HIGH UP IN THE TREES

Changeability.

{Random images together make a whole.}

From small things through to those slightly larger in scale and heavier in weight, all feels refreshingly in a whirlwind of change at present. From the tangible through to the wisp-like ideas that at times encircle the head, change is in the air. Call it the promise of seasonal change, call it what you will. Part out of one’s hands, like the imminent arrival of spring, part self-made, like the personal changes in pathway taken. In the lead up to Louise and my exhibition at Craft Victoria in October of this year, new things in mind and studio alike are afoot. We are ready to knuckle down in this final stage, working sometimes at quite a pace towards the date that is installation of work on white gallery wall and table.

More details I will give you as they came to hand. For the now I can tell you that our show is to be called A key to help make your own world visible. It will run from 22nd October through until the 29th of November. If you are in Melbourne at the time, I hope you’ll come along.

+ In keeping with the spirit of change, I have overhauled my blog template. What do you think? Keep this one a little while?

Beyond the wrist.

It seems, like many of you, I hold a great deal of things in my hand. I like it this way. Who knows how I would document such findings had it not been for my foray long ago into blogging and a wish to remain somewhat hidden from view? Here for you this Monday, treasure found further a field and nature picked closer to home.




{We drove to Geelong to deliver a set of five of our collaborative artists’ books to the Geelong Gallery (for forthcoming exhibition) and made a fortuitous stop at a junk store where we found gold. Two beautiful hair ornaments, one of which I plan to fashion into a brooch, make it all worth while.}




{Walking about in a bid to clear cobwebs from wintry self, I find and pick a little boronia (I think) to later put in a bud vase.}

In your hands,
One,
Two,
Three,
Four,
Five,
Six,
Seven.
















{In my hands a while ago now, Forming new acquaintances at the birthplace of Honoré de Balzac, the final pages.}

(My internet connection of late seems to drop out more than in and it is pushing me to such levels of frustration that I am largely steering clear of it. No amount of shaking the fist in the air seems to remedy the problem nor does the gentle art of persuasion. It seems my connection will do whatever it pleases and it pleases to remain unconnected. Until then all hope of a blog redesign have been shelved and I am contenting my self and feeding my ever-constant need for change with moving about furniture in the studio.)

With a view to the week’s end. Bon week-end.

To and fro, and hither and thither, if I don’t post these photos soon it will soon be summer. Views of late from days and nights, we start in focus but end in blur.















Happy weekend to you, be it bright and loud or quiet and snug. I am thinking of overhauling my blog space. Who knows? When next you visit it may be different. Until then, be well.

Swayed by sentiment.

I am sentimental, this will come as no surprise I am sure. I keep almost everything and elevate it to status of personally important memento. I keep text messages from loved ones, and, naturally, their hand-written counterparts. I keep the postcards that friends send and the receipts from a good night. I keep it all deliciously in unordered state, in wallet stuffed or between the pages of a book. Propped on shelf are these keepsakes not so much for reasons of nostalgia but—as I think it was Agnès Varda described it so—enjoyment. I enjoy looking at them. They make me feel comfortable and connected to things. Every once in a while I store them away from view in preparation for the new wave of keepsakes to grace the bookshelves and mantelpieces. Some receipts may worm their way into the tax box whilst others rubbed bare are dispatched after lengthy stay.

There are always certain things I am particularly glad I kept and this evening looking at my old pointe shoes, I am astounded that they at one time fitted my feet and that I could perform a pirouette in them. I keep certain items of clothing for this reason too; clothing of my old self: numerous band t-shirts all faded and well worn; lace hand-dyed slips from lengthy foray with colour concocted on Mum’s stovetop; my Dad’s skinny-fit Fair Isle knit jumpers I prized myself into during art school days.

What particular things do you keep?


{Recent collage pieces from something I will soon be able to share with you. Please click to see a fraction larger.}

Come together; assemble or accumulate.

The festival may be over but the inspiration, the visuals and the sounds, all of these remain firmly rooted in the foreground of my day and night. I am storing them up for later use, all these sensations as they break upon me like a wave or as a light is held up to them. It’s a physical business this harvesting of inspiration and ideas. Some say it is not for the faint of heart, but don’t let that deter you. Through film’s aid I have learnt that the eyes of the village are often upon you and hope, it seems, is as a bird that cannot fly nor live beyond its cage. I have discovered the music of the former soviet block countries is stirring, as befits its purpose, to the outsider’s ear; and scars such as that which snakes its way across a poet’s left cheek are ever romantic. The music featured throughout is still easy to recall, as is the sound of snow crunching underfoot or horse’s hoof.

Here is a little sound for you, my pocket companion. I like very much the notion that ugliness is beauty that cannot be contained within the soul. (Boris Ryzhy)

{For you.}

Whilst in the cinema, a book was published and launched and Louise and I feature, a small paragraph and image upon the page. We are paper people, yes, we are.

+ Read and see more.


{The Melbourne Design Guide in my palm.}


{Us, in good company.}


{Always happily curious to see which image they use.}

The End.

{With red accents, scenes from The Man Who Came With the Snow.}

Ah, my helter-skelter life has had me travelling far. The festival may now be over but I still have a few films recently seen to share with you here, a few more before my weary head hits the pillow in exhaustion. Mohsen Makhmalbaf and Marzieh Meshkini’s brilliant film The Man Who Came With the Snow took me to a darkened bar somewhere in the former Soviet Union. A bar inhabited by a varying chorus line of locals who sing, just a little, and recount great hardship in your ear, if you’ll listen. It is a place you’d be best advised to keep your feet on your bag resting beneath your stool. The Man Who Came With the Snow unfolded before my eyes like a play performed beautifully upon stage, and it was one of my favourite films (alongside Aida Begić's Snow and Alexei German Jr's Paper Soldier) seen throughout the entire festival.

Along the way I have been introduced to a Russian poet I knew little of previously, Boris Ryzhy, and I want to know more, and I have seen artful footage collaged to weave a tale of suspense in Johan Grimonperez’s Double Take. Monkeys in space, stray dogs too, we are looking back at the space race this time through the eyes of American television and newsreel footage. Hitchcock and his doubles, and birds, plenty of birds, seen before shooting across to Bulgaria in glorious black and white (Zift). I have tasted complete and delicious freedom and escaped to Villa Amalia and I have experienced the opposite in the utterly disturbing confines of Dogtooth. Yes, it has been great! Twenty-nine films seen and for the main my high hopes of where I would be taken were more than met.

 
{Films seen, the last handful.}

Roy Andersson Shorts Retrospective (including Någonting har hänt and Härlig är jorden)
Baek Seung-bin's Members of the Funeral
Fassbinder's Chinese Roulette
Boris Ryzhy
Double Take
Zift
Villa Amalia
Dogtooth
Amreeka
The Maid (La Nana)

Seen. Found. Wonder.

{Scenes from Paper Soldier.}

I am gathering inspiration. I am harvesting visuals. I am storing in my mind’s eye various scenes of great beauty that have been flickering on the screen before me. I know how snow sounds underfoot and that it is possible to peddle through water on a bicycle. I am not alone in thinking that this will set me up for the year ahead, this process of gathering sights and sounds and ideas.

Recently I saw Alexei German Jr’s Paper Soldier and I have placed atop my imaginary list a new favourite. Such cinematic beauty well supplied with cosmonauts, crows, and a landscape covered in equal parts with white snow and brown mud, a small dacha, women with almond-shaped eyes and dogs, plenty of dogs. I wonder what it must feel like to make such a film?

Also seen of late, the beautiful 35 Shots of Rum and countless others. I am having a difficult time keeping up. Must be why I have a head cold and have near to lost my voice. It’s all about endurance.

{And there are still more to see.}

Scenes gathered from
35 Shots of Rum
Pardon My French
Empty Nest (El nido vacío)
Katalin Varga
Flame & Citron
Morphia

From 'Snow' to 'Stuff'.

{Painterly and beautiful scenes...}


{...from the film Snow.}

There is but one week remaining of the film festival most intoxicating but before I show a few more beautiful film stills gleaned from various sources I have something else to share. On Friday evening Ramona and Beck (handmadelife), that delightful and clever duo, launched their book I Make Stuff.

I Make Stuff features a sizable handful of handmade folk assembled, their “purely subjective… wish list of conversations (with) makers (they’d) admired, talked about and collected”. Louise and I were invited to take part in this conversation with Ramona and Beck about the stuff we make. Flattered to be asked, delighted to participate and truly overjoyed at the outcome, really, what more could you ask for?

The opening at Craft Victoria was a crowded and happy one and the gallery was hot. It felt all the more so as Louise and I had only a few moments before been engaged in another world, in a Bosnian village after the war in the year 1997. Aida Begić’s film Snow (Snijeg) proved yet another festival highlight for me.


{A cover with three clouds of blue.}


{A familiar collage.}


{Studio Violet.}


{Turning the pages of I Make Stuff.}

Also featured in this book the equally delightful and clever Camilla and Elisabeth of Studio Violet.

+ Read our reply to why we make the stuff we make.

More soon, my friends.