Painting in progress...

OK, as promised earlier, here's a couple of painting pics. This is of my new pal, Danny, who is a sculptor and a university lecturer. I wanted this to major on his hands, as that's what he's about. We went for a walk in the woods near the university to see if we could find something that corresponded with the plan I had (see sketches)...

and he was going to bring a bit of his sculptural stuff.. but in the end we both forgot to bring that, what with all the clutter that I'd brought, lenses, tripod, reflectors and what have you. Danny was wearing shorts and the area is known for black snakes so it was a bit scary. I did actually get almost exactly that shot in the lower left sketch, but without the sculpture it looked odd to say the least.

Anyway, we found this tree with low branches that meant something to Danny and I liked this pose, it makes a lot of his hands, but once I was back in the shed, I was wishing that the sky wasn't so white to set his head against. I've tried to darken the area behind his head and added some limbs that aren't actually there in reality, but I'm still not sure about it. Anyway, thought I'd put something up. The head is getting close now, and the rest I'm going to keep as loose as I can. Bit more in the hands and arms, but I really don't want to overwork it, if I haven't already done so. We'll see.

I'm not sure about the clashing colours... anybody got any ideas?

Omnibus edition...

I'm sitting here with wet clothes on and it's raining hard outside. This is the storm season here, and we're all prepared, statewide, for whatever comes. This time of year they have adverts on the TV reminding us to make sure that we have torches with fresh batteries, candles, plenty of food in cans etc. The weather is so unpredictable... and can be violent. The sky has been rumbling for an hour or more and I just had time to clear the gutters (been meaning to for a couple of weeks or so... I tend to do it every 6 weeks, but more often this time of year. We have a tree immediately outside the front of the house that is legendary for dropping leaves all year round and sometimes for dropping the limbs themselves. They call it the 'widowmaker' (Eucalyptus). Bit of a worry that, I'll be honest, although they don't tend to drop whole branches unless there's a drought on.

Tracey and Rob and the kids have all gone away for a week or so to Melbourne and then to Tazzy, so looking at the sky and stroking my chin like the sage that I'm not, I thought I'd perhaps park two of our cars under their canopy, in case the clouds were bringing some of that nasty hail that I've mentioned a couple of times before. I couldn't get the Ute in as it's got a starter motor issue and Daile was out in the little-un. I picked up a tarpaulin that Matilda has been playing with and began to fold it up with a view to putting it over the bonnet of the Ute to protect it from whatever was coming. As I picked it up I noticed movement and saw a spider next to my hand that was almost as big as the hand itself... but it ran away like a rocket. It's funny to think how blase we've become about this stuff now. Four years ago that would have really freaked me out!

The weather had really closed in this morning. You can FEEL the temperature climbing prior to the storm... and your clothes start to stick to you. It felt all the more close given that today we had decided that we'd put up the tree... and call it Christmas. You go around the house opening everything that will open, never mind the mosquitoes, then when the storm comes, you have to rush around closing everything up again to keep the water from blowing through. The sound is awesome, especially in the garage that doesn't have any insulation in the roof, so it's just the tin roof and a sheet of plasterboard. I don't really know why corrugated tin roofs are so ubiquitous here, but it wouldn't be Australia without it. You get that lovely feeling when you're in the darkness of the garage with the roar of the rain hitting the roof, watching the sheets of rain overflowing from the gutters (even when they're unblocked). It comes down so fast that sometimes it can run over the inside of the gutter and across the soffit where it runs down the light fittings and drips off the exterior bulbs. It's a badly built house from that perspective, and some of the ceiling was damaged by this prior to our taking it on. It's been fine since we moved in, although in a really heavy storm we do get a river running through the breather holes at one side of the garage, across the floor and out under the roller door on the other side of the router. The kids and I get leaves and have 'boat' races across the garage at those times, with the sound of the rain for company and the release from the oppressive heat to make us all feel better. If there's beer in the 'Dad' fridge for me at those times and spare milk in the upstairs one for the girls, it's perfect.

We had the junior concert the other day, the one that I'd been making the hats for, and it went off a real treat. It was actually much better than the senior school version that Matilda had been involved in, as it was a really nicely thought through production involving the whole of the junior school in one big story with each class contributing a performance that was part of the collective.

Here's a few pics of some of them. I'd been lent a camera by Peta, and she's got a fantastic long lens for this kind of stuff... I didn't get brill pics of Phoebe which is a pain, (too busy trying to also get pics of our mates kids, but you'll get the idea anyway.

The flower girls...

Olivia...(My favourite little imp) she's SO cute!

one of the grass props...(from cardboard)

Feeb...

Aaliyah...

Natalia...

...the bugs. (Apparently the different expressions I'd painted on them, sort of corresponded with the character of the boys...according to Mrs George!) This is Jackson...

...more Feeb...

and with Kyla...

This week, I've delivered my first commission. He was (he says) 'Over the moon Brian'... but since he's American, he of course didn't use English footy language but said something like 'Wow' or some such gratifyingly impressed thing, which was nice... and a great relief as it's been a difficult little pic to do. She's a 'bonny wee thing' but the photo (the only photo I was given of her) was quite bland from a tonal range point of view. I'm not sure that it's quite THAT good, and to be honest, I feel that it's a bit of a shame. It's on the website if you know where that is.

I'll put up some paintings here when I'm a bit more sure of myself OK?

Meantime, I'm doing a larger painting of a guy that I've made friends with recently that's a sculptor and a lecturer at the local university (or one of them). It's being a bit of a struggle too, but I'm going at it diligently and I'm making some headway, even if it's only against my own personal ghouls. I really want to be able to achieve the kind of painterly skill that someone like John Singer Sargent had. He was pulling amazing paintings out of the hat by the time he was in his late teens and early 20's so I've got a bit of catching up to do eh! I've also been trying to find someone famous that I can paint for one of the forthcoming competitions (around March or April for submission). I'm not confident that I could win one of them, but art is so subjective, you just don't know, and you have to be in it to win it don't you. Obviously, the whole being an artist thing is a bit of a worry and stress, and Daile has been a real trooper about it, but I can say that when I'm painting, I feel 'in the zone' relative to anything else that I've been doing in the last few years, so all I need is a break I guess... and lots of practice. It IS possible to make a shit load of money if you can get a good style, get a good break, and are prepared to market like crazy. Winning a competition isn't the only way to make it of course, but it's a real crog up!

Dan (the guy I'm painting) is doing a PhD in the way that we interact from an aesthetic perspective to the touch of something. Beauty is in the touch of the be-HOLDER' being the operative idea I think. He's a very interesting and interested man... with a compelling manner that leaves you feeling privileged to just be hanging out with him - and since I don't normally resonate with people all that readily, this is a bit of a novelty for me.

Interestingly, I've met several people since I slung the hook, that I've had quite long and interesting conversations with. I seem to be having them in the street almost... with waiters or CEO's, shop assistants, and Professors. I met a guy at a do last night that is an academic at QU doing research in the way that animals perceive colour. A lot of what he's doing has a direct correlation to what Dan is doing.. and it's great to be hearing about it and seeing the potential connections. Justin (the bloke I met) was telling me that simple crustaceans such as shrimps, have 4 times the receptors that humans have in their eyes.. and that some of those receptors are capable of seeing ultra violet. His area of interest is in how animals communicate. Why do some fish have bright colouring and can afford to be brightly coloured even though that makes them easy to see, and others can't. He's been doing major research about this doing extensive long dives on the reef where he and his team are underwater for days at a time...without coming up... so that they become accepted as part of the scene down there. One of the things he's discovered is that the predators are not always equipped to see the same things that we can see, so that what appears to be a bright colour to us, may not be to them at all and could be camouflage! He's a marine biologist. Matilda wants to be a marine biologist, so I was particularly interested. He's also nearly 50 and a pom that wears a kilt. I love the wacky as you know.

So anyway, I'll finish now... the rain has stopped, the sun is out and the oil needs changing.

Testicular oration

Now that I'm an 'artist' I have to have an 'artists' statement to accompany my work. I've been concerned about this as I'll need one soon, although I do have a good story to tell, what the visit of Molly that galvanised my interest in painting, the illness, the dead end job and OC blighted boss... etc.

However, today I came across a website that does it all for you! What will they think of next?

You'll need to follow this link to see for yourself:

http://www.artybollocks.com/#

Ha ha

Miss Shailer Park...

Things tend to get in the way...

This last little while I've been distracted by a job that I foolishly agreed to do for the junior school musical. It's been a mad dash to make 25 latex insect hats. It's my own fault that I didn't just make em out of cardboard though... I'm such a mug!

Here's some pics of the workshop blathered with them.







They all had different expressions...

Last night when I was out life drawing and Daile was out at work... the baby sitter (Louise) was up to her tinker like behaviour again with the girls. She's a bit of a dark horse this one. Anyway, when I got home she was keen to show me a little video that she took of Matilda dressed up in a tutu... doing a beauty queen thing!!!! Phoebe had bribed her with a purse that got to 13 dollars! (You can imagine the haggling can't you). When we saw it, Daile and I decided to help Phoebe out on the grounds that it was a noble thing that she'd done.. and pitched in to $5 each ha ha. Louise was filming it, and Feeb was showing Matilda what to do! (Sorry that the vid goes on it's side... she turned the camera to portrait and I don't have software to sort that out).

I give you..(with Matilda's permission) .....the evidence!

Catharsis...

We've got a 'system' on a Saturday morning. We attempt to get the house tidy at least once a week. The girls play up, but hey it's part of growing up, so they have to do it. It quite often takes them all morning, or even sometimes all day to tidy up their rooms. It's a bit of a waste of time, but sooner or later they'll get the idea that they could do it in an hour or less I'm sure.

Anyway, today as I was sorting out the study, and was trying to find spaces for all the books, I said (as I've said several times before) to Daile, that we need another shelving unit to take the overflow. It occured to me at that now that I've decided not to be a manager any more point that it might be a good idea to lose some of the books that relate to that. (I wasn't thinking of throwing them away, but it could be an idea to sell some on eBay or give them to those people who still think they should be reading that kind of thing...)

So I started to sort through the shelves. It was really cathartic, and I realised that having these books there has been making me feel like a failure. They're all about stuff that I've finally realised I'm not able to do, nor will EVER be able to do. Accounting! Investing! Money management! Human resources management! What was I thinking of? In fact, why did I ever do an MBA at all? I can't really see how I went there now to be honest, I really can't!

Anyway, in deference to all the hours that went into it, and all the sacrifices that Daile made for me to be able to do it, I've kept all the books related to it, and quite a lot of other management books that actually have something worthwhile to say... but I've pulled out quite a few that I'm either never going to read again, or that are actually completely useless.

This is what the pile looks like! It's almost as tall as Matilda! It was like squeezing a spot to be honest! Ha ha.

I'm an 'artist' now!

It's been a while... and quite a bit has happened since the last blogging... not least of which is that I've given up working for the company I was with, and have taken the plunge into being 'an artist' which sounds very scary and ethereal to say.

What's prompted this is the recent brush with prostate cancer, coupled with a difficult boss... and a very boring and frustrating job. The other tipping element was the Stanford speech that was given by Steve Jobs a few years ago, that I saw on the TED site the day after he pegged it. In it he says that if you wake up for too many days in a row and can't answer the question ' if this was the last day of my life, would I be doing what I'm about to do today?' in the affirmative, then you probably should have the courage to change what you're doing. As Wayne said, 'it's easy for HIM to say that!' .. but it kinda ate away at my already weak propensity to stick with the job, and then events conspired so that I was going to be getting a disciplining and orientation meeting to straighten out my crap performance. I just made it easy for them instead.

So I've leapt into the void... again!

This time though, it's for something that makes some sense to me... rather than being a half cocked idea. If I blow this, I'll feel that it's unfortunate rather than that I made a mistake.

I'm working on my first commission this week. It's only a small and not very expensive portrait of the wife of an ex work colleague. It's a bit of a struggle though as the picture that I'm painting from is poor.

I'm also doing life drawing twice a week if I can, and once a week for sure. The for sure one is a class that I'm involved in the running of, so that happens every week, and the other one only happens if I can get out of the house in the evening which largely depends on Daile's schedule.

Daile is super flat out right now, so it's me and the girls a lot more than it used to be, and my being around is a great thing for them - not having to go to after school care and that kind of thing. I also got collared to make some masks/hats that look like grasshoppers for the school play, (Phoebe's class). There's 25 of them to make!

Not only that, but when they asked me to make some stands to put some 'grass' props against, I asked them what they meant and said 'you don't want to do it like that you want to do it like this....' and then they all reckoned they couldn't so I've ended up making the grass too. Like below but 6 off all together...

We had Halloween since the last blog too.. Here's the Feeb helping me make the pumpkin and Matilda playing the part of a zombie. (just before losing the cast!)

We got the cast off last week, and then they took another X-ray...

...Matilda's exuberance at getting her arm back was short lived as the X-ray showed that there was still a significant gap between the broken bones. There was the growth around the outside of the break, which is holding it together but inside, surprisingly, looks so much the same as it did, that I had to look closely to see the difference between the 'then and now' images. Matilda saw it and got it straight away. She was upset as she'd been looking forward to returning to her life as a surrogate Bear Grills... and asked if we could postpone our family trip to Fraser Island until it's fully restored to outback strength. Bless her.

Finally, here's a picture of the Feeb... with the beginnings of 'attitude'. :-(

You talkin' to me?

Molly just sent me this. Remember that blog I did a while back with animals that reminded me of people, well this one, well spotted by Molly I reckon... is Matilda. Ha ha.

Here's a link to the original post:

http://livingwithshackledraggers.blogspot.com/2007/11/seeing-things.html

Phoebe's birthday and stuff

Hello peeps!

Well yesterday was Phoebe's birthday as many of you will know. Here's a few pics as promised.

She was awake at 5.30am of course, and rather sneakily I'd fallen asleep in the spare room, so I had a lie in until she was un-containable at around 7am.

So, here she is opening some of her doll's house stuff from Gilly, Bill and Holly,

...her dress from Gannie and Grandpa,

one of the shirts from Molly....

and an outfit from Joe, Sarah, Sam and Eddie.

Later, as if she hadn't had enough, we went off to the shops to buy some stuff with the money that Carlene had given her. She bought this hat, some sunnies and a little handbag, all coordinated with her blue stripey dress and shoes from Joe and Sarah.

Here's Phoebe showing us how it's done...

Matilda couldn't figure it out....

we thought she should try... but she didn't get it as you can see!

Nor (really) did Daile....

so... I felt I just HAD to show them how you're supposed to do it! I'm the best at it don't you think?

Been speaking to Molly this week about her first week at Falmouth Art College. Woohoo!

She's going well, and has been stacked up with lots of really interesting sounding tasks. The people in her shared house are apparently good value too, so that's a bonus. We really miss Molly and Josh. Phoebe's been in training for 'Australia's got talent' and she's been practicing with some of Molly's songs that we've got on our computer, plus one called 'broken record' that she put onto myspace a few years ago.

Thought you might like to see some stuff that I cut out fairly recently. Some stuff for a lovely bloke that makes accordions and banjos and some chairs/stools/tables that slot together for a Japanese architectural company in the West End. This was one of three 8' x 4' sheets worth.

An enigmatic pic of the Feeb...

an embarrassed one of the Tild holding her robotics trophy...

...note she's wearing her 'escape from the wilderness' home made parachute chord bracelet. This is stuff we had specially flown over from Perth!

Since then of course, she's broken her arm (see pics above) falling off the rope bridge from the tree house to the platform on an adjacent tree. She's never fallen off anything before, so I'm under some moral pressure about the bridge... I personally reckon that you've got to let kids fall off stuff, trip up, bloody up now and again, to learn.

It's starting to be a bit hotter now and the flies are coming here and there... so I've dug out my new tennis racket fly swatter. I had one of these in the UK but get this... it was confiscated at customs on the way in. We were all bemused. Presumably it was because they thought the dead flies would be carrying mad cow disease or something. Did I ever mention that I went to give some blood last year? I was walking down the street in central Brisbane and I saw a sign for it, so I thought I would you know... public spirited person that I am. They gave me a form, i filled it in and handed it over, to be told very curtly that they didn't want MY blood! I asked why, indignantly, to be told it was because I was British! I ask you! Bloody convicts! Ha ha. Seriously though, it was because of mad cow! Makes you wonder doesn't it!

Anyway, this one's better, it's got a torch on it?!

Daile's not here... she's at work. Always at work these days. Poor girl. Don't know how she's keeping going.