eeek last post was months ago!

Well I have been working ...promise.
I have finished an interior of a florist!

and am working on a couple of new paintings for the summer show at Byard in Cambridge.

I've just finished tutoring three weeks of a five week short course 'Adventures in life drawing' at the Pacciti Company, Think Tank in Ipswich, with the lovely Blue modelling, and that's going well and I have begun teaching an eight week evening class at the institute.


I dunno about the performance art malarkey,
I have been still been exploring the self portraits tho' as I've been teaching oil painting through portraiture to my students... (All three of them, more welcome please) in my studio on a Tuesday morning, and so have been demonstrating the process. (Its a new take on the brutal selfie...)

here's a couple of works...

and the process

and

Latest ideas to work on

Under the skin

I have bought a very large drawing board to make the face the main focus.

I still want to start with the touch, with feelings, emotions before changing the emphasis to what it looks like, still keeping the layers, the rubbing out, the exploring and the re layering.

Further to a conversation with Gina I began thinking about concentrating the focus on the

drawing and artificial means to make the drawing difficult. 

We discussed, using gloves, false nails, gauntlets, big shoes, heavy shoes, very high heels.

(Feminism, I can't keep it at bay.... )

All that lead to a  re thinking around the plastic surgery and intervention theme.

So

I have decided to try out using creams, face masks, cucumbers, make up cleansers, as reaction to the drawing and punctuation in the drawing process,  could I use clay to draw with and to put on my face  as a face mask, the drawing and the reality blur. (I still yearn to work on stretched skin, that I can twist and distort like a face lift!)

Exchanging the costumes for various wraps and dressing gowns, using a dressing table as the surgeons slab, the very private spaces become a surgery with its implements to change my face to confront the world.

I still want the piece to have a renaissance feel, the historic face of beauty.

As we grow older as women we try to be even more compliant.

Our face creams / barrier creams are indeed a barrier to within, we mustn’t even fart. We mustn’t fiddle with our hair, argue in case we are difficult. Be good and the world will like you must be a nice lady. Whores swear.

Even as small children girls are held and treated differently to boys, they have to sit still to have their hair brushed and styled, they have more complex clothing. Voices are quieter when they are addressed. Their play and toys are softer and more gentle,

No wonder we strive to be compliant and good. 

So this weekend I will film another tryout and post some stills next week. 

Why use charcoal?

Why not use paint in my performance? Have been moving the paint around yesterday, (showing some students how I begin, getting them to free up, play with the paint.) and I think some of the work I made could be more interesting than the charcoal in the performance piece, besides I like using colour.  I could use umbers and ochres.

some experimental paintings...

trying out the performance,

 I have had a couple of tryouts this week in the studio, we videoed them. The first time I wore a tee shirt, jeans, had low lighting.

  and drew, explored, overlayed, it was very internal,but you couldn't see the drawing process very well as I was in front of it.











The next night I tried again, I moved around, made the drawing very large, wore costumes, etc etc, But although the drawing was large, I made the face too small and put arms and a body on it, I was rushing a bit so the drawing is too cartoon like. But it was very useful. I know I want it to feel Renaissance in colour tone, but have a raw quality, I don't want to worry about looking attractive, etc, indeed that's part of the point; although the point is getting a bit muddied. I want to say too much. So this weekend, I shall try again, see what that brings up. - gotta start somewhere.

• Further thoughts
• I like the muslin- its use was spontaneous but I think I may utilise it further
• it links from swaddling through to shroud
• its both timeless and place less.
• multicultural
• its the stuff of Renascence Madonnas and girls shifts, its domestic, intimate and simple.
• its cheap
• it comes in very long lengths. 
• it can bind and cover, stretch and float

• you can film on it and see through it.
• it can be the pregnancy and baby - I have used it before like this.
• I can make a mountain of it and climb over it

I am constantly turning ideas over and over in my mind

Bloody obsessive state. grrrr
I have checked out some of the artists Robert has suggested. Ron Athey Gifts of the Spirit on you tube
and  Gina talked about Jo Spence 
 I remembered  Marina Abramovic advice to the artist
so. the latest thoughts.

Under the skin. 17/01/2014

Personal to the general

Latest thoughts

·         Set up easel with large board and paper at one end of room

·         The  Audience sit either side of long catwalk

·         Perhaps a frame around the easel area so the performance is within a pros arch.

·         With other frames at intervals along the catwalk.

·         Lighting is by lamps.

·         It has the atmosphere of a Vermeer or Rembrandt.

·         Perhaps the paper is the window and I am the figure that appears in my paintings.

·         The light is off I talk in the dark.

The drawing begins,

·         Empty paper, using charcoal outline of a figure, child like, a face.

·         Wiped away,

·         Charcoal creates shadows over the page, large areas of dark and light that is rubbed in with a cloth, perhaps a diaper.

·         Rubbing a form emerges, is rubbed away, different figure shapes are tried, responding to my mood and the room sounds.

Now I need to look at outside influences, fashion, independence, society’s expectations.

·         Do I use props, slides, film, sounds?

·         The drawing responds.

·         I explore facets of identity using make up and costume.

I am ageing. At some point I depict pregnancy, hope, loss,

More drawing.

Now I am pregnant again. The one is two, independence has a constraint.

·         I think I shall use balls of string, perhaps dyed as the children.

·         One can fit in the hand

·         Two needs two hands, how do I now draw? I have to support them, leave them etc.

·         Three is difficult.

The drawing and the manipulation continue. Now the drawing becomes a woman.

·         The balls become entangled.  At some point I use a woven basket to carry them all in. as the individuals become a unit.

·         Now the self restraints start to be a web.

·         I use the strings which I attach to the frames to create actual barriers that I have to move to get to the drawing. (I may construct the frames at this point using gazebo poles.

·         When I have made a doorway I may explore strings that are more conceptual, made of light and sounds to make continued barriers.

How do I show my perceptions of society’s expectations of women and mothers? Which barriers are real and which self imposed. Film, slides, make up, costumes?

·         At some point I remove the string, only the conceptual string remain.

·         I explore a kind of freedom; I explore costumes and identity again.

·         The drawing comes to some sort of conclusion but remains unfinished. Perhaps I wipe it all away so none remains; perhaps I just rub out some areas.

I've had to cancel my Wednesday evening class

Due to a drop in numbers. It's not really viable. Such a shame. The recession hits us all.....
The Tuesday morning one is still going strong tho'. Hooray! So come along to that.