Sonia Delauney at the Blue Lantern

The Blue Lantern : Arts journalism for the love of it is an engaging blog written by NY based freelance journalist Jane Librizzi which I just happened upon. I liked the sweep of her posts taking in art works from a great many eras. This 9 july post caught my eye as I have long been a fan of Sonia Delauney, ever since scraping together funds to buy a massive tome on her work back when I was a very young art student with little money. I lugged that book around for 30 years and it only went astray a year ago, surviving a house fire and about 35 moves.

I spent a lot of time pouring over this book and was ecstatic when finally in Paris  in '88 I could view more of her work. This female artist early in the 20th century appeared to be re-inventing her world to be as she wished...and this impression had a huge impact. Seeing her paint not just on canvas...but also on fabric for wearables and  furnishings...even a car...I thought this artist was thoroughly modern and ahead of her time.  Thank you to Jane at the Blue Lantern for the inspiration!

Easton Pearson at GoMA

A survey exhibition of internationally acclaimed Brisbane based fashion house Easton and Pearson is  showing at GoMA - the Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane at the moment during the same year they are celebrating their 20th anniversary. This exciting show seems to be drawing the crowds as there is so much to  appreciate that is a remarkable and a joyful celebrations of craft and colour.

images taken in the gallery last week.

In the Children's Art Centre an Easton Pearson workroom has been set up with paper dolls for kids to dress in outfits made with paper samples of the designers materials which can be cut up and arranged into a wardrobe of designs inspired by pieces from the designer's collection. What fun!

Easton Pearson: Runway show 'Rainbow Coalition' 29 April 2008

If you go to the weblink for this show you can click on this exact image and it will open a fabulous preview of the exhibition. On the left of this same page you can click to read the Curator's Essay for more details about the wonderful Pamela Easton and Lydia Pearson.

website:  easton and pearson

Floating Life: Contemporary Aboriginal Fibre Art at GOMA now!

Currently on show at the Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, is the exhibition 'Floating Life' highlighting the importance of fibre within Aboriginal culture and the 'commitment of the Queensland Art Gallery to developing a unique collections of more that 300 objects'. Banubirr (the Morning Star), water, and the notion of movement through time and place are major themes. Read more here.

I absolutely loved walking into this exhibition with little knowledge of what I would find. It took my breath away! This is an exciting and memorable collection of woven forms in diverse materials, including the obscure such as found fencing wire as well as a considerable number of natural fibres such as spinifex, bark fibres, jungle vines, and pandanus leaves. Each room contained more surprise and I have returned several times to see this exhibit.

Forms of every kind, size,  structure, method and purpose are featured.

This string bag or Abmin by Doreen Yam (b 1947) was constructed with knotted-netted polypropylene and had a particularly contemporary feel.

Below: This room featured fishing technology and contained examples of nets, traps and even a canoe sail made of woven reeds. The curator Dianne Moon has written an essay titled: 'Visible songs: captured flight' that gives a lovely introduction to this work...well worth reading if you wish to know more! This exhibition has drawn a great deal of enthusiasm from all who have been lucky enough to visit.

"If you really want to do it, you do it. There are no excuses".

This title heads a post on Bruce Nauman featuring the image below (an early work of this artist) which I found on the July 6th post of the blog Artist Quote For The Day by Karyn Mannix. I remember seeing this work over the years at odd intervals and liking the juxtaposition of this 'neon' medium - commonly used in the late 60's for advertising purposes alone - in combination with such a poignant quote. Whether the artist in 2009 would be likely to make a similar work I'm not aware of, but I do find it interesting considering how it must have come across at that time. Seeing it always triggered thoughts on a different tangent to whatever was preoccupying me at the time!

Bruce Nauman: The True Artist Helps the World by Revealing Mystic Truths  1967

A quote directly from the artist :  "The artist's world is limitless. It can be found anywhere, far from where he lives or a few feet away. It is always on his doorstep. I think most artists create out of despair. The very nature of creation is not a performing glory on the outside, its a painful, difficult search within"

From another post: August 31, 2008

"You can never learn less, you can only learn more". - Karyn Mannix

Quoting from Richard Buckminster "Bucky" Fuller " to give a body and a perfect form to one's thought, this - and only this - is to be an artist. A mind always employed is always happy".

Nicola Moss: a walk in the Gardens

Nicola Moss is  Artist-in-Residence at Mt Coo-Tha Botanical Gardens in Brisbane this year and on Wednesday a small group joined her for a 2 hour walk along the Australian Plant Communities Trail. 11am was just the time to set off... the day was perfect, a slight breeze blowing, warmth in the air and the garden just  blissful. Nicola has familiarised herself  with this part of the Garden in particular over the course of the year... working on paper in situ, photographing her discoveries and the changes, subtle and otherwise, through shifting seasons, times of day, and weather conditions. Many treats lay in store for us as she guided us to her favourite places along the trail, explaining her observations through her time here. Nicola has recorded the year to date  on a fabulous blog dedicated to the garden residency with visits wonderfully photographed and details noted, along with posts on work that has evolved out of this experience. Nicola's website is equally current and has an excellent portfolio of her work.

'Pollen drift' - Acrylic and pigmented ink on canvas, 600 x 600 mls, is  a work from 2009 which can be viewed on Nicola's website.

New growth on a small tree...particularly striking for its amazing colour.

Blue Quandongs - a native fruiting berry that is used in jam (amoungst other things)  in Australia... although I must say I have never tried it. Non-indigenenous Australians have for the most part not been quick to try natives sources of food. Historically hardy cooks would not have turned up their noses at these blue beauties or the  varieties of lilly-pillys available for jam-making! I was  delighted to find these many-hued quandongs nestling on the brown leaves near a large tree. It was quite a sight ...all the variations of blue and blue-green!

My photo here does not do justice to this tree which was covered in a beard-like matted growth with green pea-like berries ...a wonderfully wild looking rainforest-type  specimen. Where was my pen and paper?...I was too busy clambering around looking at things!  Huge thanks to Nicola for a memorable and  enervating experience... so willingly shared!

back to the sketchbook: ink, aquarelle pencil, acrylics

mossy pool's edge

capturing that illusive movement of light through water

Rock pools

Looking out across the children's pool to the Pacific Ocean

These are 4 from a series of 10 small works I have been doing over a couple of days in preparation for a larger commissioned work. The first 2 images took by far the longest time as they involved rather intense study of the water...the second image in particular. I purposely wanted to keep the other 2 works quite light and quick, not getting too caught up in detail. An interesting diversion from the work I've been focused on - a disciplined but enjoyable approach to working out where I want to take the painting.

I recently found a particularly gorgeous sketchbook, smaller than A4, landscape format, with pages in a distinct off-white colour that felt quite liberating to be working on with inks ... white ink in particular. I do love my Sennelier inks from France... they worked well with the Caran Dache aquarelle pencils and Gold acrylics. The white ink is Australian - Art Spectrum - and I'm on to my second 500 ml bottle in not so long. I cant believe that I am still using one particular brush I've had for yonks that was not remotely expensive, and is looking thin and worn...but it has some magic property I adore. Basically it is a little hard to control and that makes for me a better, freer mark that I rely on to keep me from loosing myself in some notion of perfection not very suited to my aesthetic.

Its late I just realised. Lost a couple of hours figuring out the scanning and importing images process. I seem to forget these things and have to relearn each time! Still, a year ago I didn't have my Mac, had very ordinary documentation, tech skills and such. Compared to that I'm laughing now!

Love this....Pestival!

This caught my eye from the Arts and Ecology blog this morning. A festival at the South Bank Centre in London celebrating insects in art and the art of being an insect. The post is worth a look to take in the clever programming which is international, inter-disciplinary, and community-led. There's something on Biomimicry from Architect Michael Pawlyn, fashion, comedy etc etc. This PESTIVAL sounds amazing. Neuroscientist Beau Lotto creating a large bee hive in the Queen 'Bee' Hall. 80% of creatures on earth are insects according to the blurb...I'm not friends with some species...but I would be very curious to take in this event.

*For a link to Michael Pawlyn's Architecture go to this brilliant website Exploration. Read about Janine Benyus and Biomimicry here.

image from Explorations website: courtesy of NASA