Unusual to say the least

A couple of weekends ago a friend stopped by the studio so I could return a basket she had loaned us; but she brought with her the most intriguing gift.

I had never seen nor heard of these before; but they were watercolour 'stamps' used to hand tint black and white photographs. It felt somewhat serendipitous seeing as I had been spending so much time playing with watercolours and swatches.

They came in a book, with perforations just as stamps used to, and the idea is to take a stamp or portion thereof, add water, create the tint colour and then apply to brighten the photogrpah.

I simply adored the booklet as a beautiful object, irrespective of what it could do: the curling fore edges, the rusted staples, the foxed paper...

I read the directions. 

And looked at the colours. I learned that the colour is actually on the back of the stamp.

I took out an old school photo and tried to come up with some colours that might suit. You'd have to say the colours are pretty loud and proud; not a real lot of subtlety within them, and I wasn't yet confident to mix them too much.

So I tore off a few bits; and added water.

What a hoot! Everybody ended up with quite bright hair! Still, I kind of like the funny effects they produced and will think about using them again on something more substantial.

They definitely give a sense of an era I think.

This was the other photo I found - gotta love the gloves and the handbag and the socks! Not sure if I will simply let it be, or have a go at making me smile.

Thursday Thoughts...

"All you need is less". 

Unknown

Ahhhh the interweb and the great maker, writer, and speaker of quotes "Unknown". I tracked down two books with this title (by Vicki Vrint and Michelle Moore) but no firm originator; however,  I like it and so here we go.

I think it's a bit clever because we all know the Beatles song and can imagine the last word being Love. Less starts with L and and therefore you are into it before you realise in a way.

I also think its clever because we are so used to commercials and advertising telling us just what it is that we need now - the newest thing, the thing we never knew we needed, someone has decided we do! So when it turns that around and says this reverses that expectation, I like it.

But I definitely like the sentiment.  For the past few years we have tried our darndest to de-clutter, to reduce, to simplify. Our living arrangements, our banking arrangements, our transport and more.  WE try to grow food, we try to make and re-make, we try to only buy when needed, rather than when wanted. Except books, I fail on books.

I also like that it is simple and easy to remember.  I guess I am a bit of a fan of some of these apparently trite and super simple sayings, oftentimes because they actually hold real truths.

A recent sun shower on our herb boxes.

More ways with pebbles

 I am remaining true to my goal of attempting to 'play' with pebbles and stones in as many ways as I can without actually landing on anything decisively. I have painted pebbles with watercolour, and am stitching pebbles onto fabric. I most recently began to play with wrapping cement-cast pebbles; and have started to do some calligraphic renderings as well.

I think I first started wrapping pebbles a decade or so ago... just for fun.

I had these two cement-cast pebbles sitting on my desk which I had wrapped, in my own fashion, with some Habu threads. I had popped outside the studio and found some twigs from the lilly-pillies that grow there and tucked them into the wrap, and I thought to do some more.

I liked the idea of using the cement pebbles that we cast at home; with Habu thread, rather than the more traditional way with actual stones and cane that goes on wet, and shrinks to hold onto the stone as it dries. 

So I have done some more. I used brown string, some different Habu thread and a black silk tangle that I managed to get a few lengths out of!

I also used some heavy duty cotton thread that I would normally use for tying blocks of type together.

I love how this one looks...

What to do with them I do not yet know.  As per my desire to push further, go sideways, don't simply sit and think I have finished, I am considering how I might be able to use them in a larger piece. It's hard.

And so I turned my mind to words. Last year I wrote the beginnings of a poem titled "Grief is a stone" and soI thought I might play with those words and see what  sort of shapes they might make.

My notebook is a place for sketches only - no proper work can be done in there as the paper is pretty ordinary, but I did want to just try a few sketches.

Playing with background colours and shapes.

Here is the before I wet the watercolour pencils - sorry no after shot!

Because I had had done watercolour pebbles in a circle I wondered if the words might look good in a circle - this would really need more work and attention than I gave it here!

I think I could curve the letters more gently - the G and the S both offer a curve and I think I could make the E and the F could also curve. Something to explore

As is so often the case, the more you do, the more you think about what else you could do and I then began to think it might simply look nicer in a straight line.

I repeated the angled G in the first line, but decided I preferred a more upright look for the second, and also a narrow - wide variation. I think this gives me something to take further and refine as well. At the last minute I added in the downward serif on the G and I don't like it.

Again, no idea what I will do with the words, but it gets your brain active in a bunch of different ways and helps you not shut anything down too early...

I like the way I went with a stone shape for the O. It just happened as the pencil went onto the page and I love those moments. In the bottom one I like how the baseline is flat and there is movement in the upper area... we shall see.

Speaking of pebbles...

 As mentioned previously, I am trying hard not to get ahead of myself; and instead am trying to spend time exploring the notion of pebbles and stones.

I asked myself the question - how many ways/techniques can you use to make pebbles?

This led me to think about fabric; appliqué, hand stitching, machine stitching...the list went on.

So I spent a lovely afternoon hunting through my fabric stash and trying to find some fabric that felt like it had pebble potential.

I found quite a few fabrics that I had tea dyed with rust so many years ago in fact 10 years ago, and which I had re-discovered and sorted out just last year.  These soft fabrics felt like they might work and toned together beautifully.  Also some fabric a friend had gifted me was added to the group.

I got a few others out that I had printed with a corn cob, also a few years ago and think that the calico might work, and possibly the grey at a pinch; but that the dark grey with its black weft or warp would be too much. Always good to check these things.

And so I began to blind-base two layers of the lovely soft fabric together. 

This takes time, but I was lucky enough to be travelling on a plane during the week and had some time to simply sit and stitch.

I had that moment, as you do, going through security and hoping that they wouldn't mind my needle and my quick unpick. I chose my oldest quick unpick (1978 I bought my first sewing machine, second hand, and it had this with it and at that point it was fully intact) and hoped they would figure the damage I could potentially do with it would be very limited. And yes, I got through without question.

The back of the basting.

It will still be some time before I can actually start thinking about the pebble part, but I am pushing it along gently, and not racing ahead.

I feel as if I have actually slowed myself down and am now simply exploring techniques and possibilities, not attempting to solve and complete. This is good.

Thursday Thoughts...

“The most demanding part of living a lifetime as an artist is the strict discipline of forcing oneself to work steadfastly along the nerve of one’s own most intimate sensitivity.” 

Anne Truitt.

Somehow for me, these words take you to the vulnerability and exposure that making art and showing it can create. They speak too of discipline, of investigation, of going deeply into difficult territory at times to express something.

Whilst not all art is about difficult subjects, I think that what she says suggests that by working with what cheers you, or brings you joy also takes persistence to investigate and express. That showing and sharing these things can also be demanding.

It seems to me as if determination and persistence are key for her; and that she suggests it is demanding to continue to work in this manner, unflinching and not turning away from your sensitivities.

Ireland, 2008, no other recorded detail. 

Watercolour pebbles

 After doing my swatches and starting my first pebble circle, I let it dry and then went and worked back into the pebbles.

First of all I rubbed out the outline.

Then I began to work over the top of the initial wash, oftentimes leaving a thin, lighter line like a stripy pebble might have. Again, this was from the video.

For a non-painter I was pretty happy with how this worked out, and definitely was getting better by the end.

The next day I turned my mind and my brushes to a warmer palette and created the same size circle and once more began to paint pebbles.

This time I focussed on not working from the outside in and ending up with small holes near each other. I think I got the balance better here; but some pebbles still appear a tad contrived.

Waiting to dry.

Again, I rubbed out the pencil outline and over-worked the pebbles to create a few more stripy ones. I think it is amazing how the lines really lift the work and make it much more interesting.

I also think I got some interesting colour-blended tones across the pebbles; again more interesting.

I need to go back to the video and see what else I could have done - something about shadows I think!

Here are the two circles on a sheet of A4 watercolour paper - good samples and reminders.

Swatches

 Some friends and I are beginning to talk about a possible exhibition and thinking along the lines of pebbles and stones, maybe rocks and boulders.

Once I get an idea in my head I oftentimes race ahead and get to the end, in my head.  I am trying this time to sit with the idea of pebbles and stones and not rush headlong into deciding what the finished pieces will look like already.

Slow.

Down.

I have slowed myself down by thinking about colours and watercolours and realising yet again, that I know very little about colour theory, and so should probably spend some time trying to see what sort of stone-pebble colours one can create with the watercolours I have on hand.

However, the first step ended up being, go buy a tube of Payne's Grey. I love this colour so much and have it in various inks and pencils; but not in my watercolour set. I thought it would be an important base for pebble and stone colours.

I set about doing swatches of the colours in my set, as they mixed with different strengths of Payne's Grey.

Unaccustomed as I am, I realised I had really not done the colours justice at all - they had all ended up looking pretty much a shade of Payne's Grey. So much to learn.

So I went and repeated the trials and got better results. Use more water, and less Payne's Grey.

This is what the swatch page looked like at the end. The second versions really gave me some lovely tones to look at and explore.

The closer I looked, the more I loved the organic shapes the swatches made. Exactly the sorts of marks I might hope to make, but could never do if I was trying. The way the darker pigment hugs the outline...

I had watched this video here, and decided to paint some pebbles in a circle. Here is the first circle I painted, still waiting to dry.

I ended up being quite annoyed by the fact I stuck those two small lozenge pebbles near the middle and in the same direction - I was looking at the blank space rather than the whole design. Never mind. That's why we practice right?

As we walked into town on Saturday, we came across this glorious orange buddlia - the soft green of the foliage against the weathered timber, with the pop of colour was an eye delight!

Thursday Thoughts...

"Books may well be the only true magic." 

Alice Hoffman

There are any number of definitions magic, and where they include references to power or influence over things due to a supernatural force, I am not sure that books are necessarily doing that.  The power and influence that books wield seems to me to be due more to force of an individual's imagination, skill and knowledge.

But then who knows? Maybe writers are guided by a supernatural force?

Definitions that suggest magic is something that seems to cast a spell (MW dictionary) gets closer to the mark for me. I can attest to having been 'under the spell' of a good book. That feeling of returning from some other place, some other time as I close the chapter or the book and re-integrate myself into the world around me. That definitely feels a bit spell-bound.

As for being the only true magic; I am always wary of only; and of the combination only true. 

I will however unashamedly sign up for books being magic.

I know books are magic, but so are wintery landscapes...

New York City, 2013.

Shadow

 I have been laid low by a violent episode of food poisoning for a few days and have barely thought about art, let alone had the strength to undertake any.

As gentle and slow days were the go, I noticed shadows. 

Shadows of flowers, of grasses, of plants and of me.

These grasses on the kitchen bench with morning sun...

A quiet walk into town this morning and this marvellous, citrus-green against steel grey blue, and its shadows.

Me walking to the studio pre-food poisoning.

I am on the mend and feeling a bit brighter, but goodness me it packed a punch!

Thursday Thoughts...

“Walking itself is the intentional act closest to the unwilled rhythms of the body, to breathing and the beating of the heart. It strikes a delicate balance between working and idling, being and doing. It is a bodily labor that produces nothing but thoughts, experiences, arrivals” 

Rebecca Solnit

I am pretty sure there are tomes written about walking - the meditative nature of it, the benefits of it, what happens when we pack up a life and simply walk towards something; or away from something.

With these words Ms Solnit has me thinking about the rhythm of walking and how it approximates the breath and beats of our bodies. That notion rings true to me and deep within I recognise something.  

Her description of its purposefulness and its purposelessness as a balancing act is also spot on. The older I get, the more I realise that one of our jobs is to understand and to hold differing thoughts, notions and experiences. To learn and accept the two differing things can be true at the same time.

With walking it does feel like working and idling, being and doing. Such a lovely way to think about the walks we do daily.

Answering Yes

So I went back into the studio to try and sort my head about how best to layout the YES posters. Click here if you want to read the ramblings I have previously undertaken around these...

I ended up going with the stepped small YES in the top right and kept the rest pretty much as it was. 

The next challenge was trying to work out how to print the colours of red, black and yellow - which YES would be which colour?

I didn't want all the large YES blacks to be a single colour, so I tried a diagonal.

I tried two red and two yellow and just couldn't work out how to make them balanced well.

And then I hit on the idea of printing the three bands as they appear on the Aboriginal flag - black at the top, yellow circle through the middle, and red on the bottom.

At which point I left the studio to return another day. 

When I went back, I moved the magnets out of the way and started to ink up. It was bit of a weird printing day - the ink was thick and sticky and everything was a bit hit and miss. But that doesn't explain why I inked up in the wrong order, didn't notice and just printed. Red, yellow, black, rather than black, yellow, red.

So the first 20 are like this. 

In the end I think it's OK because the colours are indicative; it's not actually a flag and I am pretty sure the general feel of the message still gets across. If I print more I will print them in the order of the flag.