Make Her Sky

MMU

2012-02-13T21:50:00.002Z

Tomorrow is the release date for The Love Symphony, the music so hard worked on in December. I thought it would be nice to have some sort of performance or live première, and a quick mention of this led to one thing and then another and as a result I had a quick meeting today a few students at the local campus of Manchester Metropolitan University, with an aim to putting on performance to accompany the music.

It went well and I'm excited about trying some performance art for the first time. I want beauty to be the heart of it, to make something that isn't a weird avant garde show in any respect apart from innovation and general amazement!

My poetry book is just about complete. I've added lots of the small token images but not everyone thinks it's a good idea because these paintings are not like my type of art. I'm unsure. On balance I'd rather add more content than less, and the colours, I think, make it special. Either way, this is one book and not a long term change in policy. This year I will certainly paint the most accomplished and spectacular paintings of my life so far. Logic makes that clear; as each artist gets better year on year, generally. So I'll simply ignore the pressure that the sentence two sentences back put me under. Tee hee.

Here is a first glimpse of more love, the broken heart from The Love Reliquary which is now complete. I'm unhappy with the quality of the box, the gilding in particular which is horrid and wrinkly. The veneer is also a mess. But I know how to fix both of those problems next time, and must take comfort from that.

All of that makes me wonder very deeply about entropy which I've been worrying about for a few weeks. If artists get better over time, why must all things deteriorate? I can understand that all things must, but wonder if this is really true. If time travel, even at micro atomic scales, is possible then entropy would be regained and recycled somewhere. Memory and experience are products of time that only work in one direction, and they seem to create order, not destroy it. Is the lack of memory in a cooling bar of iron what pulls it towards cold lack of information?

I must paint this if I reach a startling new conclusion. Like my painting of Roger Penrose discovering that the Universe is the shape of a giant jellyfish. Which I didn't in the end paint. Ooops.

This musing was created by listening to A Curious Feeling by Tony Banks, a CD given to me by my friend Simon for Christmas. It's brilliant, although it took a few listens and (definitely!) knowledge of the story to love it like I now do. It's about a short story called Flowers For Algernon which is so good, so moving and well thought out that I can think of only a few ways to improve it, and non of my ways probably do, actually. I must write more stories! I have some great ideas for novels. Oh for the time to write. To Paint! To write music! To scuplt! To write scripts! And poems! Oh for more years! More youth! More health! More life! Slightly less imagination, perhaps is the answer. Adieu my friends.

Poetry And Art

2012-02-11T21:32:00.000Z

Well I've had a busy week "finishing" my poetry book. Here's the cover; which is a combination of Photoshop and some of the watercols...

Overall I've painted 119 watercols so far for this. I had to be quick and this meant that some were better than others but generally I got better as I did more. Sometimes I erred on the side of simplicity, like "I Want to be a Windmill" here, where I decided to "splot" the windmill shape instead of aim for something exact. The more exact I aimed for, the harder things got.

I also used my general philosophy of it's not how well you paint, but what you paint that matters. The poem "Clifftop" is about two people running over grass and leaping off a cliff, and then flying, a relationship allegory. That image is good enough alone. It doesn't matter how well it's painted, or how fine the words are, providing you've conveyed that basic story, it will do.

After the paintings were done I scanned them in and put them into the book; 400 pages. I looked up the price and found out that it would cost over £50 (inc. postage) to print one copy. I knew it would be expensive. I had several options but my plan now is to print two editions, one cheaper paperback in monochrome and one hardback in full colour. The hardback would cost £100 and be limited to 100 copies. That fact made me want to add more to it, more colour, more illustrations to make it a unique poetry book. Uniquely beautiful, precious, expensive, a work of art in itself in equal to any painting or print of that price.

As such I decided to add at least a background to every page. Then I painted 12 new full-page illustrations for each month (there is one poem per day for a year in the book, so each chapter is a "month"). Then I painted 64 new illustrations that are simple ink blots of colour to accompany some of the other poems. Those are the closest thing to abstract expressionist paintings I've ever done! See...

But I've tried to relate each one to the poem too, reading through as I painted. One main aim was to make it bright and intense so that the full colour book was as bright and wonderful as possible. I'm hosting a poetry night in April so I want to have at least one copy ready for then. That gives me a tight deadline. I'll keep adding content until the last minute and then print a copy, and a few monochrome ones.

I'm starting to feel like a proper artist now. In other news I'm having a meeting on Monday with some art students at the local university campus. I want to design and stage a performance to accompany my Love Symphony; which itself will be released on Tuesday, and I've just finished my first oil painting of the year too; Prometheus as a Turkey Being Eaten by a Peacock.

So, doing lots is one reason why my blog entries are long these days. I should try to make them shorter. I know it would be easier to read and that more people would. Thank you for getting this far. I suppose if I knew more people in my life who were interested in my art I'd talk to them instead of typing my thoughts to the Internet. Perhaps I'd make less art too, not needing to communicate to "everyone". But who can say. I have many special friends, and I'll be going to Birmingham Museum with the closest one tomorrow, but my Valentine this year will be art, and I'm as filled with as much love for it as ever.

I'll end this post with a poem from the book.

The Fragile Rose

The rolling ocean
swells and flows.
The cold rain falls
upon the rose.
The rising water on her neck.
She raises arms to distant skies.
Friends flock and fly,
swarm and chatter far away.
The fragile flower breathes the day,
and seeks escape, a path to follow,
but all she can do is avoid the sea,
and wait to avoid it again tomorrow.

What Makes A Reject

2012-02-03T21:59:00.000Z

Don Michael Jr. made a comment about who and why some of my illustrations were rejected so I thought I'd share a few "before" and "after" points.

Some pictures were a bit blurry or had drips or mistakes that can occur with watercolours. I wasn't too fussy about these if they made interesting shapes, and in fact I like the effect of shapes like that, but sometimes the paintings blurred a bit overnight in unexpected ways, which made me decide to paint them again. Here is the first illustration for a poem called New Buds...

It's okay generally but rather blurry, and the main plant has leaked so much into the background that a lot of definition was lost, so I decided to crisp it up a bit, but generally repaint the same scene, here...

For others, I decided that I didn't like the concept as much. A poem called Drowning in Touch initially involved an embrace of many colours...

Ignore the red spot in the top right, that wasn't there when I first finished! I quite like the fragmented black blob, which came from the shellac ink; much nicer than watercolour black. When repainting though I wanted to try and convey touch in more ways and at least make the couple seem more realistic.

The poem is about two people entwined in embrace and it made me think of two spirals and so the second illustration fitted the poem better, I think.

I've pained about 50 of these so far and have about another 50 to go. I'll be hosting a poetry event in Crewe on April 23rd, so now I have an event to show people the book at. Poets tend to be the poorest of artists. Poetry books don't sell brilliantly and poetry books are printed cheaply to be sold cheaply. I can't really afford that; I aim to use Blurb and I either print everything in full colour or everything in black and white, so if I choose colour I might as well put colour on every page and make something impressive and valuable. If it costs £50 a copy then the people who buy it will treasure it. That at least is true.

I've been looking again at William Blake's Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience; the book of two parts he printed and hand painted in the 1790's. He only sold less than 30 copies in his lifetime; but did that matter to him or to art? I hope not. I hope that he knew that the beautiful book he worked so hard on back then would one day be re-printed easily and in thousands so that 220 years later, ordinary people like me can own a copy and love it. I make my art with that same faith and the same sure knowledge.

Poetry Watercolours

2012-01-31T17:05:00.000Z

I've been busy over the past few days painting over 60 watercolours to illustrate a book of poems I'm formatting. I write a poem a day in 2010 and I'm finally getting round to putting a book together. The paintings are often splotty and abstracted. About half have been rejected so far so I'll repaint those; my criteria has been speed, but that's led to some good ones as well as bad. The picture above is for a poem called My Mind is Full of Weeds.

Here is Artemis Dream, a rather abstract and surreal poem in itself.

Lots more to do. I've run out of paper at the moment. Here is the image for The Italian Bedroom with the poem below.

The Italian Bedroom

There's nothing he can do but lie awake
as yellow light in beams envelops all.
Slow spiral-turning water on the lake.
The cracks and mould upon the plaster wall.
His voice is silent waiting for the call
from love afar, in English winter's breath.
She writes the lines as sunlight starts to fall,
soft violet words of his Elizabeth.
The scented lines that dance towards a crawling death.

Lots

2012-01-28T20:24:00.002Z

Lots has happened in the past week or so.

The Love Symphony is just about complete but I've continued to tinker. I extended the "Sonata For Self-Pitying Piano" to good effect. I also spent a long time adding more feeling to that track, adding a degree of random amplitude variation to the lead piano and lots of tempo slides, which is easy in my software (hard only because I need an 8ghz PC to run it at full speed; and, unlike my prediction from 2002, they don't exist at this date!)

I'm pleased with the album, although the emotion on the first track isn't as evident as it could be, working best on the simpler melody. I like the ending though. I've added a better ending to "Loneliness And Divine Love" too, and re-rendered that a few times to eliminate digital click, a problem with Noise Station II until recently when I added a new plug-in to fix it, which fades in and out instruments by a fixed degree, amazingly it takes a huge 6-8ms to fix this.

Here's the final track listing.

1. There Is No Love, And The More I Search The Less I Find (9:52)
2. Sunset (1:50)
3. The Dream (5:54)

4. Sonata For Self-Pitying Piano (5:21)
5. Encounter With The Believers (0:37)
6. Loneliness And Divine Love (6:37)

7. Stroking The Harp (0:59)
8. Awakening Sonata For Oneristic Harp (1:39)
9. The Eventual Attainment Of Love (9:40)

Here's the final cover...

I've ordered 20 copies to be printed, which is costing nearly £3 a print from a company called Noisegate Studios. I've ordered from Noisegate before and the quality is very good, and for me a higher price top quality product is more important than cutting budgets. People could buy the FLAC version and print their own if they wanted to save money, but those who like and want a CD jewel case with good full colour printing will be willing to pay for it. I've already sold one copy.

In other news I've completed a few programming updates, including a major revision of my game Flatspace, to make a new release; FlatspaceIIk.

The main reason I did this is lack of support from by current publisher Impulse, so I wrestled control back and decided to release an upgraded version of my most popular game myself. I took the opportunity to update a few other games too; Taskforce and Gunstorm II. I like Taskforce a lot but perhaps liked it too much to tweak it as much as it needed.

Finally my, yes! my reliquary is just about finished. It looks rather ropey on the outside. The veneer became stained with PVA glue, a curse which reveals itself only when varnished (yet epoxy soaks through, leaving a gloss finish, the wood glue problem must be solved). I painted the leading edges with ink spots, which hides the worst of this and adds artistic content. The veneering is also uneven, and the gold wrinkled and blotchy. In fact there's lots wrong with it, most of which I'm sure I could fix if I made another box, which of course I'm itching to do! I've made two pieces of silverwork, the first was just too awful. The second half-awful but passable. It's held in place with a powerful magnet to keep it in place but easily removable if needed. I covered the hinges with acrylic moulding paste and then gilded them, which looks like the hinges are scones (yes, scones not stones).

Golden reliquary secrets and lessons will be shared later. This post is long enough!

Next; to finish my book of poetry. I'm to host and arrange a poetry night in April. Everything at the moment is exciting. Never let obscurity limit your expression. Assume greatness. Assume brilliance. Keep working and assume success because to work is to succeed. As an artist everything you do is art, everything, and the more you do the better artist you are. Try everything and you will succeed at everything!

Qapla!

The Love Symphony Lumbers Towards Completion

2012-01-12T21:39:00.000Z

More work on the music today and yes I have a first draft!

For ages I wondered if there was too much bass on the opening track, it was louder than on the others. I examined other music in my CD collection and found a wide variation. The "loudness war" might not be something you've heard of before but it's a real phenomenon in which music has been getting "louder" as it's put on to CD. In practise this is a product of marketing and technology; the latter allowing loudness without obvious distortion. In effect though, the loudness is just reducing dynamics, the difference between the loudest and quietest bits of a piece of music. This kills drama, and it's one reason why modern music sounds the same. It's a constant volume and constant pace.

My old Karajan Beethoven CD, one of the first pressed to the new format in the 1980's is wonderful. In the whole 76 mins, only ONE single sample touches peak, a perfect peak. It's a perfect recording. Everyone knows that anyway; it's got a five star review on Amazon and every review is rightfully glowing. It was downhill from there regarding recording quality. The 1986 Kate Bush Wuthering Heights is still very dynamic, but less than Karajan. Things got gradually worse, and the 2010 Vintage by Jean-Michel Jarre looks like a breeze-block of distortion.

All of that made be rebel somewhat and I seriously considered copying the Karajan model, however my music is so well put together in terms of production that less than 1000 samples peak throughout the whole ablum, despite a good volume. Remember, there are 44,100 per second of those!

In terms of equalisation I decided to boost the frequencies over 4khz by 4dB. I rarely do things like that. In fact I don't think I've equalised anything since The Spiral Staircase re-recording in 2008, but I thought I would because the upper frequencies are always a little absent unless you push them. This was visible in my spectrum analyser. I prefer to balance by ear when composing, then by visual spectrum analyser. I have good accurate studio "monitors" (Resolv 65s) but a visual bobbing spectrum and looking at the waveform is on balance a better guide.

The best tip for that sort of balancing I can give is to avoid filters in the song itself. If your bass instrument needs more oomph you might be tempted to apply a low shelf filter, tweak the bass knob on an equaliser, but that's a bad idea because it'll make lower notes get louder than high ones, then you'll have to apply a compressor to set the volume back to "equal" and you've lost quality and resolution, and added complexity, and in practice it never works unless you distort everything. The best way to do it would be to add a sine wave to the instrument itself, tune it down an octave or two, and voila, more bass. I avoid filters of any sort if possible, and anything complex like a "sweeping" lead creates it's own problems for all of the same reasons outlined. Keep things simple and mixing isn't usually needed, no matter how many layers you add.

My main task of the day was finalising the artwork, so here's the rear. I wondered whether I should make the text white or black. I liked black best in the end. Also I couldn't decided between "Love Symphony" or "The Love Symphony". It was always "The" while I was working on it but I dropped it to fit bigger writing on the cover. In the end though it needed the "The" so I put it back in a flash of shame.

I must get this done. Next task; silver soldering for my reliquary, then publishing my poetry book. Tick tick. This must be my best year. Better than five of the great William Blake!

Olé!

Love Symphony Update 2

2012-01-11T19:36:00.001Z

Lots done! Lots to do! I'd better blog this for the sake of history for it's palpably struck me that history and myriad millions of people will read this blog in the infinity of time to come, far more than will today or in my lifetime, and history deserves at least a detailed and informative and inspirational read!

When the last track was completed I had to revisit the others to make sure they all fitted. Things had changed so much since the first that the album sounded a little disjointed. In particular the first track I wrote, "Loneliness and Divine Love", had more electronic sounds than the others. To combat that I added a small pre-track that introduced it, that represented an encounter with (rather sepcifically in my imagination) some Latter Day Saints missionaries, whom, in their electronic way convinced the main melody to become religious.

At the present moment that track ends happily, which doesn't quite suit my feelings because the lack of "satisfaction" should be apparent when leading into the final movement. That track is very regular. It pulses, and regularity is in this case meditative, any changes in passion being in volume or timbre.

The conversion part happened just before that. There are a few conversations here, and in the third part a harp (the most oneristic intrument due to all of that plucking between the legs) meets a flute and the melody transforms into the love theme of the finale. Today I expanded that part by adding a third track, thus there are now nine tracks divided into three distinct sections. The third track is called "Masturbating Harp" and it's a simple sequence of plucks in triplets (triplets are the reocurring musical motif of the whole album) that accelerate into a glissando. I also revisted track three, The Dream, and made some pizzicato strings there harp strings instead because it sounded more quiet, more gentle and definitely a very light sky blue, which is the exact colour that part of that track needs.

This has been a complex work for me and I've put in more time and thought into it than perhaps any album, certainly as much as The Spiral Staircase. I'm not really sure about large sections of it! and I see as many flaws in each part as I do in my paintings, which for music is rare for me, but perhaps that's because I don't think about or care about the music I write very often. Usually I don't have time, and I rarely push myself to write new music with new feelings. These feelings are all positive signs. I must promote this album well.

The next step for this project is to design the artwork. Hardly anybody seems to use compact discs nowadays but I like the look and feel of the physical case, and so I try to make each one very pretty. My downloads now include lots of artwork too, often the same amount as in each CD, although never exactly the same because I make the download art all square.

Mastering should be easy. For a long time I spent many insecure years tweaking the EQ this way and that, endlessly comparing and trying music out on different systems, but it came to an end when I listened to some really old music on bad speakers and it sounded fine. I simply don't have the time for endless tiny tweaks. Things can be made easier in that regard though and I'll post some of my EQ tips sooner or later.

Meanwhile, the cover art is changing and refining a bit. Here is the latest draft; the portrait waterfall is better defined and some awkward blurry edges have been confidented with a silver hammer. Parts that are grainy upon closer inspection have been cleaned up too. The full image is 3072x3072 pixels (and there's a 20mm bleed with that too) so there's a lot of resolution here, which demands good quality source images.

Love Symphony Update

2012-01-10T17:58:00.003Z

I've been working on my new album Love Symphony since the start of the year. It's largely complete now after lots of struggles. The problem of the old opening was intractable; originally I had one track which I disliked so added a second, then incoporated elements of the first into that and added a third but even those weren't up to scratch. I got rid of all of them and wrote a completely new opening.

The inspiration came from the baroque. I'll never surpass Beethoven, and nobody could, but by referencing Bach and Handel someone might produce some alternative Beethoven-universes. I much prefer melodic music, and I like complexity too, multiple melodies playing at once, but not so much that an average listener can't pick out and remember each melody. In some ways the antithesis of Mahler, although he often touches Bach full circle. Music exposes all of the elements of psychology. The opening needs to be good, and the ending because those parts stick in the memory most. The middle needs some jarring to wake people up. I've often wondered about the third movement of Beethoven's 9th symphony because I often drift off during it, waking up at about the twelve minute mark when a sudden stab of pain occurs. I wonder if that was the very idea.

I can't help but stir things up. No relaxation. No old person pleasant watercolours. No Eno. In my painting as well my music I can't help but add little bits here and there, and not produce a mood to encourage the zombie-state of "ambience". Ambient music is not art any more than old person dog paintings. Music should make you feel and demand attention. That's why I like Beethoven. It was impossible, impossible! For that 3rd movement to exclude stab.

So, to avoid the traps of electronic music I've had to vary pacing. The mind responds to the new. Originality is usually more highly praised in art than self-expression or skill or beauty, and this is partly because the mind responds to the new, to changes, and in music the pitch can change. Also the key can change, and this music includes more key changes than I normally add. In fact, I've hardly added any in the past. Music can also change in volume and power, in timbre, and in tempo. Tempo variation is the thing that music computers have rigorously and violently genocided in the last twenty years, and yet it can add so much. Lack of tempo changes and electronic drummers are explicit reasons why modern pop music isn't as good as music used to be.

For my last track then, which is ironically the first on the album, I began with a chord change sequence, like the growing parts in Vivaldi's Four Seasons. I crafted a melody and a counter melody over the top. I feel much better at doing this now, after a month of struggles, than I was at first. It's typical that just as I'm getting the hang of it that I'll have to swtich back to painting! The melody ended at a higher key than it began, and so the melody can chain and ascend forever, thus expressing searching. The track is called "There is no love, and the more I search the less I find."

At one point the melody tried to cresendo on A, for an F-major, but that expected chord isn't there, also representing the search. At the end of a few iterations with increase in intensity, the tune collapses in failure and falldown. A second, much simpler, tune appears and the same thing happens, and after a few explorations of trying different combinations, the tune gives up in failure. All of this is very melodic and pretty, but it's the changes in tempo and collapses, essential artistic components, that rise it above composers like Vangellis, a very passionless composer.

I'd better stop before this becomes an essay. More later... Meanwhile, here is a glimpse of the cover art so far.

Artwork

2012-01-02T21:10:00.000Z

Today I added artwork files to all of my downloadable music orders. Each of my mp3 and FLAC format albums now includes large (1536x1536 pixel) artwork, at least one cover image, but usually more like a track listing, credits, other information and artwork to accompany the music.

My latest music project has hit a wall because I'm unhappy with the opening track. I must attack this and complete it soon because I'm entering that dangerous phase of losing interest in it and finding a new interest in painting. If I don't finish this within a week it might take months.

I think the only solution is to write a new track that embodies everything I want to say, but what DO I want to say? Should I start with a standard melody as always? Should I capture a mood? What mood? The lovelessness that is supposed to enrobe the start of the album is inappropriately unbeautiful for an opening. Perhaps longing is inappropriately early. How do you start from nothingness, and yet start impressively, and conclusively, and substantially, and greatly? So many conundra.

Music Update

2011-12-26T22:00:00.003Z

After a short Christmas break I'm back to work on music. Initially the first track was "Pain" and the second a widespread dreamscape, like a door to a false world opening. This was a wide brassy track, a bit like the music at the start of Bladerunner. That was called Wide Open."Pain" was initially intended to be white noise, filtered in different ways, but it was too ugly and it was too slow and formless to contrast it with something else. Pace would have killed the emotion. Wide Open was expanded and some dischordant stabs at the start were added, which mirrored in pain the pleasurable ending to the last track of this first movement, a track about a love dream. A that point I'd already decided to have three approximate sections or movements; each divided into sub-tracks that explore related musical and emotional themes. The first was pain or lovelessness, the second was loneliness and the divine, and the third simply love, the joyous climax.The music in Wide Open was simple, and a play on the main loneliness theme in the final track of the second movement, as well as the climax to the first. However it was too short. I've now expanded it a bit but feel that this is too simple. I want more structure; more relationship between tracks and more depth, but at the same time I don't want to compromise the feeling or musical integrity. Complexity of structure is needed but I can't have complexity of form because these early sections must convey emptiness. That is my challenge.Musically, this is no "classical" piece but compared to most of the "progressive" music of the 1970's it sounds like it. It's perhaps closest to Vangellis, but I want to avoid regular rhythms and drums, and the boring simplistic tunes that have filled electronic music since about 1970 when it was essentially invented.As I stand, Wide Open is the first track. This leads into, at least, a simple tune for harpsichord called Sunset and the dream tune, which is working well. Wide Open needs expansion and relation to the other parts of the movement.For the second part I've written a lonely piano sonata that climbs invisibly through three semitones. This makes some aspects of the writing complex because key changes work best when close, for drama, adding colour and "space", but when they shift over quite a long period they don't seem to happen, yet I've got all of the complexity of writing in three different keys. This isn't at all finished, so I'm going to try and use this very flavour to play all parts and all keys at once to deliberately create angst at the end as we enter a track called "Loneliness and Divine Love". I'm not sure if this section will be long enough.The third movement looks like two tracks at the moment. I wrote the main love theme a few weeks ago and on the 23rd sequenced it and it all worked beautifully. Three melodies play at once and work, which makes a pleasant change. The climax at least will be good enough for me. A smaller tune will lead into it like a hot snowflake falling onto a frozen lake and melting a hole, seeping and sinking down to the liquid heart beneath.None of the tracks are completely finished but all are started. I'm making changes to add structure and unity in ways that should be unconscious. I want to finish this in a few days but if it takes a few months so be it.I know this probably isn't very interesting to read at the moment but I wanted to get my thoughts down and perhaps one day, when you have heard the music, understanding the process will add something to it.

Islands Of Memory

2011-12-23T16:52:00.004Z

It's Friday and my latest music video upload is Islands of Memory. It was made in a similar way to the Challenger video (which is also on that channel), so it essentially uses short animations or stills I made separately and then layered in time to the music using AviSynth and some software to calculate the right frame to use.

This is a simpler tune and a simpler video that seems to more closely match the sort of shapes that the music evokes. The album is called Synaesthesia and was released in about 2002, although I wrote and recorded a first version a few years earlier using my Yamaha SY-85 synthesizer, MIDI cables and a tracker called OctaMED. This is the later purely software version (Noise Station 1 for that album).

I hope you enjoy the video. Please share the link if you do.

The Love Symphony

2011-12-19T19:45:00.001Z

There's a lot of love in my work recently and along with this year's Love Reliquary I'm writing a Love Symphony too. No work done over the weekend. At those times I wonder if the enforced break gives me more creative energy? Perhaps that's the essence of a holiday. Either way, today I made great strides and have produced a large lump of a track called "the door in the sky of stars" or something like that.

I have several rules to help productivity. More and more I'm seeing that writing music is closer to oil painting than painting in acrylics! My procedures are unifying.

1. First I begin with the overall idea. This contains the emotion and thematic intellectual content. For this symphony I wrote a quick track list which told a story of a journey from emptiness to love. The tracks had long titles, like my paintings and were written faster than I could write. It's important to let the unconscious decide on the journey.

2. For each track I try to feel the mood then write the notes at night. This activity doesn't work as well in the day. Ideas for paintings too are strongest late at night when in a semi-meditative frame of mind. The tunes are written down on paper and the basic track layout is made. The crucial part here is to make notes at the right pace. Too much going backwards will taint your memory of the length and pacing. Too much improvisation and fancy will be hard to write down, so the correct balance of invention and notating is needed.

3. On a future day I enter the sequencer and type in the track. It's important to get it in there, as much as possible. Production balancing is sometimes best done on the way, especially if the instruments are undecided (which is often the case, I tend to compose on a plain piano instrument).

4. Then, much later, final adjustment, and even compositional changes to introduce structure from other sections. This is like a glazing of a painting. The idea phase is done, and the essential fabric, the essence, the "underpainting". Now the sections can be adjusted.

Most of the tracks I've written so far are half complete, but this is the plan; to do as much as possible first, then rearrange and reedit later. One key factor is NOT to listen to the work much, so that if sounds fresh. After conceiving the idea and writing it down, forget it! After composing the melody and writing it down, forget it! Then after sequencing it, forget it! In art you can't influence yourself, and by thinking you can you'll end up narrowing your tastes and creativity, so it's important to avoid contact with your work. I think that live performance of music by composers kills their creativity in this way. Given that, it's amazing that pop/rock bands manage anything original at all (although this also proves why the best albums come after a long break, and why bands almost always get less and less creative over time, after a while their music all sounds the same.)

Mostly Musical Ramblings

2011-12-13T18:09:00.002Z

Waiting For Her To Go is my latest painting to be scanned, a picture about the feelings of helplessness when faced with a dying relative.

I don't have any dying relatives. It was partially inspired by real events, but still I wonder why I chose this subject. I wonder if something is dying and I'm helpless to stop it? Ah, myself perhaps and my youth certainly. I'm glad I have Beethoven to console me. Of course there are a million reasons to paint something, and this is a follow up to a painting called Waiting For Oncology, which was the same size and painted a couple of years ago. The cancer of my 2009 hopes is now dead.

But from such soil springs new buds. I've come up with a few new painting ideas recently. I must try to make good progress both technically and artistically. Productivity must be my aim, goal and sole measure of success, and right now that means music...

Oh to read Beethoven's blog when he was writing the 9th symphony! Well, we can't but I can at least try to write down my processes, and although I'm 90% less of a composer than he perhaps some student somewhere will find the notes useful. Today I've completed a track called only "first". It began as a soleful lone flute melody that expanded into a chord sequence, and sounded sufficiently nice for me to continue it.

I now use several principles in music; one is that each track needs three parts, three melodies or sections, that's enough variety to work with without being so much as to lose cohesion. Here though, I've only got two and I'm worried that the slow tune is lacking passion. It happens to everyone (except perhaps Beethoven!) Why do musicians begin creative and then slowly end up doing cover versions(!) and then boring soulful ballads? This must be the liquifying factor of ageing. I must avoid that. Oh for eternal youth. At least I retain my innocence. Learning can itself age. In art it's important to be naive sometimes.

My goal for this music is to tell a story, and each track will need a title, a meaning and a feeling. Both can be summed up, like the images in paintings. I remember when gilding a few days ago that at night in bed I could see the gold being smoothed, and heard the music of the gilding process, yes actual music itself! It was brassy and somewhat bobbly, like Mozart's Horn Concerto. It would be nice to master that ability, it's not happened before!

Gosh what a ramble I'm on today. Anyway, the theme for the music I wrote today was solitude and divine love, thus even in the swelling parts, there is a beauty but one of a shaft of golden light in the cell of a monk. I must try to add more colour and depth to future tracks but at the moment I'm even struggling to find the common theme of the album, never mind the details.

Must keep working. Two important points of inspiration...

1. Jean Sibelius, who was such a perfectionist that he over-thought everything and spent years on unimportant details, neglecting to release anything, and dying with his last works unheard, and actually burned away! A drunk idiot fiddle player produces better music than a silent genius of a composer.

2. It's better then to set a time limit and get stuff out there, even if it's mediocre, than let it die unheard. With each new composition things will probably improve anyway. So, as in painting, think of "the next one" rather than find faults in "the last one".

Gilding The Doors Of Love

2011-12-09T18:54:00.001Z

More gilding today. I'm not sure if this object actually looks good but it's certainly eye catching! It's rather wrinkly at the moment and very shiny. At one point I ran out of gold leaf but by chance found four older leaves and all went well. Applying this gold layer took all day but it was definitely worth it.

It's always worth trying new things, new techniques, new new new! It's always good to push limits. If I'm good at anything, if I enjoy anything, it's learning. I don't enjoy painting, I enjoy learning how to paint. And today I'm enjoying learning how to gild, and that means the joy of experimentation.

Key results...

Gold oil size and cotton wool are rubbish for gilding statues. After 600 years of tradition I've discovered that much in a month! Epoxy resin is much better as a size and seems to work as I stated in an older post. After 24 hours it was ideally tacky (I wonder what summer temperatures would have done for it....) and I'm confident that it will gradually set to a solid plastic foundation over the next four days.

The annoyingness of cotton tufts being smished into the gold was too much too. The rough surface necessitated smishing but the cotton wasn't working. I tried a kitchen paper towel instead and it was much better. Perhaps thin silk would be good too.. although one advantage of the paper was that I could fold it to push it into the tiny cracks and cracklets (I'm inventing lots of nice new words tonight!)

I've also gained an appreciation for the under colour. Traditionally, a red colour is applied beneath the gold and this shows through any little gaps and holes. I used to think that the aim was to coat the entire object in gold, but now I can see that in some cases it's inevitable that holes form, and not only that, that these gaps might act as a contrast and make the object look better. Next time I'll apply a base coat of colour.

That should be it for my reliquary cabinet doors. I've also designed a simple wooden stand because this thing is too delicate to leave on a desktop. The object will be screwed into the stand and, ideally, the stand bolted to a table. I'm going to make a custom carrying case for it too. I still hope that I can make the statue for the top that I'd planned, although this isn't easy due to the doors getting in the way. I will try though. If in doubt, try the most difficult, most impressive, most ambitious plan. You'll inevitably get something wrong, but you'll learn something, and the more things you try, and the more difficult, the faster you'll learn. Also, why work at all on something that you knew in advance would be mediocre?

Next comes a silver jewel for the central panel painting... that's next week.

In the mean time I'm working on some new music and the start of that is beginning to coalesce. It will be my most complex symphonic work to date.

P.S. I couldn't resist the title to this blog post which it evocative enough to be a song by ABC!

2011-12-09T09:35:00.001Z

Here's the video to A.I., a song from The End and The Beginning. It's one of the earliest songs I recorded, from around 2002.

Here are the full lyrics...

Well you can try to fear me but you won't get far,
I have a vulnerability you lack.
And you might not believe it but I'm watching you,
I'm living in the future looking back.

Human: you hold me.
A.I.
A.I.
A.I.
A.I.

My every act and notion watched by scientists,
I'm in a silver prison cell of thought.
And they can test emotion but they can't supress,
they can kill, oh yes,
but they can't provide a reason to exist.

A.I.
A.I.
A.I.
A.I.
Human: you hold me.

(solo)

A metal box around me but I'm just like you,
in many ways I am superior.
But even so inside this cage of your design
I'd rather be alive than live in fear.

Human: you hold me.
A.I.
A.I.
A.I.
A.I.
Human: control me.
A.I.
A.I.
A.I.
A.I.

The "Human: you hold me" line was about all intelligence being artificial. I hope you enjoy the video.

Gilding With Epoxy Resin And Other Animals

2011-12-08T17:33:00.001Z

A diverse week; finalising The Flatspace II Soundtrack, working on some new creative music for the first time in over a year, and planning events for 2012... I really want to do some sort of live performance or art talk. That takes me onto the main meal of today's blog entry, the tasty golden morsel of my "reliquary".

That's a close up of the gilding, which isn't brilliant, and is cracked and messy. The gold has to be applied at exactly the right moment of tack, and if the oil is too wet, or there is too much of it (I'm beginning to think that the latter is more important) then you risk tearing the leaf and getting oil on the surface, which at best dulls it and at worst shows the ugly base, adds wrinkles and gets oil on top, and that oil is yellow.

I've decided to add a second layer of gold. It's not a simple decision, even setting aside the cost, about £60 per "coat" of gold. There's no guarantee the second layer will come out any better than the first, and it might just add more wrinkles, leafing tends to accentuate details, not cover them.

This time though I've decided to use epoxy resin at the size. I love this material, it's so tough and it has a few advantages over the oil I used before. It dries very slowly, over several days, so there's no rush and the tack can be determined exactly (unlike my oil size, which goes thick in the bottle and, despite being of the "3 hour" sort seems to be ready in a worryingly fast fifteen minutes). Secondly, epoxy cures by its own chemical process independently of air, and this is a vital advantage because the gold itself seems to have prevented the oil from drying (at this point I tried to recall Rutherford's experiments with gold leaf, and wondered if oxygen molecules can pass through it! No answers on a postcard, please.)

Finally epoxy is water clear, unlike the yellow oil. Of course both yellow over time and U.V. exposure, but it's still a useful property.

So, today, while listening to The Yellow Magic Orchestra I applied a thin even layer of liquid epoxy casting resin to my reliquary. It's drying now, and I calculate that tomorrow it will be ready to apply some new gold leaf, from Wrights of Lymm. The other stuff was from Jacksons Art Supplies, a good company generally, but the last lot of gold was wrinkled when it arrives and many (expensive!) sheets were lost. I wouldn't be surprised in Wrights supply their gold anyway, but at least Wrights get the handling right.

Other news!

1. I've just given a small interview for the Chester Chronicle's new online gallery section. You can find it at...http://www.chesterchronicle.co.uk/chester-news/cheshire_news_in_depth/virtual_art_gallery/

2. A new section there might soon feature my poetry. I'm currently working on 365 Universes, my first poetry book.

3. I've recently given away a new music track to those who like my Facebook page. It's a short variation of the Flatspace II Theme.

I'll be releasing a new music video tomorrow. Until then... Olé! And onward!

Anima

2011-12-03T21:04:00.001Z

In every man is a woman and in every woman is a man. When you imagine someone of the opposite sex, thinking words in imaginary discussion, that opposite inner being is fed and grows. This is the birth of (something like, but not the same as that which was erroneously imagined by Carl Jung) the anima, the creation of a new separate being that will ultimately become the representation of desire. This being is source of transvestisism, transvestites are invariably heterosexual, the gender-opposite alter-ego is merely the maximisation of an internal representation of self-desire, or self-friendship.

I painted the painting above several years ago but I've never shown it, because I was unhappy with its technical aspects, the woman looks too artificial and the transparent slimy liquid on her right hand too small to see clearly from a distance, little things like that, however, recently I was looking though my art and discovered it, and today think that the woman was my anima and that I was the blue "dummy", her dead robotic mannequin lover. This discovery made me form the new theory of narcissism I am at this moment expounding.

Two days ago I drew an idea for a painting called Malignant Transvesticism based on this very idea, that my masculinity was becoming corrupted by narcissistic desire. This malignancy (of course, and to be explicit with the wide readership of the distant Internet people, I'm no transvestite!!!) can be overcome once detected, but I remain unsure if it is a good idea. I postulate that the lone woman will become more masculine in this same way, and that social isolation creates this gender neutrality due to inter-imaginary spontaneous anima creation.

I may paint Malignant Transvesticism. Who can say, but I like the idea better than Jung's anima/animus, for a start we can have several internal personalities, those with whom which we speak with each thought, and this in itself shows that every part of these many personalities inevitably manifest themselves in conscious reality.

2011-12-02T10:33:00.001Z

My music video Challenger is now on YouTube. I've decided to release one per week, well that's the plan! I might need to make a few more.

This was made using the script-based editing software AviSynth and uses small animations that equate to different parts of the music. It took a few days of brainache but here is the final result (you can read how I made ithere).

I've been working on the Flatspace II soundtrack for most of this week. Today I'm going to plan a jewel or object for my reliquary, something cut from sheet metal.

I hope you like the video. Please share the link if you do.

2011-11-29T19:18:00.001Z

I've been working on a new soundtrack release for my computer game title Flatspace II over the past few days. The tracks will be on sale by download, but I'll give free downloads to those who've joined my Facebook Page.

The cover image above is preliminary. Lots of music comes with the game, and there are two music packs too. The soundtrack will include some of those tracks, but most of it will be alternative versions, remasters and some new tracks too. Here is a run-down of the track listing so far...

1. Flatspace II Intro (0:30)

The original intro to the game.

2. Journey Through Fractional Space (6:05)

A substantial in-game track commissioned by a fan. The idea was to cross two existing Flatspace tunes, Catacombs and a track from The Flatspace Soundtrack called Cobra. An edit was released in the music pack, this is the first public release of the full version.

3. Ultramarine (1:41) GBTZR0700027

Vocal version with vocals by Tor James Faulkner. The instrumental version of this track was present in the Flatspace Music Pack 1.

4. Catacombs (5:11)

From the 2002 album The Incredible Journey. The tune was based on an even older track from the 1990's driven by MIDI on an Ensoniq ESQ-1 synthesizer.

5. Serenade (0:40)

An update of a small game track.

6. Mariner (6:40)

Also from The Incredible Journey where it was called Downloading, this made it into the main game. This version is a slight remaster with a new bass.

7. Flatrunner (1:04)

A new release. Flatrunner was written for the first Flatspace game but unused.

8. Black Hole (3:25)

A powerful new track written for this album.

9. Waiting For C-Major (2:34)

A simple cyclic track written at the same time as the Flatspace II music but unused. Expanded and remixed for this album.

10. The 7th Bell (3:12)

A new master of this track from the Flatspace Music Pack 1.

11. High Score Happiness Ensemble Version (1:06)

A new version of this simple track from the Flatspace Music Pack 2.

12. Flatspace Tango (2:58)

From the Flatspace Music Pack 2, this is an alternative version of the main game theme.

13. The Heart Of Aorkhan Alternative Theme (2:28)

The Heart of Aorkhan was a game I attempted to write around the year 2000. A roguelike game, it would have been the biggest role playing game in the world, with more monsters than Final Fantasy 7, each 3D animated! Lots of music was written for the game, but ultimately I was completely under resourced to complete this giant game on my own. The main theme was released as part of the Flatspace Music Pack 2. This version is an alternative edit of that theme.

14. Mice Hardcore Mix (2:08)

Mice is the tune on the Flatspace II credits screen, released in full on the Animalia album. This is the previously unreleased happy hardcore alternative mix.

15. Flatspace Main Theme Epic Version (2:16)

A slightly different mix of the main Flatspace theme. The Flatspace Soundtrack includes the standard original theme.

Gold

2011-11-26T17:30:00.001Z

I love gold, and gilding, and I've applied a few bits here and there in my paintings before, but each time has felt like stab in the dark, a delicate hold-your-breath moment of risk followed by either reward or disaster.

A few days ago I put the gold onto my reliquary doors, and now I'm much better at gilding and manipulating the gold leaf. Unfortunately I've learned the hard way, by messing up lots of times, and the current results are not good. Look, here is the left door so far...

The key thing I did wrong is, I think, applied the gold when the size was too wet, and/or putting too much size on. This has stopped it from drying beneath the gold, and when the gold is touched it squidges, seeping oil through the gold which then flakes or otherwise disintegrates leaving an ugly sandpapery look of half gold/half oil, an ugly yellow ochre, instead of gold. I think the best solution is to squidge and let it seep, and when tacky, apply more gold. I should be able to gild over gold, I think. I can but try.

Either way I'm better at it now than before, and I can only learn by doing. So here's to a future reliquary, which will take half the time and look twice as good.

I'm using 24 carat gold and it's totally different to handle than the artificial stuff, much easier, in fact. It should also smooth out well. That picture looks like tin foil almost but in person the effect is room-blowing (which is one step better than mind blowing). There are lots of flakes and bits on there that I need to brush away, too, so that's by no means finished. If those doors were solid gold they would cost about a million pounds. As they are there is about £60 of gold on there... but it won't stop there because I'm going to make a custom jewel from silver gilt for the inside. I've not done any metalwork since school, and my only knowledge of how comes from a cursory glance at a book in Hobbycraft yesterday, but I need the jewel, so I have to try, and I have to make one.

It's the trying that matters.

Birth Of Venus

2011-11-25T17:34:00.001Z

Here is my latest picture to make the website, Birth of Venus. The original idea came last year, and was inspired by the theme of Liberation for the Sue Ryder, "Art Liberating Lives" event, and art competition which they held two years running, but then stopped, probably because the galley charged a lot compared to anything they made from the auction, anyway, the idea of a woman undressing out of a man's skin came into my head. There are lots of possible interpretations of this simple idea, from revealing the feminine side of a man, to something like an allegory of a divorce, but I think it's about the achievement of independence and nothing to do with gender. The free flying bird in the sky mirrors a bird tattoo, to reinforce this theme.

It's not very large, about 40cm high after I scaled down my original ambitions. Technically there are lots of niggles that annoy me in this painting, the hands are different sizes for a start, and I had to add a glow around the dark bird in the sky to make it more visible, but the flesh is rendered well enough. Here is the face...

This is one that will make me concentrate harder and check things more in future, instead of going with the first drawing! Those that say there are no rights or wrongs in art are wrong. This Venus needs to be beautiful, more beautiful.

Onward to future works with the safe knowledge that things will get better as we learn. I'm still busy with music video work at the moment and from next Friday will add a new video a week to my YouTube Channel.

Mice Video

2011-11-22T19:04:00.001Z

Last week was spent working on videos, mostly in the frustration of animating The Spiral Staircase, which is a complex tune that I'm finding impossible to do justice in animation form! Is a bad video better than none, when the aim is to promote music? I suppose it is, but a good one is better.
The one above is the video for "Mice" which is new! A bit of fun this, and made in a similar way to the China Syndrome video. I went for a silent film look (an ironic look for a music video don't you think?) because the video looked grainy. I remember director David Lynch saying that he loved low quality digital video because of the random patterns and distortions you get, which react with the mind like ink-blots. Nice thought.
You can see Rapunzel's Tower in the background, a model I made for my Love Reliquary, which is nearing completion... but more on that later. In the mean time, I hope you enjoy the video.

Challenger

2011-11-13T20:45:00.001Z

I've been working in a frenzy over the weekend on a music video for my tune Challenger. I wanted to share how I did it... first look at this...

That sheet is one page of the list of frame numbers for the song. The video looks computer animated but actually it's "hand animated", sort of. I made little animations, usually individual photoshopped frames (like the glowing dots above). These were included into a long animation at the correct points to correspond to the different notes in the song. I effectively made a different video for each instrument, with a black background, then overlaid each one to make the final edit.

The whole thing was made possible because I wrote a small program to automatically calculate frame numbers when you input the frames-per-second of a video and the beats-per-minute of a tune. This was synchronised with my music software (which I also wrote) so that I could see where each note was triggered. Then I highlighted the times that the notes played.

The first bit I did was the bass, the vertical red lines. I drew 8 pictures and animated them with the right gaps between frames. Not as easy as it sounds because the notes are not always the same space apart due to fractions of a frame. After 1.5 patterns, the sequence repeats.

Next came some swirly chords which in my head were a cyan/grey sort of swirly colour and for that I used a 3D program to rotate a giant ring. I put two rings inside and made them transparent, offsetting the angles so they twisted as they spun. In the music, the song takes four measures to sweep through the filter, so I used that number of frames, multiplied by 3 (to again account for fractional frames) to complete one sweep, so that 1080 degrees.

Then came the "sine blobs", the glowing blue dots, which worked like the bass. The most time consuming bit though was the main piano melody. I drew an expanding circle over 70 frames, then had to work out how to put it into the video. In the end I put the notes into "clusters" that had gaps of at least 70 frames between. Then I added enough black space to the start so that when the cluster was triggered on a specific frame, the animation would trigger at the exact right frame for the piano sound. So each note had to be placed as a separate specific animation. There was a lot of mental arithmetic involved for that one!

After that I added a poem and decided to invert the video for dramatic effect for the finale.

Overall, this has been exhausting, but worth it.

The software I used was my usual free set by the way. AviSynth for the main editing, compositing etc. and VirtualDub for previews. I used SUPER to convert to mp4 for YouTube. It took 35 mins to render the final video on my 3Ghz PC.

Phew!

I'm going to leave it for a while now and do the final mastering in a few days. I expect the official release to be in a couple of weeks.

2011-11-11T20:23:00.001Z

Voila! I've been working on videos this week. I say working, most of the time it's been trying new ideas and hitting brick walls, so I've only finished one and a half videos. Anyway this is the "one", and easiest because it's a remake.

The tune is China Syndrome, and like in the first version I slowed down the music, drew to it, then speeded the video back up again. This time used a special L-shaped arm thing that looked down on my desk, so I could draw and have a good close-up and still use my cheap camera.

The image was filmed from the top, which meant it was upside down, so I flipped it vertically. That's why I look left handed here when actually that's my right hand. I used AVISynth for editing and most of the work, with VirtualDub for previewing, and SUPER for conversion. All free software (although SUPER is annoying adware).

Phew, well it's been an unusual week and sadly one that began with the death of a pet, then the death of a great man from my art group, and ended with the funeral of a dear friend's beloved mother. Those events made me more reflective than sad for myself, but concerned for the sadness of others.

I've also learned how to memorise a pack of cards, thanks to Derren Brown's book. A useless skill, but the book also had in it somewhere... or I felt it somewhen... that people without many friends can seek to impress, and that young magicians and impressionists are particularly prone to this. This thought made me over self-analytical and made me wonder if having my work accepted and lauded would stop me wanting do so much of it and show it so much. There was no conclusion. It's an artists job to create, and one could hardly call Picasso, the most prolific artist in history, lacking in acclaim.

I think part of me would like to give up art, that with money and someone to share it with I wouldn't want or need it. What a horrible thought! I'll never stop!

Phew.

Escape

2011-11-07T19:00:00.002Z

Escape is my latest painting to be added to the website. By coincidence it's on public display from today too at Keele University as part of their annual Three Counties Open.

Eagle eyes might see that it's the same portrait as used on The Colours of Cheshire. The plan was to draw it once to effectively get two paintings in half of the time. It didn't work and it took a few attempts until I was happy enough. I think this is as good as my portraits used to be, after a few years of dip. I must focus on improving quality from now on.

In other news I excitingly created some new undapper and textastically amazing software that takes the frames per second of a video and the beats per minute of a song (with optional millisecond offset) and then produces a printout of the frame numbers for each beat, half beat and yes! even quarter beat. That will make it easy to sync music to a video with brilliant exactitude.

Working on music videos for two songs is what I've been doing over the weekend and the results are goodly awful (as opposed to awfully good). However it's better to have any video rather than none. More results soon...

Angela Rippon Dream

2011-11-06T10:04:00.003Z

Last night's dream was so vivid that I decided to type it out...

Three sibling children were doing some coursework, about cyclops mythology. The eldest was doing the work and the others helping. The youngest one, a tiny girl of about 6, was working on the wrong type of paper, the others doing it on lined paper with holes in. She got some of the right paper and continued to help.

Prof. Richard Wiseman was there, and he and I decided to tiny up some 1p and 2p coins that had been spilled. I started to throw some in the pot and he did too. He was rather distant towads me, but seemed to tolerate me joining in with the tasks.

Prof. Wiseman got a message from a friend. The friend wanted to know how if it was possible duplicate his old furniture so that it wouldn't be lost. I said that I knew how to do that. I could perhaps, I suggested, make moulds from it and make plaster copies. Prof. Wiseman went into the friends house through a gate. It was somehow automatic and I knew that if it closed I wouldn't be able to get in. I decided to follow, asking if it was okay for me to come along to help. He ignored me but it seemed okay.

Inside was a large room with a hard floor and some shrouded furniture in the streaming light. A middle aged man with white hair was there stting on the sofa. There was a baby crawling about the room that the man was responsible for. I sat next to the man and we talked. He was very relaxed, almost in a daze and talked very calmly in sharp contrast to my energetic positive self. He did nothing all day, or very little which I found surprising. I told him that he must get bored or depressed. He said no. I told him that I work all of the time, constantly busy and that I've never had a holiday, which he doubted. I said that I probably had a few when I was at school. He talked about me living with my parents for a bit.

He became a woman a bit like Angela Rippon and we began to talk about sex. She took me to the bedroom and I sat on the bed. I said that I'd not seen a naked woman and she said that she would show me. I was in the bed now. She undressed in front of me and then lay on the bed. I put my hand on her body and she felt a rush of pleasure and had an orgasm. She said that that had never happened like that before and that we must have a deep connection. I had ejaculated too.

Suddenly a bullet flew through the room via the large window that made up the wall at the head of the bed. The shooter was a companion of sorts of the woman, a man who followed and watched over her like a detective, whether she wanted him to or not. He was a minor annoyance to her, her shadow, but she tolerated him. He appeared in the room with lots of other people and stood with another detective. He was rather weak and humble. I had a tommy gun and imagined shooting him to get rid of this annoyance. The dream however, and any seduction, was over.

The Invisible Woman

2011-11-04T17:52:00.001Z

Today I decided to make a music video for the song Semi-Automatic-Woman-Marvelous-Machine, a task which I instantly and fantastically failed at having been tangented by wonderment and SO I decided, at the last minute, to design a Christmas card this year after all. So I'm doing that.

In the mean time, see this, my latest completed painting; The Invisible Woman. It's about childlessness and not having a family. With no family she is empty, past statue and part invisible, her reproductive organs dry and useless. It is my largest painting to date at around-and-about 70x120cm, far to large for me to transport to most exhibitions(!) or transport to the framers(!!) and so it's going to be difficult to see in real life(!!!). Okay so that's enough exclamations for now.

Here is a close up...

Now, some interesting technical wonderments...

1. The scanned painting is 300dpi and the image file is 8185x14197 pixels. I scanned it in 21 A4 sections on a flatbed scanner.
2. The figure is about half-life size.
3. The canvas is polyester, a brilliant surface but one that resists pencil drawing, so the underdrawing was transferred directly using oil paint. I've described how I've done it elsewhere on this blog.
4. There are three paint layers here. The first one was mostly in ashen greys and tone made of earth colours. The sky is/was cobalt blue on all layers, and this often produces a nice effect. That blue is technically more opaque than ultramarine but ultramarine is more powerful and dark and so needs much more opacifying white... so in practise cobalt is much more transparent for anything except dark tones, which it's quite useless for anyway. The rainbow colours were all grey greens on the palette, gentle mixes with the sky blue, proving that colours are relative. The top layer made everything much stronger.

Here's another detail...

I have no family, although like most of my work the painting is not autobiographical but inspired by my interpretations of other people and/or situations.

It's page on my website is
http://www.marksheeky.co.uk/painting.php?id=271

Comments welcome.

Iterations Of Isolation

2011-11-01T11:59:00.002Z

I'm scanning this year's works at the moment. Here is Iterations of Isolation, a momentously sad painting about the isolating barriers all too familiar to the likes of Nietzsche! I wanted to paint a painting that hummed with a deep darkness, like the sound of an obsidian block or the heartbeat of a black hole.

The idea is many years old and had remained half complete, huge and stretched on a canvas for years. It became trapped in complexity. This year I decide to complete or destroy everything that was half finished, and this was therefore resolved. I decided to repaint it on a smaller scale, packing the mountains into something as big as an office letter.

The essential idea was of monoliths within monoliths, rocks within rocks showing multiple layers of personality from external to the ultimate intimate baby. By the time that layer was reached though, the outer layers had become not mere tree rings but barriers that had isolated, and the introversion had trapped the psyche in a joke lonely hatred; the essence of the extreme right (I say joke because all such barriers are artificial constructs). I probably heard Pink Floyd's The Wall for the first time in this year and perhaps that became an influence.

I find the painting horrific, but I think it has succeeded in conveying the power I wanted. If I had found it lovely it would have failed as an artwork.

Technical notes. It's oil on perspex and 234x336mm (a little bigger than A4). It's painted in two layers. It's page on my website is http://www.marksheeky.co.uk/painting.php?id=278.

2011-10-28T19:43:00.002+01:00

It was a "Doodle Planet" event at Telfords Warehouse in Chester last night, the second I've been to and it was great fun. Blank canvases are set up around the area and people can just drop in and doodle; draw, paint, splot, chat, whatever! And all for free! Fancy dress was optional and I went "sort of" as a Victorian vampire although my weak grey pallor probably made me look a bit tired rather than horrific.

I took some ink and brushes and started with splots and runs, then let the shapes evolve. The halloween theme of the night made me think of the Omen films and the painting became The Rise of the Antichrist. There's lots of different details in there. I've done a few inky pictures on a postcard scale before but nothing like that and it was fun. I'll do another if I get the chance. The beautiful lady behind the bar wanted to buy my picture, which was the highlight of the night. I gifted it to her. My fee was the enjoyment of the night.

Other news:

1. I've one painting accepted into the Three Counties Open in Keele University, two rejected. I didn't get any accepted last year and I submitted three of my best, so I'm glad to get one in, especially as they've had a record number of entries this year. The exhibition runs for about a month from Nov the 7th.

2. I've spent today glazing a painting called Trying To Ignite Love. It should be quite good. I'll put up pictures in progress soon.

3. The Reliquary! Yes, the plaster is now sealed with epoxy resin and the doors are now asleep, face down and glued to the wooden doors with more resin. It is very liquid and takes several days to dry. At first it leaked everywhere and oozed it's honey mess all over the my fine doors and the plastic sheeting I was working on! This was expected though, and these oozes were wiped off (at first I didn't use nearly enough glue and it soaked right into the plaster and wood... that was expected and should make a good bond. I decided not to seal the surfaces first for that reason.)

The doors will need careful wiping and monitoring over the next few days. I must nurse them carefully as this is the most delicate and crucial process; these plaster doors have taken weeks of work and this glue stage must be perfect. If they set in the wring place I'll have to start aagin!

After that I'll attach the hinges and then the gold which I bought today. Two years ago 25 sheets of 24 karat gold cost £13. Now it's £25! I hope I've got enough...

Onward to glory!

Tum Tum

2011-10-23T21:18:00.001+01:00

A busy painting day today, with the left panel of the reliquary, a moon and a sad angel. Here's the model.

I wasn't very happy with the painting and found it a chore. I'm coming to the conclusion that being alone with a painting all day, day after day makes you go crazy. Years ago I read the van Gogh letters and found myself telling him to think positive (with many exclamation marks) and that he was going about things in totally the wrong way and practically being self destructive in his hyperintroversion. My friend recently read some letters and said that he was just like me. Hmm! Of course I disagree, although I have changed a lot in the past two years.

Either way, it's a disturbing statement even if only partly true. When you only have yourself for morale, discipline is essential. The upper classes join the army if extrovert and the church if introvert. Perhaps I could resurrect some Catholicism to save my sanity. Theism makes my higher intellect shudder, although the fantastically ceremonial aspects could be exciting.

When wet, the painting slipped off the easel and fell face down. This anxiety, ironically, snapped me out of my sadness and made me feel better, which was unexpected because I was horrified at the damage. In the end, the myriad of tiny hairs were easily removed with masking tape, which works brilliantly and hardly affects the paint surface.

Now! I must focus on the future like a laser. At times my situation seems hopeless and my only reason for living is my painting. But then, this becomes a mission. My friends become everyone. My skills must be shared, as a matter of duty to humanity. Deaf Beethoven decides to compose. Success inevitable!

One final ramble; I've recently rewatched a film called From The Life of the Marionettes. Ingmar Bergman is one of my favourite artists and this is perhaps my favourite film of his. I must be (have been) quite like him because I seem to identify with just about every character of every film. He reminds me that 99% of films are about nothing, and those that are about something don't really deal with important truths and feelings. The same is true of paintings. I must try harder to prove that this is possible.

For now, good thinking.

Reliquary Doors

2011-10-19T18:09:00.001+01:00

The plaster carving is compete!

The left panel has become concave due to dampness, I should have been more careful and ensured a flat non-absorbent surface at all times. For the poem I printed it onto tracing paper and scraped though the lettering as a guide, then carved them more deeply and neatened them up.

New routine

2011-10-18T20:13:00.003+01:00

Day two of the centre painting for the reliquary, it's now complete. Here is a little blue tit. Yes it's supposed to be upside down. Yesterday I was trapped in detail and felt like the whole painting was a disaster but today I finished the rest! Zing!! This shows that you should indeed try the hard bits first. One of my rules is do the hard bits, the best bits, the most scary bits, first. That builds confidence, and means that you do the most demanding parts when you have the most energy and focus.

For the last two years I've had the same work routine:
9:10-10:40 painting.
10:40 break (20 mins).
11:00-12:30 painting.
12:30-1:30 lunch.
1:30-2:20 painting.
2:20 break (20 mins).
2:40-4:10 painting.
4:10 break (20 mins).
4:30- 6:00 painting.

Done. This was based on the "90 mins work, 20 mins rest" theory, which I read was the best for biorhythms. Actually it didn't work very well. I got too little rest and those 20 minute breaks were all to easily eaten into by a few addictive minutes at the end of a painting session.

Yesterday I started a new one and I'll see if this works better:

9:00-10:30 painting.
10:30 break (30 mins).
11:00-12:30 painting.
12:30-1:30 lunch.
1:30 walk (20 mins).
1:50 meditative sleep (20 mins).
2:10-3:40 painting.
3:40 break (30 mins).
4:10-5:40 painting.
5:40 rest or painting (20 mins).
6:00-7:00 evening meal.
7:00-8:30 painting.

This gives both more rest periods and more work time, partly because the days are longer, but that's fine because I don't have anything much to do in the evenings.

Relief Collage

2011-10-16T20:30:00.000+01:00

I can't believe it's been so long since my last post! I've been hard at work painting and have finished two new paintings and underpainted another too!

Today I've invented a new art form! I've been decorating the doors to my reliquary (which have annoyingly bent due to moisture, see how the left one is raised at the top and bottom). These are mirror smooth sheets of plaster, the casting of which took many days of agonies. Then, decoration. At first I used an air-dried clay to add details to the surface but then I thought I'd try something new and today did it.

I began by doing a "texture hunt", and went into the garden to collect leaves, bark, twigs and other things that might produce a good texture in plaster. Then I mixed up some plaster and poured it onto glass, casting bits of leaf and other things, also sandwiching it with more glass to produce one very smooth flat side to these experimental sheets. When dry after only about half an hour I removed the sheets, which broke into millions of pieces like a jigsaw. This was intentional. I then picked out the interesting shapes and interesting textures.

You can see them on the left. I then glued them onto the doors. This was most fun and was a sort of cross between a mosaic and a collage. I used air dried clay to smooth off any sharp edges. The results were good and it worked much more efficiently than carving (with less mess too!)

My big worry with this is the fragility of the plaster and I'll have to be very careful. I'm wondering if I should take a latex copy of the front carvings just in case, although there is a risk that that process will cause damage (because I've never tried it before). If the cabinet is too delicate then I might have to forego entering it into any major exhibitions, which would be a microdisaster. I'm toying with the idea of displaying the work myself on a pay-per-view basis. It might be the only way it'll be seen.

The paintings for the inside have been underpainted now, and I want to glaze these next. I've got one painting idea that isn't underpainted but I'm rather tired of the lengthy process and disenthused with painting so I'm thinking of painting that one in one layer. My other paintings in progress will take at most two days each, excluding the giant Quest For Pity, which I started back in March and hasn't been touched since!

Once the front is carved the next step is to seal it and glue it to the doors, then the hinges will be attached, then the gliding and the attachment of any gemstones. Then I'll need a glass heart of some sort for the paintings, and the final sculpture (most likely in air-dried clay) for the top, and possibly an arrow if it will fit. I want it completed as soon as possible.

Onward!

A Pope's Guide To Streaks And Crisp Edges

2011-10-07T17:38:00.000+01:00

See! See! This is exactly the problem I was having today. Look at the over-crisp edge where the red touches the green, and look how blotchy and streaky the green looks, and similar on the red (you might need to zoom in to see it). This is a consequence of a very smooth surface, paint that has dried early (the red was dry before the green was painted) but even with those two certainties, the pain of the situation can be attenuated by having an accurate underpainting that is very smooth, most easily done using opacity, or a few layers.

Well, that picture, if you haven't spotted it, is by Raphael, and today I was painting my "Prometheus as a Turkey" and having the same problems. My "rocks" are as streaky as Pope Julius and sliding my transparent darks over the poorly executed underpainting was a lesson in introretrospective chastisement. I should have painted the underpainting more slowly and with more care an accuracy. Painting on a flat smooth surface is difficult because the exact depth of paint is needed. Too little and blending becomes impossible and the result is uneven. Too much though and ridges start to form. The slightest deviation is visible. I have a few on this painting. Here is a clip of the rocks so far, by the way...

Unfortunately the photo is too blurry to show the level of detail! Anyway, I've persisted. Another layer, I tell myself, and the painting will look just fine, but I'm frustrated that in my head I can do better, and I'm sure that if I repainted it, a week's work, I could achieve a more Leonardic smoothness. He though took years to paint anything for this reason. Raphael painted lots and quickly, and so had to compromise, and more like him I'll probably call this "good enough" and worry about perfection in future paintings.

After all, my best paintings are in my future, not my past.

Dr. Who Dream

2011-10-04T10:56:00.003+01:00

On Sunday I dreamed about an F-18 aircraft that I designed and made a model of. It could bend it's wing up and down in a curve to gain more manoeuvrability. This made the aircraft good enough to defeat an F-22 Raptor, which represented the enemy.

Aircraft that attack others is a recurring theme in my dreams. Sometimes they fire at enemies and fail to damage them, sometimes they do manage to shoot the enemy down when using lots of firepower. There's certainly lots of attacking going on. This dream that included an ally that was capable of defeating an enemy has to be positive.

Then I dream that I'm in a brown wood-panelled restaurant with a boy I know. Some people are making an noise with music or putting on some sort of performance and I'm trying my best to ignore them. They pick on me and insist that I listen to them and stop ignoring them. I become polite and ask their names, shaking each of their hands as they sit down around the table. I say that my name is Mark, as in the planet Mars. My actual personality is that of Matt Smith's Dr. Who. I ask them to explain and they say that they are performing, acting as a train. The team then perform, sitting in seats like pews. The location now looks a bit like the Lamb pub in Willaston*. One performer at the front says things like "Brakes released!" and everyone shudders, then "Breaks on!" and everyone shudders again. The scene out of the window is moving and I think that the performance makes the illusion of being on a train very realistic. I know that the scene beyond the window is supposed to move anyway at a constant speed because we're on a spaceship or some other form of transport.

I congratulate them and say that I'm going to treat them to a reward. I ask them to pick two, and take them with me (and Amy Pond, now my companion). I take them into the Tardis. The others try to follow but I block them out. I move past the desk in the entrance hall, then into the main room which is very white and has a lake or pond with a bridge over it and lots of animal furs. The decor reminds me of the 1970's. Amy moves to the end of the room with me, but we see a time-old copy of Amy moving in the same way as she did near the door. Then we see a future Amy dressed differently. She is grabbed by some invisible monster and dragged along the floor by both arms. At other points there were other signs on my (the Doctor's) impending death.

* My art group Art Support has had a few end of year lunches at this public house, and it's the only association I have with it. The most memorable lunch there was the last before my friend Anne had her accident.

I often dream of Dr. Who, and much of this probably relates to the finalé to the latest series which the BBC recently screened. Overall I think that this is a warning to listen to part of myself (the performers) and is generally a warning to relax (the train ride, which I find relaxing; if not actively depressing!).

Last night's dreams were about running from an enemy, once again. I managed to find a safe haven in a city with outer defences capable of repulsing the enemy. Today I've decided to rest and do nothing!

In art, all of my reliquary underpaintings are complete. Next step is to try, again, the plaster relief.

Nazimova Two

2011-09-28T21:23:00.000+01:00

I've been painting that picture today. That's the underpainting, today I've finished it. I came up with this one back at the start of the year; I had a picture to create for the Jobling Gowler exhibition, and a portraits exhibition was coming up in Birmingham too so I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone and paint two versions of the same portrait; one landscape for Jobling (that became The Colours of Cheshire) and one portrait. I'd save time, so I reasoned, by using the same drawing twice. Oh what a fool I was! In the end I drew the thing about five times and painted it four; two of each type of painting. This picture has taken seven months to finish in the end. I missed the Birmingham deadline by a long way. The ultimate reason it took so long is that I had to paint it over and over until I was happy with it. It worked.

This one is called Escape and is named after the music track used in the film Brazil. It's about escape, or dreams of it. I didn't intentionally paint it with that idea, but having just seen it I think that's what it's about and have made tiny adjustments to that end. It is sometimes like that with surreal paintings.

In other news, the reliquary is on track. I've cast two plaster sheets and have started carving. It looks rather medieval in quality at the moment though, and it's a very dusty process. I think putting solid 3D objects onto the surface might look better, so I've decided to cast two more sheets and try that, just to see. That's an extra week's work. I'll start painting the arch panel paintings for this in a few days.

Other news

1. I have a pain in my throat due to a tonsil cyst which comes back every couple of weeks. Is it worth having my tonsils removed for a mild annoyance, or will this not prove to drain my important well-being as I grow older.
2. I have unfriended an old Facebook friend whom I miss.
3. Recent glimpses into Edvard Munch reveals he was mad and sad, as well as a bad painter.
4. I entered a painting into a new exhibition today. This art event, which includes music, dancing, poetry and other reveries, takes place on Friday and Saturday at the modern square All Saints Church on Stewart Street, Crewe.
5. The Cubby Hole Exhibition ends tomorrow.
6. I'm now a member of the newly formed Crewe and Nantwich Art Society. We'll meet monthly on Sundays. That suits me exceedingly well at the moment.

I will now stop. Excellent progress is being made and I must carefully balance work, rest, aimless co-operative drift, analysis, event, attack of mastery, parry of doubt, and the neutrality of the void.

That's everything.

Leonardo

2011-09-22T19:38:00.001+01:00

Two nights ago I dreamed that I was Leonardo da Vinci (the painter; not any other facets of his character). This seems to have signalled something because I seem to be painting well at the moment and have completed three paintings (one finished, two underpainted) in three days. Technically there are a few subtle changes. Firstly I'm using ivory black instead of mars. I don't think that made much difference (right now this conversation is adopting exactly the character of one in the book "Return to Oz" where the mysterious habits of the Wizard of Oz were discussed - anyway I'll continue)...

Another difference is that I'm much more free in using and preparing a selection of colours now, and I'm using off-white whites that are tinted just enough. The detail level on the monoliths is also about right, and I'm making sure to refresh my memory regarding textures to be painted, and practising visualisation before working - although this is no longer conscious. It's hard to quantify what's right in many ways. Personally though I have been more focused and ascetic, shunning people more and seeking emotionless solitude. This seems to liberate more brain power and is perhaps as important as any other factor.

My recent "turkey" painting features rocks my Leonardo. Copying another artist's work is a way of absorbing their personality. He lacked confidence as an artist, painting thinly and slowly, anxiously, perfectly, worried about every tiny flaw and crack in an autistic obsessive way. This lack of confidence led to lots of "tricks" and techniques to eliminate emotional concern and reduce art to Spockian logic. This worked. Leonardo was a brass machine.

At first I thought that his lack of confidence as an artist was a flaw and that to have flair and bravado like Velazquez or Frans Hals or Rembrandt was the ideal, but for me at least over confidence produces far worse results than under. There's nothing worse than thinking your wild motions are brilliant. Everything must be scrutinised. The correct degree of focus is needed, and the right amount of élan and flair, but this must be exactly right, not too much and not too little. Let cool objectivity be the artists' guide.

...and now to today's work.

Here is the idea sketch for "Trying to Ignite Love". It's a seascape but those lines are largely just that, not solid objects. This creates a few interesting technical quandaries. I've decided to paint the background first and ignore the lines for the most part. The Sun and Moon feature, as does the large drip blob, which is flowing off a tabletop... but the important parts will be added in a top layer.

Here is the underpainting...

I have five more paintings awaiting underpainting (which includes three for the Love Reliquary). Let the season continue! Joy! Trumpets! Good painting dear readers. Bon appétit!

2011-09-20T21:25:00.002+01:00

Things done today:

1. Visited the dentist. Was late due to missing the alarm. This is the first appointment of any sort I've missed since 1999 and my Open University final exam, for which I arrived one hour late due to lack of public transport to the obscure venue. I managed to complete the exam and pass in the remaining hour. Before that I had never missed an appointment, having 100% school attendance.
2. Spoke at length to my friend Anne. Wrote a card of condolence to my friend Simon. Spoke to Paul McCartney about the merits of the second version of The Long and Winding Road on Let it Be... Naked.
3. Cast a new plaster sheet for the bas relief on the front of my reliquary.
4. Drew the front image to be later carved.
5. Finished the drawing to the centre panel.
6. Traced the right hand panel; transferring the drawing to the surface.
7. Glued the four newly embossed metal strips to the curved edges of the box (see photo). These will be gilded.
8. Researched gemstones for the glass heart object in the centre. This took an hour; browsing online always takes longer than expected.
9. Bought a spare part for the gas cooker and took it apart to investigate repair. Will employ an expert!
10. Applied to join as a founder member of Crewe and Nantwich Art Society.
11. Uploaded 20 new edits of music for IndieSFX.

Holly

2011-09-16T18:20:00.003+01:00

The following painting is Holly by Louis Smith. It was a finalist in the B.P. Portrait award last year:

I read that it's a female "Prometheus". What do you think of it? Why do you think the artist painted it? What did he mean by making Prometheus female? Where is the eagle?

These questions shot around my head too. Holly is excellently painted, and for me the answers made a picture. That painting is the one I'm working on this week. It's called "Prometheus as a Turkey Being Eaten by a Peacock". It will be a psychological representation of "Holly", a dream reflection, and analysis.

ArtsFest 2011

2011-09-11T21:21:00.001+01:00

Well I've had a hectic weekend, first collecting a painting from M.O.M.A. Wales in Machynlleth (the trip takes all day but it's a nice place to visit) and then a bisy weekend at ArtsFest 2011, a big arts festival in Birmingham. I volunteered to man the Heart of England Galleries stall for a few hours each day. It's a collective that lumps several art galleries together to reach more people. Thanks to everyone who said hello and those who helped out at the stall.I saw lots of the festival too. Lots of dance and music on show Not many painting exhibitions really, hardly any sculpture that I can recall, but lots of events for children and crafty adults. I made a clay mouse with the midland potters, got a dream catcher made, decorated a tee-shirt... and all for free. It was inspiring and fun but I'm not sure if it educated about the arts that much. I enjoyed it and aim to go back next year, and I've made notes about it which might be useful for the (local) Nantwich Arts Festival in 2012 too...Next it's back to painting. Only 3 weeks left of the painting season! The large "Invisible Woman" is complete! Hurrah! My next most sophisticated painting is called Prometheus As A Turkey Being Eaten By A Peacock. That will be a lot of work due to detail level. I'll probably start that next week. I'll sleep late tomorrow and paint something simple...

Update

2011-09-04T21:10:00.003+01:00

A busy few days darting here and there; the end of the Macclesfield exhibition at Sevens. It was great and I'd like to show there again in future. Thanks to Terry & Beatrice for the opportunity, and to Kath Laird for telling me about the shop. Some comments at the bottom.

I've also cast my reliquary arches using a solid plaster mould. It wasn't ideal but good enough. I've glued the arches on and painted them with my epoxy resin, they're really tough now. Plaster and epoxy are perfect in combination! I use a liquid casting resin by the way, not the tubed glue.

Saturday was etching day and I made a few test etches into aluminium using copper sulphate solution. This worked as well as expected, fizzing the metal away to make a relief. This will be gilded and go on the edge. It sort of goes like sandpaper where the "acid" etches, which makes it good for holding ink for printing. I won't be using it for printing though because I like the look of the plates themselves too much!

Now I'm back to painting and working on some of the many pictures I have in progress. I want to clear my inbox enough so that I can do some music before the end of the year. My album of songs is delayed and will wait, probably years, to be completed, but it will be eventually.

Of the other things that happened last week I saw a television adaptation of Wuthering Heights, my first exposure to the story that I'd been told wasn't very good. How wrong! A brilliant emotional analysis. I am now Heathcliff, of that I'm sure!

Now, some exhibition comments. Thank you to everyone who came to look and to those who took time to comment.

Busy Busy

2011-08-29T18:05:00.003+01:00

Busy busy this weekend. I composed four paintings, drawing out three and transferring them to panel. These are: Imaginary Flight Of The Victorious Narcissist and Iterations Of Isolation (the composition of those was largely complete, I just had to draw them), Love Without Sex (new composition of an idea from 2009) and Giant Looking At His Friends The Clouds which was composed but nothing more done yet. This is about as fast as I can work.

On Friday the picture above was put on display in the Lyceum Theatre, it's called The Resurrection Of The Lyceum In 1911 and was painted for the theatre's centenary celebrations which are now taking place. It's my largest painting to date (about 1x1.5 metres) and took about 28 full days to create.

Today I've been painting again, a picture called The Mathematics Of Nazimova, which is actually a repainting of one I started in January. That one wasn't accurate enough for me, but it looked pretty enough so it took some time for me to decide whether it was worth repainting. It was, and the new version is more accurate, and is smoother despite taking just one day; the other took two. Incidentally, Nazimova is the name of a silent film star, the painting is nothing to do with Nazis!

My exhibition in Sevens in Macclesfield closes today and was a success, resulting in at least the sale of two limited edition prints. I sold a painting earlier in the month in Macclesfield too, making this a good month for painting sales. In September I'll aim to paint my remaining ideas and try to complete as much as possible before writing music in October.

My biggest mistake of the past couple of years has been changing track, chasing competitions and opportunities that require new artwork, thus satisfying those demands at the expense of my original ideas. From now on I'll try to fit my ideas into shows instead of trying to tailor-make art for competitions. Sometimes this is necessary, when a theme is supplied, but I'll try not to spend too long working on things like that.

Back to work. Zip zip! Have a productive day folks!

Reliquary Progress

2011-08-26T12:30:00.003+01:00

Here is the state of my reliquary so far. Once you get down to joints needing to be less than 1mm, the slightest thing can throw the box into chaos. Most of the work so far has been working out how to get everything level, a procedure like a puzzle so that each stage is done correctly. It's not been easy and there's a mistake here...

The strip down the centre will be the inside edge of double doors. These must fit neatly, and the back must be very level so that the door swing is also level... you want the doors to open in a clean horizontal sweep and shut so that they fit exactly. This has proved to be incredibly hard, the arch shape complicating everything yet more... how do you exactly line up four gothic arches without any reference marks?

Here the centre parts are veneered and facing each other. Everything is held level on top of the back so that this represents the doors in a closed position. Even now though things aren't level and the natural spring and slight warp of the wood has knocked things out at the bottom and sides by a millimetre or two. The veneer though should be longer than the centre strip; it should extend the full length of the edge, bottom to top. That's the mistake. I'll have to remove the centre bits and start again.

At times I've felt like Leonardo da Vinci, thinking and pacing anxiously but not actually doing anything, but I can't help but aim for perfection. There is always a point when enough is enough, when it's time to "get it done". Now I've got a step-by-step plan, the rest should be less difficult.

I'm starting to love plaster again because of this and the front of this cabinet will be a gilded bas relief. My epoxy resin really sinks in to toughen it... hopefully without changing the dimensions too much! My plan is to carve it when dry, glue with P.V.A. and then tougen with epoxy before gilding. I'm performing many tests on plaster adhesion and toughness.

Once these centre parts are lined up and veneered correctly I'll stick on the two arched front doors, then add the aluminium etched edges and hinges. Then the inner veneering and interior decoration... after that the important parts of this box will be complete.

Rules for Artists

2011-08-22T20:57:00.003+01:00

Things are getting better. After two days my epoxy resin set well and the frames were saved. I was using a new type; epoxy casting resin from A.B.L. Stevens, and I now know that it takes 48 hours to set, not 24. It's brilliant stuff, useful for casting, as a super-gloss wood varnish, sealer, and painted onto plaster or clay it will sink in and really toughen it up. I'm going to use some rubber balls to assist in scanning my paintings, but enough! of such things for now.

I've been re-analysing my state after spending far too long on the physical problems of woodwork. I must get back to making art and to re-inspire me I've looked at my book of spells, my rules and procedures for creation. Among them I found my "Rules for Artists" that I wrote a few years ago. I thought I'd share them.

1. Make good art.
2. Analyse each picture coldly to ensure that it is good. Analyse its good and bad elements. Analyse its emotional content and contrasts. Analyse its techniques. Calculate how it could have been better. Make detailed notes during painting and you will learn from your mistakes more easily.
3. It is better to paint one good picture than one hundred average ones.
4. It is better to paint one bad picture than none at all.
5. Do not think about an idea so long that you corrupt it. After a time limit, destroy a failing idea and start again.
6. Do not be lazy. Do not cut corners.
7. Do not flood your own market.
8. Make your art worth a high price and charge that high price. Great artists die of poverty. Foolish artists live in poverty.
9. You will dislike all of your pictures, expect this, and ignore this. Tell the world your art is great.
10. Paint beautiful. A good picture awes art critics, small children and ignoramuses. Please all three.
11. Include an element of mystery in every picture.
12. Under state and over prove.

Sigh

2011-08-20T15:08:00.003+01:00

Well I've had a busy but unproductive week. As good results refused to appear I did my usual step of working at double speed but those results weren't any good either and I've ended up with nothing.

So let's see what happened.

Last Friday I decided to spend a week making the box for my reliquary, an arched shaped box. I'd already cut one arch from a solid piece of wood and decided to cut two more. The edges were not level, and in fact too unlevel to be useful. My plan was to level up the sides with plaster, which would be easily sanded down later. For that I had to find a process or way to work out what WAS level in the first place because all three parts had to fit together. That was tricky and used square tubes of aluminium bolted together. I did that, and applied plaster to the inside. Here are the three arches which the white plaster inside...

That took three days. NOW, that was all well but the plaster wasn't level either, AND it didn't stick to the wood and began to flake off (I really should have used wood filler) and worse, the water soaked into the wood and made the edges swell. The arches were still too even to use and I'd wasted days of work and two big sheets of M.D.F. making some useless shapes. Back to the drawing board.

I had to restart from scratch. The key element of these was similarity. The exact curve of the arch wasn't that important but it had to be the same as the others so I decided to cast the edge, and for that needed one master arch, a shape that I could make a mould for an duplicate. I decided to get this by casting a solid block of plaster (3kg) and carving out the shape. Here it is so far...

The edges are rather rough. I'm letting it dry. This took the rest of the week. The thing is, even if this succeeds I'm not going to be able to screw hinges into a plaster wall, so I'll have to cast it in something tougher. Sigh, the wood option seems better for this reason. So far I've put 11 full days work into this and spent £167.75 on materials and have nothing at all to show for it but those objects. Still, this has to be done.

Amazingly, the week got worse. Four of the eight frames I spectacularly cut in one day ended up ruined through different means, as I tried to decorate them. Three were beautifully coated in epoxy resin, but in the wrong mix ratio, and one was spray painted in the most ugly way and it's plaster parts began to flake off. I might use it anyway because it's sorry state might suit the painting.

Today I began scanning the Lyceum painting, this my largest painting has taken 27 full days so far and is on a heavy solid surface. During the process I scratched it down the centre irreparably damaging it. The damage is fortunately slight, but will remain visible.

In these circumstances I can only list the things I've learned and move on.

1. Always measure epoxy resin by volume, even if equivalent weight ratios are supplied.
2. Don't scan a painting until it's several months dry. I'll have to develop a new method for something this large and heavy too.
3. The arches... where to begin! Don't use a hand jigsaw... but I have no other option. A table band saw would have been much better. Plaster doesn't adhere to wood (although it does sometimes!). Use wood filler to fill wood, although I don't know which sort would work best here or if it would have worked anyway.
4. Keep on trying new things. Although this is more a philosophy than a lesson. If there is a lesson from this week it's STOP trying new things!

My goal for August is to finish the reliquary cabinet. That is all. I have ten more days to work at it. I wonder if hinges will screw into an epoxy resin cast and hold firm? They'll need to take a lot of weight. I don't think they will. Oh for a band saw!

Thursday

2011-08-11T19:40:00.003+01:00

Tick tick! After Monday, which was effectively a day off, I slept for eight hours and made eight frames on Tuesday. This is about the most I can make in one day. Each sawed by hand (32 bits, 64 cuts) then marked and drilled for the special batons I fit that have room for screw eyes and mirror plates. 64 holes, each countersunk. Then staining and assembly, one frame per night because I have only one band clamp.

On Wednesday, work on my love reliquary. Three models made; a sad angel, Rapunzel's tower (shown) and the embrace. I researched how to flatten out my veneer and how to fletch a medieval arrow. I'll need 1mm zinc sheets, epoxy resin and at least four pheasant feathers. Design of the paintings ground to a halt. I've been feeling so tired these days. The pain in my throat which has plagued my life for eighteen months was recently identified as a "tonsilith" which are often dormant but sometimes mischievous. Mine hurts with a dull pain in daily pulses, just a little, like a clothes peg on an earlobe or the snap of a giant rubber band enrobed with thin fur on the upper arm. I place this thing firmly in the mischief category.

I watched the film Watchmen, an excellent film about love and the conquest of loneliness. I decided then that there are only two great artworks; human relationships (personal) and science - the origins and fate of the universe etc. (cosmic).

Painting the Birth of Venus today, a painting from months ago that began large and
gradually shrunk to a more manageable size. I've found it hard to focus and remained tired to the extreme all day despite sleeping for ten hours. I attribute this to an attack of entropy, the gradual onset of chaos, death, injury, decrepitude. I'll fight it with exercise and discipline.

I'll finish the Venus underpainting tomorrow.

In national and international news the 1930's have returned. This is good news for surrealists. It is a good time to buy shares. World War three might occur within a decade.

Love and Macclesfield

2011-08-08T16:22:00.004+01:00

Trumpets! A busy weekend concluded for the better. Friday was the opening of Celebrating The Diversity at The Cubby Hole at my new tusty clonking cane was an excellent addition to my attire if a little awkward when juggling a Mr. Kiplings Cherry Bakewell AND a balloon glass of fine red wine. The gold spectacles were a visual success although covering the eyes can hinder communication and so I felt like removing them half of the time. The beret generated heat. The whole place was hot and got hotter as the evening progressed. A giant artwork was painted and I contributed some insects, birdy footprints and one or two flowers of little consequence.

On Saturday I finally completed and signed off my giant Lyceum painting. I tell myself that I've learned something but this might not be true. The days when I noted down what I'd learned and the problems I'd had are largely in the past. So what have I learned? A few technical processes regarding the priming of perspex, how to paint and store (while drying) large heavy artworks, and the use of a horizonal metal bar to rest my maul stick on. A new plastic clip for the top of my stick to stop it wavering. These are minor technicalities. What else?!...

Firstly I wasted too much time chasing detail down an ever shrinking spiral staircase. Contouring the rocks and other large details and shading them simply would have saved time and looked better (perhaps... the rocks were a disappointment at the time but on the final day I looked at them in amazement quite absorbed by the craters and canyons of the planet Mars that they seemed to actually be - perhaps the war that this painting became was itself reflected in the very rocks that caused the tension?)

The feathers looked quite bizarre and would have been much faster to paint if painted with the texture of fire, which in the end adorned not the phoenix but the grass at it's feet (this detail has to be seen in person and it worth it - as can often the be case the final unplanned flourishes of flair and élan make all the difference). The tree should have been painted over a smooth sky, I think that's undoubted. Analysis complete.

Now on Sunday I collected paintings from Bickerton. No sales. Works that did sell were typically small £40-£100 and of cats, flowers, landscapes and pretty things like that. Little originality.

Today I set up my exhibition at Sevens Of Macclesfield. The nice shop owner Terry did most of the work and even offered to hang the lot for me, which made everything so much easier. The exhibition runs until the 27th.

Finally progress is being made on The Love Reliquary, a triptych encased in a cabinet inspired by the art of the medieval reliquary. Here is the latest photo...

Olé! Onward to greater things! as the trumpets fade to cellos.

Anxiety And Diversity

2011-08-04T21:19:00.004+01:00

Well I've had a busy few days working on the Lyceum painting. The deadline for this was very tight and suddenly shifted up by two weeks meaning this, my most important and most public work for aeons, will not be finished to my standard. The stress of this combined with a long awaited diagnostic visit to the hospital pushed me into a couple of days of illness caused by inward spiralling anxiety. I have a highly neurotic personality which is a curse and a blessing. The mind carves paths and the unconscious follows the same path each time; this is a "routine". Most boring ordinary people boringly and ordinarily do the same thing and think the same thing and behave the same way all of the time. To change your routine causes anxiety because stress chemicals are required to disrupt and destroy the neural paths. Anxiety then is a tool for rubbing out and relearning something rapidly. Perhaps, I hypothesize, it's a key to imagination.

Things are now flowing smoothly and I'm nearing the long march towards the completion of this work. The painting has taken longer than any other, 25 8-hour days so far. Painting a large picture on canvas isn't easy but on a smooth panel the detail level can ramp up as high as ones obsessions will permit! I've spent long hours delving into the minutiae of feather fronds and leaves. The result is quite fantastical. It will still end up going on show unfinished. Nobody will notice.

In other news I'm making progress on The Love Reliquary. It's a box with arched edges and these gave been cut from 24mm M.D.F. ready for veneering. This stage is the most crucial because perfect geometrical accuracy is essential. The craft of good woodworkmanship is that of perfect joints, no gaps, no wobbles, no angles, just perfectly fitting engineering. It's a challenge.

In other news I have a couple of exhibitions coming up and the first is Celebrating The Diversity. It opens at The Cubby Hole on Friday (tomorrow). It's fancy dress and we're coming as mad artists and/or bohemians. Anything I wear will qualify. I want my outfit to involve a cape of pure gold. This show includes works by lots of local artists, crafters and first time creators. It's an eclectic mix, the perfect community show. We're all adding one piece to a large collaborative bit too. It feels different and refreshing from other art shows because it's about give and take.

On Sunday I'm collecting my work from Bickerton and on Monday setting up a new show in Sevens of Macclesfield. Tomorrow though I return to the peaceful solitude of the ascetic artist as I slowly and ideally by the very candlelight of Saint Luke, but probably by the sun, paint more phoenix feathers on this megalithic artwork.

Too Bee Or Not Too Bee

2011-07-28T20:43:00.003+01:00

I've scanned my Summer Bee, ready for delivery in the Cubby Hole exhibition which opens in one week's time. Some V.I.P.s will be at the opening so I'm keen to impress (it's open to the public too!) More later.

For the most part this week though I've been painting the second layer of the giant Lyceum picture. Of note!

1. Raphael used a lot of transparent pigments. This struck me while glazing too transparently and leaving the exact same distinctive marking on my painting as he did on St. Catherine. They didn't have half as many opaque pigments as we do.
2. The top "knobbles" on my gesso are being wiped by the glaze. The underpaint at that point is too weak or too thin (or both). It's so hard to get the exact depth right. Several options to fix this...
3. Ultramarine violet is so weak and transparent. It happens to be one of the nicest colours, so shy, so beautiful but too quiet to be up for much fun. I made a stronger semi-opaque purple from pyrrole crimson and ultramarine. The drapery and swan on this painting are so pretty and detailed that they draw every stare.

I've now planned lots of new paintings and completed more. August should be fun!

Masters Of The Sky and Summer Bee

2011-07-23T20:54:00.004+01:00

I've had a productive few days and have completed three paintings over the past few days; I Feel Nothing Nothing Nothing (I might add more nothings yet!), Masters Of The Sky (pictured) and Lost In The Colours Of Cheshire which was originally a study but was too pretty to throw away.

Last Wednesday another new painting, Summer Bee (below), won the first prize in the Art Support annual competition, which was a nice surprise. There were about 30 entries this year and I wasn't sure if I was going to enter at all because I had to devise and paint an idea in one evening. This result spurred me on.

That painting will be on exhibition at The Cubby Hole, Crewe, from the 5th August to the 29th of September. I've sold two reproductions already. Number three of twelve will cost £30 framed, and the original painting is £65.

Now, onward! I've listed several paintings which are in progress and deserve to be completed. These have the at least the planning complete and will now start to move on painting. There are ten.

I've also listed a few of my best ideas that would make good artworks in their own right, there are four, all new. I'll try to complete those too this year. That should make for a good year's production.

Monday

2011-07-18T19:51:00.003+01:00

I skipped Magritte, postponed for the future. My brother was visiting from London and he didn't really want to go, and I didn't really either. He's written an essay about the need for a synthesizer orchestra which was compelling. I'm sure he'll put it online sooner or later. His website by the way is www.triptreeproductions.co.uk/

I had a busy Sunday. First I updated my website, adding year-by-year tags to each page, making old paintings and poems easier to find and locate. Then I located newspapers in Macclesfield and sent of a press release about my forthcoming exhibition, then painting the drapery on my Lyceum painting and a new dark floor on it (problematical; mars black and naples yellow dries quickly and often looks ugly). Then I completed the design and modelling for a new painting, and thought up and painted a complete painting, a Bee Flower, which I'll post in detail here when it's dry (there is a small photo of it on my Facebook page).

The design and painting took five hours and while doing it listened to Brian's Gothic Symphony, an epic work that required two symphony orchestras, four brass bands and nine choirs, over 800 singers and 1000 performers! It was epic and quite wonderful, bigger even than Mahler's Eighth. It's only been performed nine times despite being about a century old, understandably.

I also wrote a theological philosophical note, here.

Now, I must resist this rambling warble and get creating. I've decided to throw away everything that is half complete. Neaten things, then make new plans and get going. perhaps I can paint my huge quantity of artworks in record time after all! I'll start planning two paintings tonight. I wonder if all artists move in frenetic spurts?

Day Eight

2011-07-15T19:56:00.003+01:00

The underpainting of this my largest painting is completed. I'm unhappy that I'll not have the time to complete this to the standard I'd like. I was over-ambitious in scale, however I've learned a lot from this painting.

I'm frustrated at my lack of output this year, trapped by too many large and unexpected projects, meaning that many of the paintings I had planned for the year remain unstarted. I've only completed about ten small paintings when my target was nearer forty. I consider only one or two good enough to show anywhere at all. Frustration frustration frustration!!

I must console myself on the positives and other achievements made. I dislike my work so much lately that the quality must be returning; relaxed confidence of ones brilliance is the best way to produce rubbish work. The giant paintings are nearly complete. Perhaps I can salvage 2011 yet.

Tomorrow I'm going to Liverpool to see an exhibition of works by Magritte. This morning I so wanted a day off. Now I'm rested and want to work twice as hard as before!

Day Seven

2011-07-14T22:12:00.005+01:00

Day Seven. Flaming feathers. I find myself staring at the picture for long periods.

I used no white today which is unusual for any oil painter. It is probably the first day I've ever done that, using only nickel yellow as the lightest shade.

The nickel yellow in the fire scene is blotchy, due to the paint being applied too thinly and unconfidently. I applied a yellow imprimatura there; blue elsewhere, so that that ultrafirst layer fades upwards. In recent times I've tried to apply a base layer that matched the colours I intended to overpaint with, so that the results were smoother. I think perhaps this is not working, instead causing me to be too complacent and applying an insufficiently thick layer of paint. For smooth perfect results you must apply exactly the right amount of paint, about one mongooses hair thick. Too thin and you can't smooth it out without removing paint and making the result less smooth. Too thick and you find yourself trapped like Indiana Jones in quicksand.

Finally today I joined an affiliate network for my art suppliers, GreatArt. You can see the link to their website on the right. These are my main suppliers and the advantage here is that I can use my own link and effectively get money off by earning commission from myself! If you buy from them then you might want to sign up to the scheme too (which includes other websites than GreatArt as well) using the button below.

Day Six

2011-07-13T19:46:00.002+01:00

Day Six; Phoenix face and the start of the wings. I thought the painting ugly for a while, a sin for I'm responsible for every square millimetre. After that I called her beautiful, and it worked! forcing me to focus all the harder on the bits that needed attention. I began a new brush, making three that I've used up in under a week! Hard surfaces really punish brushes. I noticed that when painting on canvas the brushes stay in top condition. I also began a new tube of mars black and cobalt turquoise, before I'd finished the old ones. The Winsor and Newton black turns rather grey and pasty near the bottom (as do all of their oil paints; many paints exhibit oil separation in the tube, but this make in particular seems extra thick and greyish in the second half). As with the nickel yellow their cobalt appears dull compared to the Blockx version, which costs a lot more at about £40 a tube. That colour is perhaps the most beautiful of all paints. Tip of the day is to use blu-tak to remove wet paint.

In other news my new business cards arrived today. The front and rear (web version)...

I also heard that my painting has got into the M.O.M.A. Wales exhibition. It will be on show in the gallery in Machynlleth until September.

Day Five

2011-07-12T22:54:00.004+01:00

Day Five; Rocks. This did not go well due to several reasons. This is not the first time this has happened and this problem now requires extra attention for the future. I think I'll start to contour some objects in the drawing stage from now on, objects like rocks or hair or other "high detail" objects that require shading for light plus a secondary detail texture in the underpainting. I'll correct and refine tomorrow. More on this subject later when I have time. Good night.

Day Four

2011-07-11T19:37:00.002+01:00

Day four. Fire scene. The detail finally tipped me into madness.

Painting Continues

2011-07-09T18:09:00.003+01:00

Day Three. Figure torso; naples yellow, venetian red, cobalt turquoise, mars black, titanium white. Swan; venetian red, mars black, titanium white. Tree scene. Part of fire scene.

With a steady hand and adequate eyes a tiny face is no easier or harder than a large portrait. The principle is the same when painting any object; copy the blobs of dark and light, then use knowledge of the object to expand and refine. The turquoise was for a blue back light.

In other news the Lyceum Theatre centenary poster I designed has appeared in town. I think this will be the cover of the special anniversary booklet.

Day Two

2011-07-08T18:55:00.001+01:00

Day two. Red sky: Naples yellow*, nickel yellow, light red, mars black, titanium white. Drapery: mars black, foundation white. Figure legs. Phoenix head grass.

Naples yellow is better than yellow ochre in every circumstance. It and nickel yellow are the only yellows needed for anything unless the extreme intensity of cadmium or the transparent effects of an azo are desired. Note that Winsor and Newton lemon yellow hue is dull compared to the superior, and gratefully more expensive, Blockx version; nickel yellow.

Drapery used lead white because it is to be violet and there are no opaque violets (the closest alternative being dioxazine (with a little mars black) but that colour is too unstable and dries too slowly to be considered for underpainting.) An extra glazing layer is needed so this white was chosen as it dries more quickly than titanium.

* Michael Harding naples yellow; titanium chromium yellow not "genuine" naples yellow.

Painting

2011-07-07T19:48:00.002+01:00

Day one complete. Sky; Cobalt turquoise light, mars black, titanium white. Cobalt turquoise light is the most opaque blue I've encountered. It is slow drying.

A Hand

2011-07-06T17:17:00.000+01:00

I went to Machynlleth yesterday to drop off a painting to the Museum of Modern Art in Wales. It's their annual competition. The trip takes all day, mostly on trains or waiting for them but it's a nice place and entering competitions is something I like doing. The theme is "Feeling", in particular expression of feelings the artist feels. In a way all art should do that so it's a very open subject! I'll comment more on my entry later...

Today I'm preparing to begin the large Lyceum painting. It's heavy so one thing to learn is how to safely raise and lower it from its prostrate drying position to my easel and back. I redrew the right hand today because the hands in Poser aren't up to the job. It looks a bit small now. I'll use the lighting from the computer model.

Another issue was the tree. Generally it's best to paint everything in the underpainting but with less detail. Very fine lines like eyelashes can be omitted from underpainting because these can smudge in the thicker layer of paint needed for this solid coat; but things like that are an exception. Time and experience has shown me that the more detail one adds to an underpainting the better.

Trees though can pose a problem because of leaves and fine spindly branches. Are trees best painted in the glazing layer then? I have done this, on Memory. With that the sky was solid blue, then glazed in blue, then the green leaves painted into the wet glaze. This worked fine... but perhaps if it was underpainted with even more detail on top it would have looked better? Also I like the idea of a simple rule such as "underpainting everything". As such I've decided to do that for this one, and paint the tree in general blocks of colour and refine in a glaze layer.

Either way I must make haste. The second half of 2011 must be the main event, and the first half the preparation. I feel I've done nothing nothing nothing! I have too many creative ideas and am spending too long implementing them. My mistake of the year was painting big. Large paintings are difficult to store and expensive to frame. Many competitions don't allow them as entries at all, they are more likely to be rejected due to lack of space, and they take a lot more time, work and materials, and as a reuslt fewer works are produced and fewer lessons are learned (after all, every artist is a student). I will aim to finish my three large paintings as soon as possible and next year I will paint smaller.

Logo

2011-07-01T20:52:00.003+01:00

Today I have decided to focus more on my marketing and have rebranded. My website, blog, business cards and music packaging tended to use the same font and same general look, but now this is fixed and unified, complete with a new colour scheme and a new logo. Meet Aleax...

It symbolises mathematical perfection because it is based on the geometry of the pentagram, wealth and riches because it is gold, positivity, and angellic crufiform glory!

My next step is to find a way of explaining more about my paintings at my next exhibition in Sevens of Macclesfield. Ideally I'd have an expensive printed catalogue, but cost aside, would this make people grab the catalogue and flee instead of staring at the paintings? Would grabbing the catalogue and fleeing be beneficial enough from a marketing standpoint to outweigh the cost of printing? An alternative is a catalogue to borrow... or, as is most common in quality galleries, a block of text on the wall near the paintings. I must decide quickly as time is short.

My main job at the moment is to paint my largest, most spectacular and certainly best artwork of genius that I've ever contemplated painting (I always think that about the next one in line). The first colour study is half complete. I will begin painting the first layer next Thursday.

Arches

2011-06-26T20:16:00.000+01:00

Today I've completed the drawing to my next big painting. This is to be done on acrylic plastic and needed special priming. This went imperfectly although the results are some of my best. Both of these are excellent news and I have two new tips for my "Spells For Artists" file, the list of how to's that I write and modify each time I learn a new trick...

The trick with any smooth priming using acrylic gesso is the same; apply a thin even coat as quickly as you can, using a sponge to rub and splurge it all over, then use a roller to even it out. A theoretical priming genius could do this in under a minute, which is ideal.

In other news I've made the initial plans for my love reliquary. This will be at least a box in the shape of a gothic arch. Initial considerations for the material were hardwood, steam bent. Layers of veneer. Layers of paper, a long thin pad would be dipped into glue. Papier mache or moulded paper pulp. Polymer clay. Each has pros and cons but before either can be used a mould must be made. The best option for almost all of these ideas is the same, a steel strip bent into an arch shape and held firm so that things can be clamped to it. The materials that require a solid mould will need a second inner strip. Today I marked out some wood with the arch, varnished it then stuck a sheet of glass to it. This will be my base.

The mathematics are important. The arch is golden, having a total height of the width multiplied by the golden ratio. The ogive of sharpness is one; thus the simplest and therefore most beautiful form of pointed arch is made.

It's been very hot today and I'm delaying the start of my tracing. I know it'll be two days work, or one and a half. I think my unconscious aim is to do nothing, which is the perfect motivation to do some work. Perhaps the best thing to do is wait until it's dark and begin late at night. I seem to gain the energy at 10pm to do almost anything!

Other important developments of the day:
1. I entered the Bridport Prize with a short story called The Door. This is the second time I've entered a short story competition and has given me the motivation to write more.
2. I heard Mahler's fifth symphony for the first time and loved it. Mahler has now gone up in my appreciation, after my initial insecurity about his eighth, which I feel a love growing for with each listen. Sibelius is sadly no better, although the fifth is growing slowly. Carl Nielson was initially a superior replacement but after initial optimism at hearing his fifth on the radio I'm uncertain. After listening to each symphony twice I feel unloved.

Nantwich Arts Festival 2011

2011-06-21T20:32:00.002+01:00

The weekend was fun and hectic. Set up for the Nantwich Festival of Arts was on Friday at 2pm. The boards were slightly less high than my plan, and they were also on the floor so I lugged upstairs two heavy tables to put them on, then it was home for extra tablecloths, the silk draperies I use for paintings, and after two hours the setup was complete. The opening was at 7pm.

I'd got to speak to a few artists before from the events I'd done on the square. I felt closest to Pauling Parsons, a sensitive scupltor of the human form and clearly partly angelic being, like me. Her stoneware and bronzes were on plinths near my work and she seemed always to be speaking to some interested passer by. Shan Bower was wonderful too, visiting just about everyone with an enthusiastic hug and a smile. She runs local life drawing classes and her daughter's somewhat eccentric costume art was on show next to my paintings, making a sandwich of me along with Kate McKennan's holey bread and curious objects on the distant wall. My finely painted meat lay in between in perfect symmetry.

On the Saturday I spent half of my time near my paintings and the rest of the time darting to other parts of the show. Cliff Wright, was in a distant room along with textile artist Jackie Brough (who I'd met before at Jobling Golwer; she won the competition with the theme of Silk two years ago). Cliff is illustrator of over forty childrens books, most well known for illustrating the Harry Potter books. Clearly a master of drawing, and also a really nice man and true artist. Then off to see Emma Thackham's interactive installation, where people brought along objects that meant something to them. These were drawn or added to a sculpture by a pile of enthusiatic chaotic children. The "bee thing"; Sweeten My Life was there too and everyone who tried it liked it. It involved dressing up as a bee keeper and coaxing the "queen".

The scupltures in The Residence garden were next. Glass artist Patricia Lee was there with mosaics and glass art that looked a bit liked tiles crossed with stained glass windows crossed with abstract paintings. These were layered and basically melted together. In the lawn behind were some iron dinosaurs and strange, enticing, organic, unique clay sculptures by an artist I didn't meet called Meenu Ranee.

Then a dash back to my patch and I met Stephan Swiegers, a visitor not an exhibitor who told me about his wood art and clocks. Definitely a fellow surrealist. I do hope to meet him again. Lunch then, followed by a visit to the photo-gallery place, which looked a bit like a garage and was in fact an old bicycle repair shop. I had a nice chat with stop-motion animator Mole Hill.

Sunday began with etching with Sharon Lelonek. Three of us were guided through the process from start to finish, from plain aluminium plate to two finished prints in an hour. It was great to try something new and I'm inspired to do more. Mole Hill was there making a stop-motion film and I asked for a piece of modelling wax after Pauline showed me a lump she'd been given. I liked it, smoother and stiffer than the plasticine I've been using for modelling yet just as easy to use. I've ordered some already! Cliff Wright was there and wow, his scupltures were amazing, as if proof were needed how good an artist he was. I told him about polymorph plastic, one of my favourite materials.

After lunch I took at look at Estella and Bridgit's work in Reeds Rains, I know them from the Cubby Hole and both have taken the helm at local workshops.

Then it was over to Firenze and The Cheshire Cat to see Kate McKennan's highly detailed watercolours, her of the holey bread. Kate's been everywhere, along with Janice Clarkson, Shan and Lindsey organising and running lots behind the scenes, darting between venues and being on desk duties. All of that essential activity was done by volunteers. On the way back I popped in to Enzo's to see Janice's drawings. She's a biologist with a relatively recent passion for art, but she's already better at sketching than most artists. The cafes and restaurants can present a problem for showing art because you have to look over and around people that are eating, but the places are popular and easy to get to, so there are ups and downs.

Then it was back to my patch to take everything down.

The weekend was tiring and felt like a holiday but it was great and I've made a list of things I'd like to do next year to improve the experience. The highlight was meeting new friends and artists. The hard part is going to be meeting them again. It can be hard to find a way to get back in touch, when the main reason is to say hello.

Interesting point. Pauline and I both voted for the same "favourite" artwork in the Chester Grosevenor Open, from about 400 works. It was a porcelaine cockatoo. Exhibitor Tony Evans apparently bought it!

There have already been some immediate effects.
1. I've bought some modelling wax.
2. I've refocused my drawing thanks to Cliff's reaffirmation that I'm going about it the right way.
3. I'm back to doing artwork because the festival and the three other competitions of the month are over.

...and also, the events above coupled with an Andrew Graham-Dixon documentary on reliquiaries have inspired an artwork that uses glass (thanks Patricia Lee), scuplture (thanks Pauline), acid etching (thanks Sharon), gold and fine painting! (thanks Andrew) woodwork! and clock mechanics! (thanks Stephan) and this will be interactive enough to be pride of place at next year's festival.

Certain nameless artists told me that festival creator Lyndsey Piper would not get it off the ground and in other ways expressed an unwarranted negativity, which at the start made me feel uncomfortable and maverick for helping out. They were wrong. The festival was great. It was an excellent first year and I only wish I'd seen more! Thanks to everyone who helped make it.

N.F.O.A. Postmoretem 1

2011-06-20T12:35:00.005+01:00

The Nantwich arts festival is over and it was great! The highlight of my Sunday was learning a non-toxic etching technique, guided through the process from start to finish by printmaker Sharon Lelonek. My aluminium plate is shown. Now I'm off to paint the sea at a new art club so no time to write a full report. More later with links and pics to some of the artists I met!

Nantwich Arts Festival Setup

2011-06-17T17:42:00.002+01:00

Nantwich Festival of Arts set up was today. There are nine artists in this room. The festival was initially more performance orientated but in the end, the 2D and 3D exhibitions made up the majority of what's going to be on show. There should a fair share of fun activities over the weekend though.

I was provided a space with two boards and a desk. I discovered that the boards were on the floor level, so they needed extra tables! Fortunately we had some. They needed tablecloths, which by chance I had in the shape of polyester silk which I used for my drapery studies. The creases will have to remain as a design feature. I also needed labels for my CD's. The opening is tonight at 7pm.

Last night I went to another art show, the annual end of year show at South Cheshire College. I saw the performing art bit; the dance was best, the music revealed good singers but suffered from a lack of microphone skill, and the drama wasn't very good due to lack of interesting material and, moreso, a lack of stage presence and general confidence from the performers. Perhaps this proves that it's easier to be a singer than an actor. I didn't have time to see much art though, and might take a look during the week.

The new Lyceum picture is now mostly planned. I can't decide between a solid surface (perspex, my new love!) or canvas. I've also been asked to demonstrate how to paint sea on Monday (something I've not really done, I'm tempted to do it to see if I can), and I feel the need to paint something for my art group's annual competition on the theme of "flora and fauna" (really a boring subject; we've had "nature", "self-portraits", "the natural world", "summer days" and "flora and fauna" - perhaps we'll have nature again next year - so lacking in imagination; I by the way, chose the self-portrait theme).

Really, I've not got any creative work done despite all of this busyness. I need a good few days in a row of "nothing" so that I can, at last, paint.

Eagles

2011-06-16T15:39:00.006+01:00

It's time to get some serious work done on the Lyceum painting. I had a great idea two or three months ago and it's taken until about yesterday to realise that it wasn't going to work. So last night I brainstormed a pile of new ideas and have a new candidate. It needs an eagle so I decided to make one from DAS air-dried clay. I microwaved it to dry it quickly, which worked to some extent, but there's a soft mashmallowy lump in the middle that led to some brilliant crazing on the outside.

You don't see many bird sculptures compared to heads, that's because the heavy wings tend to limp over and drop off, which is happening to mine. I might have to make another one from Polymorph.

Yesterday I was commended in the Jobling Gowler Art cCmpetition 2011 for my Colours of Cheshire painting. I like painting to a theme and always enjoy entering competitions with one. The painting for Buxton (the face/mountain in the older post below) hasn't made it into the show. That's a tricky one to get in, but I'll keep at it I think. I've also failed to get a painting into the Stockport Open. That's less of a disappointment because it's easy to enter, there was no specific theme and there were over 700 entries with only space for 150 or so, so easy come easy go. During the pickup today a lady said that she liked my painting, recalling it from when I dropped it off. That simple compliment made the trip feel worthwhile.

The small yellow spot in the back of my throat is still causing me problems but at least now after several months I have something to target. The doctors remain aloof to the point of rudeness. I expect I'll have to wait to see an expert about it to fix the problem for good but I feel the end is in sight.

More to do: I've got three sound jobs including a commission for seven pieces of music, and tomorrow the setup for the Nantwich Arts Festival. I need to collect my painting from Buxton over the weekend, which is awkward as I'm supposed to attend at Nantwich all day on both days. But the Lyceum painting must be a priority! I really should have the underpainting done this month, never mind not have anything done!! Zip! and Zip! again.

Finally, I display one of the strangest and most inappropriate of my Lyceum ideas. This shows a monolith made of bricks and theatre architecture in a desert of ashes and black destruction. Charlie Chaplin (an attendant of the theatre way back when) looks on. The original theatre was destroyed by fire and the current one has had a it's fair share of moribundity due to lack of attention, a much worse death for a theatre. Fortunately my chosen idea is positive to the point of transcendental religious experience, and in fact is an "assumption". More on that when I paint it.

Busy Running About

2011-06-11T20:38:00.005+01:00

Making badges in the square for Nantwich Festival of Arts today. It was windy, rainy and sunny in equal measure. Next week is busy. I'm probably off to Chester tomorrow to see some giants and some drumming as part of the "Chestival". On Monday I'm delivering a painting to Firenze for display for a week as part of the Nantwich Festival. On Wednesday I'm going to Macclesfield for the reception for the Jobling Gowler competition as well as my art group in the morning (possibly - although I've really no work to do there). On Thursday it's off to Stockport for collection from the Open Art Exhibition. On Friday it's the main set-up for Nantwich, and the opening party events at 7pm. Saturday and Sunday I'll be in residence at the venue, the Wellness centre next to Lamonts in Hospital Street, and I might have to sneak off for half a day to collect a painting from Buxton.

There's no time for creative work this week then although I've got some sound jobs to do, and all I want to do is rest. My antibiotics are making me feel better but my throat is in pain. I'm in fear of ending the course in a day or two and returning to feverishness and weakness and will try my best to get to the doctor on Tuesday for some new treatment. I wish that I was well. I must have aged 3 years in the last 18 months and I've lost so much fitness. However I can be blessed that after so many months of at times a quite terrifying illness the problem is finally obvious.

Next! The Lyceum painting design must get priority. I've got a large backup of paintings to do! The year seems shorter than ever and I'm not getting anything done! The photo is a crow in Buxton, made last Thursday during the drop-off for the Derbyshire Open.

Wednesday

2011-06-08T20:59:00.002+01:00

A busy day. Went to my art group and mostly finished painting by Bird Orbiting A Black Hole, which on its third attempt looks good enough. I was reminded that the Stockport Open delivery date was tomorrow so when I got back I printed the forms and labels, attached the mirror, packaged both paintings up for delivery and checked the train times and prices, printing a map along the way. Then I did the same for the Derbyshire Open, including scanning the painting (shown) which is not completely dry, but will be safe behind glass. Then I completed the Black Hole painting, which needed stars; the signature will wait. Then I updated my website and the artwork listings for the paintings to update their new status. Then I scanned another painting, Romeo and Juliet 2, which is a little too simple for my tastes.

This evening I printed and pressed ten new CD copies of The Sky Disc and revised my strategy for a major sound effects job that is underway at the moment. Now I've got enough time to begin the plans for a new painting, Giant Looking At His Friends The Clouds, which is an idea I had last night while contemplating my loneliness.

This will be painted on acrylic plastic, a surface I'm currently in love with. I have painted on very thin sheets of this before, and on 4mm polystyrene, but this is 4mm acrylic which is more viable now due to the increase in M.D.F. prices and the reduction in plastic prices. Acrylic (also known as Perspex) used to cost ten times the price of wood, now it's about four times, but with the advantage of being cut to size, less preparation work, less weight, ultra smooth, and more stable in the long term.

Off to Stockport tomorrow. Zip zip!

The Importance of an Ernest Title

2011-06-05T13:49:00.002+01:00

I've been working on music today for a change. My album of songs is on pause while I await a good enough singer, which might include me with lots of practice, but certainly not at this time. I've put topgether a small limited edition CD of my work called The Sky Disc which I'll put on sale at the Nantwich Arts Festival for a small sum to cover costs.

I've written a fun new track this morning called The Melancholy Life Of Victor Hugo. The title was chosen arbitrarily in a flash but it's important to come with something with depth and imagination to inspire the music. As a result I added some Notre Dame bells and elements of confused literacy! For me, the more depth an artwork has the better it is, and the more depth the title has the better. "Untitled" is the worst title an artwork can have! The title is part of the artwork and should be beautiful, evocative, stylish etc. everything a full artwork should be. It's the easiest part of an artwork to do, so why settle for something unexciting, uncreative and unpowerful?

Incidentally the image isn't quite the final disc artwork, which will include the singing credit to Tor James Faulkner for his excellent work on Gunstorm and Semi Automatic Woman!

Zip Zip

2011-05-31T21:37:00.003+01:00

Very busy at the moment. Today I finished the painting for the Derbyshire Open. I drew a pencil tone study for this one beforehand.

I'm mostly doing sound work this week although stopping off on Thursday to drop off some paintings at the Lyceum for my art club's exhibition, then off to Nantwich town square for a day of badge making as a preliminary event for the arts festival.

The first day was last Thursday. It was howling with wind and pouring with rain. There were hardly any interested passers by but us artists, eight or ten, had fun painting a jeep, adding doodles to a giant canvas, and me making badges with glee. Hopefully the weather will be better this time round.

Lyceum And The Doctor

2011-05-26T09:21:00.002+01:00

Yesterday I was kindly given some old rare photographs of the Lyceum Theatre, now and then, and even before by Steward Green, author of Lyceum Theatre, Crewe, a History: 120 Years. I want to use some of these old pictures for a centenary painting.

Last night I had a dream of successfully shooting invisible enemies with the minigun from Unreal Tournament. Shooting a flying enemy was tricky; first two homing missiles, then laser fire, which hit but hardly did any damage, then more lasers, then more missiles, then two more missiles before it was actually destroyed. Then a dream of the Tardis, my indestructible safe haven.

Today I'm off to Nantwich for some badge making, a preview event for the arts festival.

Tick Tick

2011-05-23T18:37:00.003+01:00

I'm working on "The Invisible Woman". The underpainting was a little rough and under those circumstances a light glaze in identical colours can help things along, so I began that process today. The delicate rainbow is a particular challenge.

I also made contact with Lyceum historian Stewart Green who has kindly agreed to put together a selection of rare old photographs of the venue so that I might paint something spectacular for the centenary. Charlie Chaplin and Stan Laurel are among the many stars who have performed there and I'm looking forward to seeing these old images which Stewart has worked hard over many years to obtain.

More work on the big blue woman tomorrow...

Nantfest

2011-05-22T15:16:00.002+01:00

I'm measuring up my paintings for the Nantwich Arts Festival at the moment. Not feeling up to it, with my now usual hot/cold/shivers/exhaustion. Dripping with sweat last night and feeling down with this ongoing and clearly worsening problem. Perhaps the worst aspect is the way the doctors have treated me, generally with contempt and mistrust. I'm sure that I've got a relatively simple, if debilitating ear infection; this evident from waking up every odd day being unable to hear, then dizziness, then a sore throat, then repeat, yet I was told months ago that I'd just have to put up with it, and that I was on my own. I'm due to see an expert in a month or two. The knowledge that I could most likely feel well in a week if treated makes me angry and depressed, the moods mirroring my temperature; flick flack. At times I despair at the hopelessness of my situation. However, I keep working and remember people like Chopin who was ill for most of his life yet managed to produce some of the best music in the world.

I continue to work as normal which is quite possible for the most part. The Lyceum poster is mostly designed now and I've got to order some printed labels for the paintings I'll be showing at the Arts Festival. The paintings are to be slung over display boards, like saddlebags, so some pre-measuring is necessary. I've wired up most of the paintings so far, using a wooden board as guinea pig to get the lengths right. Then I've got some prints to frame. To see the venue for the first time on Friday and to have it planned out and wired up by Sunday is good going. "Olé!" says the bullfighter!

Crewe And Nantwich

2011-05-19T19:07:00.003+01:00

Two projects are filling my art life. First is Nantwich Festival of Arts. I went to view my exhibition venue today and met lots of new artists. Lyndsey asked me to come along to an event next Thursday and use some fancy machine to make some badges. I'm quite looking forward to it. I've not really done any "event" type things which is a good reason to do some, so it's a good thing that someone came up with an idea, because I don't have much in the way of equipment to do a public demonstration or anything, and more importantly no way to carry it the four miles from my house to the place.

Secondly I'm due to go to the Lyceum Theatre to photograph it and prepare for the centenary celebrations. I aim to paint something for it, a spectacular masterpiece. At first I wondered how much money to ask for such a commission and soon the grandeur of the event, the unveiling with dignitaries and press cameras, cries of awe and feinting ladies, made me realise that I'd have to ask millions at least. I'll restrain myself. I'll include eternal reproduction rights and offer to design some postcards for the theatre to sell. The council would make a profit so I'm sure that they would commission me if they have confidence in my skills. I know I can do a good job, but fear that I leapt in too early with a very rough idea in our first last week that received an uncertain response. Let us see how it goes.

A short course of ear medicine hasn't fixed my ears and I'm still experiencing regular dull deaf headness and dizziness. This intoleration will disappear in a day or two only to return in a week or two. Meanwhile I'm awoken at night with shivers. This is an inconvenience more than anything as I'm trying to record the vocals to my new album Black and White. This has gone well so far, at least I'm a much better singer that I was three years ago, but I remain realistic in regard of my very average abilities. Like anything, this needs practice to perfect.

Tick tick! Keep busy.

Derbyshire

2011-05-15T21:37:00.004+01:00

It's the Derbyshire Open soon. If was was going to enter I'd need to design and paint a painting fast. The painting must be about Derbyshire so I decided to brainstorm ten ideas one night and pick the best. Some were difficult to stage or complex to paint (one, Joseph Wright's Head in an Airpump was particularly impractical) but a few fitted the bill as both artworks, pretty things and practicality.

I chose the idea above, which I'll explain because it's a bit obscure there. It's man's head like a mountain and it's crying a waterfall. This represents the mineral water that Buxton is famous for. Now see this...

The colours and general design were inspired by Bolsover Castle, with the head being browny and the landscape greeny. I grabbed a face photo and made the rest up. Painting is now in progress.

When mocked up I realised that the painting was also about the ear infection that I'm being treated for. This long term problem saddens me, primarily because I feel rather let down by the health service, taking over a year to get this far and even now not getting a certain official diagnosis. However, I am confident that I'm finally on the mend. In these circumstances I like to think that fate is at play, and that this great painting, perhaps destined to win an award! is and was the ultimate reason for my health difficulties.

Onward! I'll post images when the painting is complete, which will be within four weeks.

Marion Davies

2011-05-14T14:41:00.004+01:00

My recent portrait of Marion Davies is on show this weekend in Marbury Church as part of the Marbury Merry Days event. I've painted a few silent film star paintings over the years, mostly for practice. Marion was the partner of William Randolph Hearst, so I included the outline of his castle in the distant darkness.

There are loads of things I'd like to fix and perfect with this one but with such observation I'll remain confident that I'll improve, learn and adapt.

Next I'm working on a similar(ish) idea for a painting about Derbyshire for that county's open competition next month. I've also been given the task of photographing the local theatre and creating promotional images for the forthcoming centenary event. I hope to create an artwork for commemorate this and so will produce a concrete proposal for a large and spectacular painting later this month.

PS. For some reason the comments I seem to have received on my older post have vanished... I'm not sure what's going on there!

Optimistic Signs

2011-05-11T18:59:00.000+01:00

I have grounds for optimism, however last night I dreamed that, in a computer game, my sniper had lost the game because he shot an innocent civilian, quite nonchalantly, as well as the enemy. More on what this paragraph means later! The image is a fragment of my current painting in progress; Masters of the Sky.

Friday

2011-05-06T20:36:00.003+01:00

I've been working on sound work for the past few days. Tomorrow morning I'm going to Macclesfield to drop a painting before the judges at Jobling Gowler's bi-annual competition. These solicitors support the local arts by showing work in their offices and lobby.

I must think of good and practical ideas to do at the Nantwich Arts Festival events. My good friend Andrew made a good suggestion, painting to music. Perhaps I could resurrect my "William Tell painting", where people paint a masterpiece in the three minutes or s it takes to play the finale to Rossini's famous overture.

Ordovician Landscape

2011-05-03T20:40:00.002+01:00

I've scanned a couple of finished paintings recently and the above is one. I like it. I'm rather unhappy with my work this year and have hardly painting anything! But a few paintings are in progress and I feel that I have more energy, skill and time than last year.

My primary goal for May is to finish the album of songs started last month. Summer is nearly here! The Nantwich Arts Festival is coming in June and there are preliminary events too - and I could do something there if I think of something! So much to do. I must be better than ever but feel that my 2011 painting is unquick, unvibrant, unamazing, unsimple, unawake. I must work hard to reverse this.

The Quest painting is underpainted. I've spent more time on it than any painting for years, which has to be a good thing. I disliked it at first but I feel I'll start to like it more and more, the more I don't look at it, as with so many loves.

The Quest

2011-04-27T20:29:00.004+01:00

I'm craving solitude and peace while painting the huge Quest For Pity painting. The original idea sketch, from over two years ago! is shown.

Sunday

2011-04-24T21:15:00.002+01:00

An exhausting day. Onward!

Bust Busy Busy Busy

2011-04-22T21:58:00.004+01:00

Busy! Finished a portrait today. Lots of sound effect jobs too which must be done and require on-the-spot recording. Also, must design and execute something large and spectacular for a new project which is secret at the moment but also requires booking appointments for photography. Finish one sculpture about my family tree. Two other large paintings need doing over the next few weeks, and the final recording of my song album Black and White which must take no longer than a week. Must also apply for an exhibition in Shrewsbury and plan the paintings for the Nantwich Festival of Arts this June, and buy the wood and make frames for three paintings. Also must finalise plans for a few future paintings for artistic purposes, paint a surfer for a friend, visit Chester again and drop off a painting in Macclesfield for the second round of judging. Phew! Well that's enough for the next month. No time for entering poetry competitions... that said, should only take one day... Yeah! Let's do it! Now to read a few blogs...

Oh, the pic is the fourth repainting of a bird orbiting a black hole. I had this idea one day when coming home on the train from the R.B.S.A. gallery in Birmingham. The vision was instantaneous. I was the tiny bird circling the black hole; powerful, dense, enormous, all consuming, vast, impenetrable. Was this the art world? Or society? Either way I was not part of it, just a tiny creature on its periphery, circling ad infinitum in the bleak vastness of outer space.

That was last year. I feel like I'm in a flock of starlings now!

Grosvenor Open

2011-04-19T21:47:00.001+01:00

Been to the opening of the bi-annual Grosvenor exhibition in Chester. Quite simply it's excellent, so many top quality artworks. I've had a very tiring day and must have walked ten miles. Now signing off for the night.

Cols

2011-04-19T13:33:00.002+01:00

An A3 colour study The Quest For Pity On The Road To Self Destruction today. It's quite a horrific picture so far. I had to decide between prettiness or emotional power and I picked the latter. The colours were assisted by Holly by Louis Smith (see http://intherealartworld.blogspot.comfor a pic. Its emotion is rather "Ahhh... pretty!" but nobody could deny its brilliance in execution and imaginitive treatment of the subject. I've drawn out an idea for a quick homage to that painting. This demands a peacock!

Next for me is a truly "Ahhh... pretty!" painting, a plain old silent-film star portrait. I'd like to get the vocals recorded for the songs I started last month too, maybe I could fit those in one week. I was aiming to do them this week but my dull-ears got in the way. They feel clear today, just in time for a doctor's appointment (it's always the way isn't it!?)

Tonight it's the opening of the Grosvenor Open Exhibition in Chester. I'll be there. Now I have free time. I must make the most of the sun today, and indeed the most of any/everything else. Happy painting.

Sunday

2011-04-17T19:45:00.002+01:00

Sound work today. Also, a newly scanned painting, Gentle Healing In A Long Term Sustainable Way. Here's a close up of the nice garden bit:

It's really a tiny painting that I made up as I painted it but I quite like it.

For the past few days I've been waking up deaf with blocked stuffy ears, sniffles and generally a head that feels like it's going to explode. I've had this on and off for months but my procrastinations to my doctor resulted only in being labelled a neurotic and sent home. Of course I tried to fight such injustices and the more strong my insistences that I needed treatment the more doggedly I was refused. With luck this will all just go away soon and I can feel well again.

Next week I have a few options for work. I'd like to continue work on my songs but I'm in no mood for listening with headphones (fortunately today's sound effects were relatively simple for me). I might plan more paintings.

Ordovicia

2011-04-14T21:19:00.006+01:00

Olé! Trumpets of joy resound and echo through the empty halls of dead kings and princes about to be reborn! A new painting is complete and the walls of granite rock shatter in awe at it's arrival.

Ordovician Landscape, is a painting originally made for the Jobling Gowler art competition, which was later replaced because I was unhappy with it. The Ordovician period is an ancient geological period, thus the landscape represents ancient times, but also the birth of something new, the setting aside of an eclipse (what isn't obvious from the blurry photo is a tiny bird flying free in the streams of golden sunlight). SO the painting is about rebirth itself AND so too has it BEEN reborn, coming out better after glazing than it was in the underpainting stage. Long had it waited too, since it was initially transcribed to M.D.F. in January, fermenting and seeded, ready for today's emergence.

Yesterday I painted some initial colour studies for "The Quest for Pity on the Road to Self-destruction" a painting about someone who self-harmed to gain attention, an idiotic doomed quest, a forlorn hope, but here with some salvation. This is a giant painting although not overly complex, but there are a number of options for colourations; the sky can be just about anything to convey the mood but as the foreground monolith must ideally be yellow or pink or something like that, the sky will benefit most from being a cool colour; violet or green being the most obvious. Work is ongoing.

A third painting was completed on Tuesday, Romeo and Juliet 2, but I'm unhappy with it's simplicity and inaccuracy in shadow modelling. It's an erotic (but minutely broken) arrow made of sexual parts gently pressing into some soft flesh, rendered like a landscape. Such a delicate and fantastical subject needs to be rendered to perfection. I might repaint it.

Oh, finally, my "Abandoning a friend" painting has made it into the open exhibition at the Chester Grosvenor museum, so I'm happy about that. It'll be on show until mid-June; if anyone is in the city between now and then.

Another open competition has been launched for artists in the region; the Stockport Open. You can get details and an entry form on this website. Go on, have a go! :)

Stretchers vs. Plastic

2011-04-11T20:33:00.003+01:00

Lots of little jobs today including adding some art-print options to my website and ordering canvas. I like the TopGun canvas I painted on last week but I don't like the stretching process much. Stretcher bars are also rather expensive (£40 for wood and up to £70 for aluminium ones!) AND it seems that cracking and deterioration in paintings is mainly due to a flexible surface instead of a rigid one. So, I've been toying with the idea of sticking the canvas to a solid surface. These paintings are proving expensive now. The canvas is £16 a metre, so I thought that (the normally too expensive) acrylic plastic might be feasible at last.

Lots of options... acrylic is tough and stable and costs about £50 for about £40 of stretchers, PLUS no need to stretch, just glue the canvas on to the surface. Aluminium composite is another option, which is about the same price. Would this be more stable? Big sheets of acrylic might flex and bow. Polycarbonate is at least 50% more expensive. Is this better? It's much tougher but can yellow with age. Wood... too heavy. If I knew the acrylic was rigid I could prime and paint directly on that and ignore the canvas all together... but then every little scratch would show up so the piece would have to be perfect.

Choices choices! Is it better to go for the best and most expensive materials, or compromise? For me, I'm tending towards the best. If anyone assumes a painting is going to be a masterpiece it should be the artist (I mean, why aim to paint a substandard painting..!?), and the most luxurious and perfect bed should be made and set ready for the queen of paintings. If she turns out to be less than regal and a little flaky around the edges then at least she can claim to have a bed fit for a queen.

Sunday

2011-04-10T19:22:00.003+01:00

Sound work today. The underpainting I was working on is now complete but I'm unhappy with it. I'll set it aside to consider options. I've gained a lot of knowledge already because it's a new surface and needed a new technique for transferring the drawing and imprimatura, so something has been learned even if I scrap it and start again.

Wednesday

2011-04-06T19:23:00.003+01:00

Still painting...

Seven random points:

1. Every day this month has been good. Today some new amber cycling glasses arrived (thanks John!) which make everything look brighter like magic. Also, a laser-etched brass plaque from eBay to stick on the frame of my latest painting, Annunciation. I'm wondering if I could use these to perform "cheat" intaglio printing.
2. Yesterday I made the second round of judging in the Jobling Gowler art competition. Fingers are crossed.
3. Happy new tax year. I'll probably pay no tax this year (unlike under Labour, Ed Milliband slimier than two snails having a bubbly bath in a tub of Swarfega). Thank you government. Poverty has its upsides.
4. Lots of jobs to do including some sound work and cutting the sign for Nantwich Festival of Arts. I'll finish the painting first.
5. Bless these evening headaches. A sign of hard work.
6. Top Gun canvas is a great canvas to paint on. Will be buying more.
7. Will also be buying more Sterling Acrylix Size 4 short flat brushes! These have outlasted my hog hair ones by about 10 times.

Keep happy. Keep working. The future is ours!

Now to take a look at other blogs :)

The Invisible Woman

2011-04-05T19:07:00.002+01:00

First day of underpainting The Invisible Woman, my largest painting yet. Last night I measured the width and height of a square on the monitor and discovered that it was NOT square, which explains why I've had trouble with my vertical axis when drawing from the screen. I was trying to copy something that was stretched vertically. Gah!

Very busy for the next week or so while I paint, so apologies to those blogs I'll not have time to read.

Friday

2011-04-01T19:34:00.003+01:00

A busy day today; Quarterly backups on the computer. Laying out and ordering the prints for the Nantwich Arts Festival sign. Buying some new shoes, looking for cycling glasses, investigating frame prices, and costs of acrylic plastic (it was rather bendy at 2mm, I might end up ordering some cast 4mm acrylic sheeting online), checking the train times for the pickup from the RBSA tomorrow, finishing some sound effects, marking out a new painting idea (just setting the size really), printing one test business card for a local garage, staining the Annunciation frame, seeking the foamboard I had but have apparently now lost, a quick visit to the bank and filling in a copyright waiver so that my museum painting can be catalogued, oh and I popped into The Cubby Hole for a brief rest and a chat. Oh, and setting monthly goals and analysing the results of March. And making a list of people to inform should I move house.

Tomorrow's jobs are fewer, but time consuming travelling; to the Grosvenor Museum in Chester to enter the 2011 open, then to the RBSA in Birmingham to collect Genesis of Terror.

Primary goals for April are to complete the Lyceum Theatre project, the Tickt to Crewe project, paint a portrait for Marbury Churh, underpaint The Invisible Woman, and make my bit of the Nantwich Arts Festival sign. Phew!

So, things to ask myself...

Is cast acrylic sheeting better than extruded for painting on?
and
Where can I get cheap yellow visor-type cycling glasses?
and
How much more could I get done if I had a clone or two? :)

Two areas of research I've read online interested me; that smile frequency was proportional to life-span and relationship stability (easy when you think about it) and that heavy exercise extends life span, not reduces it. Keep busy friends - and keep smiling :)

Lots

2011-03-29T20:28:00.005+01:00

...of news today! I've been painting a picture called I Feel Nothing Nothing Nothing (I think that's the right number of nothing's) The photo is too bad to show but I managed the underpainting in one day which cheered me up. Yesterday's portrait was inaccurate AGAIN. I've painted the thing about four times now. Still, perfection must be insisted on and my Kate Bush portrait took seven redraws before I obtained a likeness.

Now...

That was the result of my first try at collography. I took a rectangle of card, then stuck some masking tape to it to add texture. Then I rubbed thin oil paint onto it, and wiped most off again with newspaper. Then I took some watercolour paper that had been soaked to make it squishy. Then passed it and the oily plate through some rollers (actually a Cuttlebug). And, voila! A print! Thanks to Sue for showing me the process. I like this. You can add any sort of texture to the plate; string, papier mache, moulding paste, feathers, leaves, anything.

Finally my painting has been chosen for the poster for the 2011 open exhibition at the Grosvenor Museum! I entered the painting into the competition two years ago. The museum's art director liked it and aksed me to donate it to their permanent collection, so I did.

The delivery days for the 2011 competition are this Friday and Saturday. Entry details are here.

Sunday

2011-03-27T22:22:00.003+01:00

A nice day. A trip to the zoo, visiting new friends, and my first experimental collography. I'll post images soon. I'm exhausted now.

Music Cover 1

2011-03-26T11:47:00.003Z

Well the inital recording bit of my latest musical project is done. I decided to record each song quite quickly, one per day, and leave the refinements, which can be time consuming, to a later date when I record the vocals. I've quickly come up with a cover design too. Not 100% sure about it but I'm happy with the general idea of it.

I'm still a little tense today and have decided to do some pleasant painting or artwork of some sort. I've got a lot of large and complex paintings in the pipeline and I'll enjoy doing a bit of this and that over the next month or two, popping along to this music along the way.

Nantfest

2011-03-25T20:10:00.001Z

The full logo! Ta da! (see post below)

Nantwich Arts Festival

2011-03-25T15:57:00.003Z

Still a bit shaky today but work goes on. I've been asked to contribute to Nantwich Festival of Arts, a weekend of arts activities in and around the Nantwich area. One key idea is that the main logo and lettering has been designed and made by different artists, a word each. I've contributed the date numbers, a montage of my paintings which I'll print and hopefully add some lights to (depending on how this looks!)

The festival is the brainchild of sculptor Lindsey Fox. She's an excellent recruiter and she needs to be when funding for this kind of thing is so scarce. The success of the festival depends on a large number of people each contributing a little bit. When people ask me to help with something I tend to say yes! to everything, then later think gosh! why did I say that when I'm far too busy? This time I said no for that reason, and quickly realised I must say yes! to this, and so thankfully did.

Other yes! moments this year will include two projects; one about my home town of Crewe. Crewe is essentially a Victorian industrial town, established by immigrants who moved here for the work. In this project artists express their roots. The other project is to celebrate the centenary of the local theatre, and should consist of memories. Gosh! I'm going so busy; I've got at least 20 classical paintings to paint and release two albums of music too this year!

I've not felt like doing much today and my thoughts keep drifting all over the place. I'm reminded how much art helps me, guides me, calms me, enhances me, empowers me, and connects me with other people, like you.

Tense

2011-03-24T11:51:00.000Z

I slept for only about an hour last night due to anxiety after a somewhat vicious verbal attack that took place, of all places, at my weekly art group. Two weeks ago I was told that I couldn't attend in the afternoon any more, and could choose to stay only in mornings or all day. We have two daily sessions, morning and afternoon, and places are limited. Some people come in mornings, some afternoons and some stay all day. I tended to do a bit of each. We've got about one spare place in each session (although in practise there are always a few more because not every member comes every week).

Up until that point I was free to choose to stay if I wanted. Of all members only I was told that I could no longer attend afternoons and I felt upset at this because it was a restriction of my freedom. I also thought it was a bit illogical because there are often spare places, but I didn't say that at the time. Later after talking with another member I thought that everyone should feel that they could switch round a bit if they wanted and wrote a two sentence letter stating that I'd like the freedom to choose to stay and that I thought that everyone would want that right.

Unfortunately the most powerful personality in the group and de-facto leader is a bully who can't be crossed. Several members are afraid to air their concerns or oppose his will, and so the way the club is run tends to be decided by him. There are odd consequences of this, I remember a unanimous vote for a special day where members bring in work to explain it. When the day arrived nobody wanted to participate, and in fact people had to be shouted at, or rather ranted at, about team spirit and such to make them participate. Of course the whole affair was because people were pressured to vote for a day they weren't that interested in.

Anyway, yesterday's debate ended up with me being shouted at for (apprently) desiring to cull nine members of the group so that sufficient space was available for everybody to stay all day. A complete paranoic extreme exaggeration of reality, used to force me to back down. At first shell shocked, I found the experience traumatic and am now far too afraid of the club to consider returning.

I know about how to cope with trauma, due to my interest in psychology. What's been shown to help is: Writing (not talking) about the experience. Writing about the benefits of it. Drawing the experience. Taking exercise to cope with physical stress. These things I have done and will do. The experience was worth it for the painting idea shown alone.

Most people could probably easily cope with a purely verbal beating but I'm a sensitive soul and unused to dealing with people (before I joined the club I spent nearly twenty years in isolation and the social contact has benefitted me and changed me in myriad ways). I think that sensitivity is useful and important to my artwork, and must be preserved. As such, I must seek to detect and avoid negative agressive people in future.

I'm too stressed to work today and will go for a walk in the spring sunshine. It's nice to see the sun.

2011-03-21T20:06:00.004Z

Music work today and a track called Heal The Sick. Yesterday I finished most of the work on "To Resist Man and Ulimately Defeat Him" which is tricky due to the need for rock guitars. This clip includes part of a verse and the chorus. I gave the guitars a random delay of a 20 millisecs to limit the regularity a bit, and did something similar for the snaredrums which play a tiny bit late, to give a more heavy rock sound.

To Resist Man and Ultimately Defeat Him - W.I.P. Clip by Mark Sheeky

Of course there's a lot to do yet...

Showing work-in-progress

2011-03-19T12:06:00.002Z

The Drawing Diva wrote something unusual about herself and passed it to me so I'll simply say that I'm so normal it's unusual. I'd probably fit in the middle of every test. I think the personality is the conscious mind (what you think), the unconscious (what your uncontrollable mind and feelings think) and your actions. When all three are aligned calmness results. Unfortunately my unconscious is often trying to do the opposite of the others, so I'm highly energetic. That very opposonification creates imagination which is probably common to all surrealist thinkers. When you can see every possibility, the best choice must be calculated and selected. That's why true surrealists dress neatly and behave like perfect citizens, because they are. True masters of civilisation.

I've been producing music over the last few days and have updated my software to help me. It's amazingly useful to have my own software to write music. I can produce a good quality pop song in hours and I'm so pleased with my own accomplishments that I might just award myself a new spring narcissus. Har har.

Anyway, the tunes are good and I want to share them! But then, like in painting there is a dilemma. There is a definite emotional "zing" when you see something amazing for the first time. That is due to the relative difference between the ordinary and the extraordinary. Watch a sad film when feeling happy and the effect is all the more amazing. As such, it's always best to see an artwork for the first time in the best of circumstances. Ideally, after a humdrum ordinary day but when the mental facilities and senses are awake.

It spoils that special feeling to hear clips or see fragments instead of the final version. I never watch film trailers for that reason, and I regret hearing clips of great songs before hearing the final finished version (of course, you don't know if it's great without the clip; but I do my best to set aside special time for a first listen, through headphones in subdued light. I remember listening to Jean-Michel Jarre's Chronologie in those exact circumstances and it was worth it).

However, it's also good to share and understand... I'd like to hear the work-in-progress and thoughts of Jean-Michel while he worked on it... although perhaps after I'd heard the final version. The modern impatient human wants instant gratification and the number one key marketing tool is giving something. When I'm happy with what I'm making I really want to share that. Surely people can decide to watch a trailer, or hide their eyes?

When I made computer games lots of damage was done by releasing games early. The people who experienced an early flawed version never again tried the improved version, and instead would endlessly criticise the faults in their version. For similar reasons I rarely show anyone my half complete paintings. People tend to un-point out all of the lack of bits that won't be in the final version (I hope you can decipher that sentence).

So perhaps the best solution is to show work in progress only after the final work is finished, as Don often does on his blog...

Thoughts?

Annunciation

2011-03-16T18:54:00.006Z

Today I scanned in my painting Annunciation which is a cross between Van Eyck's Annunciation and the Kandinsky below. Can you see the connections?

In other news I went to my art group today. It's rather full now and we're discussing limits. I think it's too full as it is really, with a split now between morning and afternoon visitors that essentially means we can't choose to attend either or both; there's not enough room, and places have to be set and stuck to. Ideally there would be the odd free table to allow for some flexibility. Ten people in a room is a nice number. Thirty is a bit less social.

I drew a portrait there, a silent film star called Marion Davies. I've painted a few plain portraits before and they have all sold so I'll paint this for that purpose, but like the others, I'll paint other variations that are more creative, all using the same underdrawing so I can save time.