Smoking man

Allow me to tell you a magical story. I was walking by a shop that was covered with mirrors, so that the caught and bounced in spectrums of colour in a way that looked like it belonged on the front of a science textbook. I decided to take some photographs, but when I looked at them later, I realised just how dull the beautiful effect looked in my camera. The only interesting photograph which I had taken was of a man in the blue and silver uniform of the underground train. He was smoking quickly, with his  hand on his hip. His face had been so angry before he smoked his cigarette, but it began to calm down. From this photograph I did a drawing, quickly like the man. You, too, can share the magic of this smoking man.

Flower-Arranging

I'm not usually very interested in flower-arranging. It's not that I'm uninterested, I'm just not interested. But, I've been doing some Andy Goldsworthy-inspired arrangements of nature. Above are my shoddy pastiches of Goldsworthy's work –below– which is brilliant and exciting.

                       

                       

                       

And of course this set me googling, and I found this bizarre and rather wonderful video. Enjoy!

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.

 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

Trails and Connections

I was thinking about how we physically occupy spaces and the paths that we take as we move around them. Wondering about how they would look if we saw them. I decided to try and recreate it using thread. For a start I tried using thread to wrap around the furniture in a dolls' house, creating criss-cross paths. I think I will do some more on this idea though.

Lazlo Moholy-Nagy

Moholy-Nagy was a Hungarian artist who formed a part of the International Constructivist Movement, and went on to become a professor at the Bauhaus. I love the image above, which he created, and also some of the things that he had to say about photography – 'The illiterate of the future will be the person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Photography is an increasingly significant method of documentation, and perhaps Moholy-Nagy was right.

Philippe Ramette

Take a look at these photographs. And then a second look. They are very impressive, and don't even rely on photoshop! Philippe Ramette really is most clever. The French artist's works are absurd, spectacular and thought-provoking.

Images are courtesy of http://xippas.com/en/i/artiste/philippe_ramette, where you can see even more of Ramette's work. Enjoy!

Butterflies again

You probably know I'm fascinated by butterflies already. Here's a really easy way to make them, I learned it when I was about 4. You simply fold a page in half and open it out again. Next you paint on one side to make a roughly 'half butterfly' shape, and then blob or decorate with paint. Then fold the paper together and open it out agin to create a symmetrical butterfly. Here's one I made earlier.

Butterflies


New obsession alert: I've moved from  cabbages to cabbage-whites. Bring on the butterflies and moths!

Something that I made

This is a little strange, but I found this little something, which I made about 5 years ago. When you wind the handle, the blanket goes up and down, as if the man is breathing. Strange.

Arrow

Remember that post I did about signposts? Well, I followed it up with a little drawing, which I thought I might show you.

More Vegetables

Wanting to shake the last few drops of my newly found vegetable obsession out - that sounds rather disgusting - I decided to do some more stylised designs. The first was of an orange, the second of an onion. I used white ink on black card, which was rather fun. I think that they were pretty successful, and so decided to share. You can probably tell that I was subconsciously influenced by my love of Lucienne Day, whose textile designs are a dream.  

Image courtesy of http://watermadeitwet.blogspot.co.uk/2011/06/desiree-lucienne-day-1917-2010-british.html

Garlic

Still feeling a little vegetabley, I decided to do a drawing of a garlic, ta-da.   

Gustav Klimt

It's Klimt's 150th birthday today. And so, to honour the golden Gustav, I did a quick collage based on his 'Mother and Child'. Happy Birthday!

Wax Pictures

I used to do this all the time at nursery, it is easy and fun. You use wax crayons, paper and a cocktail stick (or a blunt pencil). And this is how you do it.

1. Colour the page with the lighter coloured crayon.

2. Colour on top witha darker crayon.

3. Scratch your image using a cocktail stick.

I said that it was simple. I decided to share my results. I was in a vegetabley mood, and so I drew a cabbage, a lettuce leaf, and a brussel sprout. (I may write more later on the beauty of the brussel sprout)

Painting

I did a painting last weekend, and thought I'd share. At first I was inspired by Picasso's 'Woman in a Chemise', which is a very lovely image. And then I was looking at old family photographs, and decided to paint this. And, by the way, the little girl is holding a handbag around her neck.

Hands

Now that I've done my palm portraits post I have a new obsession: hands. Above is a little sketch that I did of my own hand. But far more scintillating than my scribbles is this film clip. I'd never really thought about hand puppetry, I can do the dinosaur-y swan thing that everybody can do (beak made of the thumb and forefinger, eye made of the other fingers curled over), but that's it. Whereas Edward Victor, who features in the clip, is mesmerising.

Palm Portraits

Much inspired by the beautiful work of Meridith Mcneal, a a little bit obsessed with the relationship between clothing and identity, I decided to make a 'palm portrait'.

 Mcneal uses vintage gloves of sheer fabric, and uses embroidery and beading to make copy the palm lines of her friends (a 'palm portrait' as she calls it). I found some old gloves in my dressing up box and traced the lines on my palm onto the glove, before embroidering - a little messily- my palm lines. The end result is actually pretty cool, and makes a witty addition to the otherwise princessy evening glove. I'm totally going to wear these to my first ball. 

Top image courtesy of: http://humantextilewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/gloves1231.jpg

Necklaces

I've been making some necklaces in preparation for the many summer fairs that approach (there are fairs, but no summer!) and here are a couple of them. I don't know whether anyone would be interested in some DIY's. If so, comment below. But otherwise, hope you like.

Painting with Light


Has anybody tried this before? It is really simple, and can have such fun results! All you need are some bike lights (or a torch, or even a mobile phone screen) and a camera. The best sort is a DSLR or SLR camera, as you can adjust the shutter speed- the slower the better. But I think most other cameras would also work.
First of all make sure your camera is focussed, as it probably won't be able to focus in the dark. Then turn off the lights and press the camera button at the same time. Then the fun bit: run around holding a the torch (or whatever else you use). You might want to experiment, because every camera will be slightly different, but the results should be cool.
I'm thinking that you could do a similar thing with sparklers or fireworks, roll on Guy Fawkes' Night!