Category: My studio

See the studio as a working space over time. See the work as it shapes.

There’s been a little complication with my complication

‘There’s been a little complication with my complication’—a line from my favourite movie Brazil—describes how things are at the moment.  I haven’t been here (at artistpractice) for a while. Our renovations meant that my studio was under siege for months. I have only just managed to get it back in order to work in there.

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Studio reset/refreshed!

While I was unable to paint I knitted up a storm—blankets, beanies, scarves, cowls—and my knits went crazy for stripes, chevrons and plaid.

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I am completely mad for plaid (Japanese schoolkids sporting plaid). Image by rumple teaser

I thought more about my ‘Finger in too many pies’ problem and realised that it isn’t going away so I started a new blog at toomanypies.com (starting a new blog to solve the issue of always looking for ‘new’ makes sense doesn’t it?). Yes, to me it makes sense to move all my other pies [the knitting, stuff about daily life, philosophical ponderings, the politics, and the gripes about education] to another place so that this blog just concentrates on artmaking practice—mine and others’.

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Love you to visit my new blog!

Speaking of artmaking practice, I was inspired by my clever nephew to think about doing some writing about the practice of other artists. My nephew has just recently done his HSC and we did some work together ahead of his visual arts exam. I haven’t taught this particular syllabus but the level of language and conceptual understanding of artmaking practice required of students was fascinating to me. I thought it would be interesting to do some blog posts here that look at the material and conceptual practice of artists.

So back to my statement ‘there’s been a little complication with my complication’. My own artmaking hasn’t diminished, I have just stepped sideways and have been exploring image-making and materials in a different way for a little while. I can now embrace the craziness of the runaway lateral thoughts.

I can deal simultaneously with multiple needy ideas. I’ve always thought that there has to be a connection between all these interests and explorations and ideas. There may well be some beauty in this intricate weave.

The square series

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Heavy rain on sea swell. Multiple exposures of lightning cracking through foggy stormy sky. Irregular chopped waves.*

I used to stare at the tiny tiles in my shower and see endless pictures – faces, animals, ghosts, landscapes. Our builders have trashed all the little pictures, but not before I saved a lot of them.

I have about 800 of them. I’d like to paint them all as part of ‘the square series’. [The square is very appealing to me at the moment.]

Whenever Eckersley’s has a canvas sale I buy some more square canvases. And that’s why I needed to do some renovating—to accommodate the square canvases. I’m not kidding!

There’s a direct relationship here with previous paintings. I’m still exploring water and related themes. But the square series is more about pulling the image out of the tile, whether it be heavy rain on choppy waves, or a rabbit.

* The image above is the actual tile, manipulated in Photoshop (colour, tone and contrast). It’s the sketch that I’ll use to inspire me as I paint.