Arterial bypass

On writing "The End"

2012-01-07T22:34:00.000-08:00

Today it is Sunday January 8th 2012 and just this very moment I have written "THE END" to the conclusion of my 4 book time-travel/alien conspiracy/ancient fantasy series called THE SEEP...
This conclusion is epic for me, Its a personal Kilimanjaro because I thought I would never get here.

My relationship with this story has been a love-hate one - in which I've felt trapped - and unable to move forwards or backwards, cursing myself that I had started and then cursing again that I couldn't finish.
I am born under the sign of Capricorn and that I think can be a curse again, because I am simply unable to let go of a project until its finished. Winston Churchill's famous cry to 'Never, never, never give up" is a bit of a mantra, that I can't shake off.

I started with fantasy after my first attempt at writing, Mahavamsa Dreaming came out, I had some wonderful responses to it - but also some very interesting comments, given that it tackled some rather delicate issues in the Sri Lankan Mythos. I found it interesting that my real world voice had no place where it could be considered "authentic" in that I was writing about Sri-Lankan Australian experience, but was discounted in some subtle ways as being either.

Thus began my escape into the worlds of the ancient Olmecs, Kemet and later Mars, which are the key destinations of the Seep. In writing purely from my imagination I found again the joy, the flow and the escape... but "the fool cannnot remain forever in his paradise"as the tarot advises, and I had to move out of the writerly life and reprise my career as a languages specialist.

So, in the last two years, I 've been writing in dribs and drabs, in bank queues, at music concerts, on trains, buses, soccer games, in staff meetings - my attention flittering, despairing that I would ever get here, because not finishing would make null and void the millions of hours I had already vested into the three other books that had come before. I wished I had just settled for one book - wishing also that I could ever just bite off a little piece - instead of a whole bloody hunk that I could never reasonably swallow anyway..

But, in December last year, I vowed to remove the mill stone around my neck, to finish the damn novel, and each night after dinner sat down to write. Its amazing the difference a commitment can make. To be honest, I don't care so much anymore abou going after the big publishing contract, with the production of art, at the end of the day, its all about the personal rewards of the process - any accolades are just the bonus for those who are blessed and fortunate.

I don't care if no one ever gets to read the story - all I care about is that I finished what I started, and now...after having written no less than six completed manuscripts - I feel my apprenticeship is over and I can start again - writing that novel that someone might read, it will be my 7th effort...and 7 has always been my lucky number, searching desperately for other good omens, I also live at number 7 and there's 7 in my family... so, I'm counting all those 7s and going to give it my very best shot.

The call of the wolf

2011-12-06T03:24:00.000-08:00

2011 has been the year of the wolf

the year Xavier left home

the year my sister gor Cancer

the year life took us through the dark glades where sorrows hide but through which light glimmered.

The wolf is a majestic beast

A spirit guide

It took me into the heart

of darkness

and out

into daylight

where I could see clearly

and rise in the dawn to a new day

shoes or gold?

2011-07-19T23:00:00.000-07:00

I created this little picture yesterday on a throw away scrap of canvas using throw away bits: bottles of unused nail polish, scraps of weave, sequins and other detritus from the studio - all of it to be framed behind an old glass I also found in a second hand shop. I love the way all these old bits are given new life, I love the idea of recycle and second chances.

I am the eternal bower bird-which is why I also love my frequent jaunts into opportunity shops, (inspiration for my last poem) those places where the discarded remnants of other people's lives end up. I love to rustle amongst the debris and unwanted, the old junk and the trash. My favourite piece of jewellery is a ring made from an old spoon that my best friend gave me - I love it because it is so simple and unpretentious - it has a story - another life- which is why I also love retro fashion... In this childish picture, these mermaids are getting excited by shoes instead of gold, which I guess tells the same story about things which are treasured or discarded.

Small Squares

2011-07-19T22:40:00.000-07:00

He follows her,
present but absent
into the
opportunity shop.
His fingers
magicking
shapes and sound
on his pixelated world.
"I wish you wouldn't waste
so much time on that thing,"
she says stepping through into the
cool cave of
last resorts
where lives are
racked in
codes from cheap to nasty.
She stoops to rustle
through a discarded box of
craft items,
balls of wool like
old ladies hair,
and framed tapestries,
the remnants of
a thousand dreams.
A million
minute squares
filled in, piece by piece
Each tiny square
stitched thread by thread
with yarns of love
now fading,
their colours
unravelled with
the death
of unwantedness.
"Wow", Thomas look
she says,
squatting to wipe
a fractured glass.
"Tapestries
Just like Grandma's."
He grunts,
"Old timer pixels Mum,
Did you tell Grandma
they're a waste of time?"

The Hanging

2011-06-17T20:55:00.000-07:00

Well, after 18 months of angsting and deliberating, planning and procrastinating the art show is almost over. Today, on a bitterly cold Saturday morning I am sitting here in the gallery, alone and reflective.
To start with, the opening night went really well, more than anything it was a celebration of my father's 75th birthday and a reunion of lots of old (ie. long term) family friends in the Van der Poorten network. I felt enormously proud that we had managed to get to the night with everything in order and to rustle up a crowd.
It felt good to actually do something, instead of just talking about it, which alas as I get older and older I see more and more people do. There seems to be so many people who say they are going to do things but never do - and its not even grand things - flights overseas, books published, business ideas- its little things - saying you will come - but not showing up, making small promises that they never keep. To me its all about integrity . I teach my sons that their word must be their sword - the word they will die by. Its not much to ask is it?
This may seem like a little diversion off the topic I know, but in many ways it's not. Exhibiting is all about integrity too. Having a show calls upon an artist to really put his/her art on the line - to price and present it to go to a new home. As I began the process of curating, however, I found many artists who could not bring their art across. The gallery was "too far" or there was too much work involved for too little reward. Most of the time, the artists were crippled by their own self doubts and reluctance to take their amazing works to the next step. They would not honor their creative processes.
When I asked my sister though, she had just a few weeks to get a collection of mixed media pictures together. Her response was "I'll get 12 done, because I can." The art she turned out was wonderful and she sold almost half of the lot. She was completely unafraid to call herself an artist and hang up her work for all her friends to see. In many ways this is what everyone needs to be able to do. I know I say it often, but I truly believe we can surprise ourselves when we try. We all can have integrity and be true to the creative forces in us that are trying to express themselves through a multitude of mediums.

Musings and exhibiting

2011-05-21T05:37:00.000-07:00

I've been reading a lot lately about the creative process; works by Eric Masel,and Eckhardt Tolle, as well as Secrets of Highly Creative Women. It's actually remarkable how much in common these books have - all are about being still and finding the presence within and without, stilling the mind, tapping into a source and being in the moment.
Of course , to live in the now is to embrace the now. Echardt Tolle has almost been like a second coming to me. For him, the past is nothing but a thought process and all that we ever have is the now. This is where we can meet the timeless real presence within us where lies the portal of true creativity. This lesson though so simple, has been unbelieveably liberating for me. Its allowed me at last,to let go of my old ghosts such that I no longer hold any regret for the past, resentments or insecurities. Instead I am trying each moment to be that 'aware presence' who watches how I react - how my ego and mind construct rear up as separate things from my eternal presence. It has been so freeing - So many things no longer matter and I feel as though I am tapping into an abundance of constant joy. (yes really!)
As well as reading, I am also busy preparing to curate a show of art works by my father, sister, brother-in -law and self. My father will be turning 75 and I haveto skite, that his work is truly brilliant. His recent works, ironically as his eye sight, due to diabetes diminishes, are real masterpieces of light and shade. My father reveals that his heart sees further than his eyes - he reveals his true presence.
In contrast to his work, my own seems so crude in comparison. I blush at my audacity to even hang them,beside his. Still, I am glad to have the opportunity and gumption to be able to do so, since Dad will be alive and well at the exhibition.
If you are in Brisbane, all of you are welcome to join us at
White Canvas Gallery
26 Church St
Fortitude Valley
from 6pm for drinks
on
June 10th 2011
tel
0422 61 9921 to RSVP

Contemplations of the Sea Horse

2011-03-29T21:09:00.000-07:00

I was at an exhibition launch the other night, listening to an artist say that she wanted her pictures to "speak for themselves" which brings me back to that question of whether the artist should or should not explain what she or he was trying to do in the picture. Sometimes the intent of the artist can shed light and change the experience of the viewer - but is this a corruption - a sullying of that first interaction? Does it really matter anyway since the viewer's response has nothing to do with the artist anymore?

I won't tell you what I was trying to do here - but I'd love your take on this picture...maybe if you come along to my second major exhibition in June this year, you can. And... if you really like it - you can even buy it :-)

Mother shopping - and choosing your medium

2011-03-29T04:01:00.000-07:00

This is a pastel picture which serendipitously I found behind a chair the other day. Its glass frame had cracked which meant I could photograph it. I absolutely love the translucent brightness of pastels and I am becoming even more aware as an artist about how important it is to choose your medium. Once I was very excited by house paint - the fact that I could buy great buckets of it for next to nothing - in comparison to purchasing one tube of artists oil paint for instance - the cost per gram of paint was incomparably cheap. But on my old paintings I see now, how the colours are quite dead in those which I have used house paint - a bit like genetically modified vegetables - the paints have the form but nothing of the substance to go the distance. The lose that brightness which I initially found so seductive.
Strangely - this painting too is about choice - I painted it when I was expecting my third child and the idea of a spirit enterng me and choosing me as a mother - made me wonder about that time when souls decide... if indeed such a process exists. We tell ourselve so many stories to explain the world - perhaps this too is just another one - Still I love the idea, that we choose the parents we have in order to learn a karmic lesson. What do you think?

At the swamp

2011-03-26T06:35:00.000-07:00

Oil on canvas

Crow Love

2011-01-25T04:12:00.000-08:00

'I wonder, she says
how the crows
know?
I stare,
sparkling blue black
between the eternal eucalypts
the crows dig
side by side in the
undergrowth.
'Daddy,' she says,
‘Are you really leaving soon?’
She knows, I think
watching her eyes
moisten,
then turn to the
dark shapes
outside, as though
for consolation.
‘But Daddy,
how does he
know that’s her?’
She asks pointing,
adamant, accusing
in a way she
doesn't
understand.
‘How does he
recognise her as
his?’
I tell her
it is the way
she calls,
her beak,
her eye,
her scent...
I muse
then
I turn away,
decisive
thinking
all of that
and more.
Drawn for a moment,
into her
animal curiosity
I wonder at
ancient crow wisdom,
if cool long beaks
that meet through
angry storms
make feathers stiffen
in some
avian erotica?
Through burning days.
where plagues of others
could serve as substitutes
how two will dance through
mud and cloud,
certain that the
world is here.
It is only her he knows
and needs.
I draw the curtains
roughly
and shrug.
'Isobel, 'I say,
my voice
a touch too harsh,
'Crows just know, Ok.'

Getting the big picture

2010-11-28T00:54:00.000-08:00

I posted the picture in the middle of this triptych a few posts earlier -but a few days ago I created the left and right parts. It was a bit like giving birth to separate twins -months apart, and it surprised me because I've never created a picture like that before. It made me think a bit about the way life unfolds. What you may think of as the whole might in fact be just a part . Art is amazing what lessons it reinforces isn't it?

A thing with birds

2010-11-02T01:26:00.000-07:00

Random drawings from the studio, chickens and peacocks reveal that really I do love birds. Last year I wrote "Techno Crow" a junior fiction novel which I am delighted to report is available for sale on Smashwords.com. More on that later.

This mythical bird came out on to card after I read a verse from "The Songs of Kabir" - a mystical Hindu poet who for some reason I always thought of as Sufi. Anyway in his verse: XIVII, he writes:

"There is a strange tree which stands without roots and bears fruits without blossoming
It has no branches and no leaves, it is lotus all over.
Two birds sing there, one is the guru and the other the disciple
The disciple chooses the manifold fruits of life and tastes them and the Guru beholds him in joy"

Somewhere else Kabir refers to these two birds within us, an image which resonated with me like so much of his rich ornate writing, which is lyrical and sometimes thick like treacle. I wondered what a "guru bird" might look like, then I found this in verse XXX

None tells me of this bird that sings within me
It is neither coloured nor colourless: it has neither form nor outline
It sits in the shadow of love
it dwells within the unattainable, the Infinite and the Eternal and no one marks when it comes and goes

Kabir has inspired me many times in the past - one of my first paintings was a tribute to his ode about finding a garden of flowers within yourself, rather than having to look elsewhere. His major theme that '...the eternal is in the midst of all forms' is one which drives much of my ideas. Anyway, my bird has form and colour, but if I had a guru bird within, it would be a much better rendered version of this one, made as it is with the latest in colored alfoil which I just love to use in collage. I am always a bower bird, attracted to the shiny, so it is no surprise that the roll from my kitchen drawer has made its way into the studio!

2010-10-27T23:13:00.000-07:00

This image was created as part of a 4 painting series (a quadtitch?) around the idea of the universality of prayer. It is quite an old picture and inspired by a 90 year old friend who wrote me a prayer around the time I was gestating my fourth son. I remember tossing out the other three pictures in this series, and being surprised that this one sold at my first exhibition. It can be surprising the different responses a piece of art work generates...

For me, this picture really is the celebration that art allows us to express ideas of this kind - art for me is about the message more than the technique - I am in absolute awe of the masters who can reproduce the visible world with such skill and talent - but for me - it is those artists who capture the things that cannot be seen who are the magicians.

I'm sorry that this work seems so passé to me. Its time for me to return to the studio instead of hashing over old work - but it can be difficult when life is full of so many other obligations. I'd better live to be a ripe old age so that I can get the time one day to paint and write all day. For now, there are always more pressing matters - boys to take into manhood and human relationships to be nurtured, at the end of the day, all that mattters is how we live our lives and how kind we are to each other and the planet - the art is just a celebration of that, its the cherry on the top.

Memory of Childhood

2010-08-25T23:59:00.000-07:00

I did this picture in fresco style - a memory of a Sri-Lankan Festival when I was around about five years old. I'm busy preparing for an exhibition of these works next year and drawing on so many stored images as well as developing older paintings with a different palette. For me its always about the colour, which is if course amazingly transformative - it just amazes me how much it changes everything.

Eve in the garden

2010-08-03T02:55:00.000-07:00

Playing with effects, again

Forbidden Fruit

2010-07-04T01:13:00.001-07:00

I hung this painting yesterday although its still unfinished- as you can see I have much work still to do in the figures. Even so, I'm still excited by the new series I plan to do.

I'm thinking about stories - creation stories, biblical stories, mythical stories - and plan to revisit how each one reforms and shapes inside my head. I'm also intrigued in those moments in time which are so critical that nothing ever is the same after.

I call this one - The trap. As you might see there's a net inside this magnificent mythical tree that's about to fall.

I have to say this picture does not do the real painting any justice :-)

Inside this house: A Poem

2010-07-01T23:42:00.000-07:00

Inside this house a family
a continent of secret countries:

The new born
whose senses multiply, divide and split
like molecules that shaped
the new earth.
A synergy of light and air,
a promised land
untilled and unsquandered
joyful and green
in the Eden that
will not last.

Inside this house, a family
a continent of secret countries:

Pubescent nations with volcanic centres
their cores raging with heat and fire,
their shores
shifting with passing allegiances
impatient for tomorrow
and shackled by the geography of blood.

Inside this house a family
a continent of secret countries

The ancient ones with deep terrains
their ruts and grooves eroded
by dark hidden histories
their inhalations synchronised to
the flow of time and
its pendulem of grief

Inside this house
a family, a continent
a land mass grinding
along a primordial
fault line, linked eternally
by contracts signed in blood.

The conception

2010-06-14T02:43:00.001-07:00

Do we choose our parents? What are the spiritual lessons we come through them to learn? These are the questions I asked when I worked with this image.

reflections from an aging artist

2010-06-12T05:23:00.001-07:00

Returning to my painting life has been an interesting experience. Revisiting a lot of my unfinished/old/cast away works, playing around with colours and textures on old canvasses and unearthing box loads of pictures - stored yet abandoned - in the paradox that is always with the artist, the reason why the soul recognises sorrow and joy as the same thing (or so the deep ones say)
Coming across my old works has given me strange mixed feelings - even though they fall so short in technique, most still please me aesthetically, and I am annoyed with myself for giving up on those ideas and not developing my skills. There is a lesson here - as there are lessons everywhere - for the young and impatient - and I won't beg the point.
Even so, It startles me to see I am amounting a body of work and developing with each year with the new tools available. It shows me that every little bit of work you do is taking you that much further and that "brush mileage" really means something.
Those of us who can make original art should! Those of us with a craft, a gift, a yen, a buzz, a need, a drive must never ever stop!
There are some other cool things I've noticed about persisting with something over time: Most importantly for me as an artist - my eye is noticing different things as I age and my aesthetic is refining itself.
I knew I was always about colour and texture but now I am also more confident in the marks I make. I also find that if I go without any specific idea of what to paint into the studio - I am more receptive to whatever it is that comes from the first mark I make. I think that's the zen of art - why I'm not much of a planner in either my writing or my visual art.
Being an "untrained" artist, I am always on the back foot with my art- but recently I've noticed that I am painting for myself more than any one else, and I am no longer seeking approval. This gives me so much more confidence and is a place I wish I could have come to so much earlier in my life. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that with time you'll develop into anything you set your heart on - one little bit at a time,and really in the end its only you- you need to please!

Dreaming of Fish

2010-06-11T00:15:00.000-07:00

Here is a quirky picture I painted today to celebrate my return to the studio! We are all I think like this little penguin, everything we want is here right now. The substance of our dreams

is reachable if we only open our eyes.

The Art of Life

2010-06-08T00:30:00.000-07:00

Sometimes it would be nice to take things a bit less intensely - but those who know me well - also know that this has never been a strong point. That, I guess comes with the artist's soul that inhabits this multi- tasking body of mine.
As I was running in the forest the other night - under a golden moon as big as the eye of God, I mused about the art of life. The art of living a life rich in texture and colour. Vibrant and deep. A life of joy. For years I've been seeking that through the art I've been creating, but it has come at a cost I could never have expected to pay.
There is a long and convoluted story behind my recent catharsis and one I can't really share in detail here other than to tell you it involves children and police and sexual predators - with these key words you will know something of what our family has been going through this year.
I won't go into the grissly details here - other than to say that this event has shocked me. Shocked me back. Back into the world I walk on rather than the artificial closed-scale ecology peopled by confused time travellers and Pleiadians, back from Mars, ancient Olmec Kingdoms and Egypt- all which figure in the 4 manuscripts I have been writing for some time.
And so instead of heading to my studio or continuing in my word count accumulation, I have planted over forty trees, lain by last count, close to 40 cubic metres of forest mulch as well as metres of lush Sir Walter grass around the pool, resumed my study of languages and my career in linguistics - and at long last - opened my eyes to the world.
I must say - It has been a kind of re-awakening after years spent in the surreal light of retreat, luxuriating in the sheer indulgence of being able to create art without having to account in any real financial terms for my efforts.
As well as creating hundreds of paintings, five manuscripts and some 11 children's picture books (simultaneously of course - as running a household full of five sons, giving shelter to the homeless, keeping chickens and planting organic food, as well as running and participating in a few volunter community creative writing groups, my life has been abundant and blessed.
But now, my art-making has been dealt a recent and cruel blow which has caused a set down of tools.
When I think about it, the itch for art is the itch to make time stand still - to leave a foot print - to say - 'I was here'. My idiotic, meaningless scratchings, the specks of dandruff for the Gods of time. My art was always motivated by the shallow egoism which makes us all desire to leave behind a legacy.
But how precious is our time- and how easily squandered?
My recent experience has taught me that the real legacy is the life you live- the love you give. How much integrity did you show to all those you met? How pure was your love? How often did you laugh? How many people did you drop everything to help? How present-time conscious were you? Did you tuck your child in bed? Did you feel the grass between your toes? Did you plant a tree? Did you care for an animal? Did you say sorry ? Did you know when was proper to give up? Did you leave the past behind?
All these questions I ask of myself - they show me the way I think to the true art - the art of sculpting my humanity - the art of living the life I was meant to live and drinking deep from its chalice.
It doesn't matter then if I never touch a brush again...but of course - I know that will be impossible as ideas come swirling in my mind and the letting go deepens my sence that I am part of something much bigger in this great Universe of ours, just as I am certain all of us are.

Down and disheartened

2010-05-06T06:57:00.000-07:00

OK, here's why.
For those of you who have been following my blogs, you'll know I was looking forward to trying to sell my books.
Last week, I finally managed to get 40 books in the mail - along with long awaited for Australia Post reply paid envelopes, and cover letters - hitting - I told myself - just the right tone - not quite begging - but sincerely stating my requests off some kind professional to add my book to the reading matter in their clinic - (alternatives to old women's weekly magazines are always good right?)

I sent sample books (four titles) as a gesture of trust - confident that sales would be easy - 15 came back....the others are lost to the Gods who squeeze out hearts, the Gods who are trying to tell me something that I just don't seem to want to hear.

So this week I've been struggling. Wondering if I should just forget all my grand plans and return to plan A which somewhere before babies was to climb the academic ladder - that safe but rickety path to retirement, secure work and certain success.

I applied for a PHD in an area which I'm fascinated by, and am awaiting allocation of a supervisor, but I can't help myself from thinking of the move as a failure in some ways. My husband ever the pragmatist tells me the obvious- that I will be creating some thing which people will have use for. Some thing which can be meaningful and advance knowledge in a way that my writing will not. I nod and agree with him, wishing with all my heart that I can do it all, wishing it could be different.

Validation or Appreciation?

2010-04-30T17:15:00.000-07:00

This week we had an interesting discussion at my community Writers class. This is held in a local centre which supports the needs of a diverse range of people, ranging from the unemployed, disabled, elderly and those who are simply searching.

It was stimulated by the arrival of a new member - an inspiring writer, retired director of stage shows, musicals and screen plays. He was a musician who brought a whole box full of his projects to show us. We were all simply gob-smacked by this man's out put, his creative genius was incredible. At the same time, his name is still unknown, many of his works were never published, though all his stage shows performed and awarded with various prizes along the way.

I asked him if it bothered him, and suggested he enter some of his work in the upcoming Premier's Writing Competition - possibly the most prestigious award for writers here in Queensland. He replied that it did not interest him in the slightest and for him it was the completion of a project - not public accolade which satisfied him. To compete against others with his art, was for him an abberration. For him Validation was a personal experience - it could not come from the external.

I found this an interesting point of view especially as my manuscript languishes, for lack of motivation. Yes I want to finish it desperately, but for me, its not enough just to write "THE END" I want that time I take away from life to reward me - I want others to go on the journey with me. I want my work to be read - and the truth is that that may never happen unless I opt to publish it myself. I personally can't be validated by just completing the series for myself.

Then I wonder if this makes me less of a writer? If the act of writing should be enough to sustain me? I have a sneaky suspicion that when I am 96 and in a small room in a nursing home somewhere (Or preferably on top of a mountain with a butler) it will be enough - but for now - in my vital years there are just too many other things to experience. So I'm really looking forward to that time when I can be completely lost and sustained and carried by the interior constructions of my writing, whilst for now I jump from stone to stone along the meandering path of my life.

On practicing art when life takes over

2010-04-04T02:17:00.000-07:00

I pinch myself to believe today is Easter Sunday 2010. It seems so hard to believe that the last time I was in a creative space was in December. 2009

So what have I been doing - so little painting, or writing.. so few posts. I've been itching for art I have to say, but being productive has been next to impossible.

Apart from ploughing through page at a time with various rewrites of my fantasy series in snatched commutes when I feel excited or at lunch breaks and reworking my cockroach pictures with photographs. it has been a bit of a grave yard here.

The truth is I've had to return to the working life which has been exciting at the same time as extremely challenging in terms of the time sacrifice it entails.

I'm trying to work out how I can be a great mother. professional. friend. daughter , sister and wife at the same time as devote my yearning heart to the art I crave to do! I want to paint and write and sell my books - but the truth is the bath room needs to be scrubbed and the floors mopped. It is a familiar rant. I am so desperately time poor but ideas rich...I really struggle to get away and keeping faith is the hard part.

At the same time, there are so many millions of others doing it - regardless - fantastic mothers. writers, artists who are being successful in their practice and really creating wonderful work - novels - paintings - videos - film art - (Many of my friends included who are reaping accolades and success) IT IS SO HARD NOT TO BE JEALOUS!

I read their blogs and am inspired at the same time as being struck by an overwhelming sense of defeat. Who cares about somebody else spruiking their wares? There is so much talent. How can I ever compete? It seems such an act of faith to keep going. My sister calls it "farting in the wind".

But then I return to my own personal space, and realise it doesn't matter. T hat the mere creation of art is a joyful meditation that reveals me to myself. That it really doesn't matter if no one along the way pays me any dues...

This then brings me back to the essential conundrum...how I can justify the time I spend on doing it which again leads to a question how I can make it valid in real terms for any legacy I leave behind? See? It is all so circular!

The answer of course is not so complicated. In my herat I know I must keep producing - but more than producing - I must galvanise all my courage to go out and hang my pictures and sell my books and create a serious artistic profile - without being distracted by the dragon of material reality.

So that is what I resolve to do...Wish me luck as I try to finish my book set on Mars and paint a picture a month - and complete my cocky story book (...again) I'll keep you posted as I go and hope you can keep me going.

Wally's Howl

2009-12-20T06:52:00.000-08:00

Its done! I've finished "Wally's Howl" This story was made especially for speech therapists, about a were-wolf boy who learns the proper ways of howling. These are just two of some thirty images.

Wally's Howl makes the sixth picture book in about 4 months - and today being a few days before Christmas -probably the last one for the year, although I have already written the text for another three on the way.

I know I have waxed lyrical before about how amazing is picture book making as an art form, but I have to repeat myself:
It really is an excellent outlet for artists who have used up all their wall space, who love to draw, paint and write... and who are impatient about book completion.

Wally's Howl for example has taken me little over a week to get to first draft stage, so I can vouch for the speedy coming together of these books. Basically, with a good scanner and Indesign and photoshop tools, it really is possible to put together something that stands up alright next to the more experienced producers.

Don't be put off, if you feel inclined. There is nothing to stop you from having a go. Remember that kids love to see the world through an artists eye - it doesn't matter if your figures aren't perfect - in this day of Google - factual info and images are accessible at the blink of an eye - however images drawn from an artist's hand are unique and can set kids on fire with their own drawings and imaginings.

I think everyone has a story in them - and hundreds of pictures just waiting to come out...but that's' me - I think art is everyone's portal into real happiness, and that everyone is an artist - some just don't know it - and others get too easily put off.

Holiday activity

2009-12-16T04:42:00.000-08:00

Ok its the holiday and I am at the beach with 5/6th of the fam...but I have to admit to sneaking along my box of paints and half the studio... and actually painting 30 pictures in goauche and ink which will make up the "Wally's Howl" story I have written especially for speech therapists around the English speaking planet. I can't wait to get back to my scanner and start manipulating the images once I return home.

I started sketching on Sunday and completed the paintings on Wednesday. I don't know quite how this happened, how I managed it - either the sound of the waves crashing on the rocks set my muse on fire, or not having other boring domestic tasks to do freed me up no end. In any case I just had more leisure time to do with exactly as I wished... everyone else being happily engaged by pools, surf and crime novels, exhausted and relaxed, calm and in their own spaces of recreation.

As it happened, I got the chance to explore painting with gouache. It sets my heart beating just thinking about this amazing medium , and yes I have to admit having fallen in love.. again. Fickle? - I know, I have written before about the amazingness of photo shop and art making on the screen, and how I had become a digital art convert and would never look back..but now I can fully appreciate how much of a little tryst that was.

Let me tell you folks - there is nothing - no nothing - to compare with the joy of applying pure bright rich dazzling opaque colour onto paper, there is nothing more primal, more pure, more simple, more inspiring... ah. I am a child again with my brush and water jar. I feel foolishly joyful, I suspect I am insane.

'Look, I caught myself saying to Richard. "How productive I've been on my holiday" realising how lame that sounded, too late.
He rolled his eyes and told me that it was sad that I couldn't relax, that even on my holiday I could not just sit still.
Then I had to explain to him once more as though through some perspex tunnel where he could see me, but not hear properly, that art making was never work for me- that it was my play - the thing which relaxed me most.
I hope he'll understand...

An Hallelujiah moment

2009-12-06T06:29:00.000-08:00

Page 30 from The Well-Adjusted Yeti

It's almost 1 am and for me its early. Tonight, after a week end of intensive painting and scanning , I have actually completed my 4th version of The Well-Adjusted Yeti. This book was the first title I took seriously, and has been through three proofs already. When the last proof came back with some garish yellow borders around the images, I decided to revist the whole book since I knew the proof was unacceptable anyhow. My skills have improved so much since I sent the yeti book out, and I could see how much more I could do with it .

Now at last, I think I have got the format and balance right - more pictures than text and more yetis everywhere. I know the end result is so much better than what I had to begin with.
It brings me back to my favourite motivational quote of all. "A failure is really a win with bigger lessons" and that to me seems incredibly true for my shaky voyage into publishing. My failure to ever get a contract, had led to an incredible journey of learning and dancing with the internet. I am sure none of it would have happened had everything just fallen into my lap.

As I was sorting out the pictures, for what seemed like the thousandth time, I found the first version I had ever mocked up on publisher, in March 2007. I couldn't believe how primitive it was and was amazed at how much I have learnt since then. The world is a wonderful place if you love learning! In this day and age - there is nothing you cannot do if you try.

It highlights also how much easier is the craft of picture book making than novel writing. You can not see at a glance the miniscule changes and edits in a whole novel's draft. Which leads me to thoughts of my untouched manuscript which I know I have to get stuck into. I have to rewrite Tombspace 2...but...I'm going to make ten picture books before I do, and somehow that excitres me so much more artistically...probably because there is a chance that some one may actually run their eye over my work!

Blaspheming at the hlls hoist

2009-12-01T05:14:00.000-08:00

Ok, here's another holy housewife, perhaps I'm pushing the barrel here and may get my car torched one day soon by some incensed fundamentalist, but I hope not.

I'm hoping instead that that they' ll "get" what I'm trying to do, rather humourously with these quirky and childish images. That is: turn the tables on the traditional perception of housewives and get people to think of home makers in more reverential ways. Homemakers make sacrifices of life energy doing the most mind-numbing jobs, which often go unnoticed.

For me, as an artist - its more about time.The time it takes me to clean out a fridge, (for instance) equals the time I need to write a poem, or paint a scene, or work on a book. However paradoxically and sadly, I can't live with dirt. This means that my life is always full of this constant tug of war on my heart , clean or paint, mop or write, laundry or studio? My hands can only do so much! My heart says paint, but my conscience says steam mop now.

Since I don't enjoy passive leisure. can't sit down and actually watch TV (unless I'm on a date whn my time for that has been allocated,) I count each free hour as creative time for the real "work" of my life.

The solution is easy really - I need to get mega rich to have numer ous domestic servants or move to some second world domain and live the expat life, having many servants to do my bidding... (for just 2 or 3 dollars a day) but then how could I get my whole family to come with me...how could I ever do that...and ...what would I have to paint about?

New St. Fatima

2009-11-30T03:37:00.000-08:00

Here's another picture I created on my "housewife saints" theme, this week-end which was a diversion from the frenzied picture book creation that is consuming me at the moment.

Tonight I have finished the first draft of "The Podiatry Secret" which is I think a real evolution of the picture book art work I have been producing.

Considering this now makes five books in five months, I am feeling like a Christmas celebration will be well deserved, since it has been exactly "the power year" a psychic describe.d to me as unfolding in January 2009.

After I complete the sixth book, which I will start very soon, (this week) I plan to then really get serious about the selling side of all my books. This is something which fills me with great apprehension, since historically speaking, money and I are a disastrous combination.
I i fear I would happily sit in front of a bx of paints and a scanner all day, instead of actually going out trying to sell my wares. What I need is a benefactor, a patron saint, a lover of the arts, an entrepreneur, a distributor...a publisher someone to say...'I'll take care of it..' But I know, this dream only becomes real for a very very few lucky people, so I have to harden myself up and go door knocking. myself...wish me luck...say your prayers...or better still visit my web site at www.26toinfinity.com where it is all taking shape.

New St Patrick

2009-11-25T21:06:00.000-08:00

Ok - so I'm on a roll here with my housewife saints. This one again is a humourous take on St Patrick and his snakes...The ideas keep coming, and I rush to sketch them quickly. Everyone knows I hate house work with a passion - more than anything else on the planet in fact, so its a bit ironic that its giving me some creative fodder at the moment.

Housework saints

2009-11-23T22:34:00.000-08:00

I have been asked to create images around housework by a gallery owner who wanted more of my "laundry beast" painting. and now I am slowly building ideas around the theme. This image is inspired by the idea of a house wife as Joan of Arc - a humourous idea of 'Burning at the steak"

When I met my mother

2009-11-15T16:35:00.001-08:00

Why?

2009-11-05T03:52:00.001-08:00

Because the doctors prescribed it
Because of the fancy golf clubs they had in the Ferrari
Because they didn't read the research anyhow
Because he had been fed on a diet full of toxins
and artificial substances from the start
Because his mother didn't know any better
Because she fell pregnant too early
because she had to leave school without her papers
Because her father was a drunk who loved the roll of a dice
Because his father in his turn, had had wondering arms and came to him at night
Because his father before him, had been institutionalised and fed some
kind of toxic concoction
Because the doctors prescribed it...

Fleeting at the school gate

2009-11-05T03:21:00.000-08:00

I watch the mothers at the gate
some are early, some are late.
Their hair awry, their faces flushed
their lives are always in a rush,
Dinners that just can't be skipped,
lessons that must not be missed.
I watch their faces as they smile,
those who stop and talk awhile.
I hear their idle hot laments,
their voices thick with discontent.
They moan,before they roll their eyes,
I pray that they will realise,
The seeds grow tall and turn to grass
for life is short and nothing lasts.
As clouds will race across the sky
how soon, how quick the moments fly
For little boys will turn to men
and ash will turn to dust again.

The Pudding is in the proof!

2009-11-02T05:26:00.000-08:00

The proof came back a week ago of my Eloise book and I was heartily disappointed. My graphics looked clunky - the book needed much more work to get perfect. There is something about committing to print a piece of art work that will get reproduced hopefully millions of times - that makes perfection much more important than when paint is simply slapped onto a canvas. It makes the art making process much more considered, more mathematical, more technical. It makes me see how much I don't know.

So I have been burning the midnight candle working away on the pictures,making thousands of mouse shifts I calculate that are turning my shoulder blade into some kind of hard golf ball.

At the same time I have also been working on the first draft of "The Homeless Little Cockroach' for which,I am most courteously, awaiting approval from the Eric Carle foundation. That's because, the structure of the book closely appropriates, "The Hungry Little Caterpillar" Although, Eric certainly doesn't own the concept of an insect going on a journey - he was the first King and I thought it would be nice to acknowledge him, and ask his permission. Although really, my little roach tale is much more a cautionary tale about mess making than anything else, I am hopeful he'll give me a smile and a big pat on the back, allowing me to use his name...but that's very optimistic, and I could well be told what to do with my roach!

So today, unbelievably - there are 4 books somewhere along in the publishing process and another six waiting in the wings...the thing though is that making them is all very fine and dandy...now I've got to put on my marketing hat and sell them! I'll keep you posted, because ultimately that's what this is all about - making myself the guinea pig so that I can help other artists actually make a decent living. one day with their own work.

Creating picture books : Ode to Joy!

2009-09-21T03:04:00.000-07:00

I've been quiet here for a while, because I've been busy gestating 26toinfinity press, and finishing "Techno Crow" my novel for upper-primary kids.

Tonight, my second picture book about a Vampire called Eloise is finished. I gave myself the end of September to finish it, and its only the 2oth, so I'm totally rapt. This book is going to go direct to every dentist on the planet when I put on my marketing hat on and start sending out my please-buy-this amazing- book letter.

There are some seven more completed manuscripts awaiting illustrations, and now that I have discovered the key graphics tools I need, I know they will actually see the light of day!

It leads me to muse how incredibly fortunate we are to have so many amazing ways to explore ideas, so many different tools and mediums. Today - anyone can be an artist, a writer, or a publisher. We can be our own masters, if we choose not to wait for that letter of approval to come out of the publishing wilderness.

But there... I digress. I really wanted this blog to be about computer generated art, which is is something I've stayed away from until recently, but now I have to say, I am totally hooked. It is incredibly peaceful and absorbing, more than anything it is so portable and publishable, as well as being clean and non-toxic. Really, a Virtual studio in your lap top is nothing to be sneezed at. Anyone wanting to learn can log onto amazing sites like VTC and master the relevant software programs. There really is nothing stopping us except how we choose to spend time..

The dragon: Magic of creation

2009-08-25T18:14:00.000-07:00

The dragon mosaic is complete! It took me many snatched moments to get it right, but at last it is done. I used broken mirror pieces and stole a marble from my four year old- for which he was most irate. I was born in the Chinese year of the dragon so I have always loved these mythical creatures. In this piece I have placed mirror in the fire breath. This is as much about light as a statement about revelation. We reveal ourselves to ourselves by what comes out of our mouths or hearts.

The dragon took shape at the same time as "Techno Crow" my latest novel reached its concluding chapters. I wondered why so much of what I create involves magical beings and fantasy. Even when I set my stories in the real world like "Techno Crow", bizarre events take place. This book is written for the upper primary market and will be less than 45 000 words.

I mused as I wrote it at my desk, then worked on the art work, that so much of what I do involves putting small pieces together. I'm going to be finishing the last chapter today. I promise myself.

It brings me back to the beauty of art creation - it makes you think and muse . And once you have created a body of work, you can step back and wonder at the complexities of self and mind. It doesn't matter if you never get acclaim. It doesn't matter if you never make a cent out of it. Its God's gift to you and how you use it is a reflection of that creative power. You become God. That's the truth of it.

The Phoenix rising

2009-07-20T18:13:00.001-07:00

This Phoenix

rises out of the Bunnings Bin

where bits of wood

too small or thin

for the home renovator

await their fate.

It composes itself

slowly, thoughtfully

from coloured pieces

of broken glass

left in a cardboard box

under a shelf somewhere

where glass is made

for designer homes.

Like scattered words

from a would-be poet

and shiny moments

that make a memory

the broken pieces

form an image

coming to life

from the breath

of a creator.

More coffee table mosaicing

2009-06-09T20:45:00.000-07:00

Here are more photos of another coffee table I mosaiced. This was my first attempt to cover a whole table.

Mosaic mermaid

2009-06-08T02:01:00.001-07:00

I've been working on this mosaic for a few hours at night: chopping glass, paper, scraps and shards. I've been musing as I go about the art-making process, and how other might see me in way as a mad woman of sorts. I mean, cutting small bits of paper then sticking them onto broken pieces of glass in the wee hours of the night , in a dark and wind blown shed, surrounded by screeching bush animals - oblivious of all but the shapes and the fits of the emerging patterns. It is exactly the same in writing. or indeed in any art making process. I wonder where that stillness comes from and whether it is this that makes an artist?

The photo does not do the piece justice at all, and it it is indeed nothing too fantastic but I simply love the textures and the sheer audacity of it - the lack of symetry, the roughness, the fact that you have to really step back to work out what it is, and I lovethe fact that it is made up of recycled rubbish that would otherwise have been discarded.

The thing about mosaicing versus writing, or even painting - is that there is no re working. There is nothing more final than the act of placing a shard in the strongest adhesive available then surrounding it with grout. For that fact alone mosaicing is very satisfying to a writer. The work is completed and that is that. There is nothing left to say or do. Nothing more than to step back and say, wow. that works.

I feel a thousand different mosaics gestating inside me... I feel totally hooked by this art form.

Look for the Knight

2009-05-13T16:56:00.000-07:00

An ammended painting.

We can all be knights, no one needs to save us, but ourselves. The white knight comes rushing out from the inside...

boys on the road: 3 dead

2009-05-05T07:26:00.000-07:00

There is

word for this.

Hell

As hot

word for

Grief

As numb

And

Cold

Word

Mght have beens

shoulds

If onlys

thing to

Change

the facts of death

Lazarus

among the lads

who will

not

live

to say

thanks

Coffee Table Art

2009-04-18T23:15:00.000-07:00

I finished this mosaic piece today, being April 19th. Everyone around me is now seriously afraid that I have gone mosaic crazy! The thing is this, mosaicing is incredibly meditative. In a way, it is a complete act of faith. You leave yourself vulnerable and open to the possibilities once you start breaking up perfectly good tiles into random shards. You just cannot predict how the piece will end up looking, and unlike most other art forms, changing the outcome is much more difficult. The other good thing about mosaicing is that you can finish a project quickly...now that has to be good thing.

When Darcy fell

2009-04-18T23:05:00.001-07:00

I painted this picture in honour of a little girl who was thrown over a bridge at the age of four. Nothing could ever adequately express the horror of that moment, even so I painted and wrote.

For Darcy Freeman (thrown over the Westaway Bridge)

Did she ask him to stop? Did she plead, did she beg?

Did she beat and pound with her five-year old legs?

When he’d braked on the car, with a jerk so quick

did she know he was more bewilderd than sick?

The man who was normally warm and strong,

The man she loved who sang bed time songs

Whose arms were safe, who held her so tight

Did she know on that day, that his mind was not right?

When he’d ignored her brothers, and called out her name

Did she imagine a special girl only game?

When he’d come so fast around the passenger side

ignoring the traffic to get her untied,

did she know he was deaf to the horns and the shouts

as he’d reached right across and lifted her out ?

Did she laugh when he first held her so high?

Did she reach out her arms to touch the sky?

Did she wish she’d brought her angel wings

her butterfly dress, her fairy rings?

Then as he carried her fast over the ridge

to dangle her over the Westaway Bridge

did he sense the fear of her soft warm skin,

through the new school dress right pressed to him?

Did he draw in the smell of her soft clean hair,

as it fluttered so fast in the morning air?

Could he see the stretch of the Yarra river?

Did her skin turn cold, could he feel her shiver?

Did he feel her terror, did he feel her pain?

Could he bear to ever breathe again?

Did he hear her voice, as her body screamed no?

What was he thinking when he let go?

Mosaicing: Putting small pieces together

2009-04-12T05:18:00.000-07:00

This is the first mosaic piece I have just completed. It gave me such pleasure: a new medium, an ancient art, the infinite possibilities of broken pieces, used material, old crockery, bits of marble, coloured glass...my heart sang. I am ever the bower bird, and here at last was the chance to recycle and reuse the fragments of broken pieces, scraps and morsels I have been collecting for years.

This piece is inspired by the Jacaranda , my favourite tree. One day I hopw my house will be surrounded by lilac flowered beauties,but in the meantime, I made this tiled shard picture to inspire my little sapling along.

As I became engaged in the project,I discovered I could spend weeks at a stretch just mosaicing...just as I do writing. I guess there has to be a connection - the putting together of small pieces, the intricate choosing of shapes and unusual colours - the positive and negative spaces.

Mosaicing is such a simple pleasure, but one that requires time and patience. Unlike writing though, I can finish the work and possibly draw a comment or too. Writing as we all know, is much more laboured, more time consuming- there is nothing I can show unless I have a book in my hand.

I hope to do more mosaics.but its always about the time I have, never the inclination... That's the great irony of life: Our possibilities are infinite, art is infinite, time is not. Just what was God thinking?

For Mr Beamish

2009-04-06T01:18:00.000-07:00

Dear Mr Beamish

I don’t know if you are alive or dead

But you are probably still

deaf

and mute

as you were

on that day when they

found you guilty

and dragged you off

to the jailhouse

somewhere in WA

guilty of

murdering

some chocolate factory

heiress

They mention you in passing tonight on the

6.30 news in between the

racing results and the weather

as though the miscarriage of justice that

was discovered twenty years too late

was just of passing human interest

unworthy of delving deeper

the secrets that kept you sane

or uncovering the guardians of light who alone

heard the strident implorations of your heart

as you wasted still and quiet

like your tongue

Snippets of news: poem at the kitchen counter

2009-04-06T00:54:00.000-07:00

Good evening , ladies and Gentlemen

Here is the News

The weather today is predicted to be fine and sunny

after heavy rain

hundreds of corpses floated

into the Rwandan

River

The Pope in Rome presided over

Mass graves

disturbed in the floods

loosened

Bodies believed to have been thrown into

loose mud pits

to adopt again

Fifteen years ago

the first lap band operation

was performed alond with

massacres occurring on a daily basis

live in Los Angeles

Biggest Loser begins tonight

The weather tomorrow is more of the same

Her forgotten baggage

2009-03-21T06:34:00.000-07:00

Customs
note the woman
passing through the gates
at Heathrow
is paler in her skin tone
than her passport
photos show
They do not see
the blood stains
that have splattered
on her hem line
or the bruises where
her blouse comes to the
bulging at her waist
She is leaving in a
hurry
Just another woman
panicking
cause she's late
or she's nervous
maybe she's left
something behind

Amongst the
phlegm and
flecks of urine
and the
makeup pads
all oily
the tissues
crumpled, dirty
the cleaners
find the
baby
squirming faintly
in the papers
of the bin
inside the bathroom
of the cockpit
of the jumbo
and they're
certain
as she's
weeping
that
she's left
something behind

Never Leaving

2009-03-21T06:30:00.000-07:00

He's yearning
for the bus stop

and the moment
when he told her
it was over
simply over
and he'd nothing
left to give
He yearns to take that moment
and smash it with his hatred
and the remorse that never leaves
But time is not a vessel
and he can buy no backward
passage
to that speck upon the wheel
when his head was full of motives
playing tricks upon his mind
when his heart became a ticket
at a counter
to the
women
who were
countries
then
whole continents
at large.
For always at his centre
She's the
ghost whose
still not twenty
whose pristine
in her beauty
whose heart
is just for him
She's
the one who swore
she loved him
whose lips wept
tears of ardour
as she promised
not to leave
Somewhere at his centre
she's an island with a lighthouse
and a flame that burns so brightly
to heat his dreams in winter
as he lies beside his wife
where the landscape is too brittle
and the hills are stark and barren
but where he can never leave

The Artist (inspired by Leonard Cohen)

2009-03-21T06:22:00.000-07:00

The artist's in his tower
but he forges massive canyons
and he climbs across the mountains
in the fortress of his mind
And yes he has no money
no agent
nor no
launches
no kudos nor no
fan club
But he fills your
hungry body
with his food
He's
a sailor
and a pilot
a thinker
and a poet
a weaver
and a
builder
sometime architect
of dreams
He's the king of all the centaurs
the beasts who amount to nothing
but the fictions
of their
makers.
He's the
fantasies of
children
who have
Gods
but no religion
an outcast
with no city
on fire
in raging torrents
in the world in
which he lives.
But he
feels the world in colours
and he touches with
his nostrils
and he weeps
his joys with fingers
as he fills your
hungry body
with his food
And you wish that
you could be him
in his prison and his freedom
in his angst and in his
torture
for he's filled your
hungry body
with his food

Good News

2009-03-08T06:26:00.000-07:00

Good News!

A US based literacy agency has actually accepted my children's story for chiropractic offices as well as "The Homeless Little Cockroach"!! That now makes three books in total presently in the hands of agencies...being considered or marketed.
It's a bit of good news at last. Nothing published, but just a bit of hope in the void... I have a lot of work to do to prepare the art work and it will probably end up looking really different to the mock up below, but I feel excited! The book is actually written in verse, (surprised, aren't you) and tells the chiroprcatic story in a humourous tale.

After the last drink

2009-02-17T04:33:00.001-08:00

Lamentation: 1989

2009-02-17T04:14:00.001-08:00

You were raped, or so it seemed

somewhere between the full and heavy Summer

and the bleak but certain Winter.

I turned around to stretch my wings

to visit realms unchartered and

heard the voices across the phone line

that became the dirge

of mourning.

As though you had died

for of course you had in parts.

It perplexed me

how they got to you

and your soul, how they

bound, gagged and and chained it

so that it was trapped in a faraway dungeon

I could not reach.

like a political prisoner

and case for Amnesty International

in a place inaccessible to visitors

accept maybe, those with the correct

credit card.

And then, to make your imprisonment final

they poured cement into your blood stream.

Your heart became a concrete and desolate ball

a distant lifeless planet winking in the icy solar system

expelling poisonous fumes and pulsating

toward self destruction.

It turned your words leaden

they fell like dry particles of asbestos after

stony silences

And your touch

cold and clinical

as though your fingers were engaged

in examining a corpse somewhere

in a governemnt funded mortuary...

But

it was your eyes

I could never fathom

flinty pebbles

blind to the stars

cross armed policemen denying

access to the scene of the crime

I know now

they were also the

guilty accomplices

of your seduction.

Koala Mourning

2009-02-12T05:04:00.000-08:00

I ran and ran

right through the night

the bush was raging

with a light.

The air was hot

the sky was black

the baby clawed me

at my back.

Below me where

The grass was dry

the earth itself

began to fry

The branches bristled

As I swung

The bark was hot

my mits were stung.

I trembled as

the baby cried.

My tongue was limp

my eyes were dry

I turned to tell her not

to fret

that soon, so soon

we’d be met

with safety

in the leafy green

and it was not

a mother’s dream

A home awaiting

Safe and warm

Our fur not burnt

Nor bristles torn.

But as I turned to tell

her this

I saw the orange

rage and hiss

a fury

Lashing out in rage

trapping us

into a cage

My baby cried and

yelped with shock

I felt her little

paws unlock

Her cry distorted

At my ear

My muscles tightened

With my fear

I watched

the burning orange ball

And then

I too began to fall

My legs gave way

my heart imploded

I closed my eyes

the world exploded

Look for the White Knight who lives within

2009-01-21T04:13:00.000-08:00

I rescued this picture from the back of a cupboard today.

I painted it for my oldest son, but also for myself last year when I was wanting him to have valour and virtue, to act with pure integrity. I told him, to live an d die by his word. That his word was his sword. It is a lesson he gets each day from his father, and the adage is his alone, but teenagers are sometimes in a hormonal haze and unable to connectto the real world..

But I was also painting it for myself. As a woman, it is so easy to wait for the knight to come along. Learned Helplessness is something that is hard to break through.

We can all be knights, or so I tell myself...

Before the birth: Acrylic on canvas

2009-01-20T23:42:00.000-08:00

The Prayer

2009-01-19T05:52:00.000-08:00

A strange thing happened in the studio last night. I was there by myself - the last few hours of my birthday - It had been a beautiful day. I woke to the joyous shouts of my children and the pure adoration of my husband who had been busily buying and wrapping me exactly the gifts I had strongly hinted at in the preceding weeks. My niece and nephew were also present and I was surrounded by seven gorgeous children and my amazing husband, plying me with gifts and hugs. I just felt so loved and appreciated, and blessed. As well, I received so many lovely messages and well wishes from al over the world - thanks to the amazing tool that is Face book, it was the nicest day. To cap it off we went out to dinner, and then I finally ended up giving myself my own present... time in the studio.

The place was wind blown and unkempt, many unfinished works were scattered all over the place, the easel had collapsed. but the pots of paint were waiting on the table. I started work on the first canvas, and then another... one hour later I had finished two paintings...

All at once my eyes settled on two more paintings that I had been looking at over the last month in contempt. They were part of a series, and I had already dumped the third one, so there were only the two left. The paintings were meant to depict a prayer as it went across the world. I wanted to say something Universal about the prayer experience. But the pictures I had created were flat and dull. They did not speak what I intended really.

Suddenly, I was overwhelmed by a crazy itch. I felt as though my arms were driven and I was smearing thick lashings of ultramarine oil paint across the canvases which I had laboured over for many hours years ago. The prayer was raging through me... It was a moment when I really felt the muse, when I did not exist. I felt as though something higher was driving me... and this is the result.

I wonder what you people out there think? I know there have been problems with the comments sections and I do apologise to all of you for the time wasting. If you'd like to just email me your responses at fiona@the sawyers.ws, instead that would be fine. Take care now...

Looking for God: housepaint and canvas January 2009

2009-01-14T21:47:00.000-08:00

I painted this picture today on January the 15th, 2009. It was a quiet moment in my house. I relished the silence - my children all away at the time, no one asking for chocolate biscuits just before dinner. To me the picture is about an Universal Presence. It says that the world offers comfort and care, that the hand of God is everywhere.

I want my pictures to be poems on board. To have meaning and content, substance and colour. They are definitely not technically perfect, but I want them to speak. I hope you can hear something too.

St George and the dragon

2009-01-13T22:39:00.000-08:00

St George battled the dragon, but each day I battle the vacuum cleaner... A very old picture- pastel on board - discarded some time ago for its poor execution.... The painting is gone, but the angst remains. It rears its ugly head each time, the itch to paint demands to be scratched, but house work demands otherwise. If only time would stand still for me. If only all that needed doing was art!

After I am gone: an illustrated picture book (2006)

2009-01-11T04:42:00.000-08:00

After I am Gone

Listen to the waves

when I 'm here no more

I'll be calling your name as they touch the shore

The storm winds will blow

forceful and strong

And I'll send you my kisses

poems and songs

When it should rain

relentless and hard

Be certain I'll be there

Your celestial guard

And when the day succumbs

to the night

I'll be there you know

in the moonlight

Beyond the rainbow

of a wide grey sky

I 'll stretch right across

where albatross fly

And when it is quiet,

especially calm

You might feel

the slightest

touch of my arm..

So be peaceful, be quiet

Be happy

Be still

I'll be waiting

and watching

always

will

These are some images of the illustrated

book, that has been sitting in a file

somewhere in my studio for the last few years

or so (along with numerous other efforts)

There are pictures for each stanza. One day, a publisher on a big white horse will come by with a contract in his hand...

2009-01-11T03:25:00.000-08:00

His Guardian Angel:A response to black death in custody

Mixed media and collage on MDF

2004

Poem :A Rememberance of London: 1989

2008-12-31T21:54:00.000-08:00

A Remembrance of London

An inner city train

The afternoon exodus

In our carriage

The Red Sea is coagulating in a young man’s pocket.

Low commotion

Horror stampedes

Down the aisle

Agitated gray skinned men

Transmit the alert

Puffing shaky smoke signals

Through their pipes

Tocsin

Of sedentary Indians

Distressed blue haired

Old ladies

Lend a hand

Fingers dripping

Under alarmed wrist

Watches

With reds of rubies

And garnets

Spotted with emeralds and

Sapphires and the occasional solitaire diamond

Winking and flashing

Their semaphore

Not trained for combat

But still they

Lay siege

Around a Spartan Warrior

Whose battle wound

Has left him

Hemorrhaging

So badly that as the Red Sea

Parts through his thick coat pocket

It deposits a terracotta sludge

Around the banks of his thighs

We remark upon his extraordinary

Self control

Refusing all offers of help

There is something in his fear

That paralyses

Our instincts for action

Blunts nerve ends

Our networks of stimulus-response

He is a wild horse

Rearing savagely

Enlarged whites in the eyes

Ears almost horizontal

Nostrils flaring in the

Winds of our concern

It is a cage

But we are not in ambush

Self consciously then

We avert our eyes

Explaining away his reaction

“Physical and Cultural differences

You know”

“This country is not his own…”

A communication problem

Even the language not his own

Yes…Terrible…Ghastly dear”

And So on...

But when

Panicking

The Crimson River

Deltas

On the floor

We pull the chord

And wave

And as we cry out

And the guards

Arrive

We discover

Also that

The bleeding

Hand he has been hiding

Is also

Not his

Own

Leafy Sea Dragon and art preoccupations

2008-12-28T20:16:00.000-08:00

Amongst the animals at Underwater world,

the leafy seadragon is my favourite. I found out later that the males of the species do the child rearing, and in some sea horse species - even the gestation! No wonder I like them so much.This impression does them no justice of course... Nature provides me with so much inpiration, the more I paint, the more I realise how much. That's the most interesting thing about art.. the only way you find out what kind of an artist you are, is by actually doing it. As your body of work takes shape, you realise where your sunconscious interests lie.

Becoming Medusa:

2008-12-28T19:32:00.000-08:00

This picture was rescued from the studio floor last night.

I touched it up with more strident colours, and will probably work on it some more before I hang it anywhere

Interpreting the art: Lifecycle of a Mother

2008-12-28T18:19:00.000-08:00

Art responses are individual, there will always be shades of grey...What one piece of work says to the viewer or reader will always be different, even amongst friends.

The piece of work above, I think is a fine example.

At the Pine rivers Art Exhibition last year, this painting was hung upside down. It made me laugh. After all, the painting had caused much debate in my family.To my son, Xavier, they looked like boobs.To Max, they were cups of Jelly... To Oscar they were just circles..

It got me thinking if it was better for me to mark the meaning I assigned each square - to declare to the world my intent, that the circles represented mother, father, child. That the first circle is of man, the second, woman, the small light blue circle inside her, the child wish - the child.

See, I told Max, watch how the circles change...Each square from left to right, man, woman, meeting, impregnation ,geatation, lactation (dependence) childhood, puberty, adulthood, parental dependence...and the last, the mother now existing only in memory..

I wondered if I ought label each square...'Don't' someone said. "It doesn't matter what you intend. The experience is for the viewer to make of this what they want..."

But, will it be a better experience, if they know my intention? I asked.

'Ah,' said my friend.'Isn't that what life is like, full of hidden meanings and shouldn't Art reflect that?'

I guess she was right...butI am still udecided. I'd like your opinion.

2008-12-28T05:11:00.000-08:00

Tsunami: The day the earth retched

House paint on MDF

Posted on the 4th anniversary of the worst ever known natural disaster

Lest we forget

Lest we forget to remember

Lest we continue to ignore

Artist at the Laundry

2008-12-27T22:24:00.001-08:00

Artist at the laundry

Wet fingers

Dipped in cleaning liquids

Shower Power and Mr Sheen

Startling colours

Blue and green

The slogans promise

They leave no mark

But Art beckons her

Even as her fingers

Skirt the washing line

The wind blowing wild

Making the clothes entwine

Turning them to the insatiable beast

That strangles the urge

And thieves

Those pristine moments

That she might seize

And make endure

Forever with a mark.

Her mark

To declare

I was here

Just for a moment

From Zimbabwe December 2008

2008-12-27T22:15:00.000-08:00

From Zimbabwe

I woke today

And heard the news

Kids were lining

Up in queues

Miles away in Zimbabwe

I saw the pictures

As they stood

With arms outstretched

And begged for food

Miles away in Zimbabwe

Pus was frothing

At their mouths

Infants squealed

Amid the shouts

Miles away in Zinbabwe

But then a magazine ad

Came one

And Zimbabwe and its kids

Were gone

This week’s goss

About some sleaze

And some starlet’s

Eating disease

Were Miles away from Zimbabwe

The Christmas Gifts

You have to buy

The gourmet food

You have to try

Then cut back to the

Morning Show

With pundits

Lined up in their rows

Those who wished

to be a name

grasping for their

Minuites fame

What toys this year

Were all the rage

How to cope with

Underage

Crime and drinking

Drugs and death

Christmas parties

Wild excess

Miles away from Zimbawe

2008-12-27T00:01:00.000-08:00

The Writer

Inspiration Where does it come from?

Collage on Board: December 2008

I started writing seriously in the year 2000. It was the turn of the millenium, and pregnant with my fourth son, I resigned myself to an unfinished PHD in linguistics and the end of an academic career.

It was all very well to research the language teaching needs of non native English Language Teachers but who would be there for the children?

So, I took the noble path. (There really was no choice) And resolved to stay at home and use all my free time (!) to write my first novel, (instead of the thesis since it too would end up around 60 000 words...)

Mahavamsa Dreaming finished, and self published (That's an entirely different blog all together) I am now engrossed in a historical fantasy series I have been writing since 2005. On the strength of the first book - this year I was the only Queensland female selected by Hachette Livre for a manuscript development retreat and mentorship program. It was a small morsel of hope.

The task is so long though - three manuscripts - all in various stages of development. I wonder why I have driven myself with this impossible whip. That is why I love to paint and write poems. They are small packets of time. I can see a result. I can get feed back. I can say, Hey what do you think?

And that is why I started this blog. I'll keep posting

Striped sunset

2008-12-26T19:58:00.000-08:00

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Acrylic on canvas. December 2008:

I said I would never do this. A blog. But poems and paintings gather on my walls and fill my head. I succumb to the lure of the infinite cyber world, the thrill of short moments captured in words and pictures.

I painted this picture yesterday. I had children around me, shouting and demanding to be fed. My heart was frantic, tight and wound. Time was rushing, rushing. I felt the urgent need to paint or write. The desire to freeze time, to fold into a wave. To be still and merge into the ether. This is how I spent the moment.