internet of things…

“

First published in touches of sense… in 2014, at a time when I began to build up and play with a palette of painting and remix apps on iPhone and iPad, I was both attracted and repulsed by the relative ease with which I could create visual imagery.

The poetic style of the blog post is typical of much of my writing which emerges like some of my art in a stream of consciousness.

Much of the artwork I created between 2014 and 2018 exists only as a series of digital files. The resolution of the images, the multimedia nature of the creations or their existence as part of a collaborative dialogue with a group of musician, poet, artist friends means that they have meaningful life only on a screen.

Nevertheless, I chose to include a few examples here as these images are an important part of my artistic journey and remain a source of inspiration for future play…

As I take time to review the different collections I see more and more connections.

Each image, each blog post has the potential to spark off unpredictable creative exploration.

A selfie.

I am already dead.

The instant is over.

I am passed into pixels.

Beautiful chimera.

I am young, I see myself acting, acting middle-age anger.

There is hurt in the glaring eyes.

I am reduced to a still.

I am framed in a moment 10:30 on Sunday 7 September.

I am a stream, a river of disconnected instants screaming for attention.

I am alive, I am dead.

Hope resurrect my youth with a swipe.

You see me as your thing.

We are as web of avatars, algorhythmic robots, waltzing in a cloud of particles.

I am made in your image.

I am target.

I am customer.

I am lover.

I am your object for an instant.

Save me.

Move me.

Scale me to your attention.

How will you divide your attention?

No matter.

Grains of sand

We are swimming in quick sand.

We are both grain and grinder.

Time slipping through our fingers.

Shall we drown in this sink-hole?

Save me

Throw me a rope of reality, of time spent together, of common history.

Let us drink together before we drown to drown no more.

Let us touch.

Let us breathe in the dew of distant lands the dawn awakening.

Cyclops

What shall we make of Cyclops, who would Google us up?

Should we believe his plea that he serves no evil?

How shall we avert his gaze, while we dwell on the island?

Must we seek to blind the Cyclops?

We are prey, toy-thing, free lunch.

Circe

Sleep, and doze, listen to the sweet songs, fix your eyes on beauty my friends.

She is yours. Your play-thing.

She is dancing for you.

She is already ancient, her face is made up.

She is Circe.

Notice how the wolves are packed around her court.

They are as docile.

Beware the enchantress.

They are wolves and we are become swine.

You are myth, an odyssey to be written.

Attend to ancient heroes.

Awake and sleep no more.

touches of light, preciously preserved.

First published in touches of sense….August 12 2021,

The heightened attention, the heightened emotions, present during an afternoon’s walk with my eldest son are expressed in images: expansive panoramas, tree-lined avenues, the sculptural boughs of a tree, a sun-lit path.

Few words were spoken.

Few words are necessary.

A page escapes to leafy paths.

An instant of communion with a Cézanne.

A5 sketchpad, framing expression of infinite dimensions.

Kilometres becoming scaled in centimetres.

Touches of light preciously preserved.

Unfocused focus washing weariness away.

Ephemera rendered eternal.

Taking a moment to contemplate.

Pause, gaze, breathe in, remember.

Moving, losing sight, feeling loss.

Remembrance.

That moment.

That minutiae.

Words tramp through grass like Wellington Boots.

Stop stomping around.

Present movement moments evaporate.

Fine edge, broad sweep, fanned lines.

Found in nature.

Lost in flow.

Time absent in presence.

Touches of light preciously preserved.

out in the open…

“Exhibition preparations” 2022

Storms were forecast.

Organizing a first exhibition, out in the open, was suddenly raising a whole list of concerns.

What would happen if it rained, how could I protect the artwork? What if there were high winds?

I am pretty good at imagining catastrophes.

I wasn’t really too concerned about the weather conditions keeping people away.

Having agreed to doing an exhibition, I laid out some artwork on the living room sofas and with the help of my son, I set about selecting a small collection of nine paintings.

Not knowing how much space I would have, thinking about the practicalities of framing, thinking through the logistics of transport, deciding that I would be making prints of a small number of paintings, enabled me to limit the collection.

I really enjoyed the process of selecting and rejecting, making choices based on unity of theme, contrast of subject, vibrancy of colour.

With the exception of one painting, “Rockflow Scape”, all the artwork was inspired by recent walks in the Auvergne.

First Exhibition Selection.

Working on this website while preparing for the exhibition helped me to focus on practicalities: how I would pack the artwork, the printing of Certificates of Authenticity, the labels to describe each painting, the pricing.

In doing this work I discovered many parallels with past experiences:

• preparing for conference presentations

• the technical aspects of theatrical productions

• the organisation of film shoots from my days as a production assistant in London.

Now, writing this, I find joy in the creation of this website, excitement in getting ready to be “out in the open”.

I have learnt so much in such a short period, I feel that taking this time, developing the framework for this site, learning to work with these web applications, finding work-arounds to constraints, is not separate but an integral part of making the art that I choose to share. In 2010, when I was preparing for to speak at my first national education conference, I spent hours writing an article in French, building a website and then starting a blog.

When something is important to me, I put my heart and soul into the venture.

Perhaps nobody will visit this site and read what I am writing or see the art that I am doing.

I am stoic, I am only concerned with what I must do, I am giving everything that I have.

There is a quote of Andy Warhol that I love:

“Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone decide if it is good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding make even more art.”

Open day.

Everything was packed into a large plastic box, I was as ready as I was going to be. When I arrived at the exhibition site, I was pleased to discover that the organizers had provided covered market stalls, tables, chairs, and wires to hang artwork on.

First exhibition set up.

With a little help from my friends.

With the help of my wife and daughter, Thomas de Ligneris from the Association des Artistes d’Auvergne, and Flora Gueton a neighbouring artist, we got the exhibition set up.

I was struck by the generosity of the people and the camaraderie of the people on the different stalls displaying arts and crafts.

As the day went on, I was able to take time to talk with the other artists exhibiting, and had long conversations with a few passers by who took the time to look at my artwork and who gave me very complimentary feedback on what I was sharing. I always find the perspectives of others fascinating, it’s always great to come across people who have surprising reactions.

What I really love is meeting and learning from others.

Even if there weren’t many people who came to that market, and nobody to my knowledge sold very much or anything at all, time didn’t go slowly, I was much too busy talking with the others, learning about where they were exhibiting, learning about how they lived their art.

There’s something that Flora said to me which resonated, even if it is hard making a living, her meetings with other artists had confirmed to her that she was on the right track.

This was my first exhibition, out in the open.

There were many lessons learnt, no sales, many meetings.

I don’t know where my path will lead me, but this was certainly a memorable step.

unexpected twists…

“Reaching down” May 2022

May 2022

I sense that I am seeing and drawing things differently.

Initial hesitancy or sketchiness is increasingly replaced by bold, sweeping lines.

Over time, I am beginning to take a measure of the man making the marks.

Status update.

Don’t you just love bureaucracy and form-filling? I know I do (not).

After four months of phone calls, emails, form-filling, toing and froing, twisting and turning, I now have an official professional status as an “artiste-peintre”.

(How did that happen?)

I will be able to derive income through any sales of my artwork while maintaining my job as a university teacher.

Not having to make a living from my art gives me the freedom to create.

Freedom to sell?

I never set out to sell my artwork. It was always an activity I did freely.

I had always associated money with constraint rather than freedom..

Then I was faced with a conundrum.

SPACE-TIME-FREEDOM (money)

I had never created so much art as in the last four years.

What on earth was I going to do with it all?

I started by giving it away to family and friends.

I didn’t want to burn all of it. I couldn’t keep it all.

When push comes to shove, what’s the point of keeping your art or your artist identity in the closet?

Art Cupboard 2020

In January 2022, I weighed everything up. I wanted to spend less time doing academic research and publications and more time doing art.

There was no way around it, I would need more SPACE, more money for art supplies, a website, a studio SPACE which would allow me to create with bigger formats and make more mess.

I wanted to do exhibitions, I wanted to sell my freely created artwork. I didn’t want to do commissions..

Unexpected twists…
I was setting up for the weekly life-drawing class, ready for another relaxing session.

Suddenly, somebody asked, “Who wants to do an exhibition on the 3rd of June?”.

I heard myself saying “Me.”

Exhibiting.

I hadn’t really considered the practicalities of getting an exhibition together (at short notice).

It was also apparently, of course, the right moment to start the building of a website, I decided.

(Why? Why? Why?)

I have got myself tied up in knots so many times.

I should know better than to trust my worst/best instincts.

I know I won’t not trust my instincts in the future.

I am hard to live with at times.