getmyownblog

opt in studio crit

2012-01-28T05:13:00.001Z

Outsider Art . . .

2012-01-27T19:49:00.001Z

I find I keep contextualising my practice in terms of having a history of exhibiting as an outsider artist.

The night before this weeks presentation I read through a catalogue of major outsider art exhibition which I was in.

Part of the submission form was a box in which to add what you thought made you qualify as a marginalised artist. It wasn't made clear that this information would be included both within labels for the exhibited work in the gallery, and the catalogue. But then that wouldn't have served the 'inclusiveness that no doubt funded the enterprise, and subsequently had something to do with which artists were awarded prizes with financial awards.

I have removed the names. - See if you can pick out my statement.

It's interesting [to me] how I have chosen to censor parts. I've included so many to show how representative [and repetitive] these statements are.

I am in a psychiatric unit. I have never done art before but I enjoy it now and try to learn.

In this painting I have made something which I am very proud of and which is my own.

I am 21 years old and if I am to be honest I don't consider myself to be marginalised. Just because I have problems doesn't mean I have problems drawing or painting. art is my means of expression.

I enjoy the expressive process of using oil paint and a fascination of skin tone. Sometimes I work from life study observations and sometimes from distorting figures. I have had mental health needs for a number of years.

I am a graffitti artist and in being so, am marginalised not only by society and the community I live in but by the mainstream art community as well. I am currently serving a prison sentence for graffitti art.

My work has never been shown due to my health and marginalisation. I paint for myself and my well-being. Recently an outsider artist visited me at my home and described my work as outsider art, naive art and childlike.

I have been in drug rehabilitation for 6 months in Weston-Super-mare and will be spending time in a drug house in London. I would love to learn more and carry on painting.

I am a self-taught artist and my lack of technique allows me to create compulsively through art, music and words. My work looks like my psyche to me - childlike, disturbed, hopeful, lost alive.

___---- has a moderate learning disability. ________ is interested in art and goes to as many activities as she can afford. She belongs to a small group of similar artists who meet monthly to work independently.

I have been making my work for over a decade and because of my insular nature, rarely do I reach out and show it to people. I find the issue of applying terminology to so called 'disorders' controversial.

My art has always been important to me and being seen as a n artists first, not just someone with learning difficulties, or the names they used to call us.

Art acts as a a release for my mental health problems. I express through painting, words I cannot speak.

I have a language disorder, I like to express myself through my art work.

I've been for many years a long time mental health sufferer and I am so pleased to have this chance to show some of my art work to people who might somehow enjoy looking at it.

I had a breakdown.

My art work has developed, in part, as a result of severe physical and mental ill-health. It explores issues that make many people uncomfortable. For me the process of creating art is an essential part of achieving balance and staying well.

I enjoy pencil drawing having time on my hands as I look after my disabled wife and I am disabled from a road traffic accident. Pain rules my life a lot of the time and drawing is an escape for me.

I was discouraged to continue with art at school and until I started serving a four year prison sentence had not drawn or painted again. Having time alone now allows me to notice, evaluate and process what is around me.

I'm in prison, a victim of circumstance. My life, my image as represented in the painting is being pushed and pulled against my will and I am powerless to stop it, I just look on.

I am currently in prison and discovered art in here. I'm not on any of the art classes as they are full, so I paint in my cell, and there is very little natural light, my window is just 2ft x 2 ft.

I have been painting and drawing since I was a child. I confront the issue of prejudice against the mentally ill by using informative illustration and captions to raise awareness of the problems confronting them.

I enjoy painting.

_________ suffers from a severe and enduring mental illness (Schizophrenia) and was first diagnosed in his mid twenties. _________ has been a keen artist since he was a child and has produced paintings and draawings throughout his life.

__________ has experienced homelessness and is in treatment for substance misuse. He is also an ex offender. His lack of access to mainstream art schools and society in general make him a marginalised artists. __ has had mental health needs for the past fourteen years and has been painting for the last two.

__ is currently using acrilyc paint and enjoys exploring different colour combinations within circular bands on coloured backgrounds.

I am currently serving a prison sentence at the HMP _______

___ is 84 and has been registered blind since 2002 and has Parkinsons diease. Her "________ ____ is based on the _____ of _______ and is her interpretation of what she remembers now.

My art is art of meditation and centemplation of the wall; it is a phase I went through while I was using. I began to see shapes and marks that at first were not obvious to all.

I am very happy to have done this painting. Using both felt tip and paint my imagination took over and this si the result.

drawing is my man way of communication with people, as people cannot always understand what I am saying. I drwa everything I see, it's my way of recording and making sense of the world around me.

____ feels he does not fit the norm due to his disability affecting the control he has over his art work. Fred has Parkinso's; a few years ago he had pioneering brain surgery to help the symptoms.

If I get moved to another prison the chances of me being able to sculpt are virtually non-existent. As I onl;y get a small prison wage the only way I can prusue my interest in art abnd reach a larger audience is when I am lucky enough to be in a good art department and this is very rare.

I enjoy working with objects and materials that I choose from things around me. I seem to naturally enjoy making patterns. I started on my own bedroom ceiling where I felt that I could try different things out.

I am a self taught artist although I have attended various art classes over the years. In 2003 I suffered a breakdown which i have since described as a 'breakthrough', it was to change the course of my life.

The ___ is from a re-cycled ____ which was gong to be ______. I chose and ____ from the ____ and arrnegd the ______to make a ________. I have had both mental health and learning needs for many years.

___ has a moderate learnign disbility. He goes to as many art activities as his finaces and physical problems allow. He also belongs to a small informal group which meets monthly.

I have been described as an outsider artist in Raw Vision magazine. Also I only have two fingers and a thumb on each hand and have some arthritis in my hand joints that make drawing difficult at times.

I feel like I invented the words 'marginalised artist'. I turned to _______ in ____, ____ years after disgrace and illness at ______ University. people haven't wanted to know me, which makes finding homes for my work very difficult.

I am a surrealist painter, due to a disability people didn't believe I could be an artist, I love painting.

It's true to say my artwork is obsessive in nature. The very act of sticking such a large number of pieces of ________ together has been seen by many to be an extreme way to make art.

I became ill after losing my job some years ago, and subsequently recieved treatment for obsessive compulsive disorder and depression. I have continued to be involved with art and currently volunteer at the ________ ____ Hospital.

I feel that I am a worthy candidate as being in prison means I am restricted from many things that an artist outside of prison has access to. I have taken up art as a way of expressing myself.

i am suffering from post war trauma syndrome, due to an experience of bombing of ________ (_________ at that time, 1___). I am fascinated with out mortality, and have impulsive strong inner need to paint.

I really enjoy doing art. I like all the colours. The cats are from my house. I like doing art.

"My work is not bad and it is important to me. I would do nothing if I didn't do my art; making art is my life."

I feel good about myself when I'm painting. I like bright colours, flowers, animals and am pleased to exhibit.

Due to health, mental health, it has been said by other artist that my work is naive and outsider art. I'm not sure how I make it, it just happens.

I used a newly learnt technique with a brush for this picture and I ma pelased witht he reult.

___ work is sometimes infulnced by his other creative interest - ____ - _____ and ______. several of his drawings are preparatory sketches for sculptures, very often featuring human forms, particularly ____.

I always struggle with this concept. Is the work of artists in these terms merely pathological specimens. Is the work more authentic if the creator is more "ill" than another ?

___'s paintings develop gradually. He returns to them again and again, loading his paintbrush with heavily diluted paint building a richly layered series of translucent marks.

I am committed to making art and would like to have my own gallery. I enjoy art very much.

I've had long term health problems since a child. I've always tried to work with traditionally recognised paths - college, exhibition, career. This has been very difficult, as things aren't set up for people with health problems.

The message of this work is not to get drunk as it will lead to unhappy times. I was influenced by Van Gogh, Richard Hamilton and Roy Lichtenstein.

I have had several serious breakdowns and suffer from Bi-polar and emotional Intensity disorder. Art is a great healer.

Art is important to me becasue it is in my heart. we used to go to ___. ___ for painting weekends and I love making paintings about __. ____.

I like using nice colours such as red, pink and mauve. I like being busy painting, it makes me feel nice and sunny. Painting makes me feel good, yes good.

I have used art as an essential part of my emotional health. My main enjoyment comes from work with coloured pencil in an abstract way.

_____ _____ has a moderate learnign disability, is in her seventies and lives in sheltered acoommadation. She is part of a small group of older people with similar disabilities who meet monthly to draw and paint.

I have Aspergers Syndrome and chronic mental health problems. Although I have studied sculpture to MA level I find that the art world itself is not a place that is easily accessible to someone with my diagnosis.

I am a disabled person and my creative is defined primarily by my response to that. The themes of my work - identity, resistance, survival and joy in life - are themes of my life.

art makes me feel perfect - makes me happy, makes me feel good. I like printing and painting. art is funny - i do crazy stuff - enjoy getting messy - I love it.

I have suffered long term depression and mental illness along with various health problems relating to poor diabetic control ( eyesight problems, neoropathy etc).

I am a patient in the psychiatric unit at HMP ______. I have been here a long time.

I ama self- taught artist with a learnign disability. the work I do is self directed using aminly recycled materials without support from staff at the centre. I have worked with both scultpures and paintings.

I love art and drawing. i like to see my work, it makes me happy.

i am a disabled artist and such a visual art is a primary means of communication for me. I enjoy working mostly in paint and clay. I work from observation and have developed my own unique style.

I have been painting for 5 1/2 months. My work is unique. I paint what I see in my mind. I get a vision in my head and I draw it. I have experienced mental health difficulties. My painting has helped me; I work many hours a day on each painting. I am keen to get my work noticed.

I am a long term manic depressive being hospitalised for this condition at least ten times. This illness has severely affected my confidence in my creativity. I am passionate about life and expressing it through art.

I have had mental health problems since before I can recall. I have been on the peripheral [sic] of society's acceptance. through art, which nourished and watered the seed of my life, I have grown and become a friend to myself.

It took a long time, months to do it. It took a lot of courage to do it, but I am very proud of it. It makes me proud, it makes my happy thoughts.

I have a learnign disability and my art is as important to me as art is to someone who doesn't have a learnign diability. I enjoy making my art and I like expressing myself. It makes me happy.

I think I am a marginalised artist bbecause I suffer from Schizophrenia and at the moment I am undergoing rehabilitation. When I do my artwork it makes me feel relaxed and it is very therapeutic.

I suffere from a severe mental illness, diagnosed as schizoaffective disorder.

i liked art school and wished to contiue developing my art skills. I particularly like painting. One of my favourite subjects is animals. I find art is relaxing for me.

______ has suffered with mental health problems and learnign difficulties; he tells me he has severe ADHD (attention - deficit/hyperactivity disprder) and possible Asperger's Syndrome. He has been in prison for 2 1/2 years.

I have a learnign disablity with people in the community and sometimes it is difficult to communicate with these people, particularly when I want to tell them about my art work.

I have been mentally ill since 1987. I never had any art training and really don't know where I fit into (if at all), in the art world. All of my work now is using 100% recycled materials.

______ is 80 and has Parkinsons disease and lung cancer but this has not stopped him from being creative or keeping his sense of humour. His "Abstract Formation" piece is based on an imaginative journey through his mind.

I consider myself a marginalised artist because of the way I have to live my life. A lot of my time is spent in the woods and fields as well as bus shelters and walls at petrol stations etc.

I am a Doctor who has suffered from Bipolar disorder for the last 25 years. The condition has radically altered my life. One of the positive effects has been the discovery of the powerful healing porperties of art.

For seven years I have suffered severe mental health problems. I have been unable to work. I began painting through art therapy and now art is a major part of my life.

I have learning difficulties. I like being an artist because it is lovely. I like it when all the pictures are up and see them on the wall. I like mosaic and drwaing and all.

My art reflects my experience from the perspective of an adult survivor; I use my creativity as a healing tool.

I have had two strokles and suffer from depression.

___ does not speak or write about his art, he just does it. He paints and draws. ___ expresses himself through his art and people like what he does.

Heroin addict. Mulitple suicide attempts. Depressed, lonely, overwhelmed.

four years ago I started painting with a charity called MIND. Painting was something I had never considered before. These classes inspired me so much and made me realise what enjoyment can be found in painting.

My work reflects my reason for being, purity, honesty, living and loving.

I have a learning disability.

I've excluded images of the work, but I personally was impressed at the very high quality of the work. Though of course this was after a selection process from thousands of submissions.

I don't want to get into anything more decriptive about the actual work, just that artistically straying into medical history seemed irrelevant.

2012-01-26T16:17:00.001Z

"Illustrating how all creative work builds on what came before."

All it proves to me is how all figurative work is restricted by the limits of articulation of the human body.

2012-01-26T14:04:00.000Z

Trying to explore the opposition of static drawing, and the represented and the representation . . . . as I don't have the time for animation . . .

Nil points . . .

2012-01-25T11:00:00.000Z

Felt my presentation went badly yesterday, though wonder what my ideal one would have consisted of. My context came across as irrelevant and far too anecdotal. [The one thing 'Outsider art' has left with me with, is a disinterest in 'self - expression' - too self indulgent too self involved too subjective.] I don't do anything just becasue "I felt like it."

I even used it at the end to hold a survey of who had seen 'Coral Reef'! Of course many had already seen it.

A lot of the questions I'm asking myself, I'm just going to have to resolve on my own - is that my 'studio' practice ?My presentation partners were chosen for our conceptual similarity - I can't remember the specifics as I immediately went into shock. Me? Who's been drawing faces compulsively, every moment I can get, the only way I'm surviving at the moment, the only way I can another day of my failure at Chelsea.

I was late, not being able to sleep for all the dialectical nonsense going through my head, the very thing that I engage with materials and craft to avoid.

I've set my self another impossible task - as I try to dematerialise like mad, surrounded by the presence of old work

Met up with D, afterwards and went over pointless psychiatric self - justification. Maybe I should write all that down and put it to one side.

I presented the drawing and the video. Apart from the novelty of seeing myself,exposing myself [my dreadful skin, how I move when I draw] it was dull dull dull. Grey man grey drawing - the whole thing lost when presenting it in a cavernous white room.

On the bus home I thought of just inverting the whole thing, colour/tone male/female drawing/performance, etc ect.

Borrowed a couple of wigs on the way home, the price learning secondhand that my brother believes we hate each other. So so old.

Came home and brushed wigs . . . . then drew badly, listening to Obamas speech about 'winning,' and bed at 5.0am.

Now up and the usual trying trying to find a reason to continue.

The paper is just too smooth to accept enough of the graphite.

Plotting completely off, getting lost in detail.Time for some measured drawing.

One looks for so long, it takes a break to see how much one has missed.

"There are no markers with which I can measure."

2012-01-23T14:46:00.001Z

Picked up this book when I went to bed. Excerpt below conveys an interesting example of the durational.

"I was marched back to the back of the building where chains were attached to my ankles. I was then taken to another cell not far away. I was horrified to see that the cell I was about to enter had no light in it at all, just a door and four walls. When I peered inside, I saw that there was a metal ring attached to the wall. The guards hustled me in and proceeded to attach one of the chains on my leg to this ring. They had only left me a few inches of slack and I pointed this out to them, stupidly thinking that they had made a mistake. The guards laughed and continued, leaving the cell when they had done. The door slammed shut and everything was black.

I couldn't move any more than a few inches, my leg married to the wall in this way. There was no bed in this room, just concrete floor. I tried to lie down but my leg was in the wrong position for me to do so. I could only sit against the wall in a half-squatting position. I could think of nothing but the shape of my body and the position I was in. I could see nothing. This was imprisonment at its most absolute.

The difficulty in telling this story - my whole story, in fact - is that there is no way for me to communicate duration of time to you. It may have taken a minute for you to have read of my position in this punishment cell, but I was in this position for a whole month. How do I convey this notion to you? There are no markers with which I can measure. The only way for you to come close to experiencing this is to read the previous paragraph, over and over, every minute of everyday, for a whole month. But nobody could do that without going mad with frustration."

page 148

The Damage Done - Twelve Years of Hell in a Bangkok Prison. Warren Fellows. 1997

REALISM

2012-01-23T02:21:00.001Z

Been looking into Realism, Photo-realism, and Hyper-realism.

Has got me wondeering if life-casting is a kind of 'photograph' of form. I talked in my essay of the attraction of 'realism' to the 'outsider' or folk artist, and by that I mean any artist not a professional artist, or working within the established art education and promotion system.

I'm learning to make these distinctions as the first text I've read covers the period of realism in the 19th century, where the move was to champion the use of themes and scenes from contemporary life, as opposed to 'history painting.

I'm fascinated, as a social phonomenon, how the engagement with the medium and the demonstration of it's mastery becomes an end in itself. Perhaps as well it is the initial stage in all artists careers? [I remember one artist of particularly minimal work, being confronted with a childhood example of 'paint by numbers!]

Eventually one either has to make a choice to look deeper into the the world around, or stay with trying to impress with fidelity to what would have once been called nature. The original movement is classed as historically preceeding Symbolism.

The realism I was thinking of is the 'Photorealism' of the 1970's [I use it as it's clear it refers to the 2D] and is perhaps a strain of Pop art reaction against Abstract Expressionism and an embracing of popular culture. Was interested in reading the entry on wikipedia about how "Textures, surfaces, lighting effects, and shadows appear clearer and more distinct than the reference photo or even the actual subject itself." [Meisel, Louis K. Photorealism. Harry N. Abrams, Inc., Publishers, New York. 1980. p. 12. via 'Hyperrealism' Wikipedia]

'Hyperrealism' seems to be the term used to cover overtly realistic work of the present' though again artist are using "additional, often subtle, pictorial elements to create the illusion of a reality which in fact either does not exist or cannot be seen by the human eye." [Fleming, John and Honour, Hugh The Visual Arts: A History, 3rd Edition. Harry N. Abrams, Inc. New York, 1991. p. 680-710 via Hyperrealism Wilipedia]

Again and again the qualification to be defined as a photorealist or hyperrealist artist, after the photographic source material has been acknowledged, is the skill to recreate the image with sufficient skill.

Realism = the opportunity to display skill. If anything it lead to questioning of the existence of reality, or what constitutes reality. Of course, when placed next to abstract work, anything remotely representational will look as tending towards reality.

This is the text of a student, studying fine art, with a college that has design in it's title. I question everyday what is 'fine art' ?

One thing I am concious of is, an incredible technical achievement for the artist, can be invisible to the public. Work that is technically spectacular can be self-indulgent. It tends, I feel, to design, which stretches all the way to function. I don't want to be a designer. The one design that every artist and art student agrees to is the design of the gallery, with it's visual neutrality, white walls and grey or pale wooden floor. It provides the seriousness for the most playfully inompetent work. [I'm thinking here of the complete relocation of Paul McCarthy's grotesque studio to the forbidding gallery on Savile Row, with it's bank like security and location in the wealthiest part of London.]

But where does this leave sculpture ? There are installations but withouth the same definition of skill. [Wish I could think of the name of the artist who carefully copied everything in their studio in another material that was in the Tate recently.] What is the one thing most challenging to recreate with skill - the figurative ? Unless it is the human body, is it not design we are looking at ?

I want to look at the figurative, in and out of the gallery, and related to the mediums and processes involved.

Off the top of my head, there is

Lights camera action . . .

2012-01-22T23:13:00.002Z

Am doing anyhting to avoid starting this new . . . . ?

Update: It's done, now it's up to youtube to upload possibly the most boring video on there yet !

Whoops, didn't check if they're not too long . . . . .

The purpose of these films is to create both a drawing and a film to be exhibited side by side, to create a sense of something existing in two states and at two different times. The film is moving and made in the studio, at a time before exhibition. The drawing itself would be present at the same time and place as the viewer in the gallery.

Again I want to look at the subjective motive of the artist experienced during the making, and the objective existence of the work in the gallery and away from the studio, with it's processes of making hidden. [This would be more clear perhaps if I had instead designed an object with purpose, or something more deceptively realist in it's appearrance - something made to look like something else. The work can fail to have any wider value to anyone else, beyond the artist exercise of making.

The drawing itself is inspired by the realisation that the one thing the 'serious' design of the gallery cannot allow is the pushing back into it's walls. The centre is darker as it 'recedes.'

I'm amused that the radio relays talk of short films, social media, mature students, welfare reform, etc etc . . .

Drawing #1 8:08 Mins.

Drawing Part Two 30.0 Mins

David Pye THE NATURE AND ART OF WORKMANSHIP

2012-01-22T10:49:00.001Z

Trying to read this book. Pye divides craftmanship into two categories, . . .

time to walk the dogs. . . .

Back from the park, but have to make a video now.

after the meeting re presentations on Saturday, went into the tate, and discovered a work I never knew was there, was thrilled by it, lost in it and then when I left, found it had been there for two years and is about to be removed.

Coral Reef by Mike Nelson.

fucking link won't embed,and it's taken me 10 mins . . .

reminds me of the film that most resembles my nightmares, no zombies, vampires or any of that shit . . . . .

2012-01-22T10:44:00.001Z

omg fucked this blog up, trying to update the template,

add another skill to the list of things I don't have the time to acquire.

Shit, changed it again and now it takes about 7 steps to edit . . . .

2012-01-20T23:06:00.001Z

2012-01-14T22:40:00.000Z

"The thing about relics is, it's not their authenticity that matters, it's their history of veneration which is so deeply fascinating." Geoffrey Munn

How forbidding can a gallery be ?

2012-01-13T22:50:00.010Z

"My work is more about being a clown than a shaman."

Paul McCarthy

New York Times 22 November 2009 [via Wikipedia]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/22/arts/design/22mccarthy.html

"We think we're liberating ourselves, when maybe we're just hurting ourselves."

David Hoyle. Onstage 2011

Maybe hurting oneself, in work involving the artists body, and by extension appearrance and identity, is not physical self - harm, but if taken too literally is social self sabotage.

I went to two parts of the three part exhibition of Paul McCarthy's work, "The King, The Island, The Train, The House, The Ship" 16 November 2011 – 14 January 2012. I've only been aware of McCarthy's work since a piece occupied a whole space at Tate Modern a few years ago. as with with Hauser & Wirth, there were the warnings at the entrance.

I do wonder what it says about me ? Rather than "adult," initially the work seems juvenile or disingenuous. Of course no little boy has a career of decades standing or has the means to work of such complex construction and scale.

"THE KING."

The presence of the artist is there either on camera, via a full body cast, or as with any artwork, by the selection of subject. Upside down canvases show [airbrushed ?]porn, an old Playboy cartoon, the trio of Paris Hilton , Britney and ?, with their papped privates, made me wonder at what age does the expression of sexual interest inevitably become goatish. These paintings were ringed round the huge presence of "King", described as the easel the paintings were made on, with a full body cast of McCarthy [with added body hair] sat in a blonde wig. King lear in Ophelia's hair.

"CUT UP"

Downstairs were two videos, one "Flicker King" 2011, a flickering projection of Milli-seconds of print ads, so raidly passing that seconds were enough to comprehend all that was being shown.

The second video: "Cut Up" I watched all the way through. Seeming to cover the time just after the body cast had been completed, Mccarthy shows himself making decisions about how to work with it further.

I've been asked a lot recently about casting, something that conceptually seems to be easier than constructing a modelled work built up over time with observation. There is nothing like life-casting to pick up an incredible record of surface texture, but there are many stages from initial mould to the final cast, and much is dependent on the final medium used. I was certainly hit later, when viewing 'Paula Jones' by how toxic modern synthetic materials are, something they seem to declare with their dreadful smell. Silicon was used for the cast of McCarthy, and it certainly has something like the density of living flesh, but this density is too even throughout, and when I walked in midway, McCarthy seemed to enacting a self hatred as he took an electric saw to what superficially seemed either his twin or inanimate self. It was soon clear that he was trying to remove material from joints to provide more articulation. The video was of extremely high resolution, and even though the cast was too warm coloured and almost bouncy for a corpse, it was hard to avoid feeling one had entered the morgue as the saw blade hacked through a wrinkled knee and hairy leg. But the 'flesh' inside was blandly even in tone and colour, and I was left to conclude that however disrespectful of the body McCarthy may have seemed, exhibiting a video that lingered on dismemberment, I was left musing on how the reality of death had been avoided or evaded.

The naivety of the amateur, in 'not realising' that a cast could not possibly imitate the variety of muscle, sinew and fat that lies under the skin, the study of which is the staple of the life class. The awkward actions of the cutting spoke of an impatient artistic struggle to bring the leaden object to artistic life, rather than of clinical investigation, or the murderer's attempt to annihilate the evidence of the victim.

MADHOUSE JNR

Upstairs, "Madhouse Jnr's" self reflexivity, repaid the cost of dragging myself into town. Though recently constructed, it is described as a "macquette" for a much larger version exhibited in 2008.

A spinning box stands on a tripod of pairs of hydraulic pumps, so that the box is tilted on nearly every axis. This I found mesmerising in itself, the loops and loops of black electric leads leading back to a whole board of processors etc. On walking round the piece it was clear that the box was a model of a room, inside of which was a camera,which was spinning round too, the result was projected on one of the walls not covered in neo - Georgian panelling. Sometimes the camera wasn't rotated, while the room was, and vice versa , with differences in speed so that via the projection, it was either the world outside that spun, or the just the room and sometimes both to complete chaos.

I was reminded with so many pop culture references around, of Dorothy's house in the Wizard of Oz. A room in a childhood home is the definition of a starting point, but here revealed, just as Dorothy is tipped into a chaotic and alien world by the tornado WHILE STILL IN HER OWN HOME.

Off to Savile Row, where the huge . . . . . . . . . .

"She Me"

The components of human life, death, sex , work and professionalcredibility have their idealised aspects, but also their squalid realities. Morality is the way of defining the two, and proscribing one against the other. I certainly object very strongly to Gunther von Hagens plastination exhibits, feeling too morally compromised to attend his shows, as if to justify their use of actual bodies of humans and animals for what I feel are totally failed scientific or didactic purposes.

Paul McCarthy: Animatronic Designer Jon Dawe

THE TROUBLE WITH YOUTH
by Donald Kuspit
http://www.artnet.com/magazineus/features/kuspit/kuspit8-17-07.asp

time wasting . . . . .

2012-01-11T11:40:00.002Z

Sent: 06 January 2012 09:59
Happy New Year to you all!

There will be a studio meeting NEXT Monday 9 January at 3pm to discuss some important issues that may effect Opt-in and also to review as a group how the space is functioning.

Look forward to seeing you all then!

Best wishes

Sent: 08 January 2012 23:02
Dear All,

Following feedback I would like to re-schedule this weeks STUDIO MEETING for 3pm on Tuesday 10 January. I hope this is OK with you all?

See you then!

Best

Sent: 10 January 2012 21:07
Dear All,

As those of you who came in to the studio today will know todays Studio Meeting was postponed due to unforeseen circumstances. The meeting will take place:

TOMORROW Wednesday 11 January at 2.30pm

Apologies for the rearranging but please turn up tomorrow if you can as there are some IMPORTANT matters to discuss concerning Opt-IN

Hope to see you then.

Best

2012-01-11T08:41:00.000Z

today's task

2012-01-09T08:52:00.003Z

take five steps forward

stand downstage arm pressed flat as if against a pane of glass

turn head downstage

turn head up stage

turn head downstage

gaze at feet

release arm

walk across stage

and sit

bring both hands towards chest - palms out

elbows should be out in the air

look out to audience

stand and walk to the centre of stage

sit on the edge of the bed

lie on right hand

extend left arm along the side of your body

gaze up at the ceiling

flick your eys down to the bed

walk to the other side of the bed

and sit

look down

look up

close your eyes

open your eyes

stand up

life right arm straight up over head

close eyes

sway your body slowly as if to music

open your eyes

stop swaying

walk slowly along the upsatge wall trailing your finger along its surface

looking down

sit on the nearest chair

make your left hand into a fist

raise it to your chin

bring it out in front of your face about 12 inches and gaze at it

open your palm slightly

bring it up to your left eye

close your eyelids

and trace your left eyelid with your middle finger

trail it slowly down your cheek to your chin

bring it across the chin

move it along your right jaw line to your right ear

swivel head to the left

trace finger down side of neck then onto shoulder grip right shoulder

gaze up gaze down

stand

[Instructions for a performance piece]

bernard buffet

2011-12-25T23:25:00.007Z

Was trying to think of the artist I was first ever aware of, whose work was the tackiest and therefore most easy to dismiss - while being ubiquitous.

The first that came to mind was Monsieur Buffet, whose many scenes of London architecture came to mind, and instead I came across these existential portraits from the 50's. Seems we all aspire to credibilty.

Ken Russell "The Boyfriend" in 13 parts ! . . .

2011-12-19T19:43:00.012Z

This film is criminally STILL NOT OUT ON DVD in the U.K, though the American release has the full film without edits.

I've posted this as a way of playing all the sections in order, to establish what's missing. Plus they will no doubt be removed before too long - I get tired of posts full of dead Youtube links.

Part 1

Part 2

"Perfect Young Ladies."

Part 3

"The Boyfriend."

Part 4

"Won't You Charleston With Me."

Part 5

Part 6

"Fancy Forgetting."

Part 7

"I could Be Happy With You"

Part 8

"Lucky Star" By Arthur Freed and Nacio Herb Brown appeared in Singin' in the Rain (having originally appeared in Broadway Melody of 1936) from Muppet wiki !

"Sur La Plage"

Part 9

"A Room In Bloomsbury."

"Nicer In Nice" and "The You-Don't-Want-To-Play-With-Me Blues" are missing from the middle of tis excerpt.

Part 10

"Safety In Numbers.

"I Could Be Happy With You" (Reprise)

Part 11

"All I Do Is Dream of You" 1934. By Nacio Herb Brown, the lyrics by Arthur Freed. Added to the score for the film.

"It's Never Too Late To Fall In Love"

Part 12

"Poor Little Pierrette"

"The Riviera"

Part 13

to be played at the same time . . . . .

2011-12-19T18:03:00.001Z

bill plympton

2011-12-14T17:23:00.001Z

having to retrace my steps and track down the work that has stayed me over the last couple of decades from the sea of stuff out there. another rediscovery - the most striking combination of drawing and the moving image . . .

I married a strange person . . . . .

the real Petra von kant . . . .

2011-12-13T23:54:00.009Z

Petra and Karin

Fassbinder and Armin Meier

http://www.theagencygallery.co.uk/mingwong_n.html

http://www.sensesofcinema.com/2005/37/thirteen_moons/

Been working on someone else's project - developing an idea from this film, though I'm unsure how much to post online before it's performance.

It is strange to atomise a film, on behalf of another creator. In that respect I - as well as all the cast are Karins to the directors Petra.

The Workshop

First we are bodies for a recreation of a flat film, then we speak, and move, depending on our assigned roles and the action of the film we are copying, all hoping to transcend our 'real' self by particpating in this project. Now I have some idea of the directors approach, I'm not overwhelmed by details as I have been when watching the film over and over agin before the first workshop.

I've also wanted to look more into the background of the film and it's context within all Fassbinders other films, a little difficult as I only have a copy of the one film.

I'm starting to see the reasons for what I have struggled with when re enacting the film. Although Karin has all the power based on her looks, it's not just Petra's [unconvincing ] success as a fashion designer that bankrolls this enclosed scenario, but her tangible base of power would always in reality trump Karin's charms.

I was most uncomfortable with a scene where as Petra I had to beg with declarations of my love, something I suspect in real life Karin would be having to do - having had direct experience of the suspicions of the rich.

Francis Bacon and George Dyer.

Carlos Diaz and his Cuban theater troupe Miami Beach Theatre June 2010

studio 1 & 2 . . .

2011-12-08T08:00:00.003Z

Both videos to be played at the same time.

Whatever you're doing, this is [usually] what I'm doing . . . .

2011-12-03T17:20:00.004Z

10.06 Mins

12.00 mins

10.01 mins

begun, as I had my camera on me, after a child started screaming and throwing stones at my dogs as we entered the park. This part of my life is largely hidden as you cannot take dogs anywhere now . . . . It's also something that is very sentimentalized, but in fact is boring, repeptitive, often very bleak in the winter, and since I had one dog killed, always with anticipation of violence . . . . .

it was interesting (to me) how I immediately began to astheticize the shoot, not speaking, moving slowly, and how all the other activities that go on in the park are happened upon . . . . it's also a park where a lot of filming takes place, for film television, commercials - all without prior warning.

i've also used stills from video, and its a reminder how fleeting images can be, the preview still on this page for example.

What I Did . . . .

2011-12-03T17:16:00.000Z

what i would like to do

2011-11-18T21:14:00.003Z

Price per panel is £75.01
Gate panel is £125.11 prices are excluding VAT

http://www.jacksons-fencing.co.uk/fencing/metal-residential-fencing/dog-cage/metal-residential-fencing-dog-cage.aspx

An Audience With David Hoyle . . . . .

2011-11-16T23:03:00.001Z

Face to Face - An Audience with David Hoyle from Homotopia on Vimeo.

An interview with a total inspiration.

David very kindly agreed to an interview with me around last Easter, as part of my H.N.C. course, running 2010-11. It was the first time I have ever interviewed anyone, and we managed round my phone not recording the begining and most intense part of the interview.

I had all sorts of fears that areas would not be covered and other strayed into unecessarily, it's easy to feel protective towards David, and it didn't go as well on my part as I would have wished.

The subsequent essay was a mess, too long rambling etc, and I scraped through the rest of the course and hid over the summer from the consequences of failing, and not making it onto the BA at Chelsea.

It all seemed to work out in the end, and I spent this afternoon listening to, as well as talking about my own, proposals for the small Performance Art exhibition next week.

When I first saw David's work live, it was all I could do to leave the house, and inspired by his example, I've come a long way.

It hurts to hear David so suprised to be called talented. I do feel that when an individual is so undermined existentially they can be compelled to re balance their predicament in a way that uses visibility as a medium, but proof that one really is in a bind is that the conventions of fame and show business ask too much of one so marginalised in every other way.

I am yet again trying to refocus, change and re orientate myself for the third year running, just as my whole means of material existence is threatened and questioned. Like a dog on a chain, there's only so far I can go before I am yanked back and my progress is stalled.

Looking forward to the first night of "David's Winter Warmer" tomorrow night ! How do we all keep going ?

Now have to get the graph paper out in readiness for a tutorial tomorrow. The piece I am planning is to be called "In My Space". This song has been 'in my head' the last few days . . . .

2011-11-15T22:20:00.000Z

http://www.propstore.com/product-Static-Damaged-Bishop--Lance-Henricksen--Puppet.htm

cLEMENT gREENBERG ?

2011-11-14T22:00:00.001Z

Studio pRActise ? Don't make me laugh !!!

2011-11-14T21:50:00.002Z

Soon everything you know will be replaced with ESA

Instead a tune discovered while googling Crazy frog..

Duck Amuck in lecture on "tHE mEDIUMS"

[Looney Tunes] Duck Amuck (1953) from Arnaud TISSEYRE on Vimeo.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_Amuck

A shadow of its original self

2011-11-14T20:47:00.007Z

Unpicking the dress .

Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth by John Singer Sargeant1889
Tate Gallery, London
Oil on canvas
221 x 114.3 cm
Presented by Sir Joseph Duveen 1906

The Tate portrait, which Ellen Terry described in her Memoirs as the sensation of the year (1889), was bought by Irving for the Beefsteak Room of the Lyceum Theatre, where it hung in an alcove.

"At over 120 years old, the dress had seen many years of wear and tear and was subject to much alteration. It was structurally very weak and a shadow of its original self. "

Ellen Terry wearing the dress - 'in character' in 1888.

http://textilehunter.blogspot.com/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1366616/Victorian-beetle-wing-dress-worn-Ellen-Terry-display-50k-repair-job.html

http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-global/w-news/w-latest_news/w-news-famous-beetle-wing-dress.htm

"When Ellen starred alongside Henry Irving in Macbeth in 1888, there was not a wide choice of fabrics available in England, and Alice could not find the colours she wanted to achieve her effects. She wanted one dress to ‘look as much like soft chain armour as I could, and yet have something that would give the appearance of the scales of a serpent. ’(Mrs. J. Comyns Carr’s 'Reminiscences'. London: Hutchinson, 1926). Mrs Nettleship found a twist of soft green silk and blue tinsel in Bohemia and this was crocheted to achieve the chain mail effect.

The dress hung beautifully but: ‘we did not think that it was brilliant enough, so it was sewn all over with real green beetle wings, and a narrow border in Celtic designs, worked out in rubies and diamonds, hemmed all the edges. To this was added a cloak of shot velvet in heather tones, upon which great griffins were embroidered in flame-coloured tinsel. The wimple, or veil, was held in place by a circlet of rubines, and two long plaits twisted with gold hung to her knees.’"

http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/t/the-actor-and-the-maker-ellen-terry-and-alice-comyns-carr/

And today . . . Spartacus Chetwynd via Saatchi - Her mother is Luciana Arrighi, an Oscar-winning production designer.

"My performances are really gestural and are not meant to exist afterward. I wanted to burn the costumes after, but really had to change my attitude. My heroes are the Marx Brothers, but I only know them off video. They bothered to make their fun, gestural, off-hand experience package-able, not in a dark way but in a way that people can enjoy afterward forever. It's important to make an effort to make things that last so they can continue to communicate to people."

"The repairs proved as much costume archaeology as needlework. The dress arrived at the Brighton studio of specialist textile conservator Zenzie Tinker with a box of tattered pieces. She soon realised that she was dealing with the remains of two near identical costumes, presumably patched together when both were too badly damaged to wear. She has carefully removed the later additions, restoring the original Victorian appearance of the gown. Hundreds of broken beetle wings were repaired by gluing green-dyed Japanese tissue paper on to the reverse, and stitching them back into place."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2011/mar/11/ellen-terry-beetlewing-gown-macbeth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Terry_as_Lady_Macbeth

http://www.ecouterre.com/victorian-era-dress-made-from-1000-beetle-wings-restored-for-50000/

http://www.pasthorizons.com/index.php/archives/03/2011/the-archaeology-of-a-dress

We will all admire the fabulous design and craftsmanship, but seeing the dress close up will also somehow make us feel closer to the person who wore it.

http://theshakespeareblog.com/2011/05/those-fabulous-frocks/

DORIS KEEN AND ELLEN TERRY

Your browser does not support iframes.

Marcus Harvey Curates - artnet Magazine

2011-11-07T23:48:00.000Z

Marcus Harvey Curates - artnet Magazine

Damn missed this . . . .

same dress - two stars

2011-08-28T23:00:00.005+01:00

Marilyn Monroe in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes 1953, 20th Century Fox.

Abbey Lincoln singing 'Spread The Word' from 'The Girl Can't Help It' 1956 - 20th Century Fox

The designer Travilla's own later recreation.

And Sheree North wearing Jane Russell's dress from the same scene.

see also

http://www.coleccionmaiteminguez.com/

ladies and gentlemen . . . .

2011-07-29T13:17:00.002+01:00

the amazing Jakub Kujawa

"Portrait of a great tattoo artist Slawek Myskow. Oil on board 50X70 cm"

http://kujawa-art.carbonmade.com/

and a perennial favourite Oldrich Kulanek . . .

Job No. 1 - lithograph, 2002

http://www.fineart.cz/Umelci/Kulhanek-Oldrich.aspx

eerm . . .

2011-07-21T15:17:00.002+01:00

pain - t

2011-07-09T21:58:00.003+01:00

Trying to save this painting, not that I know how to paint really,here's what's left of the right-hand figure after sanding down the scars of transport.

A drawing made this week to try to resolve the tones . . .

another drawing from the same reference session . . .

Wish me luck .

Bring out your head . . .

2011-05-22T23:31:00.008+01:00

This plasticine self-portrait [it's by Newplast actually] gets another airing, this time without the praying hands I showed it with last year.

As ever the show invitation came at short notice, and the other piece from last years end of year show was particularly requested for.

I discovered it in pieces in storage and had a very long and stressful Royal Wedding weekend recreating it.

I didn't have nearly enough time to include the ears this time.

I don't know if I'd advise anyone to show works made in plasticine , a combination of calcium carbonate petroleum jelly and other fats. I grew tired of clay drying before I had finished modelling, and used grey partly as a good mid-tone to work with as well as close to the colour of concrete which I still hope to cast these pieces in. Though of course they are a little reminiscent of Spitting Image's John Major puppet.

They are all originally intended as a macquette for a huge bust combining reclaimed wood and cast concrete pieces that will never be realised. I quite like the clamminess of the plasticene mimicing the skin of those under stress, the mood of the work. My interest in the figurative coming from ideas about how we manage identities within the bodies that we are given.

sort of portrait . . . . .

2011-03-11T12:11:00.000Z

Clamped . . . .

2011-03-01T22:46:00.000Z

today's the day . . . . .

2011-02-21T20:58:00.005Z

Took part in a study in hoarding in the morning, questionaires etc. Only pretext on which I'd have two clinical psychologists indoors. We all jumped out of our skins when the baliffs knocked on the door, on behalf of the water board.

Etching class in the afternoon.

Proof print

Quick sketch which I didn't use, was asked by other student if I'd draw her portrait, I'll be safe working Leicester Square in a picnic chair and easel at this rate.

Went back to studio to discover half naked fellow student painting, and spent hours looking for expensive brush I found the minute I got home. Did a bit of priming, fixed the u-bend in the studio sink, came home and fed the dogs and administered ear drops. No mention of absinthe so far eh?

The night is still young . . . . . .

just a couple of paintings . . .

2011-02-21T00:24:00.004Z

Rididulously dark, will have to re-photograph.

Again too dark.

this week last . . . .

2011-02-20T00:12:00.008Z

Self-portrait. Pencil [H grade] on paper that's just too rough. I reach a plateau where I can't get any darker in the tones. Apart from fudging the nose, I gave up below the chin.

Second attempt where I struggled so much with the "tooth" of the paper, I appear to have changed race.

One of the many studies I've done, from the many studies I've done, with reflective cards.

Carrying on the mark making/ cross hatching I thought I'd try mark making in 3D. This cast in plaster from clay. The pressure from each line cut with a knife closed the one before, realise I need to PRESS into the clay.

. . . . and what I wake up to every morning.

Fernand Pelez

2011-02-07T19:06:00.003Z

Grimaces and Misery, 1888 221 cm x 625 cm

Note to self, as I am sick of having to refind this artist again and again . . .

work in progress

2011-01-29T12:28:00.001Z

acrylic on board

recent show

2011-01-27T01:21:00.002Z

3 and a half times life size

2011-01-24T20:11:00.001Z

VAT bill on 'light fittings' the EU says aren't art | News

2011-01-24T20:10:00.000Z

VAT bill on 'light fittings' the EU says aren't art | News

Painter Man - Boney M

2011-01-23T12:27:00.001Z

Went to college, studied arts
To be an artist make a start
Studied hard, gettin' my degree
But no one seemed to notice me

Painter man, painter man
Who wanna be a painter man
Painter man, painter man
Who wanna be a painter man

Tried cartoons and comic books
Dirty postcards could have done
Here was where the money laid
Classic art has had it's day

Painter man, painter man
Who wanna be a painter man
Painter man, painter man
Who wanna be a painter man

Did adverts for t.v.
Household shops and brands of tea
Labels all around the cans
Who wanna be a painter man

Painter man, painter man
Who wanna be a painter man
Painter man, painter man
Who wanna be a painter man

La...la...la...la...la...la...
La...la...la...la...la...la...la...
Painter man, painter man
Who wanna be a painter man

pencil drawings on paper. . . . .

2011-01-23T11:12:00.005Z

mirror card under flourescent lights

crumpled card

pleated card

doodle

Recent stuff . . . .

2011-01-17T21:14:00.004Z

Detail

Real Cinema: The Stripper starring Joanne Woodward

2010-06-20T15:06:00.001+01:00

Real Cinema: The Stripper starring Joanne Woodward

Every portrait is a , , , , ah . . . .

2010-04-28T22:34:00.002+01:00

Been here, been there, been nowhere, and now I'm back. I think . . . .

What you having?

2009-08-10T10:43:00.006+01:00

Glimpses of the past - before they hit the paper bank - all from Reader's Digest December 1963.

. . . . and from the sexist in your life . . .

. . . and for the results of all that cha cha cha ing on the shag pile.

Whaddya know, beehives for the under 5's.

Dunno what to call this?

2009-08-03T11:10:00.004+01:00

Having to clear out Grandmother's, closest thing to "Ancestral Pile", and am struggling to part with a complete set of "Golden Homes" by Marshall Cavendish.

Currently going for 99p on ebay

Keep telling myself it is NOT a wonderful archive of 70's imagery, and I am NOT about to emabrk on any major carpentry projects any time soon.

Royal Vauxhall Mediatheque.

2008-03-26T10:09:00.008Z

Oh dear, well I have fretted long and hard on the ethics of filming and then posting on the net, the performances of another.

This is starting to look like a David Hoyle stalking blog, and when I was tackled last night, by the Divine David as to just what was I planning on doing with the footage, I was looking forward to posting his response on the net.

I stupidly assumed that my new camera would automatically be an improvement on the last one one, only to find the clip sounded like it had been recorded down a well, though several blankets and with a bucket over David Hoyle's head. After 6 hours to edit the clip from his series, for youtube, and now considering on embarking on sound engineering [well it looks so easy on CSI] I am begining to think Mr Hoyle's styling of the Royal Vauxhall Tavern as a "media-tech" is the literal truth

EDIT: Clip once here - now gone.

With the amount of photographs taken during his show, I often think of those dodgy camera clubs they apparently had in 50's Soho, you could enter and hire a nude model, and it was up to you whether there was actually any film in the camera during the session. I guess anything I have taken, or posted probably contradicts Mr. Hoyle's desire to be elusive. Could he disappear for another 7 years or more?

Anyway it's "The INTERNET" next week.

And here's a picture of one of my dogs I uploaded by mistake.

Must See ! Taylor Mac

2007-11-05T00:23:00.000Z

Dear Santa . . . .

2007-10-22T02:29:00.000+01:00

From Crackle: Role Models

2007-10-14T13:27:00.000+01:00

Check out this video: Taylor Mac - But I Loved Him

At Last!

2007-09-27T08:27:00.000+01:00

From "The Divine David "Heals. 1999.

"We find people with problems - in Manchester - and absolve them."

I can't tell you how many efforts this took, I think it would have been easier to re enact myself. The Divine David Hoyle entertains the folks at Ivy Lodge to the strains of Amanda Lear's "Follow Me." AN appropriately Faustian theme.

Be you - but dont be a C**t.

2007-09-25T11:47:00.000+01:00

This post covers my first experience of seeing live the phenomenon that was the Divine David, and that now is and always was David Hoyle.

Although aware of his shows at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern, the first chance I had, like most, to see him for myself was the World of Wonder production The Divine David Presents, broadcast on national television at the beginning of 1999.

I caught a couple of episodes of the subsequent Divine David Heals shown in 2000, and then . . . .

. . . nada, nothing. To the extent that a commenter on this blog had to tell me that he wasn't actually dead but had recently reappeared under his own name David Hoyle. As I'm not very mobile, and he is based in Manchester, I grabbed the chance to see his London show Magazine the Reprint, having missed the first issue of Magazine in late 2006.

What a journey it has been! While Mr. Hoyle claimed that "if you want theatre - Mamma Mia is in the West End," it did get very hairy trying to attend, as this tiny gay venue packed in larger and larger, and increasingly arty, audiences over the weeks.

I mised the first three "issues," Celebrity, Cookery, and Crime & Punishment, and Immigration was the first I made it to.

To be continued . . . .

Leave Ms Britney ALONE!

2007-09-14T14:19:00.000+01:00

2007-09-08T22:18:00.000+01:00

I got my name in lights with notcelebrity.co.uk

So there!

I see . . . . .

2007-09-08T20:57:00.001+01:00

Apparently "'klever kloggs' is a new and innovative clothing brand that will launch in November 2007, the website will go live in conjunction with the launch of
the brand."

Might as well called myself "Joe Bloggs" then, come to think of it they do rhyme.

2007-09-06T17:19:00.000+01:00

Lovin the video for "Munchhausen - v. Sarah Miles

http://www.nobra.co.uk/quicktime/munchausen.html

http://www.nobra.co.uk/

The Queen . . . . . 1968

2007-09-05T20:44:00.000+01:00

and now

Lovin this . . . .

2007-09-04T16:13:00.000+01:00

http://www.briansewell.co.uk/

esp the prank call

via http://madamearcati.blogspot.com/

found while googling April Ashley, though Madame is a journo institution already, it seems.

exactshit

2007-09-04T13:41:00.000+01:00

And MORE Amanda Lear!!!!!!!!!

OVERKILL

2007-09-01T13:05:00.000+01:00

Amanda lear - Follow me remix video
Uploaded by halxman

"Faust was right!"

2007-08-31T03:45:00.000+01:00

hopefully with sound this time!

2007-08-31T02:46:00.000+01:00

See more at Divine David.

Though you might want to try here,

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=85904226

Be prepared to be blasted out by this . . . .

v. reminiscent of a certain someone's recent world tour dontcha think?

BTW this is the gentleman's actual myspace

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=108065755

here goes nothing

2007-08-31T02:33:00.000+01:00

See more at Divine David.

According to MySpace . . . .

2007-08-21T00:48:00.000+01:00

"You must be someone's friend to make comments about them."

How Bizarre?!

2007-08-06T03:08:00.000+01:00

http://www.kleverkloggs.co.uk/

Definitely not me!

None of it's real, including the way you feel.

2007-07-09T10:38:00.000+01:00

Not sure about Madge's new look.

Wayne/Jayne County sings to her cat!

2007-06-21T12:53:00.000+01:00

Though I prefer . . . . .

. . . . especially as she seemed to get all cool and remote after the op. Loves the comments about how she was the best thing in Derek Jarman's Jubilee

Girl, you know we know.

2007-06-07T03:54:00.000+01:00

A work of genius. Miss Cleo being one of those telephone Psychics.

http://www.myspace.com/thegeminishow

Do you want your face in - or not?

2007-05-31T16:22:00.000+01:00

Well, while I was away, it seems Mr. O' Dowd was swept away by the creative urge again. In the Sunday Times interview that followed as a corrective to the recent Channel 4 doc that covered his recent community service in NY, he seemed to spend all his time photographing straight men "and I sleep with them all!" Seems the Norwegian Mr. Auden Carlsen [28] doesn't read the broadsheets, and didn't think that his £400 fee covered "extras." This video seems to have been leaked amongst the sprawling trail that is Boy George's online presence these days.

Considering that this was all supposed to have taken place in the middle of the night, they sure are talking fast. Do you think they had too many expressos?

http://www.youtube.com/Alchomey

Warning: May Contain Nuts.

2007-05-29T21:33:00.000+01:00

Well, another misguided attempt to get this blog going again. Content is much harder to create than I thought, I guess. I'm not enough of a journalist to dish the dirt on my nearest and dearest, don't really see myself as a pundit, and a parody requires a fully thought line in irony, or one's psychological slip is likely to show.

I'm out of the loony bin, having tried to get myself beamed up, and have also moved, which means I seem to spend an awful lot of time putting up shelves and unpacking books. I was managing a nice line in avoidance, re-arranging the garden, but the bank holiday weather has put paid to that.

For a little light relief I took Nick Ferrari to task for Jeremey Clarkson's recent comments, although as it's the equivalent to an audition on the X-Factor, I wasn't quite as, measured as I could have been, not having any idea of when I would be cut off and consequently not prepared to spend my time buttering him up. I still can't bear to listen to the podcast!

I managed to get out of the NHS just before the smoking ban. I survived this recent stay by self-medicating with nicotine like mad, excuse the pun. Illustration of the smoking room, wjich was quite a haven with 24 hour group therapy, until a mad psychiatrist was admitted and started taking case histories before lauching themselves into their "patients."

Thinking about the upcoming new series of Big Brother, which of course I swear I won't start watching this time, I am yet again reminded of the parralels with the house and yur nearest general admission psychiatric ward. I do think a better expression for the end of a houemate's stay would be "You have been discharged, please leave the ward."

There is the same lack of stimulation, the almost excruciating lack of privacy, count how many times you express an opinion that could apply to someone sitting behind you, innappropriate touching, sceaming shouting and general attention-seeking, etc, etc.

Phew!

2007-04-21T17:44:00.000+01:00

On day leave from the loony bin, more to follow.

What Price a Diva?

2007-03-08T10:37:00.000Z

So, Alec Guinness' old tea towel goes for £45,000 plus premium and tax at Bonham's Sale - The Angels Star Collection of Film & TV Costumes. I was intrigued in Lot #185+, a showgirl outfit from the Bond film "Octopussy" feeling certain I'd seen it some where else.

Whaddya know. Annie Lennox had yanked it out of the dressing up box to wear in the video for her 1992 single "Why," and album artwork for "Diva." It went for £360 plus premium and tax, but then Annie did seem to pick it for it's worn out tackiness. Any way, the evidence......

And for someone who's alot funnier about all this kind of thing http://www.bayraider.tv/

Weell!

2007-03-04T17:49:00.000Z

Show pity on the poor wretch that is this blog. So little that I dare report, that Google is such an efficent little snooper.

Absolutely at loggerheads with my paranoid neighbour. He has spent the whole day blasting me out with Beanie man [yes I know I've misspelt it, I dont want him snapping at my heels via Google.] Funny thing about paranoia, those who do not trust are not trustworthy. It was all I could do not to laugh when he was nearly run over by traffic trying to cross the road to avoid me last night.

Spent two hours grooming the furballs that are my dogs, only for it to pour down all day today. Can you scotchguard dogs? I once shared airspace with Linda Evans / Sue Ellen, and all we talked about was "Scotchguard TM" Go figure! They're not "bloodclat shit-zoos" but they're not waterproof all the same.

http://web.archive.org/web/20060424104601/http://killbattyman.blogspot.com

Look! It's my blog okay!

2007-02-13T04:02:00.000Z

And I'll post whatever I want to. Easter is just around the corner and eggs are in the shops as we speak.

'Course, kids being what they are to day, they have to take the piss.

The advertising agency's site is quite user friendly too.

http://www.wanda.fr/

Are those the legs of Mr O'Dowd?

2007-02-01T08:14:00.000Z

Where are They Now?

2007-01-30T12:28:00.000Z

Dontcha just love the innernet?

http://www.myspace.com/davidglasper

You did not win the item. Find similar items now!

2007-01-28T03:15:00.000Z

"You start off not wanting to lose someone and end up just not wanting to lose. But when strong people pick a fight with you, you'll lose. All you can do is leave. And you can't do that because that would be losing. So you stay, and you lose, because they're strong and you're not."

Antonia Quirke "Madame Depardieu and the Beautiful Strangers" Out 5 Feb.

http://www.foyles.co.uk/foyles/display.asp?K=9780007182756&sf_01=KEYWORD&st_01=antonia+quirke&m=2&dc=3

Well I for one have reasons to be grateful to Mr Tweed, why I actually got a few hits thanks to his recent "wardrobe malfunction."

The last really popular subject was my old flame, Madame Ex. It's been a while seen we've crossed paths and things seem to have settled down for him. Having the organs of someone half his age inserted into his guts, have pulled him back from the perpetual brink of mortality. Still managing to mainline the sympathy though. A hetrosexual relationship successfully undermined to produce one faithful hag to come up with the handbag. And a new "relationship" to provide the day to day personal care. Only glitch to resolve, getting the carer to have his dog put down. It's so exhausting trying to intimidate it when it's owner's out of the room.

Bitter? Moi? My God - I was in love with a Crocodile!

I WISH YOU LOVE

2007-01-24T02:50:00.001Z

The Jade Backlash - Backlash starts here!

2007-01-20T11:02:00.000Z

Watch this space!

One sad thing about Friday nights episode was that we missed Jack Tweed's lone moment of glory, as he modelled a thong made from Jade's tights as part of the handicraft task. Think they're mad to dump Jades perfume, it's just going to become majorly collectable.

Meanwhile check out this review of new film, with the v. "interesment" Malik Zidi

http://parodycenter.blogspot.com/2006/12/dvd-reviews-times-change-les-temps-qui.html

UPDATE

http://www.fmforums.co.uk/forums/index.php?showtopic=69329

SS CLUB 7

2007-01-19T06:15:00.000Z

"Cleo and Ian discussed their mutual appreciation of Jo in a morning chat.

In the absence of old early morning tea-drinking partner Jackiey, Ian sat outside and chatted with Cleo about his life outside and inside the house. Upon the mention of Jo's name, Cleo enthused, "I love Jo."

The comedienne even went as far as to suggest a new line of work for the former S Club singer. "She said the other day she hated acting," she recalled, but said that she pulled off uncanny impressions of Shilpa. "Makes me laugh every single time," Cleo smiled."

http://www.totallyjo.net/

Apparently this dear sweet girl has spent the last year sitting in front of fruit machines, as her company slides into bancruptcy.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,11049-2007000787,00.html

She - who must be obeyed.

2007-01-17T05:38:00.000Z

Don't know quite what I think of the whole Jade v Shilpa debacle. Shilpa seems so habituated to being a figurehead, Peta, Aids etc, that her relative incomprehension is protecting her from the full force of the "untouchables" dislike. It's been obvious since the second series of BB that a fast track outta there is to hog the kitchen.

Despite the 10,000 complaining phonecalls, the producers are in a cleft stick, the whole idea of the programme being to lull the contestants into a state where they forget the outside world. A quick trip to diary room to be informed that you are the centrefold for the BNP might just have Jade withdrawing into her shell. "Celebrity" seems to be a misnomer, with the fractured media we know have, either your career is from the 70-80's era, when mainstream still meant an audience in millions, Dirk, Cleo, Loe, and Jermaine, or you come from the populist paparazzi fed "Heat" stable and "talent" as a concept is reduced to a party trick.

There was something about Jade's predicament that had me musing, just what did it remind me off? Of course, "She!"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/She_%28novel%29

"It recounts the adventures of an expedition to an unexplored part of Elstree, where they find Jadesha, a beautiful and apparently immortal sorceress, She had become ageless and perfectly beautiful more than 2 millennia in [tabloid years] earlier by immersing herself in a magic flame of reality television.

Jadesha takes family to see the fire of publicity, that they can become immortal and remain with her forever. However, with this second immersion she reverts to her true self and immediately withers and dies."

Contains moderate sex and emotional intensity.

2006-12-09T03:41:00.000Z

"Winds of Change at Castle Rising." 1978

By Fanny Cradock.

An excerpt. . . .

‘Tell me just one thing. Have you ever slept with a girl?’

‘You know I haven’t’ – indignantly – ‘what a question, from you!’

‘It’s a perfectly normal question to a young man of nearly twenty-one. Your cousin Stephen seduced one when he was fourteen and she had a baby!’

Lucien started up. ‘I think you’ve gone mad. Are you suggesting I should try to start a baby with some beastly girl?’

‘In a sense yes,’ Piers’ voice was harsh, ‘at least no, not a baby, but just that you find out by having sexual relations with a girl before . . . well before you do anything else,’ he finished lamely.

‘But I don’t want to.’

‘How do you know if you haven’t tried?’

‘I don’t get erections from girls but I do from boys,’ Lucien said sounding very cross. ‘Piers we have drunk all the champagne, shall I open another bottle? Are we going to sit here all night talking about you not wanting to make love to me any more because I suppose you have fallen for some stinking black Indian princeling.’

‘Christ! Is that what you think?’

‘Well, no, but oh do shut up and let’s go out to dinner and have fun as we always do together. I’ve had another perfectly splendid season and London simply adores me and my clothes."

Seperated at Birth?

2006-12-08T07:26:00.000Z

Guess I know what Simon Amstell does on his days off.

What's that?

Oh give me a break, he's sarcastic enough on the television.

What Next?

2006-12-08T07:14:00.000Z

After what I read she wants to do to the baby David, and now wearing fur, is she going to lead the way for female circumcision.

Watch out Lourdes!

And you thought people piercing babies ears at 6 month was "chavesque"!

It was a dark and stormy night

2006-12-02T13:13:00.000Z

Phew! Check out the cobwebs!

Don't think this post will be of any interst to anyone but myself. Really need to renovate this blog. Tried to post on my childhood idol, namely Mrs Fanny Craddock. The biopic on her has come and gone, and I gave up trying to encapsulate the evasions and revisions of her life, she employed to create the austerity era tornado of pretension and suburban luxe that entranced postwar housewifes with vicarious high living, before everythign when beige and hessian in the 70's with Delia Smith.

No news. Apparently people hate recieving Christams cards with picture of the sender's dogs, so that photosession has been cancelled. Occasiononally bump into Madame Ex, buty have managed to escape blow by blow reports of his romance with the heterosexual Mike Skinner-alike neighbour, whose 8th kid must be due anytime now.

Checked out the vacant Battersea Power station, with it's great wall of rotting apples, and a lot of crap Chinese art, only to have it reported yesterday that it's been sold for £400 million yesterday to some irish plutocrats.

Getting so bored with myself, I've even taken to ringing up LBC 97.3.

Is everyone now at MYSPACE? I wonder. I shouldn't really blog, as I have never settled down to the one house subject . Probably delete all this, but at least it's broken the blogging ice.

I WANNA BLACK BAYBAY

2006-10-18T01:04:00.000+01:00

"Madonna's Personal Assistant brings new Malawian son through Heathrow."

Seems as if Madonna's business empire has now extended to smuggling illegal immigrants. She's gonna have fun with all the fake visas, when the in-laws all want to come over for the Christening.

They should have known what was up when Madge was flapping her bingo-wings in an effort to hide the fact that she was probably the only person in Malawi of her age to still have all her own teeth, and not be responsible for all her aids-orphaned grandchildren.

Shame, noones posted the harry Enfield sketch, where Waynetta demands a black baby, cos all the other mothers on the estate/project have at least black child. Hence the title of this post.

If you can't be happy, be bitter.

EAT IT PLEASE

2006-10-04T23:42:00.000+01:00

Title apropos of nothing, just something I read in the last hour online. This website powered by Tesco's Spanish Cava. Special offer £3 something. Just don't buy out all the stock in my local Express.

Just watched the video of Madoona's $Jump.$[Off a cliff more like] Well she's got to save the bobbies now a little kiddies on the way. Big combat trousers to hide the scrawny loins that will never see a delivery. Just her and a clothes rail, and more Parkour than Sainsbury's. What is it with this Parkour. Try Parkour on Beachy Head and then tell me it's a new form of dance. Nobody mention the syrup. What next, H&M dentures, as worn on tour?

Highlights of today. Don't stay at home it's dangerous. letter from landlord asking me to let them in to evict Mr. Para upstairs. One thing I've learnt in this world is , you don't trust people, they'll give you every reason not to trust them. I'm sick of him freakin out every time the postman signs the Recorded Delivery summons himself, rather than leave a card. I couldn't care a f*** about your upcoming courtcase, and I ain't too impressed about you taking in post for men with eastern names neiver. Then dealing with Miss Pavlos, 'oo wants to set a pack of non-English speaking electricians to gut my house like they did the bloke next door. What's mid European for "You've f***ing fused the f***ing fuses, don't you realise I've got a f***ing live webcam show at 14.30 hours British Summer Time."

Not much happening personally. Huge strapping Strawberry blonde moved into the flat recently vacated by the african couple and their dead baby, what they waited an hour in the G.P.'s with. Strange way to cover up infanticide. Reminds me of the baby murder industry they 'ad in old Lunnen town. Proper embarissin' when they drained the Serpintine, only to discover a layer of infant skellingtons. Sorry, I must be channeling some Victorian Bawd.

Goodnight, and yeah sorry, I do still have access to a modem.

P.s, to Caroline, the only one to dare comment on this blog in years. Pete from Big Brother 7 had Tourette's and is not a "Spastic." By which I think you meant cerebral palsy, which is a condition caused be a lack of oxygen to the brain during birth. This can cause all sorts of degrees of damage, from profound motor skills damage, while the peron inside is completely sentient, to mental as well as physical disabilities. Pete had Tourettes Syndrome, causing physical ticks and profane statements, such as swearing and confessing you voted Labour in the last election. It was interesting to see it manifested in Pete whenever he faced psycho-social conflict. E.G. Nicki: "Does my bum look big in this? Petetee Darling?" "Wankers!" Of Course Wankers! Not My srawny stick of love. Wankers." I don't think she realised he was the usual shade of hippy wishy-washyness - "Let's not tie ourselves up in the patriarchal possesiveness of materialistic western society bullshit." As the space cadet said herself [or her agent] "He wouldn't hurt and insect, but he destroyed me!"

P.P.S. Still waiting on Jenny's fitness DVD.

Through the round window.

2006-07-19T12:40:00.000+01:00

Well, isn't it hot in the Big Brother House today!

Big Ted is in the garden with Little Ted.

Big Ted - "Omigod, it's been so long, they're gonna have to open my ass-crack with harpoon.

Little Ted - "Really! I'm trying to preserve as much masculinity as possible."

Mysterious hands descend to help Little Ted swish back into the house.

Meanwhile, in a studio nearby.

Jemima - "I so hate that Hamble. I just know she's going to be all over Brian Cant now I'm not in the house.

With she collapses on the floor, her lanky striped legs all akimbo.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/classic/playschool/trivia.shtml

Technical note. I've been trying to do a skit now for two weeks on Lea, can't find orange balloons anywhere, but then it's no longer topical. Could anyone help me out with an image of Jemima? How I mis those big rosy Cheeks.

Big Brother 7 Up

2006-06-10T17:25:00.000+01:00

I can't helping feeling, especially with the lastest series of Big Brother, that one can't watch reality television without being prepared to take part in it one's self at some point. To see that the two oldest [by far] housemates this series, who are roughly my own age, are seen as either ridiculous if they try to be entertaining, or controlling if they try to intervene in any "Lord of the Flies" scenario.

Lea is hardly guilty of having plumbed the depths of depravity in the adult entertainment business, nor the heights of financial exploitation. While Richard, with his past experience of that American institution, Summer Camp, is just a head waiter/server exasperated at unruly diners with only a slightly supercilious air. Wish he would skip the baby blue eye shadow though.

Last night, and for the first time in the history of the series, a contestant was admitted, under the initially random golden ticket scheme. [Think Willy Wonka.] A great failure as most of the entrants had bought their tickets for last sums on the resale market, and all I could see were row upon row of identical middle aged / middle-class wannabees, all the same age as those being inside the house. I cringed as the middle-aged promotions woman was grilled by the pubescent promotions girls already resident.

As it doesn't look like I ever auditioned in time, I thought back to the Grandaddy of all reality television series "Seven Up."

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0002S64SC/002-8567740-9584843?v=glance&n=130

The series started in the early 60's, without the consent of any of the then seven year old participants. The idea, based on the Jesuit maxim "Give me the child of seven, and I will give you the man" meaning that after that impressionable age, it would be impossible to influence a persons character in any meaningful or permanent way. The series is revisited every 7 years, catching up on the lives and development of this disperate bunch of baby boomers. The idea was to relate this to the backgrounds from which they all came, it's been too English to probe too far, and the most successful and upperclass having all predictably dropped out.

Big Brother is the closest thing to a soap opera I have ever watched, with the same arc of each character's story, their fellow housemates/contestants all busily scriptwriting, and shoehorning each other into the roles and plots already decided. realising that I am now too old to take part, unless my husband stumps up the money, I wondered what the arc of the real persons actual life would be, after a bruch of such fictionalising. Will we be seeing more updates in the future than just Brian Dowling on the mint? How about a secret garden, where everyone evicted is moved to, a parallel house.

Will Sam, for example, survive the constant character assasination on an already fairly fluid ego in her/hislife in the real world. [Coincidentally the name of a less claustraphobic predecessor on MTV]

What am I trying to say? A character appears on television, with a back story, something dramatic happens, endless speculation in the papers between the portrayal and the real person/actor, and then the painful writing out of the storyline.

I read somewhere that Sam was booted out of the family home at 14, for his/her taste in nail polish, certainly not the £300,000 flat in Notting Hill, lavished on Grace. Okay, Sam made the mistake of thing that calling everyone in earshot "AMAZING!" would banish the dark side, rather than owning her own potential for negativity. She unwittingly backed into being called hypocritical anyway over the "arselicking" incident. But didn't anyone question the origin of Sam's neediness?

What price will she, or anyone on the gogglebox pay, for the misreprentation of themselves for the expedience of plotting.

Who cares, now where is that picture of Pete's dick I wanted to post?

Let's say . . . . . Grace?

2006-06-10T17:10:00.000+01:00

http://www.channel4.com/bigbrother/

"Why are they booing me? I don't snog women with fake tits over glass tables!"

"I was just being myself, maybe I shouldn't have been, maybe I should have been backstabbing like everyone else." This from a little girl who could upstage Linda Blair for expelling bile.

Catch her on Monday [Sensless 12 June 11 pm] sniffing the arse of her of her big black ex-boyfriend. Now what was that about Aisleeyne being a 'wigga?'

Just a "Ghetto Ho?"

2006-05-31T16:35:00.000+01:00

That Sezers got a f****'n cheek. Mmmmm? Watch this space. I think this creep has met his match.

Call the R.S.P.C.A. Overexcited at using a friend's broadband connection to make this post, I couldn't resist posting this picture of me strangling one of my dogs. I had slipped into a local supermarket with a puppy to use their photobooth. Hygiene, what hygiene? Anyway, I was petrified of being chucked out, but as the picture was about to be taken, he turned to the back. I swirled round, and he turned his face to the back again. Hence why by the time the picture was taken, I had a firm grip round his neck. Sorry about the lack of poster paint!

Big Bedlam

2006-05-23T11:12:00.000+01:00

This image records how the paying public in the Eighteenth century visited Bedlem mental Hospital for entrtainment, to be amused and shocked at the behaviour of its inmates.

In the danger of repeating myself, I am still appaled by the progress of Big Brother 7. Starting with Shabaz and going all the way up to the producers. The idea of the programme is to expose the psychology of the contestants.

I AM fascinated with social psychology, more so than whether any hanky panky takes place.

But I don't see that people out of adolesence should be expected to deal with disturbed behaviour, and when I saw Shabaz mugging as a spastic person to illusttarte his use of the word imbecile, well . . . . . . I have worked with people with cerebral palsy, and they have as much going on inside as you and me. Playing tit for tat with stigmas is just not on.

It also touches on something I have learnt is poison to the social compact - paranoia. It's more contagious than syphilis. My neighbour upstairs [ever wondered if I'm house bound?] since I accidently opened a letter of his, doesn't trust that I'm not spying on him. I've recently been accused of signing for the delivery of a summons, and knowing something about why his front door lock doesn't work properly.

Now I don't trust him.

If this blog disappears, look out for news that an idiot with a red nose and too much eye shadow was found stabbed in his bed.

There's a lot in the media about the shallowness of reality tv stars, Chantelle for example, but as the Big Brother house is on display, any kind of interior life, any dissembling is seen as some kind of sinister witholding, being two-faced, on a task, etc, etc. The openess of Shabaz's behaviour seems to be taken as proof of it's triviality, not the display of a behavioural pirhana in a pool of entertainment minnows. Come on Endemol, takes some responsibility!

Shabba Wanker

2006-05-22T13:42:00.000+01:00

Spot the difference!

Which one is most likely to:

Have no understanding of personal space.

Finish your sentences.

Accept no responsibility for his actions.

Serve up dollops of his self-contempt as a "compliment."

Out you in the most crudest way.

Hide behind accusations of homophobia.

Why it's Shabaz.

It's too sad I know, to post on Big Brother, but when I saw an 18 year old boy try and explain to a 30 something man, that he didn't appreciate being continually touched, only to be asked if he had a problem with homosexuals, I saw blood. LEAVE THE BABIES ALONE!

Imissed last night's episode, but did catch the live broadcast, where in the middle of hiding all the hous'e food in a compost bin in the garden, the camera actually TURNED AWAY from the sad poof.

I do wonder if this man's grotesque double think as been his only defence as a gay Muslim over the years . . . . but come on, please.

It's intriguing that such an unsuitiable person, get a position to dominate the start of such a long series, as a founder member of the "Big Brotherhood." I found Makosi's interminable paranoia in the last series, wasn't helped by being given a "secret task" almost from the first episode.

Now I've vented my spleen, I can only justify my triviality with somthing wot I read on page 8 of today's Guardian. "Psychologists yesterday argued that that rumour, scandal and defamation of others is what brings us together. Professors at the University of Oklahoma had dozens of subjects 'eavesdrop' on a recorded converstaion between two fictional characters, Brad and Melissa. The group was then asked to mingle and chat about what they liked or disliked about either. The scientists found people felt closer if they agreed in their antipathy towards either Brad or Melissa. a common fondness created less of a bond."

Well, that's me covered then. Wanna be my friend? Promise I won't backbite you. Honest.