i am eating cold pizza for breakfast....
and posting patches...i like patches cos they are small portals
need to stitch patches with pizza on portals
perhaps
i like pizza

things i did the other day
take me into another place
waiting to play with dots
lines and things

Here's some working from the box....at least it has an air con!

Um what to say; draw on board, put down cloth rub with hand and voila, instant ready made marks...the orange images above are the actual boards i have painted on...i think they in themselves look ok too. not sure whether to die these now post printing or keep white??? What do y'all reckon?

Anyway, didn't think too much about it, just threw the paint down because i like the process and made a few...it's a very different rhythm from painting with just a brush...which is like; put out paint, get brush and do. This process adds another element and is slightly removed from the direct mark making of just painting.

I am so thankful to anonymous, who recently left a mark on this blog with a wonderful poem.... (check comments from post below)

beep

look at tonight's amazing sky.....just had to share

broths and brewskies...

Yum-Cha anyone! Mmm delicious broths and brews on the go...

First up is year old white clay I discovered sitting nicely on the shelf - turning an interesting grey colour. Should be delicious for making nutritious marks.

Second up is the pot of slowly cold cooked quinine - light on the palette, yet on cooking or with rust might add some flavour.

Next is the wondrous concoction of last week - chef's delight; red pigment (not iron oxide as formerly advertised) with some other thing (secret ingredient). The results are fabulous deep red/iron lines on oxidisation... to be continued. (Chef wonders how to work with the lines when they oxidise?)

And finally the desert, not yet complete, is the week old salmon gum bark shaving gumbo pot! Sitting irreverently on the back porch in the sun all day, should be getting fizzy soon and making the tannins rich and dark.

Chef is brewing more as we speak and planning the haemadorum and pogonolobus special....oh yeah not to mention the upcoming secret ingredient........coconut ash!

ramingining road sign rarrk....

OK while we are kinda on a theme...I went to Raminginging once and was thrilled in the ensuing twilight by this cool road sign - which appeared literally in the middle of nowhere. Right in the centre of Arnhem Land, hundreds of kilometres from anywhere.

This is the first left hand turn since leaving Weemol which is a long way away and the rocks are either some form of bush indicator or else someone broke down out there and was bored for hours waiting for the next car! (I wouldn't want to walk the 103 km's either!)

As for the road sign, I like it! Think it's spray paint. Hmm...road sign rarrk , might be a fresh new art form in central arnhem land!

Black and white, with spots and lines
Red dirt and rock stacks
Long grass
she is growing...

mud motions

A real African mud cloth (above) reminded me of some other things I had done - wax resist on cloth (above above).

Feel like it would be good to get into some black/white mark making mud motions.... pondering the potions that would be required to resist on black???

Thinking of mud reminds me of something i did once....got loads of iron oxide and wrapped myself in it by the pool in Darwin.

It was really red...it made great marks on the sheet later and marks on the pavement...good for shadow playing.

mud

Today I have been pondering the world of mud....

How to simulate the extreme experience of loud, noisy polluting cars that drive around in circles and try to go really fast? I wonder why many people are so excited by this world of mud racing, it seems so pointless!

But my first experience of attending the 'mud racing' this weekend has provoked thinking about how to simulate the experience as an art work....hmmm, the most exciting bit was when the really pimped out fast cars fanged around corners and sprayed the crowd (with much pleasure) lavishly with mud...maybe i can just throw mud around and pretend that i am a fast car....seems really exciting.

I wonder if mud sticks? I want good mud.

Mud cloth

Mud madness

Mud

play

today imbi has been playing around with stuff....
she has experimented with a few bits and pieces:

1. Quinine leaves - starting turning yellow colour, am hoping this will morph into rich darkish black colour. I wonder though, how to mordant it to cotton fabric - I think I have tried this before and it just runs out - maybe it needs boiling with ash or some other thing??

2. Iron oxide with hyro sulphite (stuff you use to reduce indigo)...seemed to make the cloth turn a darker red and caused a film on top of the water - and smelt real bad...like photographic developer turned rancid. I am excited to see what happens as it brews, but not looking forward to stinko.

3. Rusty stuff with water - might need to get out my notes on rust dye processes using ferric - but it might also be more fun to got out the tip and get funky rusty stuff to make marks on cloth

4. The most fun - painting on wood with watery paint and taking mono-prints with cloth before chucking cloth into pots of stuff...the fabric paint picks up the grain of the wood making lovely marks. I will keep experimenting with this on cotton, silk bits and other stuff.

C'est finis....

moo

Imbi wonders how you get really dark colours, blacks or blues using only natural dyes, pigments or colours??

I was thinking about bark paintings from Groote Eylandt and how they use manganese black on the backgrounds....

Imbi likes these marks below and talking to herself in third person!










yeah and she did it...yay who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks?

imbi is still trying to figure out how y'all can make comments....

the road ahead

Micro shots of some fabric, rust based, shibori dye works that I did a while ago...trying to flip the switch in the brain...from making paintings to infusing fabric with colour.

My daughter the other day was worried about the process of 'dying', because she felt that I would never come back! Poor thing, I had to explain...

Today I was looking at the artist Hiroyuki Shindo and loved his/her? indigo clouds...was thinking about my own storms and clouds... loved the way the installations are so minimal yet powerful, the Japanese have a way of balancing the complex so simply. Profound. I also love the way Shindo stitches panels together to make one work.

I also realise today that i intentionally don't like using good grammar...might have to address this at some point however.

working with if....

today i feel like spear grass in the dark


i am gearing up for new works that will explore the world of;

colour, plants, lines, textures, feelings, sounds, red
dirt, love, pain, bark, tannin, brews, broths
loneliness, space, change
home, land, bush, blues
rocks, iron, stitching, binding
heart, mess & longing
walking, discovering unearthing

These are a series of little works on paper that didn't make the final cut for latest show. there were 9 in all, and looked kinda cool all together in a little bunch, each with its own story.