Progress report

As my exhibition at the Crown Gallery,Carlisle starts on October 26th I reckon that with the summer holidays starting here in Scotland next week then I have to remain focused -otherwise time is going to drift on by ....
Wimbledon too is a huge distraction but with Nadal going out then I'm not so interested!

I've had a quiet few days where I've been looking at ideas,jotting things down,researching .This piece is a work in progress which I actually started pre Spring Fling and is gradually becoming into the idea I had in my head at the start.  

Using gesso,sand and modelling paste I crafted two panels or windows on the canvas.I am trying to achieve an aged,archival look. Where I feel the surrounding area is complete I am searching for the central idea. It won't be much-maybe a small collage or further painting.Something that will grab the attention and draw the viewer in.....

Tomorrow I am taking a new painting down to New Abbey to Abbey Cottage where my work is on show until Sunday. I may even treat myself to a pot of tea and a scone as they are delicious there and the tea award-winning....and then delivery of a painting to a lovely new customer....Oh,Djokovic is now playing....happy days indeed

And detail...

Cup-and- ring carvings....

I'm particularly intrigued by rock art in all its shape and forms -from cave paintings to carvings. They give us a glimpse into the past and how our ancestors lived. Sometimes you read a book and somebody has articulated your thoughts in a way that lingers in the memory.

 This passage is by David Malouf...An Imaginary Life...written in 'Rock Art & Prehistory of Atlantic Europe.( Routledge,New York).

"How can I give you any notion....of what earth was in its original bleakness,before we brought to it the order of industry, the terraces,fields,orchards,pastures, the irrigated gardens of the world we are making in  our own image?

Do you think of ...(the) land you now inhabit...as a place given you by the gods ready-made in all its placid beauty? It is not. It is a created place. If the gods are with you there,glowing out of a tree in some pasture or shaking their spirit over the pebbles of a brook in clear sunlight, in wells, in springs, in a stone that marks the edge of your legal right over a hillside; if the gods are there, it is because you have discovered them there, drawn them up out of your soul's need for them and dreamed them into the landscape to make it shine".

I've revisited spirals -inspired by the cup- and- ring carvings often found on passage graves and henge monuments.

It's a box canvas,layered with gesso, modelling paste and sand to add relief and texture. Layer upon layer of acrylic paint & ink was added,finishing with silver leaf to highlight.

Weaving and Spinning...

'In the ebb & flow,
In warp & weft,
Cradle & grave,
An eternal sea,
A changing patchwork,
A glowing life.
At the whirring loom of time I weave
The living clothes of the Deity'

Goethe,'Faust'.
 
In all mythologies,the art of weaving is originally found in the divine world. Some small mistake must always be woven into the pattern to remind us of imperfection in all created life.

In spinning our own lives,intertwined threads woven together become our own tapestry of life...and we have the ability to create,and make something using those threads of fate.....

This is one of the panels in my completed box-work 'Verdandi'.I've used mod roc on hessian mounted on plyboard. The relief shape is made of sand and modelling paste with Egyptian paste beads.Acrylic paint and inks were then layered...The image is based on a Viking calendar stick which marks important dates and events but is also symbolic for the passing of time...