Gallery News

Wet and Wobbly

Thursday 16/07/09

Yeah, see, I thought if I did these line drawings enough I'd sort of start getting better. Some hope.

Friday 17/07/09

Had a first go on Wii Fit the other day (if you haven't you should cos it's good - subject to the following reservations on its ability to add up). It's the art of wobbling (or not) about on a board and with a confidence borne of knowing my bmi as independently verified and certificated by the BIOBANK I confidently took to the board and wobbled (or not) in front of a crowd of partisan family members. Oh the shame, oh the travesty, oh the ridicule by said formerly supportive crowd as the software churns out a 'Wii fit age' of 52!! Pah! What's the good in wobbling (or not) on a board anyway?! Surely it's much better to play 5-aside football in the pouring rain in a butch and hearty kind of way?

Maybe the board knows more than I think as after the 15 min wobble work out I was already feeling some sort of burn (maybe it was just wind) and after football yesterday I'm once again walking into town to paint with legs all stiff and achy (at least we won).

It's grey and miserable (the weather, the painting and the artist all combining in a symphony of grey and miserableness). I've got the wet weather gear incorporating my dad's old raincoat that he generously donated to the cause. It's green and combined with the brown trousers and the white tilley hat I think I'm looking explorer like, but probably not the good guy as I don't look cool enough - in an Indiana Jones type movie, you'd be thinking I'm going to bite the bullet before the end - maybe when the rope bridge gets cut, or the truck explodes, or ... anyway ... where was I ...

Back to this painful painting and the weather. It's been so long since I started the thing that the shop is no longer empty and is busy trying to flog overpriced rustic design against the tide of recession - we'll see, but I'm not holding my breath. I try painting from a different spot to avoid blocking the window, but it's no good, so I move back and try to nestle between the gift shop and the curry house next door which sort of works.

It starts to rain, good and proper, but with the wet weather gear I can keep going for a while - I get soaked, but the painting moves forward. I can't believe I got all my angles so wrong and I end up repainting most of it - it's still not right, but it's getting better.

The zip doesn't work properly on the coat - aha! that's why he palmed it off on me - and it smells of my dad, which isn't a bad thing - it's not stinky or anything - it's just one of those smells of home that take you back to your childhood, probably emphasised by the wetness of it all. It's all slightly surreal - standing painting in the pouring rain, smelling of my dad.

The BIOBANK

Wednesday 17/06/09

Woohoo - half day off - so let's ....

do another line drawing of myself ... (?)

Thursday 18/06/09

Still thinking about THE BATH PRIZE - had to submit the application form this week and within I had to write the dreaded 'Artist's Statement', the perennial and apparently necessary concoction of very long words that don't really go together in an attempt to justify the artwork whilst also making the artist sound really intelligent. I blathered on about why I write on the paintings to 'involve the viewer in the experience of the painting' (ha ha - pretty good huh?). It occurs to me now as I walk into town to set up that I am once again in a foul mood and the reality of being in my head in a 'Being John Malkovich' kind of stylee would not enhance anyone's viewing pleasure of the painting.

Grump grump. I can't finish the rubbish painting I started last week because the spot I was standing on is now the property of an even more grumpy than me shop front decorator.

Grump grump. I think about just going home and not bothering, but what the hell, let's go and paint Pulteney Bridge again.

The sun comes out and then goes in, comes out and then stays in. This suits me as I think I like the grey.

Another fly crashes into the painting, but this one is in trouble as he landed on a sticky bit and got his big skinny body all stuck. He struggles in vane to escape. Maybe my painting was so good that he thought he had loads of space before he would reach the bridge and then whammo! he's encased in titanium white.

WA HA HA! I am a cruel and pitiless god and I let him suffer. WA HA HA! And then I feel guilty so I flick him off with my brush, which doesn't really help him - he's too far gone - but at least I can finish the bit of painting he was on.

There's some of that green stuff again poking in on the right. Ha - not having any of that ruining my painting and I do it all greyish. A bit of yellow gets through relatively unmixed, but I leave it - kind of wild I know, but that's just the way I roll.

Friday 19/06/09

A couple of months ago I got a letter from a sinister covert government agency - The BIOBANK. (So, putting their details on the letter wasn't that covert, but it just shows how sinister they really are - clever maybe, but it didn't fool me). They wanted me (and half a million other people) to donate their bodies to medical research. (See - pretty sinister or what?). I quickly realised that the only way to burst this festering pustule of corruption wide open was from the inside and with that I signed up, sent off the form and thought no more about it.

Two months and some other bits of time later and here I am, standing outside the lab, cleverly disguised as an unused office block (the lab, not me) right next to a sandwich bar and the Tesco metro. (clever, very clever, but I guess undercover evil government agents have to eat too.) I do a quick sketch of the place - just in case I never come out (of course, if I don't come out then the sketch is unlikely to make it out on it's own, but let's not let common sense get in the way of a good diverting fantasy). I've got my best pants on and I've cut my toenails - bring it on ...

As soon as I get inside they start with the tests - I'm pretty hopeful I will get selected for the experimental drug that will turn me into a super soldier as everyone else has got to be over 60. All I need to do is perform on the tests and I'm a sho in and then we'll see who's laughing when I bring this crazy madhouse tumbling down.

There's a series of questions which seem innocent enough until I stumble across the 'bald' question. Aha! Just as I thought - a surreptitious selection process is at work here - and they are obviously looking for the follically challenged - I knew it would be an advantage eventually.

I ask them where the secret lab is (knowing that there's hundred's of floors below this one full of failed experiments), but the operative just laughs and says if he told me, it wouldn't be secret. (clever, very clever - but I know the truth.)

Damn - I fail on the pairs test - It's all going well until the last four cards and then I click everything randomly and I'm done for.

Still - there's always the urine, mid-flow, test as they cruelly force you to cut the wee off after you've started, get just the right amount in the cup, stop again (?!) and carry on in the loo. Can't see all the other elderly subjects managing this one. I can do it, I can do it - yes success - but wait, there's not enough in the cup! And it's all too late as there's nothing left. I've blown it.

That's it. Time to go, just the sop at the end of the free cup of coffee and a ....

ooo bourbons.

They smile at me as I leave (they all smile, all of the time - even more sinisteriness), but I'm not expecting the call back or the abduction by armed swat team in the middle of the night. I guess I will have to leave their demise to some other agent of justice.

FYVP

Tuesday 09/06/09

Hey, it's Tuesday! I shouldn't be doing any drawing. Don't I know that today's an office day? Duh!

Thursday 11/06/09

I'm almost there, I can feel it. The end is nigh and it's looking flowery.

Just ... one more ... coat hook.

I can do it ...

That's it!

There.

Done it.

Finished.

I am a broken man.

P.S. Don't know what I was thinking with the hoody.

Friday 12/06/09

Too much studio action recently so despite the aches and pains of yesterday's 5-aside football debacle I hobble down GPS to stand outside one of the empty shop fronts in Argyle Street.

Just a little painting, should be fine, but oh no ...

I get casual with the layout and the next hour is spent trying to correct the Victoria Art Gallery - will I never learn.

There's this Bath Prize thingy coming up in a couple of weeks time where you have to paint a Bath landmark of their choice and have it dry and framed within a week. Top prize £2,500 (or thereabouts).

I was tempted. I was going to give it a go, but now ...

Look at this ... only 12" x 12" and it's a mess [so distraught am I that I have to post the image small so you can't really see it.]

I'm going to have to come back and sort it out another time.

This kind of performance isn't going to win me the coveted BATH PRIZE. I have worked out the timings and I reckon I will have a window of one or maybe two days to do the actual painting. Let's just hope it's sunny (long shot as it coincides with Wimbledon).

It's with a sense of relief that I pack up and whizz off - I've got to be somewhere at 11.00. Yes, that's it - quick let's go - not slinking off, but head held high - I've got places to go and people to see.

P.S. Later, back in the studio and I put the finishing touches on the portrait so here it is fyi. (fyi - that doesn't make any sense, better would be fyvp - for your viewing pleasure.)