Gallery 4

This gallery happened because I inadvertantly created it whilst re-building my "galleries area on the pages side of the blog.
It seemed to be taking an inordinate amount of time to actualy publish stuff as I went along. I took this to be down to the fact that more and more images were appearing.
I started to think what it may get like in six months when I get closer to realizing some sort of historical documentation of how and why my work has evolved along with pictoial evidence.
So
I have split the galleries up into four parts, and hope that will give me some breathing room, before there is too much for the site to cope with.

Gallery 1
Starts from Shepherds Bush where as a fourteen year-old, I discovered creativity and moves onto the point where Anne and I have just returned from India after spending over a year there at 30 years old.
Gallery 2
Is based around Cardiff and a massive studio that I had there, even though a fair proportion of that time was spent abroad. It includes a large mural painting spree and a few exhibitions in Wales and ends with the death of my father.
Gallery 3
Starts with our academic trip to Western Turkey, Our life in Istanbul and birth of Aydin. Move to Birmingham. The M.A. course and large show at St Martins in the Bullring.
Gallery 4
Begins with the X-Ray factory in Smethwick and covers all the events that took place there. It also covers all the spin-offs and the various projects I have been involved with since.

The Motherlode

THE PROVERBIAL MOTHERLODE
I see this site as the proverbial Motherlode.
The nerve centre of all the work Ive been doing all my live and all the work Ive put out into the ether.
It's a diary, starting with current and going backwards in time with different pages offering different slants on things.
By connecting to links, I would like to make it possible to embark on a journey all over the proverbial place.
But eventually, back again.
I would like to make it possible to make the same point, from the same eyes, but from different view points.

CURRENT PAGE
I left The Cube in October '80
I see this folder as starting from then.
There is a lot of sketch book work made between Cornwall and Erdington.
There are also a series of paintings I have been engaged with in my studio in Ladywood and at home.
I would like to present them here in situ - in the place they were made, no frills as it were.
But with links to more readable sites.
Of course the name will have to change as I become embroiled in other activities or maybe it will simply be moved to the "Gallery" page. Which I fear will have to be split up at least once to avoid the congestion and lack of storage capacity that seems to be building up.

HOW TO READ my ART 3000
This site isn't especially about presentation. It isn't a convenient way to sell myself. Although I hope to have many of the images and some of the areas linked up to other sites. I also hope to link some of the images to pertanent areas of other sites where their backgrounds may be covered in greater detail.
I see it more as a library for as many of the things I have made to be stored in as possible.
I also (hopefully) see it as part of a chain - a hoop of sites regarding my work, that one could pretty well get lost in

Loon's Encyclopedia

Loon's Encyclopaedia for the absolute twit.
TREE HOUSE
Is of an ongoing, personal and pretty well historical nature about my life and why I came out with some of the conclusions that I have done. Although it doesn’t attempt to pinpoint or explain them.
It is generalised - or at least tries to be and will be!
It doesn’t go into specific detail, it links chains of events up.
I need to take some pages out and maybe add a couple more.
A CURRENT page would fit as it is a chronological piece, would work with and beef up the daily blogs and in time become historical anyway.
-a process of explaining what is going to be before it happens.
Creating the encyclopaedic branch gives me a chance to cover certain important aspects in depth. Quite often parts of my history that got away.
A collection of views about issues, extended articles, songs, and theories.
Because it fits into the tree house intermittently in all aspects - it can be continually referenced.
Moving to Loon's Encyclopaedia:
DITTIES
Songs and poems that I have hit on at this moment as a collection. Even though they have influenced me in the past. Changing to "VERSES"
(Add "My Way" - the title. X "Clear Spot")
ACHILLES SHIELD
Not a finished presentation in any way, but the information I have from each verse with the idea of tightening it up later.
i.e. put everything out quickly as a base to work from later.
Creating in Loon's Encyclopaedia:KASHMIR
3 months on a house boat, check note books for a title.
Based around the set of large watercolours as a kind of show with back up material on each if possible - black and white photos and work from sketch books and letters.
There is a list of paintings - maybe scan it.
A WOODEN OM.
The book based around the air mail layout with extras from the fast and furious sheets, embellished with cutting written stuff, a couple of photos here and there and the odd painting if it fits - just to brighten it up!
The header could be me carrying the large Om painting.
SPRIGGY TOKES
There is a basic layout - problem is that it doesn’t go anywhere.
It needs breaking up with its associated contemporary work - art work I was producing at the time - characters and back ground landscapes.
LONDON SURREY ARTS
The difficulty is getting the thing to fall into a chronological order - then adding the images and trying to remember what was in the lost Golly book.
SPIRITS NEED HOMES
A chance to group together all the gang huts I have ever built! Complete with designs.
Well maybe starting with Sue Macleods "wattle" photo anyway.
UNBELONGING
Starting with the essay and maybe just adding the M.A. show to it, with just the work that fits into the written stuff.
Maybe finishing with the first written work "Ne Yemmek?"
THE X-RAY FACTORY
A chance to tell the story along with mug shots and coverage of the events and shows we held there.
Maybe do an album in face book , tagging the people involved and linking it up.
CULTURALLY CORRECT
I wonder if I can spread the whole site out, all the different books and pages. The logos, photos, maps. Group by group.

Its a maze in me - its amazing me.

Painting from the middle of a maze.
Surrounded by passing ambiguity.
Why do I paint in such an open ended way?
"It must be difficult to work out where the painting is going,
Or in fact
What is happening at any point (until it is tied up)"
I suppose what its all about is "keeping the ball up in the air as long as possible."
Not always
And not on all paintings - some are very much straight through, self determined - a race to the finish that is always in sight.
Some paintings could do with a journey, an unknown destination.
Maybe even and only, half a thought out subject.
Maybe it’s a case of accepting that on occasion I don’t have a clue as to what is actually happening in front of me.
Or
If I did not having the ability or mental capacity to be able to assimilate all the loose bits of information occupying the various areas within the composition.
Its almost like giving up the control of the thing and letting it sort itself out (in my hands)
An alternative take could be having a subject in the minds eye as it were and slowly moving towards it with a uniform but open composition. Building it up, but always leaving holes in which "matters of importance" could slot in. - Home for definitive statements.
But
These comments would end the thing, tie it up, finish it.
Almost like adding little droplets of water on the petal of a still life.
Skirting around the issue, then, having prepared the ground – making the point.
It’s a maze in me – Its amazing me.

Swans Eggs

Whilst walking the dogs the other day, I failed to stop a couple of kids from smashing the eggs in a swans nest.
I kind of frightened them off but they came back again as soon as I had left and got stuck in. Premeditated, malicious intent, you could call it.
They smashed the swans eggs, not geese eggs of which we have many and who are a nuisance.
It's almost like crime and evil have fallen into different levels of intent.
When something is targeted because it is beautiful seems particularly mean spirited.
Its like a cry from someone who has not, who is taking revenge on someone who has.
A while ago, I pulled up into a car park remarking as we did to my wife about what a refreshingly beautiful blue the car that was parked next to us was. As we came to a halt I noticed there was a large and very deliberate scratch along one side. It seemed it was too beautiful to remain in that state for somebody occupying a very dark place.



In Defence of "Granny Painting"

There is a term which describes the use of non waterproof pen lines with brush and water to create immediate effect.
Immediate excitement as it were.
Good to create fairies and mystical feel.
And , if that inspires one to be creative - well, why not?
I could be good for fourteen year olds in a school situation.
It is also very easy, physically.
In that you could near enough do it on your knees- you only need somewhere to stash your water.
But,
I don’t think it is something to actually brag about, unless it is taken further.

The Royal Wedding

I use it in three ways:
1 Primarily to get an idea down - there is access to tonal qualities very quickly.

2 Also, there is a certain amount of not knowing what exactly is about to happen. It can inform the initial statement - suggest other alternatives in quite a painterly way.
It is in fact edging onto a kind of surreal form of development - coaxing out partially submerged ideas and forms. Also helping to solidify composition - tying bits of drawing up as a whole.
3 It can also be used as a working base. It lends itself quite comfortably to the inclusion of water colour based washes, and then can be corrected with more opaque layers, it can cry out to be finished off and tidied up.

It can of course also be worked on with water proof pen either to produce more linear work or used in a kind of hatching process.
It can in fact leave itself open to quite a considerable amount of further work, to the point where that part of the process is not identifiable anymore

But Seriously





Zoot Alors

How seriously should you take your self?

How many jokes can you crack to keep the thing moving?

When does it start to detract from the statement you want to make?

How much of a joke do you want to make of your life?



What is Surreal?

In a lot of senses - I suppose that I have been following "surrealist" path throughout my entire art life. Since I was fifteen years old.
Loads of my work comes out as brain to hand - immediate stuff before anything else gets in the way. Any other thoughts that is.
But the subject matter is also directly about "unlocking what was being thought" as oppose to "what the thought process was about".
I am in a position where I can exist and carry on producing art that is only relevant to my being and my way of life.
I don’t have to work in a supermarket and I don’t have to paint portraits in fair grounds.
I can't fault it,
But I do complain sometimes.
BUT surreal is such a big taboo.
Is this mainly because of Dali? - when I can find this kind of stuff everywhere. Start with meditation and you have to free your mind of anything else.
Surreal is cool (really).
Does the idea precede the mark?
I mean the focus on this ;
If you think too hard about what you are about to do, everything pauses, and sometimes everything goes, is lost.
( this is normal isn't it?)
Where is the line?
Being weird,
Or living a weird edge?
It doesn’t matter in the end what I'm painting about - not even handling the subject, or subject matter.
It's how I have painted it.
This is how it is to me.
It's me being a craftsman.
In many other ways maybe I could have been a diplomat or a councillor(!?)
You can say artistic things in many ways, but there is a fine line
- somehow, somewhere I know there is!
1924
Surrealism
-to express the subconcious activities of the mind by representing the phenomena of dreams and similar experiences. - using chance and the unconcious as methods for exploring the "unreal"
(Miro) leaning toward abstract expressionism.

Wills, Kate and Osama

The Royal Kiss

It all started with a kiss, I decided to simplify my face book stuff for a lttle while.
Although I am working on a large scale, multi-characteur composition on canvas.
I think this is better than Tracy Emins offering for the Independent, and less of a sell out.

Carrying on in the same vein, and coming, almost in time to wrap up the weekend was the nobbling of Osama Bin Laden.
It lent itself well to my self depreciating form of match-stick whit I felt.

The first being "the Neighbours from Hell"
-waking people up in the middle of the night like that.
The second, being its negative and bearing the inscription "neighbours - everybody needs good neighbours, with a little understanding - - - "

Neighbours from Hell

With a little understanding, we can make a perfect place.