along the way, letting them know about both the show and the opening event.

I had some A6 brown card which I cut in half, and then pierced a line of holes for stitching.

I used four different threads, each of which had been dyed here at the cottage, to do a line of running stitch. I thought this might personalise things a bit, and also link to the threads I use in two of the exhibition pieces.

And then I wrote a note.

Devil's Bit Scabious

Thistle.

Heather

Bog Asphodel

And over the weekend I did a little bit of activity prep. Here I am in the back shed painting a cardboard box. All very fine art and high tech!

Once it had dried, we headed inside and worked out where to cut the hole to let the postcards go through.

Done.

And yes, the postcards I am hoping folk fill in to help me create a book, will fit inside!

Lots of little bits of printing and writing and signing coming together, and the work has all been completed, and the different pieces checked for how they will present, so I think there is nothing now but to get them to the showing space and install them.

Inspiration in so many ways

 It's a funny old time at the moment, with the exhibition just sitting over the horizon, still taking up space in my brain and with my mind only allowed to go a'wandering alongside lovely things to do and play with once time has been freed up.

There have been plenty of little moments of inspiration around me; especially some lovely textures, worn timber and rust.

A worn out nest tucked inside...

Beautiful stone dykes everywhere, covered in lichen.

And always flowers. They are my creative outlet when I can't be doing much else...

And a final moment of creativity. Barry is looking for wonderful old buildings to paint so as we drive around we pull over when we can, to get some photos. He had hopped out of the car to take a shot or two here when I glanced in the side rear view mirror and thought that looks pretty cool!

Thursday Thoughts...

"They thought I was a Surrealist, but I wasn’t. I never painted dreams. I painted my own reality".  

Frida Kahlo

Powerful words, and a powerful insight.  I sat with this quote for a while and wondered about her paintings and her reality. 

Perhaps because she painted her lived experience, a life perhaps not many others would understand, her own reality appeared surreal to others. 

But if it was her own reality, what a glorious, bold and creative reality it seemed to be.

The Wounded Table, Frida Kahlo 1940

Things are getting real...

 

This morning I checked my emails and Fiona from Strathnaver Museum was asking what did I think of the poster she had designed? I replied all good  - and within 5 minutes it popped up in my FB feed! Things suddenly got really real.

It is really quite exciting and I am looking forward to installing the works next week. Barry has made all the plinths for me to cascade my seven scrolls for All That Was Lost down, I have laminated all the signs I need and printed all the catalogues. I have prepped for the workshop with the High School students, and broadly speaking I think we are on track!

Here are some images of The Emigrants (shown in the poster above) and I previously blogged about it here.

And here are some details of All That Was Lost. The last image shows the word kist in a rusty tin. Kist means a chest, that you store things in.

And here are the seven plinths lined up against the cottage wall. Next time you see them, they will be installed!

Beginning slowly...

As ever, when we come to the cottage I have to think about what I will make and how I will make. We have built up a pretty nice studio space and workshop space and gradually our bits and pieces are coming together. I had been looking at some lovely images online and thought how much I would enjoy trying to paint something like that. So, I thought I would set myself a task of working out how to work with watercolours and how to build up a painting. 

Plenty of scope for error right there!

I got out the 8 watercolour palettes I had long ago made some swatches of.

I was trying to create a warm cream colour from these pretty intense and bright colours. I had previously numbered the palette underneath, so I could at least reference the palette. But it became evident from these swatch attempts that there were oftentimes more than one colour being tested from each palette.

 So I decided I then needed to number the colours in each palette as a better guide.

Which helped quite a lot with my swatches. And you can see that by the end I had worked out how to make the warm cream colour I was after using number 1 in palette 8 plus a bit of number 5 in palette 4.

Because I was on a mission of discovery and recording, my side of the table was pretty organised. I was deep into analysing the colour I was trying to create to replicate the painting, and scanning the early swatches for hints of which colour might go with which colour to create it.

Barry on the other hand was painting away merrily and had far more of the flow about him!

By the end of three hours I had worked out how to make all the colours I wanted to use in the painting. There were 10 I had needed to sort.

And I had also worked out that I should also number each palette on top rather than just the bottom - so I could aways create my reference easily and without having turn the palette upside down; or accidentally re-arrange them.

The cottage and the village have welcomed us warmly and we have little birds on the bird feeder tower; beautiful gifts of rosemary and lobelia from neighbours at our door; and sweet peas and cornflowers from another friend.  So much loveliness.

A fair bit of time is also going into bits and pieces for the exhibition and things are coming together nicely. The show opens on Friday 30 August at 7pm.

Thursday Thoughts...

"Reading is escape, and the opposite of escape; it's a way to make contact with reality after a day of making things up, and it's a way of making contact with someone else's imagination after a day that's all too real." 

Nora Ephron

The older I get the more I try to work out the duality of things. How cognisant dissonance can exist within us all; and that sometimes it truly is possible to hold completely differing thoughts.  

This one I think helps us understand that something (a book) can do two separate things which in a way are also opposite things - the way it can act as both an escape; and as a connector. 

She put this really well. I have often said books let me disappear from life; and that they also make me feel not alone.  They are multi-functional tools.

The Trip North

 We have made it safely to the cottage, after a good trip with no hassles or delays. It is just a long, long trip.

As we headed off from our first night’s stay at Pitlochry a friend asked what was the drive North like? What sort of country did we drive through? Were there forests or water or mountains or was it barren?

That got me thinking and Barry very kindly helped document the view as we drove for about 6 hours.

I compiled these 24 photos into 6 and they sort of document the different parts of the trip, but by no means capture it all.

We started at Pitlochry and headed through the Cairngorms. Heading down the hill into Inverness, and over the bridge.

We come down another hill to cross the Cromarty Bridge, a fabulous sweep of a bridge, past fields with summer crops, and then we head inland into the countryside.

We climbed a fair way and then drove down alongside the Dornoch Firth, going through a few showers. Into Lairg and past the wee hoosie on Loch Shin.

Edging closer, the single track road begins just out of Lairg, and we pass a great big Wind Farm as well. The road into, and out of Altnaharra.

And now we are in our country - the Flow country. Mountains, single track roads, and wild emptiness. Looking down at Melness and the Tongue causeway, then we turn right towards Armadale.

Looking out to the water as we drive through Coldbackie, then up another hill to BettyHill hotel. The road into Armadale, and a wee bit further along, the gate to the cottage (and the bins!).

There is a certain colour theme at play throughout the day.

We are here, we are safe, we are happy.

Thursday Thoughts

"The problem is, we look for someone to grow old together with, while the secret is to find someone to stay a child with". 

 Charles Bukowski

If I could re-write this one a bit, I would change 'problem' to simply 'thing'. I am not sure it's necessarily a problem.

I like the intent behind this which seems to me to suggest that as we grow old, we should also stay young.  There are so many truisms about ageing gracefully; or disgracefully. About staying young at heart; about acting your age and so on and so forth.

My attraction to this one is I think, that I can find my middle ground - about trying to accept ageing as a thing; but in doing so also trying to keep a sense of child-like wonder about the world - about the trees; the birds; the footpath; the rusty nail; the little mushrooms; the light in the sky; the funny clouds; the beautiful flowers...

I also think I can interpret it to mean trying to remain playful and laugh a lot. Giggle at some silly things, some terrible jokes, and funny one liners that no one else gets.

Acting like a child fully isn't all that helpful in a relationship nor as we age; but elements of the child-like should accompany us I think.

Ahhh... that light!

Finishing off

 Well, our Scottish adventure begins in earnest tomorrow as we head off to our home in the Highlands.

We have been working right up until we go, but have also taken moments to enjoy magic and beauty.

This first shot was of my shadow after I arrived at exercises one morning - it was 3 degrees outside and I had taken a lovely shot of the sunrise; and then glanced down and loved the texture and mystery here on the concrete.

But back to finishing the work... I was wanting to hang my burnt bundle in a Perspex frame. Barry very kindly made me an extra long brass rod needle for threading my very fine nylon thread through the envelope so we could tie it on. Here it is on our high tech work bench (kitchen bench) with a hand towel as protector.

We did some measuring and then began drilling the holes. The first hole was a dream. The second hole not so much. The drill bit warmed up so much it began to melt the Perspex, and then when it had, that meant that the drill bit kind of got glued into the hole in the Perspex.

An interesting dilemma.

But lots of patience and ingenuity working out to encourage the drill bit out of the hole were brought into play and after a wee while we had successfully removed it.

We then tested threading the nylon thread through the envelope and through the holes and tying them off and I think it will work.

Our work station.

And as a complete and utter absurd aside - how is this? On Saturday we were alerted to three stags (with excellent antlers) wandering around below us here in sub-tropical Maleny in winter!

I wonder if we will see any when we actually get to Scotland???

And for more moments of beauty, I took this photo of a ceramic heart that hangs off a sculpture near our front door.