Favourite YouTube videos including Hey Ya of course!

I couldn't resist putting this on my blog, I think it's beautiful.



Now that I've learned how to copy that bit of code over and checked that it works, I can't resist adding more videos for one of my favourite songs. Remember "Hey Ya" by Outkast? I love that song, it's so happy. Well, I came across some versions on youtube that really surprised me. The first is an acoustic version by Mat Weddle of Obadiah Parker:



And the other version which is a lot of fun is by a German country covers band called Boss Hoss:



And while I'm at it, I'll also include a version by the Wellington Ukelele Orchestra:



and some buskers on a street:



and a dramatic Jason Webley cover with a piano accordian...yes, a piano accordian:



and then American soldiers in VAW-116 Hawkeye Squadron's video:

Life drawing class 26 April 2008

I wasn't very happy with what I drew on this evening - but I'll post some anyway. I ran out of large white cartridge paper, and used a cheap Chinese watercolour paper that was quite textured. It would be interesting to take a charcoal drawing further with this paper and put watercolour washes on it. I was happiest with the conte on black building paper. This was a pose I'd requested because it was similar to the one I used for the painting Extracts from Trapped Self. In that painting the figure is twisted slightly to the left and forearm rests on the thigh. I wanted to draw it again, this time from another viewpoint.

I changed the photograph of the seated pose into a negative and like the way it turned out. Hopefully my drawings will be useful as a resource in my paintings and playing around with them in a photo programme can help me look at them in a different way.

Drawing

Someone commented on my blog that I was brave to share my life drawings. Not at all. I post them for a few reasons, mainly to show the art that I'm doing at the moment and not just finished pieces. Although my drawings are a resource for my art, sometimes they inspire a painting (Warm Winter for instance), I draw for the sake of drawing. I love it. I think it's something anyone and everyone can and should do. Another reason is so other people can see there are so many ways to attempt a drawing but the main thing is to have a go. In drawing classes there are so many different styles among the participants. Everyone has a preference for a particular media - some like to draw with a pencil and sharpen it frequently - and there are so many different types of pencil to try - graphite, charcoal, chinagraph to mention a few. I particularly like my red chalk pencil. Then charcoal - some people love willow charcoal, I seem to use compressed a lot. I just took a photo of some of the things in the box of materials I take to life drawing class - some semi-hard coloured pastels are useful for a change, nice on black paper. I need to buy some more compressed graphite and charcoal and conte, I struggled this week with those little bits! You can see I've got a really big piece of willow charcoal that's fun to draw with. And white - compressed and in pencil form, are other items I use regularly.

One of the class participants commented to the tutor that she likes the "zone" she gets into when drawing over the two hours. I know what she means. And when I go into the studio it takes me an hour or so to get into that "zone". When I come downstairs at the end of a few hours I feel like my head is in another place and it takes a while before I'm all there! Must be something to do with that left brain/right brain thing...

One more life drawing

from last night. Unlike Flickr where you can add a lot of images, blogger has a limit for each post.

This is an example of a drawing where, not being happy with it and not having time to start another one, I play around with it, dabbing away on the surface. Adds texture and interest but adds nothing to the accuracy. I hope over time my accuracy in figure drawing improves, but at the moment I'm more interested in capturing the gesture of the pose and playing around with the media I'm using.

Life Drawing

These are some of last night's drawings (though I hesitate to show some with their wrong proportions). I've used Gallery semi-hard pastels on black building paper, compressed charcoals and conte on white cartridge paper. We weren't able to use our usual room for last night's class and the replacement was a smaller room, long and narrow, so it wasn't so easy to move around and find a different viewpoint.

I think the longest drawing was 15 minutes. I felt like creating loose drawings last night, used the pastel/charcoal on its side quite often. It's difficult to stop with a drawing. Sometimes I get something I like then spoil it by continuing to draw on it. I'd done a very quick drawing using charcoal on its side of the seated pose. I then started to draw lines on it and at that moment I realised what was on the paper had captured something of the model and I should have left it alone.

Another thing I do when I'm not sure if I'm happy about the drawing, or feel I've got it out of proportion is to start adding tone with light, dark or midtone, making short, sharp or scribbly lines. Last night I worked the charcoal into the paper and thought that was starting to work.

More Collage

These two are titled "Dream vs Concept" and "Another Earth". The first is magazine collage and the second has hand painted papers with a little magazine collage.

Once a month I spend the day at Gordon Base Studio with a group of artists - we each take along some work and have an enjoyable, relaxing day socialising while working on our painting/drawing/collage. Three of the artists recently participated in a sculpture symposium in Matamata (New Zealand) and you can view the works here.

2008 International Collage Exchange - ICE

Today I finished the last collage for this annual exchange run by Dale Copeland. I didn't think I was going to make it. It's odd how sometimes I agonise over a piece, and it takes hours to finalise. Other times the collage goes together smoothly and quickly. Naming them is quite a lot of fun too. Three collages I've already uploaded to flickr as I created these some time ago - "The Imagineer", "Radioactive Eden", and "Stories to Tell". Two others ("A Proposal in Blue" and "Elegant Seductress" were also on my blog a couple of posts ago although I've written all over the latter. It'll be on flickr shortly. The words are from an old song I found in a bundle of music in a charity shop. An interesting collection of all kinds of songs someone had collected and been using in a retirement home.

I mostly put these on canvas boards because when I've received collages in exchange, the standard size and solid base seems to be easier to frame. Otherwise I use a heavy art card.

If you're unfamiliar with the ICE we create thirteen collages A4 or less in size, and one is exhibited in New Plymouth and permanently online before being sent overseas (this year to Texas, USA). Another collage is in an online exhibition where each piece is for sale. The other eleven (or twelve if your sale piece doesn't sell) are sent out to participating artists around the world. We each receive a package of wonderful artwork.

The four collage works above are titled "An Appropriate Contract", "High Dance of Innocence", "Religious Scene with Fossilised Plant" and "It was never in your control".

Life drawing

Our life drawing class resumed last night after a break of several months. I'm out of practice, that's for sure. We started with 1-2 minute poses, then 5 minutes then 20 minute poses. Here are some of my drawings - compressed charcoal on white paper, conte on black paper, red chalk pencil on brown paper and then for seated pose on white paper, and willow charcoal on brown paper.

To read a post about the class written by tutor, John Mulvay, click here.

The textural topography of my mind at the moment

These are collage works in progress. They all relate to current issues, oblique though that may seem. This little town of Waihi where I live is at present waiting to find out if the open cast gold mine will be extended in westerly and easterly directions. There are those for the proposals and those against. Some residents are employed by the mine, and some local companies receive work from the mine and of course they might be keen to see these new extensions proceed. Others are stressed and tired from living with the open cast mine (and some may receive some money towards this...see today's front page of the local newspaper above) and would like to see the open cast operation end as required by all the various legal consents etc. Tonight the Hauraki District Council is holding a public meeting in Waihi to explain the council's role in any application by the mining company (I don't believe an application has yet been made) and the process of acquiring consent and objecting to any consent. The Council stated in their "HDC News" in the Hauraki Herald of February 26 2008 that "The meeting will not be to discuss the proposal as we have no information to share but when the process has been explained, those who wish to share concerns can have their opinions noted for passing on to the mining company." ??? Does the Hauraki District Council not care about the concerns and opinions of their residents and ratepayers? Is it their job to gather such information for a company? Who is running this town?

This issue can have its effect on friendships, personal and business relationships. Even a husband and wife can have different opinions about it, and it's not something that's going to go away in a hurry. "There's gold in them there hills" you know, and companies are actively hunting for it using ever improving technology to find it and extract it. The companies are doing what they're in business for. What is the Hauraki District Council in business for?

So, back to the collages. They each express something about how I feel about this ongoing issue. Names tentative at this stage - "A drained life" is what I'll call the blue and gold piece with the eyes - representing the layers of the land, and because I think of the land as the 'earth mother" it is her eyes and white face with the life drained out of it. The next one could be called "Blue Proposal" - see, he's holding a wedding ring in his fingers. The green piece is again related to the earth mother, crying out, powerless and petrifying. She is actually an ancient statue of Eve and was described as the "Elegant Seductress"and I think I'll call it that. And she is, in some ways - hasn't the promise of finding gold been seductive over the centuries? All on heavy art card, magazine imagery with some ink and paint incorporated.

Waihi Arts - Life Drawing Classes

We're lucky to have life drawing classes once again up and running, commencing March 12, with John Mulvay. The class ran for two terms last year with community education funding. Classes are held in Waihi and the local college can provide details to anyone interested in joining.

Anyone who reads this blog will know I appreciate the opportunity of being able to draw from life (see quote on my page here). There's something about having a class to attend each week that keeps me up with my drawing. Keeping notebooks and visual journals all over the place helps as well - in the car, in my bag, in the sitting room, by the computer... but those drawings are usually fairly quick compared to a couple of hours concentrated drawing with a model every week.

Drawing the human form teaches so much about proportion, volume and structure in an expressive subject that has been an enduring theme throughout the history of art.

By the end of a couple of terms I was starting to really use my drawings as a resource in paintings and beginning to work up some of the drawings I brought home from class. I'd like to continue to do that, creating more finished works from the drawings. The gesture drawings would have to be my favourite though, those very short (one minute) poses that can really capture so much.

I have several of my drawings on my flickr page that links from the slideshow at the top right corner of this blog. The photos above are drawings as they were from the class and later after working on them further. The drawing of two models was done originally in red compressed charcoal and later worked on with indian ink, white charcoal and compressed charcoal. The other drawing was originally in black and white compressed charcoal, and I worked further with both media and some red charcoal. Both are on brown paper.

Waihi Arts - Life Drawing Classes

We're lucky to have life drawing classes once again up and running, commencing March 5, with John Mulvay. The class ran for two terms last year with community education funding but for some reason was not funded in the last term.

Anyone who reads this blog will know I appreciate the opportunity of being able to draw from life (see quote on my page here). There's something about having a class to attend each week that keeps me up with my drawing. Keeping notebooks and visual journals all over the place helps as well - in the car, in my bag, in the sitting room, by the computer... but those drawings are usually fairly quick compared to a couple of hours concentrated drawing with a model every week.

Drawing the human form teachers so much about proportion, volume and structure in an expressive subject that has been an enduring theme throughout the history of art.

By the end of a couple of terms I was starting to really use my drawings as a resource in paintings and beginning to work up some of the drawings I brought home from class. I'd like to continue to do that, creating more finished works from the drawings. The gesture drawings would have to be my favourite though, those very short (one minute) poses that can really capture so much.

I have several of my drawings on my flickr page that links from the slideshow at the top right corner of this blog. I've posted above some drawings from class as they were originally and later after working on them.

Blue guitarist lacks progress

I'm just getting to grips with this site - you can post once a week during the month, after Tuesday, a photo for the theme - and it must be linked back to Self Portrait Challenge. This time I'll report on the progress - or lack of - on the blue guitarist oil painting I started recently You might be able to see my stress in the photo! It's still basically an underpainting - decided I wasn't happy with the way I had changed the stance of the model from my original photograph (elsewhere on this site and on my flickr page) so I've been working on that. And I'll have to sort out where I want the left hand to be on the frets and finalise the actual guitar before I start the top layers. But that'll have to wait until I get my ICE collages completed.

If you haven't clicked one of the links yet, you can see more blue self portraits here.

spc

This is an interesting site where people post self portraits monthly that link to a theme of some kind. This is my first SPC post.

For more 'blue' click here.

Marchwood Farm Music Festival

Yesterday, 9 February, we went to the Marchwood Farm Music Festival in Omokoroa which featured blues and jazz musicians Wizard and Oz , Dutch Tilders, Phil Manning, and George Washingmachine (yes, that's his name, check out the website). It was a really enjoyable afternoon, went from about 2 to 7 pm, finishing with a jam with all the musicians on stage together. The musicians all know each other and most have played together individually but have never played on the same stage together - this was a world first.

Andrew Farrell, pianist with Wizard and Oz, is a great pianist and singer, and David McMillan, the other half of the pair, has an incredible voice - check out their website for some samples of their music. And I'm told there will be details of the Tauranga gigs on their site soon.

Dutch Tilders is a real blues singer, and I loved his lyrics, and his style. Here's a couple of samples: "Smoking Woman" and "I'm a Blues Man"

George Washingmachine was pretty much the MC, great sense of humour.

Photos above show the 'stage', Wiz and Oz with George Washingmachine (plays jazz violin and sings), Wizard and Oz, Phil Manning and Dutch Tilders, local percussionist/drummer Ken Collis who brought along his washboard and got the opportunity to join in for a couple of numbers, and Peter Archer with David McMillan.

The site was sloping which made it comfortable for sitting on the ground, most people brought along a picnic but there was food and drinks for sale, and the musicians performed on the deck of a truck. Fantastic views all around. This was the first Marchwood music festival and they're planning on another one next year.

Some or all of these musicians will be playing at the Tauranga Jazz Festival at Easter.

I found this event on eventfinder - this is a really useful website for finding out what events are on in any area).

What is art?

This is a discussion that has been ongoing since a local art competition over the summer holidays. Seems some people don't approve of the judge's choice. Well, that's often the case. I've had the most interesting discussions about art since and I think that's just great.
So, what is art? There was a letter to the editor in our local newspaper that said it was about beautiful and poignant paintings that made people feel good about their environment. What do you think? The question was asked "what a heritage we would have if all the great masters just chucked their framed dirty washing on the wall"...
For lovers of art history, negative responses to new or 'different' art are not a surprise. I think "dirty washing on the wall" is kind of what art is about - the artist's personal response to something whether it be a beautiful forest, a happy child, a shocking war scene, a political speech... Sometimes it'll be pretty, sometimes it won't. It might shock, upset, threaten, or soothe, entertain or make people laugh...
I found an essay written by Leo Tolstoy in 1896 "What is art?" He wrote "in order correctly to fine art, it is necessary, first of all, to cease to consider it as a means to pleasure and to consider it as one of the conditions of human life". Makes sense to me.

Political correctness and art? Do they have anything to do with each other?

Playing around with some collage

and it doesn't take a psychologist to see what was on my mind. Currently I'm working on collages for the 10th International Collage Exchange. These may not end up in the 13 that I send but it was a thoughful and enjoyable process putting these together. 'Reduction Method' contains one of my own photographs - it's taken in the main street of Waihi. My poor son had to stand in the road holding a piece of fence netting so I could take the shot through it - we have lots of fences around mining property and I think you will get the message of my photograph. "Warning - Worry People" also contains pieces of two of my photographs. The third one I think I'll call "For more information please call". I'll probably work further on these with other media, ink, paint....

Garden, Visual Journal and my favourite poet

I've been working further on my large oil painting, but not ready to post further pictures as yet. The weather is great, we've had rain finally and the garden is growing. There is a little garden area in front of the older part of the house (miner's cottage built about a hundred years ago, and the rest of the house was added onto in the sixties and then the seventies). There are five acres behind the house but this little piece, although it's close to the road, has a feeling of seclusion and privacy and wasn't used very much so I decided I wanted a vegetable garden there. Behind the vegetable garden is a very old Rasperry Ice rose that is coming to the end of it's flowering, and behind that again a South African begonia type shrub that has just started.

I was working in a visual diary for another artist and here are some photos of what I've done so far. She asked for words - particularly words that uplift or inspire. The first one is "a journey of a thousand miles starts with one step", and the facing page has imagery from more than 3000 years ago (The White Lady of Aouanrhet). The other was created after reading some of Joseph Campbell's work. He talks about "aum", you might know this as "om", he said "the meaning is wordless". I like that idea, that meaning can be wordless. And there's another quote from Campbell - "words are always qualifications and limitations". On the opposite page there's an image of Buddha in meditation, it's a Tibetan tanka painting about intense contemplation leading one's prana to take shape as radiating ripples of air. I've used art papers, paint and ink with the collaged imagery. I've chosen some images to create the next spread, I'll put up a shot of the finished work when it's done - each artist has completed three in the journal and when I've finished my last spread the journal is returning home to it's owner.

And finally, in this post, I'm going to share some of Hone Tuwhare's poetry. I have several of his books, and been rereading them, and drawing ideas in a journal thinking I might do some paintings about him. The first one is in the book "Ooooooo!!!" published 2005 and, as I've said before, Hone wrote earthy poems.

"If I should die, think nothing (nihil) of it. Happens naturally to all.

To my deaf ear, I raise
the Wrist to which
my watch is strapped
just barely noting
the tiniest intervals
between the tick and
tock of it, inexorably
paging - unemotionally
and without the least
evidence of compassionate
interest the leaching, leaking
moments between your
arrival, and final nod-off
& ... goodbyes - of your
departure time:
One last emptying of the bowel
and piss-bag: tick-tick.
tock, hands off cock -
er ... tick ... tick ... tick.
O'excelsior! Full marks!
Mayhap, your great, great
grandnephews, nieces, will inherit
your wrist-watch
& reclaim, the rhythm
the 4/4 Boogie beat of your heart.
For, on their tiny feet you march."

From "Piggy-back Moon" (published 2002 following Hone's appointment as Te Mata Poet Laureate in 1999).

"For Linda

Well, really,
when I think of your utter
absorption in your work, I am
entranced by the flow of your
silken thighs (the hemline
of your skirt is just fine) -
as you sit down to write out
my prescription for Zestril,
making my heart loop and pump mis-timingly! my
eye-sight, you confirm, is
okay. I pull my sleeve down
and shrug into my jacket.

Nonethelessly,
I think of you warmly, if not
swarmingly - and feeling, like
I am a yellow, zebra-striped
bumble-bee, just thoughtfully
if not diagnostically nosing
the flower-heads of
prim daisies, edging my
lawns, and waking them
newly, to the infectiously
courtly kisses of a leisurely
but discriminatingly (pickie)
nectar-gatherer. I'm heartstruck
with love, Linda. It's my
trade ... "

There are so many poems I'd love to share but I'll just type out one more and hope that people continue to read his writing. He was and is a delight. From Shape-Shifter published 1997:

"Wry Song

O may the texture
and fissured lines in
stone temper my life-style
to another self, enduring:
less faceless.

For in the tumult of my
separate hells, pummelled
I have been beyond shine or
recognition.

And if I should never know
delight again, or shut my
ears to coarse banalities
of sea and storm

then let my poems rock
to a dark sea's roll:
as the stricken moon."

Hone Tuwhare

Hone Tuwhare died this week, he is my favourite poet, a most amazing man who wrote gorgeous, earthy, clever poetry.

Here is a short bio with a link to his poem Rain. And another link.

Blue Guitarist oil painting

This is a real departure for me. Painting very large, in oils. It's based on a photograph I took of a musician (the photograph is one of the flickr slideshow showing on this blog). I'm streamlining him somewhat - changed the baggy jeans to tight ones. Changed his stance a little which has got me into trouble with the guitar but I'll get there in the end. So far I've stretched and gesso'ed the canvas, roughly drawn in my composition, and laid down thin layers of acrylic underpainting, and begun the layers of oil paint which I've never used before. I want it to be more abstract, but as usual I fiddle around and end up on a path to a realistic image while I'm laying in the building blocks of the painting. I need to leave the details alone for the moment. Once I've got the basic thing painted in oils, I'll see what I can do to jazz it up. The guitarist was standing in front of a large screen with music videos running silently and I caught this one with the female face floating there. The photographs I took that night were out of focus because I didn't want to use a flash - no atmosphere - and long exposure without a tripod and with the movement of the guitarist as he played doesn't make for a good clear photo But I liked some of the shots I got, especially this one, and with a friend offering the use of his studio for a week and having the space to paint big, thought I'd have a go at something different from my usual work. It's a brave thing I do posting a work in progress but it creates some pressure to continue to work on it.

Mural

A while ago I think I posted a shot of a mural here in Waihi. I had helped a little with the drawing up of it. Well, here's a progress photo. The artist is John Mulvay. I've posted one shot that shows the Cornish Pumphouse, in the distance, that cost millions to move. The mural is in the centre of our little town, the models for the figures are local residents, the street and other details from photographs of Waihi in the early 1900's. The open cast gold mine is just behind the shops shown. A few months ago there was some kind of "accident" with the blasting and rocks fell on nearby buildings, including the Video Ezy store which is further up (the sliver of light blue in front of the dark green tree). Isn't that amazing? And now the mining company wants to extend their licence to mine the east and west walls of the open pit even further, although previous consents have declared open cast mining would not continue. Open cast mining is not permitted in residential areas, however it is my understanding that the mining company would need to, if they decide to continue with this plan, apply for a change of zoning for some of the land they would want to take. Not only that, but apparently the district council would have to change their District Plan to permit this further mining. Means moving the local primary school and the main road to the local high school. We might even lose our quick access to town and have to drive around these extensions. Open cast mining was supposed to stop some time ago. All these laws and consents seem to mean nothing when a company can simply get them changed. I thought the job of the council was to work for all ratepayers, work to improve the lives of all residents. Seems our Council is keeping it's head down - we certainly haven't heard anything at all from them in any public way such as interviews or articles in the newspaper, and I know lots of people have written and phoned the Council to protest the idea of further open cast mining.