burfdays

Meet the burfday frog :)
He's my version of a childhood favourite but thankfully without the smell of slightly mouldy lentils! He's now in his new home with Em's who's all of 20 years the other day. She seems to have acquired a taste for eating "cookie-dough" which I was told would give me worms when I was a child, but I'm assured that Ben and Jerry say it's fine and she's allowed! Anyway it seems the burfday frog is the one to gain the larger waist-line (he's hiding his ample bulges here), so all's ok :)

a little mixed up

Thank you all for your lovely comments and welcome back! Such a lovely thing.
I have as promised been more active in the creative department. Photographs of course have been a big focus but I've had a go this evening at putting together some pieces with paint. Printing out my own images on an archival matt paper has made for better blending (one of my niggles... things have to blend right) and I'm using oil paint on canvas - a bit risky as there's less room for mistakes and back tracking. Still, here's my first piece so far - it will need to dry for a couple of days which is mighty frustrating so I'll start something else too.

levelling the land

Well, ups and downs have left me flat and uninspired (yet again... sorry to be a bore) but I'm determined to make amends, so I though I'd start blogging again. Feeling like I had nothing worthy to share has to change and one of the best effects of blogging is that you are then compelled to continue the process as so continue being creative. I hope it works for me this time ;))

Now then what have I been doing this last while that has been creative? The loss of a friend and neighbour recently prompted me to a short trip away and lots of photography. To go along with it I was delighted when words started to flow too, and gradually I've been processing the images and putting them up on flickr with their words. This is still an ongoing project but I'm going to put the first ones up here to share. What's interesting to me is this new way of working. I've often longed to be an artist driven by some great cause, making art that challenges the wrongs of the world or does something more than just create nice images, but I'm not an outwardly political person. With this session of photography I think I've found a story in the making, a journey that I can recount with images and words, and it's a totally new experience to be driven by the story rather than the image alone. I'm finding that the further I go along with this wee journey the more I'm designing the next step, working with the concept, exploring the intimacies of the experience and laying a trail for people to follow should they care to do so. One of the most pleasing results is a sense of purpose and direction, something I've wished to have in my work a long while.
so anyway... here it is so far

the levelling

all we have
The simple, silent departure...
Leaving bereft a family, friends, a community, an island
An echoing of laughter and the raised palm in a warm gesture of recognition
Lost to a reflection
If I could inject the world with but a portion of his infectious laughter and jovial warmth
I would be a better person than I am today.

a port for all tides
Each moment is perfect in it's own right,
a microcosm of rhythm and design,
reflecting and absorbing,
making nothing of time.

A port for all tides,
a tide for all men,
a man for all seasons.

forever changing, forever the same...
suspended in unusual times...
were be it they were "interesting"
then there'd be something to take up arms against

travelling to escape emptiness
a location in transit,
a night journey,
to occupy the senses,
stop mental pictures,
have a quiet moment
in the newness of it all.

away from it all
Night birds call eerily from the shore,
waves scraping the stone beyond
the door of this ancient dwelling...
sanctuary from a busy world,
where time passes
unmarked by the ticking of a clock or digital alarm.

Here, where the hearth glows warm,
a blanket wrapped
still lets the night chill
touch my face,
sharp and vital,
a breeze running it's fingers through my hair,
whispers "Don't cosset the soul,
let it feel..."
The raw tang
of seaweed
fills my senses
as I drift
into sleep
by the open fire.

night watch
And through the darkness
waves caress my dreams

dawn
Quietly
the light creeps in
drawing colour from the embers
I pull the satiny softness up around my face
and closed my eyes again...

wakening
The crisp morning light
finds me sitting beside
abandonment
with coffee steaming
to warm cold hands
I contemplate
what is left
around me...

and breathe deeply
the autumn air

(To be continued...)

saving old treasure

When I came across this old wall paper I had to save a bit, mainly for colour compositions but also because they are beautiful fragments in their own right. There's a small movement of artists here in the islands who find access to these old papers and use them collaged into their work.


















The wall papers come from abandoned old houses, often of the "white-house" style (as opposed to the traditional black house which the Hebrides are famous for). When you see these snippets it's easy to imagine "home" in one of these small houses and they create a wonderful atmosphere. One of my favourite island artists who uses such methods is Mairi Morrison of Shader in the North of Lewis. You can visit her website here, though sadly only one sample of her collage work is here. I think I will give her these bits :)

new drive

Well I did manage to do something this evening. I sat and worked on a new image from the islands with the smell of burning wood in my nostrils. This wasn't because I had matches up my nose but because the stove has been renovated and this was the first light since, which can be a bit stinky.


















This piece is now ready to work stitches and beads into.

tidy and ready to go

I've been having a tidy up and sort out generally around the house. The sitting room is now only needing the curtains to be done and my workroom (above) needs a plant here in the corner. Hopefully its feng will be properly shui'd. I can really see how the idea of de-cluttering helps clear the mind and, though it might still look cluttered to you, I'm already feeling more inclined to do some creative things in this space again.


















First though a bit of quick appliqué on a dressing gown to cover up some bleach marks.

Maybe by this evening I will have done something more worthy of posting :D, so until then, t'rah fer noo.

memories and pictures

I had fun with my other blog and distorted memories last night...
http://ideas-of-inspiration.blogspot.com/2009/08/baby-blue.html

and also found out that some of my photo's are in flickr's "explore" pages... some sort of popularity thing though I'm not sure how it quite works but I made a wee thingy of the photographs that are in those pages just now.









1. morning harris, 2. "now wild" poppy, 3. port-summer, 4. solstice dawn, 5. heartstone, 6. Beitearsaig, Nr Huisinis - Isle of Harris

I was spun off into spontaneous decorating the other day and now have a fengshui'd sitting room (I hope). The curtain material arrived today so I'll blog the making of them. Don't worry it's not boring sewing. I'm going to paint on them and do some huge textile panels for them.

market days

Such fun in the islands as the European Market has been in town. Lots of inspiration in shapes and colour to be had. I like that each stall has a single country representation. We had French soaps, Indian fabrics, Greek olives,


















African wood carvings


















Turkish sweets (a delight of course),


















Norwegian reindeer pelts, German sausages, and loads of nationality hot food stalls. Lithuanian glass was quite interesting but one of the prettiest stalls was the one of wooden roses... huh! I can't remember which country they were from.





































Oh, and did I mention it was a bit busy?