Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween to all of you. I thought you might like to watch this funny, weird Felix the Cat video.

Strawberry Hill

In preparation for Halloween, I visited the Gothic house of Horace Walpole, author of The Castle of Otranto. The house is amazing, and much of the intricate detailing within was made, like Walpole's books, of paper. The stained glass windows are also fascinating, and were collected in Europe, as stained glass rare in the UK at the time. I would definitely recommend a visit. 

Images Courtesy of:

http://intranet.arc.miami.edu/rjohn/ARC%20268%20-%202003/Pugin.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Strawberry_Hill_House_from_garden_in_2012_after_restoration.jpg

How to Make Buttons

This is a pretty useful video, which helped to explain to me the scientific processes behind the manufacture of buttons. Enjoy!

Circus

I went to the circus today. It was very bizarre, with a lot of spangles and lycra. But some of the performers were so talented. In anticipation, I did this little picture. 

Text Literature

This competition seems like a really interesting idea. Each month one must write a story on a theme. But the story can be no longer than a text. Of course Ernest Hemingway outdid this in his six word story:

'For sale: baby shoes, never worn.'

There is more about very very very short fiction in this article. Can any of you write a story in six words. I think I might give it a try.

Sweet summer

Autumn is beautiful and golden and grey, full of rosy cheeks and melancholy. But I'm feeling a little nostalgic about clean, bright summer. Years seem so natural, but also very strange. I don't know.

Autumn

This image, by Vasile Dobrian, is entitled Where the Autumn has Passed it all Becomes Dust. The Image, and the title, made me think.

Dusk

The sad blue night
And the scratched white moon,
As the day is burned
In its clouded tomb.

Autumn

I can definitely sense the autumn in the air today and it is beautiful. Blue skies, crumpling leaves, misty mornings, cold faces. To capture the essence of autumn here, I have chosen three pieces. From left to right they are: M.C.Escher's Three Worlds, Egon Schiele's A Tree in Late Autumn (1911) and Georges Seurat's The Eiffel Tower (1889). 

Plate

I wanted to make something about starvation, and I chose a plate. I thought I would subvert cheery propaganda, with images of starving children. It's not happy.

Map manicure

My hand love has made a natural development, I've done a manicure. It's not very well done, but the idea is fun. I based each nail on a section of the A-Z map of London, and used a cocktail stick to carry it out. And just so you know, the hands aren't mine, I could never paint my own hands even this neatly!

T-Shirts

Just another weird little image for the front of a T-shirt, made by me.

The Notebook

Another couple of pages from my diary. Looks like I was marking my own work – I did a lot of that. And here it seems that I've got a good grade, according to the comments: 'Well done for this' and 'What a good thing'. By the way, the drawing on the right is of a necklace. But your probably already knew that. 

Infinite Time

I was thinking about time whilst I was washing my hands (so basically in the bath, I suppose). And I was wondering about the nature of time. Does it begin, does it end, is it infinite? And then I was thinking that because it is continuous, it can be divided into sections that are infinitely small. So in a weird sort of way, we all have infinite time. Is that a silly thought?

 Liubov Popova

I have to share with you my love for this woman. Let's not get on to the politics, because I know there are some very strong opinions on the ideals and the realities of Communism. But you have to admire her work: textiles, paintings, set design, photo-montage and so on. She was a genius, and so ahead of her time. If you looked at the majority of her designs you'd be justified in thinking that they were from the 1960's. But no, she was just a super cool dude.

Images courtedy of: http://www.wikipaintings.org/en/lyubov-popova