The passage of time whilst inevitable, is also an amazing thing, it softens all kinds of blows, fades enthusiasm for foolhardy ideas and makes crappy drawings look not quite so crappy.
In our first drawing lesson Glen dragged a table into the middle of the room, positioned it on its side and instructed us to draw the rotten thing.
This is my drawing.
Once we had drawn the table to the best of our abilities we turned our easels towards the centre of the circle and checked out each others drawing. I enjoy crit sessions as I am my own harshest critic anyway and I like hearing other peoples ideas about my work as it often spins me off onto a tangent.
We were all mostly silent on this occassion and Glen congratulated us on fulfilling the brief, which was to use all the paper and to fit the table onto the page.
Glen explained about optical illusions and handed us all a short length of dowel and showed us how to use the stick to capture the angles and lines of the table.
Using the stick as a drawing aid, this is my table from my second lesson.
My angles are much better. Glen showed us how to use the stick to measure proportion but I wasn’t able to concentrate on two things at once and only just managed to work out the angles. There was a lot to take in in one three hour lesson but I am really confident that I can learn to draw.
The most important thing that I have found, is that I actually want to practice what I have learned so far.
Yay!
Though I also don’t think that they are horrible photos either. I went for a walk this morning and took some photos. I was fascinated by this piece of roadkill. This was a wallaby. Now it is a series of photos.
The images of the oiled birds weigh heavily on my spirit.
The ancient trees cry out to my soul as they are cut down.
Once the ocean is dead what will become of us?
I am hurtling towards the last of my year of firsts and I miss my mother desperately.
I can feel the weight of depression heavy in my chest, a hard lump underneath my breastbone and I can taste its sour flavour at the back of my throat. I can feel it clutching at me at the edges of my mind.
As the heaviness threatens to drag me down, I could easily leap into the darkness and stay there submerged in my own sorrow but I don’t have the time to linger on self absorption, I have wasted enough time already.
A cup was stuck in the mould and I ripped it in my impatience. As I smoothed the jagged edges and altered its shape I became lost in the moment and a series has been born.
I will be exhibiting in the Tasmanian Ceramics Association’s annual exhibition in August, the theme of the exhibition is the seven deadly sins. I cant decide between greed, pride or sloth as my sin of choice, either way this cup and its resemblance to a jagged tree stump will be my interpretation of the brief.
Our sloth, our laziness, our apathy in the face of a world on the brink of catastrophe. Our pride, our vanity, our overriding arrogance that we can control nature and bend to the earth to our will is uppermost in my mind. The essence of our destuctive human natures will be represented in these forms.
They wont be blue like the picture above as I need something harsher than that to get the idea out of my head. Blood and ashes, graffiti and despair. There wont be any hope in these pieces at all, as they will contain my anger but maybe it is better to have my anger contained in these vessels. We will see.
Yesterday was my last class with Dr Christl Berg. I cant remember the exact title of the class but in a nutshell Christl’s class was all about developing ourselves as artists as well as learning to look at art critically. It was a valuable experience as we had lots of presentations from established artists describing their own art practices.
Our last presentation yesterday was from visual artist, Glen Dunn and I had a lightbulb moment during his presentation when Glen said,”That in essence, artists are thinking in public.” I realised that is what I am doing, I am thinking in public, I am having a public conversation with you. I know it looks glaringly obvious but I hadnt actually thought about it that way before. A couple of pieces of the puzzle clicked loudly into place yesterday and my mind is buzzing.
My proposal for the sculpture trail has been accepted by the friends of Chauncy Vale committee and I am really excited and terrified at the same time. Now I have to do more than actually think about making the eggs, I have to produce them. Eeek.
Just to add more excitement and terror to the mix, yesterday Glen also suggested that I should film the whole process. I was going to photo document everything anyway but making a short film has captured my imagination. I have absolutely no idea how I am going to go about it at all but the thought of making a film is really exciting.
Now back to the idea of thinking in public. I hadn’t really thought much about the oil spill in the gulf of Mexico other than general, “gosh that’s awful” type of thoughts until I followed a link on twitter to the Boston.com’s Big Picture, News stories in photographs and the images truly brought home to me the devastating impact of this massive environmental disaster.
The dragon eggs are a very public thought. The dead albatross bowls are very public thoughts. And now I want to make a couple of oily dragonfly plates. This dragonfly is trying to clean itself while it is perched on an oil soaked blade of grass. I cant get the idea out of my head that to the executives of companies like BP and Monsanto we are as worthless to them as insects.That the destruction of our environments dont matter as long as they get their fat paychecks and the shareholders get theirs.
How can BP compensate the world for the loss of a dragonfly? How much is a dragonfly worth?
Last week I went to a bulk supply place and stocked up on paint. Somehow my grand daughter got wind of the fact that Nanny had new paint. Lots of new paint.
After we had sampled all the paint and sort of cleaned up a bit, it was time to get the shells out and listen to the sea.
