I am wreckage hear me roar nos 1.2.3.4.5 studio shot

My Tattoo Nightmare

I woke up at 5 am this morning because I had the worst dream.
I had this really crappy blue butterfly tattooed on my foot and I could not remember when I had it done or why? It was horrible. It was one of those cliched cheap tattoos and I was so upset. Some one kept telling me it was done by a really famous tattooist. I thought it was so badly done, it was terrible, imagine some one like me, having a crap drawing permanently displayed on my foot. I could not sleep a wink after that thought. I will never risk getting a tattoo ever!! Oh the horror!

It's nearly over!!

I've almost finished I am wreckage hear me roar No 5.

Thin gs to remember for No 6...Do a smaller version! I tell you 2 metres by 1 metre and it's sch an intense painting experience, he wreckage paintings always are..What was I thinking?
I'm really causing myself harm here, this bloody paintings hurting like all hell. Next one is going to have to be smaller (she says as she orders another huge piece of paper)
Can't help myself.

When I study this painting I go from thinking it's a beautiful piece of work to finding it repulsive. This is a good painting when you not sure which end of the poles it's sitting at. It's expressing both at the same time. It find of full of that opposing energy but it's a single entity.

Shit, I'm sounding like a hippy.

But, it's wine o'clock now.
I've got to work at my day job tomorrow but I'm coming back to the studio so I can finish this piece Wednesday. There's definitely only one days work left in it now.

Studio

running list

Apart form having to do one days work on Tuesday, I'm on holidays until the 20th April.

So heres' the list of art stuff I have to attempt to get done.

Finish the following pieces:

I am wreckage here me roar No 5
The rework of No 4
Finish the collage pieces for the new repetitions.

Photograph this series and submit them for possible group show and solo's.

Go on a new gallery hunt...I need to do some shows..the years half over and I haven't done any, nor have I entered any art prizes. Maybe look into organising my own group show.

Figure out whether I do this TV appearance, I guess I should just see what these people have to say.

Created 3 new windows for repetitions
Redo the first Nine in a line...I'm not happy with the canvas it went onto, it blocked before I could finish it...I lost the creative flow which means it's not right...It needed to be on paper in acrylic. It's a much faster painted and keep the energy of a painting flowing. So I need to rewrite and draw up the nine new pieces them extend these by putting the on a 2 metre piece of paper. They will hang vertically down the wall.

I want to create a writing site of some sort, I written some nuch poetry and prose and I sit's in studio doing nothing. It needs to be online...

This is all I can thnk of at the moment...Better get to work

Secret Muse

Sight
and deep inside
something moves. It
shifts sideways and stops.
Glance
caught and the aching begins.
I wanted to reach out and slide my hand
across your flesh. Slowly.

Warmth.
Your sharp souled eyes
glancing. This is not right.
Yet the want begins. Deeply
inside something shifts again.

Virtue Fern
26.03.09 8.30pm

To TV or not TV

I can get this dinky TV show to do a spot on me, and kind of about my art. Nothing's set in concrete yet, it's very early stages. I really don't know if I should do it. It's focus on my adoption as a baby and the search to find out where this creativity comes from...they love it, I'm not so sure. It's one of these really popular TV shows and I'm kind of thinking it would be good to do but then I thinking it would not.
It would explain a lot of stuff in my art and I think that's a good thing, the publicity would be good, I think! It's a very personal thing to do in public. I'm just not sure, I'll wait and see what they have got to say!! I hate being filmed. I really hate it.

My Lastest art paper

A Visual Analysis of Sweet Sorrow, a work by Rosalie Gascoigne

A Visual Analysis of Sweet Sorrow, a work by Rosalie Gascoigne

When describing the works of Rosalie Gasgcoigne, Edmund Capon maintains “Her work is inspired by the surroundings of her immediate landscape...” (Edwards p.5 1998). Sweet Sorrow, a work created from yellow road signs, is obviously inspired by her familiar physical landscape, yet it speaks just as powerfully of the emotional landscape and our human nature.

Commonly, road signs are warnings. These bright yellow signs are placed along the roads to assist drivers through dangers of traveling. This common experience of this cannot be forgotten when you view this work.Yet, this work expresses not of the dangers of road travel, but the dangers of the heart, love and the sadness instead. The words love, sadly, wed and sad are romantic ones which encourage an strong emotional response. This is not what we traditionally experience when we encounter road signs, we expect a common sense warning of a danger we can pass through if we concentrate and moderate our driving skills. Sweet Sorrow has a very different warning, and it’s message is unexpected. It is not the traditional view of a happy romantic union. The words, love, wed and sadly does not lie within the traditional ideology of marriage, it should be happily, love and wed. Encountering such an negative, or dysfunctional attitude on the “road sign” creates a significant tension between what we expect to encounter and what we are actually looking at. We feel challenged by this unorthodox “road sign” as our expectation of road signs are to guide us quickly and safely past simple dangers, a bend in the road or steep decent not a message that confronts our comfortable traditional beliefs about marriage.

Commonly, a road sign is read quickly as it usually encountered from a moving vehicle and responded to almost automatically, Road signs displayed short sharp messages designed to allow this. Sweet Sorrow confounds this traditional with a complex emotional message of love displayed within a practical, instructional road sign. When viewing this piece there is a tension between the need to contemplate the emotional message of love and sadness and the common experience of rapidly reading a road sign, heeding it’s warning and moving quickly past it. This work asks to be contemplated, it’s message is not expected nor easily taken on board. it is not the common view of love and marriage, instead of a romantic dream it speaks more of a nightmare. Yet the common experience when reading the road sign is to glance, take on board the message quickly, respond, and drive on past. Yet this work confounds this as instead of a simple warning or instruction that we can understand quickly and drive on past we are stopped. Instead we see the complexities of marriage and the possibilities of pain and sadness. Our comfort zone has been lost and we need to contemplate.

Sweet Sorrow has a very poignant message about our emotional human nature. The message present in this work, created from road signs, suggests a warning about the ignoring the great sadness that can occur within marriage. This work plays with the idea of public warning by challenging tradition within the context of a commonly experienced part of our human landscape, the humble road sign. Although this work does speak of the Australian environment it is still carries a far more complex message.


References

Australian Biography. http://www.australianbiography.gov.au/subjects/gascoigne/interview1.html Interview with Rosalie Gascoigne. Visited 19/.03.09

Edwards, Deborah Material as Landscape Rosalie Gascoigne. Sydney. The Art Gallery of NSW/The Pot Still Press. 1998.

MacDonald,Vici. Rosalie Gascoigne. Sydney. Regaro Pty Ltd. 1998.

National Gallery Victoria. http://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/gascoigne_education/ Rosalie Gascoigne Education Resource Visited: 18.03.09



I am wreckage hear me roar no 5 cont...

Another session on this painting, it is going really well. It's not as draining as when I started it, which usually happens.
This first painting session of any expressionistic piece usually hurts, I think It's because it so spontaneous, it all coming from a subconscious source, it gets really intense. But as the work progresses it gets easier, Logic and reason creep in. So I'm starting to enjoy working this one. I really happy with it. Both No 4 and No 5 took a huge leap forward.

I feel like my art is developing so well at the moment, the inspiration form my muse has stirred it up to this level of development. It's all working really well. I've got almost 3 weeks off from my day job soon. Fusk I hate having to work sometimes, I'd much rather be in the studio,

I'm looking to repeat some pieces.
Namely this first series of Nine in a Line. I'm going to do two things.
Firstly, connect these pieces more directly with the muse who inspires them, do something more 'purpose built'.
Secondly, as these are made of up of nine small pieces, ( indulging my addiction to things in groups of nine), these will go onto a large piece of paper, around 2 metres long, which will hang down the wall, I've been wanting to do this scroll like piece for a year or two now.

The original nine pieces in this series were put onto a large canvas, set in an oil painting but it didn't work, it's blocked. Just the other day I realised it need to be on paper.
Paper and acrylic is a faster paint, oil you have to wait for days for it to dry, and this is the problem, I lost momonetum painting it in oil paint.

Can't wait to get into the studio full time for a few weeks

I am wreckage hear me roar no 5 cont...

I was so very diificult in the office today. I didn't realise until I sat down to work this mornng, how much I was still being affected by this painting. Without sounding completely lame I was on a higher energy level, not good for working a day job, it was so hard to concentrate. This is the worst thing I find about painting expressionist work, you have to let it go, let your unconscious energy and creativity take over and then it so near impossible to put it back in the box. It such a power energy. One I can never really explain. It's why I sometime refer to my creativity as a monster, it feels like one. I was still in this creative mode, it took me until 2pm to start feeling human again. Through all this I had to keep working and not fuck up. What a challenge, I just wanted to scream.I was exhusted, not physically but emotionally and mentally...but now, my energy level has lowered and I'm tired...It's a great piece though, loads of potential even in these early stages...I guess it will be back to work on it on the weekend.

I am wreckage hear me roar no 5 cont...

So I got this fully blocked out today and made a start on he ink work. I'm happy thus far.

I went to my art history class at the Victorian Collage of the Arts this morning. The VCA always pushes me to my limits. I was told today that art is not about self expression. This blows the shit out of the above wreckage series which is all about self exploration and the expression of of my shitty childhood hangups, well, mainly about this.
No, according to the VCA experts, art is about what contemporary language is being used at the moment in importatnt art, what ever that it. I know about comtemporary art and I do take this language into account but when I go to these "in" galleries and look at this contemporary art, I am truely bored. It's dead, it's lifeless and it's dull, dull, dull. Well 90% of it. There are some glimmers of good art which can hold my attention. And you know what type of pieces they are, one's that have a true sense of the artist in them, one's with a true personal style, and an artist included in the piece. These show true talent, no true giftedness. The artist has ignored the contemporary and did what they wanted.

I have always known that good art is created when you do what you want to do and not what you should do.

Since my twenties I have always dreamed of studying at the VCA, It's one of the best art schools, and I actually am and at a gradute level, sometimes I still feel like pinching myself.
I can't believe I'm arguing with them....

I am wreckage hear me roar no 5 cont...

Almost finished the background paint, I'm about 2/3 s done. Next is the ink work and more detailed paint work. Anyway, I'm happy, it's a big piece but it just flowed, it was good session. Although I'm a bit drained from it. New paintings are always hard, they are so strange, new and uncharted and this tends to take it out of you. I'm not going back to Ballarat tonight, I'm just too tired, I sleep in the studio in Melbourne tonight, I love sleeping in my studio anyway...

I am wreckage hear me roar no 5 cont...

No 1 top left...No 2 bottom left...No 3 bottom right...No 4 top right

In the studio...I've got the 4 of them on the wall and a 2 metre x 1 metre piece of paper laying on the floor ready to paint No 5. Just before I let it go I want to write a bit about the these four. The interesting thing is No 2 and 3 seem to have lost energy, they are quieter paintings, they don't have the tangling paint and movement that No 1 and 4 do. I'm thinking these two may also have to be reworked.
I'm still so happy with No 4, It's really developed the series which is making 2 and 3 look like they are now lacking....Anyway...time to paint this monster....

This is how paintings start

I am wreckage hear me roar No 5

Since moving in my new studio in Melbourne I've been feeling torn in two ways. I'm swinging from happiness in getting a great studio finally and feeling a great deal of anxiety and pain from horrible childhood memories. The studio is in the area I grew up and it's bringing back memories I'd rather forget. I need to get this out of my system, and I need to focus on what I've just achieved and how far I've come since escaping Melbourne and the dysfunctional, mentally unstable adopted parents many years ago.
I've been wading through some dark waters this week, I've been feeling really down, overwhelmed by feelings I have felt for a while. 'My baggage exploded', triggered by wandering around Brunswick again. I love Brunswick, it's a bohemian nightmare, so I've got to deal with this stuff.
I need to paint this out of my system. This is the essence of this series, I need to take my wreckage, the repressed feelings, memories and create something perfect, beautiful.
I'm going to blog this painting the week before I start because these negative feelings are so powerful, the pain and horror I saw as a kid was terrible, the verbal and emotional abuse has left it's permanent scars but I have the ability to acknowledge this and turn it into beauty. I need to both write about this to get it out of my and to slowly diffuse these energy being these feelings as if I paint this with too much patho's and absolutly no rationality it will turn to a mess.
I've got a 2 metre by 1 metre piece of paper waiting, anything smaller won't work and I've taken Monday off from my day job so I'm holing up in the studio and I'm going to not only painting this out of my system, I going to find the beauty and perfection it.

It's the only way.

Creative individuals

Creative individuals are remarkable for their ability to adapt to almost any situation and to make do with whatever is at hand to reach their goals.
When we're creative, we feel we are living more fully than during the rest of life. The excitement of the artist at the easel ...comes close to the ideal fulfillment we all hope to get from life, and so rarely do. Perhaps only sex, sports, music, and religious ecstasy—even when these experiences remain fleeting and leave no trace—provide a profound sense of being part of an entity greater than ourselves. But creativity also leaves an outcome that adds to the richness and complexity of the future.

By: Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

New studio

Finally a new studio, mine form today, I can live in a house now with no art work all over every floor in every room. It's just outside CBD in Melbourne...so i'll be moving in on the weekend...

Wreckage and exhustion part two

See image below..
I think this next piece in the I am wrechage hear me roar series should focus on how my artistic side destroys my everyday side. How it stops me having an completely everyday existence, which is good for my boredom levels as it's always interesting, even thrilling sometimes but it's bad for my social life. I get too intense and driven and it scares people off. Don't blame them I can be a bit of a maniac when I'm painting. But what can I do when it creates great art. I always seem to making the choice and art always wins, so does my creative eccentricities. I guess the drive is always too strong.

I ay have found a studio in Melbourne finally, I'm going to have a look tomorrow, the location is great but it's a bit more than I wanted to pay. we'll see what happens

Wreckage and exhustion

What do I expect? I paint pieces title I am wreckage hear me roar and end up wrecked myself. I've only just started to feel human again. This painting just totally wiped me out, it was a fairly big piece 100 x 70cm and I finished it about 7 hours, although focusing that intently for that time is really draining. I'm still a bit shocked by it, this piece has a life of it's own, it was a really intense creative process, typically these paintings are usually better quality and content, they also break new ground, but they nearly fucking destroy me.
I'll attempt another piece soon bt this week I'll finsh the 12 collge pieces and put together the 3 new Repetitions. It's an easy draw and not a manic, out of control, emotionally driven painting session. I need to build up some strength for another one of these.
With a new Wreckage piece, I want to do something that focuses on the destruction of the everyday, typical and average. I'd start from a personal position, my dislike for popular culture, my utter boredom towards the stuff most people find thrilling, Hollywood movies is a good example of this, I've no idea how anyone could find them thrilling, they bore me out of my mind. Lately, I want to scream when I listen to stranger's conversations around me they are so mind numbing, or maybe it because I have interesting friends? But this is the start point, and as these works are largely spontaneous and subconsciously driven, these issues should deepen and become more complex and universal. Well, that's the plan....

i haven't written poetry for 4 years, now I can't stop

i felt you
lightly
almost as if you weren't there

you weren't really there
no
but i felt you
you were soft
perfect
and simple
one thing
one small vulnerable wish
one simple hope
you went home and you hoped
such beauty can be never forgotten
now i can't fight
now i can't forget
your perfect loving moment
mine
and you thought no one was looking