Towards Southern Russia and the Black Sea coast.

My hands have explored the Japanese coastline. From fingertip to palm to the inside of the wrist, I have spent my afternoon assembling newly collaged worlds. I have found antiquities of Southern Russia and the Black Sea coast (several clay vessels from Ol'viia (Olbia, extinct city, Ukraine), and from Ochakov, Simferople, and Kherson came iron and lead objects). All these treasures found in the form of a book with 69 colour plates (from which colour copies were made).

From here I have explored the Nordenskjord Glacier and Fortuna Bay thanks to a blue hardback picked up for less than a song. Niall Rankin’s Antarctic Isle: Wild Life in South Georgia took me to the Main street in Boom Town, before showing me a nestling Wilson’s petrel and a hillside rookery of Gentoos. Plate 63 in black and white of a lone penguin coming ashore and finding itself face to face with a Sea-leopard came a close second to one of a Grey-headed albatross standing at its egg-cup nest.

I’ve not walked along the coast, nor lakeside either, for the longest time, but it seems my hands have. They have been to the Hakone Lake and found it hidden underneath old Japanese gold and silver coins. They have been to Bund, Yokohama and found it partially obscured. They have been to Fujiyama (“Fujiyama was exactly as I had seen it on fans and lacquer boxes; I would not have sold my sight of it for the crest of Kinchinjunga flushed with the morning.” From Sea to Sea, March - September, 1889, No. XVII, Rudyard Kipling) and found Egyptian markings, and to Mount Aso, too.

{To the ground below.}

{You mirrored me completely.}

{Where your tears cannot reach me.}

{In neat formation, falling one by one.}

Treasure of a different kind, and a little closer to home, I have two blue rabbits scaling a vase to show you. A gift from my parents this year for my birthday, the vase currently bears a fistful of bright poppies.

And finally, Arthur’s Circus in Queensbury Street, North Melbourne where you’ll find a new batch Thelma’s stuffies and felt pins (see two of them in the photograph below, sitting on the glass counter in the window) nestled alongside paper ray guns from the 50s and Aunty Cookie softies. With a most fetching Donald Duck in the window Arthur's Circus is a cave worthy of Aladdin.

{A pair of blue rabbits, and two Thelma's stuffies in the window.}

October is in the wings... here's to a super and productive month. Happy week!

(Be sure to check out an elderly bunny (from 1998) here and a aurora of rather glum polar bears here.)

Comments

[louise]

Oh you have such active and lucky hands. All that travel, all those things that have been seen... It's all so fantastic. I love these new collages too.

[jac]

Beautiful vase! I have a soft spot for bunnies. And fawns.

[shari]

i have been listening to bublitsky by amsterdam klezmer as i was reading this post. :) i love your work, you know that right? and i love your blue bunny vase. i bet it looks marvelous with poppies inside. hugs!

[cruststation]

I love travelling through your collages, a whole fascinating new world of beautiful surrealism. Love the rabbit vases, what a fabulous birthday present! Thelma's stuffies look so happy in the window, such a cute looking shop :)

[lisa s]

always a treat to travel with you....

and those bunnies? wow. so good.

[Les très riches heures]

He, I like very much your work, you adore, like me, doing some "collages" with a lot of pictures, and it's a great pleasure to do...Sory for my english, i m french from Bordeaux...

[amisha]

i can't believe that it is october already... time rushing by so quickly.
thank you for this virtual travel... yes yes to lj's comment... such lucky hands you have! :)
xo

[Janelle Dunstan]

So lovely to go on imagined adventures with you.

[cd&m]

Amazing!

[Kylie]

That is really the most superb birthday gift!

Lucky I live so far away, or else I'd be tempted to do a midnight raid for that one, so jealous am I!

;)

Hope you guys are well
Kylie
ox

[andrea]

Your new collage pieces are beautiful and so is that blue rabbit vase.

[julie]

Your blue vase is gorgeous - such an appropriate gift for you dear Gracia...
I love how your work comes from the treasured old books and postcards found..xxx

[gracia]

Thanks, LJ. These new collages may just make it into our two planned Arctic books. Those Ukrainian vessels from long ago, and other collected and collaged antiquities, will sit alongside your polar bears well, I think. Lets make a start on the next books - today!

Thanks, Jac. It’s a ripper of a vase, isn’t it? That blue! You would also, I suspect, have liked the stag vase which accompanied it. Sadly it was a little costly as it was in pristine condition and completely crack free. I’m sure someone, somewhere is enjoying it.

Such timing, Shari. I have been listening to Katakofti on cd and naming my Mum’s stuffies after members of de Amsterdam Klezmer Band and the Galata Gypsy Band. At Arthur’s Circus and Craft Victoria you will find stuffies called Zurna and Onat, or named after a line in a song… one was even called Limonchiki, if memory serves. I think that particular stuffie had long striped ears, and a tail fashioned from the pocket of a kimono.

Thanks, Crustation, and I think you’d very much fancy that new shop with its 1950s accent. Perhaps one day you’ll be over in this part of town and you shall be able to explore? I’m hoping to one day make it over to your corner of the world, too.

And to travel with you, too, Lisa, is always a thrill. I have so been enjoying your Japanese polas. That square frame, the filtered light, why it suits your vision perfectly.

Hello les trés riches heures,
Thanks for swinging by my blog. I am happy to know that you enjoy these collage pieces and I am keen to see your work. I’ll duck over and say 'hi' sometime soon.

Thanks, Amisha… nice to hear such words. And just where has October gone!? How can it be the 6th today? Whatever happened to the 3rd, 4th and 5th?

Hi there Janelle,
Thanks for stopping by. I love the look of your new blog devoted to paper delights hoarded, found and loved. I hope to stop by later on to have a good ol’ look around.

Thank you, CD&M and Andrea, too. Always gladdening to hear such things.

Hey there Kylie,
Yep, I’d be tempted to do the very same were this vase in your possession not mine. I saw this blue number in an antique warehouse meets treasure barn in Geelong, and fell for it immediately. I had no idea that my parents later snapped it up for me. Whilst I was looking at something else they had it wrapped in newspaper and tucked away safely in a bottomless pit of a bag.

Hi there Julie,
I really love this shade of blue when used on ceramics or other like things, and if you like this one I suspect you might like another vase I have to share later in the week (I just have to take the photos when the sunlight is just right).

Enjoy your day,
grache xo