Last posts on art

Uganda Art

2009-10-30T17:44:00+01:00

After being denied the space to express myself by (You know yourselves) various media houses and their collaborators disguised as civil society, Free Uganda Critical Media has allowed me to use their platform. I appreciate guys!!

I'll kick off with experimental Art:

My Fans want to know what I'm up too???

I can say to them that, you won't be disappointed with what is to come-just be patient with me!

I consider this art as work still in progress..,call it props for some mind-bending art to come!

Lake Bunyonyi Monster

Lake Bunyonyi Monster from the virunga mountains has been stealing goats from the village.

Uganda Modern Art

This time I'll try my best to publish any work, be experimental or finished product, on this website.

African Art: Virunga Airport

experimental 3d sculpiting

3d sculpting and modeling

Battleship on Lake Kivu

Virunga International Airport

Virunga furistic International Airport

The Year is 2050 and Trade in information has made Virunga Mountains the place to be

Welcome to Virunga futuristic International Airport

Virunga Mountains futuristic City

This Art is from a Vision I have for Kivu and Kigezi, South-Western? Uganda.
As I continue to experiment..I thought that, would be good not to just delete the work but share it.
Maybe sharing the project will help me to visualise better.

Kabale charter plane checks in at Virunga Airport

Virunga International Airport

African 3D Art featuring Virunga City

D'arcy

2009-10-16T06:27:43+02:00

D'arcy

2009-10-16T06:27:17+02:00

Leonardo da Vinci picture 'worth millions' revealed by a fingerprint

2009-10-15T00:01:24+02:00

The painting, titled Young Girl in Profile in Renaissance Dress, recently sold for a mere £12,000 ($19,000). It was billed at a Christie's sale in 1998 as "German, early 19th century". Peter Silverman, the Canadian-born owner, thought there was more to it and decided to get the drawing checked out after buying it in 2007. His hunch appears to have paid off.

A Paris laboratory discovered that a fingerprint from the tip of an index or middle-finger, found on the top left of the picture, was "highly comparable" to one found on da Vinci's work St Jerome, which he painted early in his career when he did not have assistants. The infrared analysis also showed "significant" stylistic parallels with those in da Vinci's Portrait of a Woman in Profile in Windsor Castle.

The ink and chalk drawing was also made by a left-handed artist – as da Vinci was – while carbon dating was consistent with the Milanese fashion the girl was dressed in, from the late 15th century. If verified as a genuine da Vinci it could be worth tens of millions.

Art for the blind?

2009-09-15T01:35:24+02:00

I visited First Friday in Denver, Colorado, U.S., enjoying the art, culture, and frankly funky people-watching implicit to such an art event. It’s several consecutive blocks filled with galleries, people, wine and crackers, and of course, art.In one of the small shops, a piece caught my eye from across the room. It was an entirely black canvas, painted in what turned out to be acrylic, but with texture noticeable from across the room. Curious, I went to check it out.Sure enough, after reading the fine print, it turns out that the artist has a blind brother, and that this was his rendition of the world as seen through his brother’s hands. Beautiful.

qweqwaa

2009-09-05T13:17:49+02:00

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2009-09-05T12:51:30+02:00

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Shared Experiences as Art

2009-07-17T17:28:36+02:00

In future, when perhaps all experiences can be shared through direct neural interface, the mere fact of experiencing would become art and the only art. Anything could be created by merely imagining it; by imagining an image, it could become a painting; by imagining a melody, it could become a composition; by imagining a scene, it could become a movie; but even emotions, thoughts or any other experiences could become a form of art, and be shared as they were experienced by the individual. There would be artists who would try to achieve the most beautiful possible experiences to share them with others, be those experiences in reality or in their minds.

Insight through Expression

2009-07-09T12:22:00+02:00

By expressing oneself, one becomes vastly more aware of oneself. Aspects of oneself that would otherwise be hidden in one's subconsciousness manifest as one pays attention to them. This is the main reason why psychotherapy, a diary or creativity can be so useful to gain psychological insight.

Police struggle to control Beijing Olympic ticket chaos

2009-07-07T14:44:00+02:00

Agence France-Presse
BEIJING - Police struggled on Friday to control surging crowds of more than 50,000 people desperate to grab the last Olympic tickets in Beijing, as a Hong Kong journalist trying to cover the chaos was detained.
Frustration boiled over as the fans -- many of whom had been queueing for two days -- jostled to maintain their spot in the long line as latecomers tried to force their way into prime positions.
At one point the surging crowd broke through a control barrier and lurched towards the ticket counters, sparking a sharp reaction from police.
In hot and dusty conditions, some groups in the crowd chanted insults at the officers, who were seen dragging people out of the line and kicking and punching them before leading them away.
"The police didn't have a clue how many people would come here and there was no organisation at all, it was chaos," said Wang Zhongliang, a delivery worker for UPS.
It was the last chance for Chinese to buy tickets for the Games, with 250,000 on sale at several locations in Beijing from 9:00am for events including athletics, diving, and gymnastics.
Demand was so high that more than 10,000 people were in a line by Thursday at one of the main ticket selling centres near the Olympic Stadium, district police chief Xiong Xingguo said.
By early Friday huge reinforcements of police were moved in to maintain order as numbers ballooned to between 40,000 and 50,000 at that one line alone, Xiong said.
Xiong conceded that police had been taken by surprise by the demand.
"The situation was chaotic and difficult," he said. "Once the newspapers released the news about the ticket sale, too many people came at once so we had a security problem."
Amid the confrontations, an AFP reporter saw police manhandle and lead away Felix Wong, a photographer with Hong Kong's South China Morning Post. Staff at the newspaper's headquarters told AFP he was detained for several hours.
A Beijing Olympic spokeswoman confirmed to AFP that Wong was detained, but said it was because he was disobeying police orders to leave a restricted zone and had injured a police officer.
Despite the chaos, the sales did offer a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to some fans, such as 23-year-old Lei Peng, who had slept on the footpath for two nights.
The engineering graduate from eastern China's Anhui province managed to score two seats to one of the hottest events of the Games -- the final of the men's 110m hurdles.
Chinese hopes for an athletics gold medal rest on defending Olympic and world champion 110m hurdler Liu Xiang.
"It was hard but worth it," said Lei, who had been queuing since midday on Wednesday.
Han Ruxiang, 76, had spent two nights sleeping on a bamboo mat so that he and his 67-year-old wife could see the finals of the diving competition.
"How can you be Chinese and not go to the Olympics when it is in China?" he said. "I am tired but so happy."
The demand has fuelled a flourishing black market in selling tickets at a massive profit, even though ticket touting has been outlawed. Police have arrested 60 touts over the past two months, according to state media reports.
Outside Beijing, 570,000 tickets for football matches went on sale in football competition host cities Tianjin, Shanghai, Qinhuangdao and Shenyang.
Altogether around seven million tickets were up for sale for the Games, with around 75 percent going to China's vast domestic audience, with the rest made available overseas through each country's National Olympic Committee.
Friday's release of tickets was the fourth and final round of sales for the August 8-24 Games.

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Hero

2009-05-25T08:18:16+02:00

I love A5 magazine, I've been intending to submit artwork for it since it's very first issue, but somehow the whole experience was so daunting and intimidating that I never did, well, never till 2 issues ago when I submitted 3 pen and watercolor paintings and one of them was accepted and published! The topic was sex and so I needed very little adaptations or thought to make just what I wanted. It was really a wonderful experience, I mean, any publication is awesome, but one in a magazine you are already a big fan of is at least double as wonderful! Not only that, but the pieces I made for the magazine inspired me to draw more artwork in the same series and eventually, became the body of work to my solo show in Chicago. So then, the next topic was published, it was "Childhood" and though I had every intention in the world to submit again, I never got around to it, I had a lot of ideas, but eventually, I think mostly out of fear of rejection, I never did. After the deadline was over, I felt like such a pussy - I totally let myself miss on a good opportunity not only to get published, but also, to be inspired and to make something cool.

I decided that whatever happens, I'm going to submit for the next issue, but then, when the topic came up, I was sort of disappointing, the topic was "Hero" which was very hard for me to relate to. I don't believe in hero, a couple of years ago, I was in someone's birthday, and some guy who was doing inspirational lecture for a living, asked us, to prove some point or another, who are our heroes, I said that my grandparents were, but actually it wasn't true. I don't think there are or were any heroes in my life. I don't believe in salvation or being saved. I think that though I were in life threatening situations in my life, the largest difficulties I've experiences, were just dealing with everyday life. It's been a couple of difficult weeks around here. Ned's in a bad mood, he's trying to crack some big emotional riddle and spend a lot of time doing nothing, it's hard to see him be so hard on himself and so sad and heavy for so many hours everyday. I'm working on some freelance design projects after not doing it for a while, I'm actually making some money which is nice, but dealing with client, putting boundaries and asking to be paid is really hard, and I think that also the tension between me being so work busy while Ned being in this non-busy state adds a lot of tension. I decided to do the Hero project about me and how I had to deal with a lot of confrontational situations lately and tried not to hide and wait till it goes away but actually stand up for myself.

Yoweri Museveni is the main cause of Land Problems in Uganda

2009-05-11T19:51:00+02:00

Uganda has no land problem like the government propagandist wants you to believe. In fact 80% of Uganda land is not being used but owned by Tibuhaburwa Yoseri Buzariranwa a.k.a Yoweri Museveni the Burundian crook and his Luwero bunch of thugs like; Kizza Besigye, Kahinda Otafire, Mugisha Muntu, Jim Muhwezi, Amama Mbabazi, Salim Saleh, etc. Big chunks of land are also being horded by crooks like Gordon Wavamunno, Basajjabalaba, etc.

Mr Al Waleed Bin Talal, was in 2005 given the 14.5-acre land in central Kampala, formerly belonging to Shimoni Demonstration School by the Burundian national occupying your State House. Now hundreds of families in Naguru and Nakawa are to be forced from their village in favor for a foreign capitalist. Mabira forest almost went to an ethical bloody investor called the Mehta group of companies. However, he has been promised chunks of land in northern Uganda that once belonged to the occupants of yoweri museveni's concentration camps. Forced Mass displacement in northern Uganda in 1996 by Genocidal Yoweri Museveni, resulted in 1.5million Ugandans losing access to their land. Thus their rights over their land while displaced, including the right to cultivate land and the right to compensation were lost. • Several hundred thousand people have been forcibly displaced by the state, with no compensation offered. • Trees on IDP land have been burnt down, as security forces set fires to remove cover for rebels. • IDP and army camps have been set up on private land without permission or compensation. • Public facilities have been constructed on private land, without compensation being paid. Where camps have become market centres, local authorities are simply taking people’s land, for instance to build roads. Genocidal

Yoweri Museveni is the problem in Uganda and not land as there's enough land for 1 billion Ugandans.

Neurological Evolution

2009-04-24T00:41:53+02:00

Many scientists attribute our every quality, be it directly or indirectly, to genetic evolution. Art becomes a means to show off to attract partners, love becomes a means to keep them and others with them.However, this narrow view of evolution is incomplete; it has already been shown that evolution works through at least two mechanism of selection: natural selection and sexual selection. However, a third mechanism of selection is so absurdly obvious that it it easily overlooked; the third mechanism of selection is our own: choice. "Intelligent selection," as it might be called. The first is unconscious; the second is conscious; the third is self-conscious. The first created the second, the second the third, though the three transition into one another gradually.Natural selection is the first and most basic mechanism, which depends on survival of the fittest; this mechanism is partly genetic in that it applies to genetics, but also of importance before and beside genetics, as it applies just as well on chemical, atomic and even lower levels, beginning from the very birth of the universe.Sexual selection is the second mechanism, depending on sexual attraction; this is, arguably, the only of the three mechanisms which is purely genetic, depending on how one interprets "selection." A bacterium does not feel sexual attraction during conjugation, or a virus during insertion, or an oxygen atom during combustion, or a neutron when it collides with a fissile atom, yet these are all examples of reproduction. However, unless matter is conscious, this is not "selection."Finally, neurological selection is the third and as yet the last we know. One might say that this mechanism is barely genetic at all, but it may be that it is partly epigenetic, though more research would be required. It is known that the activity of certain genes in our brain cells can change over time. It is also known that we may increase certain chemicals in our brain by desiring their effects; what, then, if the latter partly involves the former, and we may change the activity of our genes indirectly by desiring to do so? And what if these epigenetic changes affect the epigenetics of our gametes? This remains speculation.Be it in part genetic or entirely memetic, neurological selection has dominated our evolution over the past thirty thousand years. For a large part, our sense of beauty is for a large part a mere side effect of our genetic evolution, but this side effect has started to lead a life of its own, and grew more and more sophisticated without any further genetic influence.The collective unconscious was programmed, mostly genetically, to appreciate certain environments more than others by instinct because they were more favorable, and to appreciate all their aspects: birdsong for instance as a sign of life, flowing streams to lead to fruiting plants, distant views to detect approaching danger, physical appearance to find a successful partner or friend, aromas to find food that is healthy, taste to examine its contents. These are all things that increase likelihood of survival.But flowing from these simpler perceptions grew something far more complex; the brain took over, and used these perceptions for itself. It improved its enjoyment of beauty not with the purpose to ensure chances of survival, but because it found it pleasurable, and to seek pleasure is simply how the brain is meant to work. The brain started to evolve by itself without much regard of evolution. It is because of this that among humans we see phenomena such as asceticism, celibacy, even masochism, phenomena which from an evolutionary viewpoint are contradictory. This is because the brain has acquired a will of its own, detached from genetic evolution; genetic evolution plays part in neurological evolution as neurological evolution stems from genetic evolution, but it no longer depends entirely on it, just as genetic evolution no longer depends entirely on chemical evolution. The brain has become so complex that it has become like an ecosystem of itself, with its own species.Thus, aside from viability there came a second selector, and it was enjoyability; today, the latter has become far more prominent in our world than the former, and it no longer has very much to do with viability. Think of the things you do in your free time for enjoyment: how great will their effect be on your chances of survival or those of your offspring? The answer is, very little.Of course, everything may indirectly alter our chances of survival, but relative to other things you might be doing instead, most leisurely activities will not do so to any significant extent. From a purely evolutionary standpoint, we are wasting the majority of our time, with a things ranging from smalltalk to art. All of these activities have an effect on our chances of survival, but it is so small that relative to those of other species, our activities are utterly irrelevant. If we were to survive rather than live, we would behave as animals. Our average pastimes score extremely low on the evolutionary ladder, though even in an environment as we have, we could do far better.The memetics of neurological selection may be both collective (through the collective unconscious), but also individual, since the brain, especially in humans, is so complex that it may perhaps undergo such a rapid evolution throughout life that one's sense of beauty is developed through one's own life. How their sense of beauty would develop would depend on their genetics, environment, and a third factor of how the brain would interact with itself, since, as said, the brain has become as complex as an ecosystem.

Uganda Tyrant Yoweri Museveni Appoints Wife Minister In Mineral Rich Region of Uganda

2009-03-04T02:16:00+01:00

florida division of corporations

2009-02-15T15:03:42+01:00

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African Art of the day

2009-02-13T15:21:00+01:00

Any serious 3D Artist will agree with me that, all the character [human] objects out there are mostly Eurocentric.

The once in a while afro 3D face is not the real Nubian but a Eurocentric distortion of the African.

This new project will become a source for African 3D Objects for future Multimedia authors.

This Character is all from a single box that was modeled in lightwave to create a human face for my animation

that will be featured on Free Uganda TV.

With 3D, creativity is seamless....

Okey, you might be thinking that [ rubbish, is that all??] is the only face I can model. Hehehe, very Wrong!

This is the start of big things....

I am now willing to forgive myself for believing there is something wrong with being wrong about some things!

What's wrong with being wrong? Does going Pink make you a Sis? I keep asking myself.

I was worried to use pink for fear of not recovering. For sure I'm not a Sis but just taking a step in a direction that

could ultimately take me off course.

Here is a prayer for those that might have called me a Sis. Blessed and Divine spirit of Colors,

I ask for and accept your forgiveness for anything that I have done in violation of the law of colors.

African contemporary Art:

I've been working on some new art for sometime that is overdue for release. However, I wasn't able to do so because

I was still stranded in Western Kivu,DR Congo. I'm now back in the Virunga mountains and I'll continue from were I left...

I promise to release some mind bending Art very soon. Meanwhile enjoy some of my old art:

African Frozen Animation

African Contemporary Art

More African Art coming Soon... African Art of the day; African Modern Art

Some people might want to ask me that ; i.e. Do you have to go to school to learn Art? Ofcourse not, I stopped in primary six (P6),

I hated school, because I never believed that the teachers were saying the truth-I felt embarrassed going to strangers every cold morning(for those who have been to the Virunga Mountains, you know how cold it can be in the morning) to be told lies and made to parade and sing silly songs. Ehh,Home study is the best. Education on paper is fake. The Greatest Ugandan Leader Dr. Idi Amin Dada Had the best economic and strategic planning for the ugandan masses. The most intelligent class of people in Uganda, Abayaye (the sharp ones) never went to school. School makes you stupid, look at Sebbagala (kampala Mayor), when he enrolled in School, he became stupid! PHD holders in Uganda are the most stupid!!!

Severine

2009-01-25T07:26:36+01:00

Ned and I haven't shot in about a month and a half, Ned was sick, we were tired, then sad with his dad's cancer news and other things, it's winter, it's cold, we were busy with other things.

We've seen Severine's Model mayhem page a while ago, and both liked her style and photo personality, Ned wrote her an e-mail and said we'd love to shoot with her if she ever comes to NY. Then, a couple of weeks ago, she wrote back to say she's going to be in New York for a week and would love to shoot with us.

Ned and I were pretty nervous about this, we both felt unpracticed in taking pictures and also, unprepered, we decided ot not have hair, make up or wardrobe for this one and to just shoot intuativly, without any type of concept or idea.

So the day started sort of slow, as Ned was adjusting the lights and figuring out while shooting what are better angles, I was very tired and feeling sort of sick and upset all day, which meant I couldn't really take any charge as far as outfits goes, Ned had to deal with everyting on his own and I felt like a usless lump.

Severine on her side, was really nice but also very closed, she felt very guarded and dignified, I liked her strangth but it felt somewhat hard to communicate, She was pretty shocked when Ned asked her to shoot without any make up on, and then also made her wet her hair and let it frizz as it naturally wants to and not just be straight like she's used to wear it all the time, I had to go out and get a blowdryer so she can strighten it before the shoot.
We talked about how we all see ourselves in different ways and always want to look like different people then ourselves. Both me and Ned agreed that her hair looks beautiful when it's curly, it actually looks like a lion's mane, but she wasn't intierly convinced.

When she was drying her hair in the bathroom, I fall asleep, I only slept for about 10 minutes, but when she came out I felt a lot more refreshed and much more awake. I looked into my camera and were shocked to discover I took 174 pictures! I felt like I was doing nothing all day...
Andthen when I downloaded them I was even more amazed at how the pictures came out. I really love what I shot. I think it's my favorite photos that I took of a girl that isn't me.

We are shooting again tomorrow and I'm going ot try and use Ned's lens and not my own, I'm ciourious to see how those would come out.

National Endowment for the Arts Issues Research Note on Women Artists: 1990 to 2005

2008-12-03T11:25:48+01:00

National Endowment for the Arts Issues Research Note on Women Artists: 1990 to 2005

Gender pay gap persists among full-time working artists

For immediate release:
December 2, 2008

			Contact: Sally Gifford (NEA) 202-682-5606 giffords@arts.gov

Washington, D.C. -- A new National Endowment for the Arts research note shows that women are making gains in traditionally male artist occupations, but still earn less than male artists. Women Artists: 1990-2005 takes a closer look at female artist employment trends that were previously mentioned in the May 2008 NEA report Artists in the Workforce: 1990-2005.

Totaling almost 919,000 artists in 2005, women represented 46 percent of the artist labor force, comparable to their percentage of all civilian workers. The note reveals significant patterns in pay disparity, demographic and educational trends, and women’s advancement in various art fields over the past 15 years. This note draws on data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2003-2005 American Community Surveys (ACS), along with the 1990 and 2000 population censuses.

"This important new report provides a factual overview of the situation of women in the American arts, said NEA Chairman Dana Gioia. "Committed and entrepreneurial, women artists are making enormous progress, but still lag behind their male colleagues economically, especially in fields such as photography, design, and architecture.”

Among the key findings:

Female artists earn less than male artists. Women artists who work full-year, full-time earn $0.75 for every dollar made by men artists. Women workers in general earn $0.77 for every dollar earned by men.

Women’s pay disparity increases with age. In 2003-2005, women artists aged 18 to 24 earned $0.95 for every $1 made by young men artists. This ratio fell to $0.67 for 45-to-54 year-olds. Similar pay gaps by age are found in the overall labor market.
Pay gaps vary by occupation. Men and women had closer earnings parity in lower-paying performing arts occupations (such as musicians and dancers), where women earned an average of $0.92 for every dollar earned by men. The gap tended to be larger in non-performing art occupations (such as designers and art directors), where women earned 72 percent of what men earn.
Pay gaps vary by state. The pay disparity was smaller in ten states, such as New York and Arizona, where women made 80 percent or more of what men made. Women made less than 75 percent of what men made in 27 states, including Virginia, Michigan, and North Dakota.

Women make up just under half of all artists nationwide (46 percent), yet they are underrepresented in many artist professions. In 2003-2005, nearly 8 out of 10 announcers and architects were men.

Women have achieved a greater presence in some artist occupations. By 2003-2005, women made up 43 percent of all photographers and 22 percent of all architects – representing gains of 11 and 7 percent, respectively, since 1990.

Women artists are as likely to be married as female workers in general, but they are less likely to have children. In 2003-2005, more than half of all women artists and all women workers were married. Yet only 29 percent of women artists had children under 18, almost six percentage points lower than for women workers in general.

Female artists cluster in low-population states. Women made up more than 55 percent of the artist labor force in Iowa, Alaska, New Hampshire and Mississippi in 2003-2005. They represent well below half of all artists in New York (45.8 percent) and in California (42.6 percent).

"This important new report provides a factual overview of the situation of women in the American arts," said NEA Chairman Dana Gioia. "Committed and entrepreneurial, women artists are making enormous progress, but still lag behind their male colleagues economically, especially in fields such as photography, design, and architecture."

The NEA research note Women Artists: 1990-2005 is available for download at www.arts.gov/research/ResearchNotes_chrono.html.

Resources

The NEA Office of Research & Analysis issues periodic research reports, brochures, and notes on significant topics affecting artists and arts organizations. The NEA research note Women Artists: 1990-2005, as well as a full report and executive summary brochure of Artists in the Workforce, are available in print and electronic form in the Research section of the NEA website, www.arts.gov.

About the National Endowment for the Arts

The National Endowment for the Arts is a public agency dedicated to supporting excellence in the arts, both new and established; bringing the arts to all Americans; and providing leadership in arts education. Established by Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government, the Arts Endowment is the largest annual national funder of the arts, bringing great art to all 50 states, including rural areas, inner cities, and military bases.

http://www.arts.gov/news/news08/WomenArtists.html

Preoccupation

2008-11-29T10:16:00+01:00

I am bombarded with thoughts of almost every thing, as always. It is quite annoying, especially when they give you some Alice attack. Read: headache.

Hito
I'm having a little obsession about something. Woot! *whistles* I think of it like every hour, or whenever I consciously decide to. Haha! I should stop this. Actually I'm missing some details here. Nyaha.

Music
I'm being into Twilight's OST. I want to save up so I can have it. When heard them, before I watched the movie, I thought they'd not appeal to me. Except for Paramore's and the so-called Bella's Lullaby. But when I watched the movie I'd say they're nice albeit the weird choice. Seriously, those songs are not the typical ones you'd pick for a teen movie. Did I just say teen movie? Erk. I hate to admit it, but yes. Twilight is a teen movie, and more. Someone even described it as chick flick. I won't disagree with that.

Art
I'm still "burning" to pursue my art-skills, if I have one. Haha! I'm still inspired with J. Action's works. But of course, I'm going to do something else. I'll do it with my own style.

Music:
Eyes on Fire

Yay! I'm almost ready 4 Halloween

2008-10-31T08:57:01+01:00

Letters from Bethlehem

2008-10-28T23:43:00+01:00

Up a narrow street in Belem, Lisbon, and just yards away from the hungry tourists queuing for their Pasteis de Nata (the custard tarts which are a Lisbon speciality) there is a chapel which re-opened as a gallery in September this year. Its outer wall has been transfomed by an art installation inspired by wood type. Chunky sans serif lettering of differing heights and depths has been applied to the wall and then given a coating of bright white render. The bold capitals are stacked into arrangements vaguely reminiscent of Henrik Werkmann.

The Chapel of the Immaculate Conception was dedicated in 1707. Unlike much of central Lisbon, it survived the catastrophic earthquake of 1755. The messages which now cover much of the outer wall are mostly religious, and more rigidly arranged than Werkmann's anarchic experiments. The piece is called 'Vai com Deus' (Go with God) and is the work of Oporto studio R2 Design.

It must have been a nightmare to specify and install. The letters have been individually pinned to the wall and are not always spaced or aligned with the kind of perfection we are used to. Perhaps this is why it has yet to feature on the web site of the award winning designers.

Vespine gallery show

2008-10-18T00:04:06+02:00

So a few weeks ago Ned gets this phone call from an art gallery in Chicago, it turn out that they were looking for me for a few weeks, I usually don't answer my phone and for some reason I didn't get any of their e-mails. They wanted to give me an art show in their gallery.

This is not only my own personal dream (and art show without having to run after the gallery, but them running after me) but probably the dream every artist I know.

I couldn't bring myself to call them, but I e-mailed, Ned did, he told them I'll e-mail them and so I did.

So then, I never heard back, which made me a bit sad, but I sort of moved on. Then about 2 weeks later, they called Ned's phone again. It turned out that for some reason, again, I didn't get their e-mail. They needed the artist statement, and bio and know when I'm sending the pieces and so on.

Again, I couldn't bring myself to call, and Ned did. He's been doing all the communication for me, even e-mails, that I'm usually not so anxious about. He consulted a gallery owner that we know about prices and arrangement and what to ask and do.

It turned out that this is the only show in the year in which participant artist don't have to pay for the space. the gallery is giving me one of the most amazing gifts and opportunity I could ever wish for. Everyone around me who Ned have told to about this are so happy and helpful and wonderful about this.

Yet, I feel so scared and anxious and like I'm messing up. I've been creating a second body of work for this show, about 30 drawings in less then a week. I've written a nice enough artist statement, later improved by Ned, a gallery owner friend and Ned's dad. And yet I feel like I haven't done a thing and like I keep messing up.

Everything is so good, I just paralyzed with fear waiting for the other shoe to drop.
The show is going to be at the Vespine Gallery in Chicago on November 15. We are already planning a motorcycle trip to come to the opening!

This week has been such a crazy emotional roller coaster.

I just want to sleep (and for all my painting to sell in the show of course...)

Fermenting

2008-10-13T17:13:00+02:00

Malcolm Gladwell writes in the 20 Oct. New Yorker about University of Chicago economist David Galenson's theories of creativity, which Galenson divides into two types, conceptual and experimental. Conceptual geniuses bloom early, experimental geniuses later, not because experimental geniuses are late starters or because they are simply discovered late, but because "they simply aren't much good until late in their careers."

Speaking of Cézanne, the art critic Roger Fry says: "'More happily endowed and more integral personalities have been able to express themselves harmoniously from the very first. But such rich, complex, and conflicting natures as Cézanne’s require a long period of fermentation.' Cézanne was trying something so elusive that he couldn't master it until he'd spent decades practicing."

I think that's me. Not Cézanne, more like Wallace Stevens (49% of whose anthologized poems were written after he was 50), but not that, either. I feel I am practicing something intangible, and creative, sometimes enormously tiring and even monotonous in a certain way, without known product so far. 'Fermenting' and 'elusive' describe it well. Sometimes I feel very frustrated, mostly I feel excited to be part of whatever this experiment is, in some way, and to continue with the brewing metaphor, I feel that this is the vat where I need and want to be, though whether I am the brewer or the brewed (or both -- or neither) is unclear to me most of the time.

Later, in the context of patronage, Gladwell writes, "If you are the type of creative mind that starts without a plan, and has to experiment and learn by doing, you need someone to see you through the long and difficult time it takes for your art to reach its true level." Thank God for my patron.

[Fotolog] : Selingan...

2008-08-14T15:24:13+02:00

Dah lama tak update blog ni. Memang sibuk betul sekarang. Tapi, dalam sibuk-sibuk pun, kadang-kadang tak studi jugak aku ni. Huhu... Sekarang ni tengah panas pasal isu pembukaan 10% UiTM untuk bukan bumiputra dan pelajar asing. Tapi ramai yang tak tahu, sebenarnya kuota pelajar asing [antarabangsa] kat UiTM memang dah lama dibuka. Cuma tak dihebahkan aje.

Masa aku MMS [Minggu Mesra Siswa = Orientasi] tahun 2005 dulu, ada MMS untuk pelajar Thailand. Kalau alumni-alumni ada yang masuk alma mater diorang, mesti nampak betapa ramainya pelajar antarabangsa kat UiTM. Boleh geng dengan UIAM dah... Hahaha.. Dari Arab Saudi, Yemen, Mauritius, Afrika... Dulu dari Jerman pun ada sorang. Huhu.. Meriah jugak ada pelajar antarabangsa ni. Semester lepas siap ada International Students Carnival lagi.

---

Minggu depan cuti mid-term. Seminggu. Seronoknya. Nak rehat kat rumah sambil siapkan assignment [<< boleh caye ke ni?? huhu] dengan nak download movie. Redcliff dan lain-lain [sebab tak tahu filem apa lagi nak download.. ;p]

Apa-apa pun, enjoy gambar-gambar kat bawah ni. Gambar-gambar lama dari komputer... Saje nak letak kat sini. Hehe..

Aku edit sem lepas...hehe...

Ni pun edit sem lepas... ;p

Ni pun..hehe.. biasela bosan2 tak tau nak buat apa.. ;)

"Friends are everything to me.. Without them I am nothing" - khairul izwan

Aku dgn Rem. Tengok filem 3D yang paling 'BEST' kat dunia...hehehe

Underneath the arches...

2008-07-22T03:00:00+02:00

...there's an awful lot going on. Somebody should make a book about all the things to be found under London's 25 miles of railway arches. The arches are a natural home for wine vaults and fringe theatres. Dodgy car mechanics also thrive in the dark spaces beneath curving Victorian brick, but you can get much more than your car serviced under the arches in Vauxhall, where dubious saunas cosy up to brightly lit cafés and DIY specialists.

Last Sunday we had breakfast at the Café Madeira beneath the viaduct beside the Albert Embankment. I tucked into smoked salmon and scambled egg on foccacia - a bargain at £3.50. Everybody else seemed to be Portuguese. Respectable, decent, hat-wearing folk chatted convivially beneath big wall-mounted LCD screens. A bakery next door turns out dozens of reasonably-priced and tasty-looking Portuguese specialities. Further down the viaduct there's a gay gym, some clubs and several bars, all part of 'Voho' the Vauxhall 'gay village'.

There's even art underneath the arches. Not far from the tourist disappointment that is the Lambeth Walk, the once grand Lambeth Ragged School has been sliced through by the railway. It was built by Henry Benjamin Hanbury Beaufoy FRS in 1851 as a memorial to his wife. Ragged Schools educated 'about 800 children' At the school's opening, Lord Ashley portentously declared that 'there is no reason whatever why Lambeth should not rescue itself from the present disgraceful opprobrium which attaches to it.'

An art gallery called the Beaconsfield now occupies the one wing that remains of the school, hitting back at the railway by colonising the arch behind. Inside we heard Aura Satz's 'Glissolalia' - a weird and wonderful sound installation featuring disjointed barbershop singers, an endlessly sliding theremin, a musical saw and much else that echoed mysteriously round the high, empty former schoolroom.

The gallery was founded with high-minded ambition of the kind the ragged school's founder would recognise. It aims to “fill a niche between the institution, the commercial and the ‘alternative’”. It isn't exactly welcoming from the outside. In trepidation we pushed the buzzer beside a blank door set into a high wall - but the people inside couldn't have been nicer or more friendly.

There was an unexpectedly warm welcome at nearby Southbank House too. You can't help being struck by the fabulous Victorian building in Black Prince Road, all ornamented terracotta and glazed tilework set into the window ledges. A frieze over the doorway is one clue to the office block's distinguished past. If you look up, some fading lettering spells out the name 'Doulton'. A smiling caretaker led us to a gallery of photos that tell the story of how John Doulton built a vast business at Lambeth starting from a £100 investment in 1815. The Doultons' fortune was first made in glazed earthenware sewer pipes which saved the city from epdiemics of disease. Doultons then went on to make the fine china that was much admired by Queen Victoria.

All this and the Vauxhall City Farm too (where you can walk among floppy eared rabbits and chickens) just ten minutes walk from the Palace of Westminster. London never ceases to amaze.

Solutions: Art (Notes from Status Anxiety)

2008-07-12T12:00:00+02:00

Notes from Alain de Botton's Status Anxiety (2004). This is the eighth post on this topic; the first is here.

PART II: Solutions

CHAPTER 2 - ART

Literature

The history of art is filled with challenges to the status quo.

Mansfield Park, Jane Austen (1814): The rich and well-mannered are not ipso facto good, and the poor and unschooled are not necessarily bad.

"Almost every great novel of the 19th and 20th centuries stages an assault on, or at the very least harbours scepticism regarding, the accepted social hierarchy, and each offers some sort of redefinition of precedence according to moral worth rather than financial assets or bloodlines."

Examples: Balzac - Le Père Goriot (1834), Hardy - Jude the Obscure (1895), G. Eliot - Middlemarch (1872), Fielding - Joseph Andrews (1742), Thackeray - Vanity Fair (1848), Dickens - Bleak House (1853), Wilkie Collins - The Woman in White (1860), A. Trollope - The Way We Live Now (1875), Zadie Smith - White Teeth (2000).

Painting

(You have to see the book for this, as he reproduces "paintings of the commonplace" -- which elevate the status of the ordinary -- and discusses them)

Tragedy

"Fear of the material consequences of failure is thus compounded by fear of the unsympathetic attitude of the world towards those who have failed, exemplified by its haunting proclivity to refer to them as 'losers' - a word callously signifying both that they have lost and that they have, at the same time, forfeited any right to sympathy for losing."

Tragedy helps to re-inject empathy into the equation by showing how like everyone else the tragic figure is. G

Examples: Oedipus, Antigone, Lear, Othello, Emma Bovary, Anna Karenina, Hedda Gabler, Tess, et al.

Tragedy doesn't absolve its subjects of responsibility but does offer and elicit a level of sympathy.

At the center of tragedy is an ordinary human being with a tragic flaw who makes an error in judgment from which flows a terrible reversal of fortune. Tragic flaws are defects common to humans, such as excessive pride, anger, impulsiveness, etc. Errors in judgment occur not from evil motives but from lapses in judgment, slips.

Tragedy reflects:

(1) how apparently small missteps can result in grave consequences

(2) the blindness we suffer with regard to the effects of our actions

(3) a fatuous tendency to presume that we are in conscious command of our destiny

(4) the sped and finality with which all that we cherish can be lost

(5) the mysterious forces against which our powers are pitted

Tragedy apportions blame without denying sympathy. We're appalled yet compassionate as we see the universality of the situation. This form of art seeks to plumb the origins of failure.

Comedy

More specifically, satire.

"Jokes are an enormously effective means of anchoring a criticism. At base, they are another way of complaining: about arrogance, cruelty or pomposity, about departures from virtue or good sense."

"History reveals no shortage of jokes intended to amend the vices of high-status groups and shake the mighty out of their pretensions or dishonesty." [q.v. George Carlin]

Comedy also can be used to make sense of and mitigate status anxiety: "Comedy reassures us that there are others in the world no less envious or socially fragile than ourselves.

Anger of the Hands

2008-07-07T17:45:00+02:00

The portraits of the “Anger of the Hands” are my simple art works on oil pastel. I made these out of my creativity and desire to express what goes beyond my mind, my heart and my hands. I started having a hobby like this since I was a kid and I guess I still save those sketch and design way back at home ~~goin’ to post it here when I retrieve them~~ If I can remember then, I really don’t have the guts to show my works to other people since I have the feeling of getting shrink when they can’t appreciate every single thing that I make. Duh! Not all humans know how to cherish the work of art.

But now, I’m gonna share all these stuffs out here….just an outlook of being ingenious to life.

[see album for larger view of the image]

Waftaroms, indotherms and the graphic language of cartooning

2008-05-04T19:50:00+02:00

Don't know a grawlix from a plewd or an agitron from an indotherm? Finding words for the marks made by cartoonists is a funny business. A jokey article about the marks cartoonists make for things like movement, emotion and radiation is now the stuff of earnest research into the visual language of cartoons.

It seems to have started with American cartoonist Mort Walker who wrote a satirical article in 1964 called "Let's Get Down to Grawlixes," for the National Cartoonists Society. In 1980 he expanded it to a book The lexicon of comicana. In Mort Walker's Private Scrapbook he writes:

'I spoofed the tricks cartoonists used, like dust clouds when characters are running or lightbulbs over their heads when they get an idea... I spent many hours at the museum recording their "language". I created pseudoscientific names for each cartoon cliché, like the sweat marks cartoon characters radiate. I called them "plewds" after the God of rain "Joe Pluvius".'

The spoof didn't quite work (even though the words he invented are very funny), because people really wanted words for the marks cartoonists make. So here is a run-down, from Wikipedia:

Plewds Flying sweat droplets that appear around a character's head when working hard or stressed.
Briffits Clouds of dust that hang in the spot where a swiftly departing character or object was previously standing.
Squeans Little starbursts or circles that signify intoxication, dizziness, or sickness.
Emanata Lines drawn around the head to indicate shock or surprise.
Grawlixes Typographical symbols standing for profanities, which appear in dialogue balloons in the place of actual dialogue.
Indotherm Wavy, rising lines used to represent steam or heat on hot objects -- however, the same shape found over a hot apple pie or something else strong smelling is a wafteron.
Agitrons Wiggly lines around an object that is shaking
Blurgits, swalloops Curved lines preceding or trailing after a character's moving limbs
Hites Horizontal straight lines trailing after something moving with great speed, or indicating reflectivity (puddle, glass, mirror). Likewise, up-hites would be lines above an object falling.
Lucaflect A shiny spot on a surface of something
Dites Diagonal, straight lines drawn across something flat, clear, and reflective, such as windows and mirrors.
Solrads Radiating lines drawn from something luminous like a lightbulb or the sun.
Vites Vertical straight lines indicating reflectivity (compare dites, hites)

It's funny in a Sellars & Yeatman kind of way (something else that deserves to be better known). Dash Shaw responded to the comic challenge with a great cartoon strip using the symbols and The Balloonist drew a booklet for cartoonists using some new symbols. Needless to say, the academically minded take it all very seriously. Neil Cohn just about gets the point. But only just:

'He also attaches a myriad of useless names to them, to the extant that you feel that his whole point for jargon is to be facetious (which it may well have been).'

See also an explanation of Kirby Dots (developed by Jack Kirby to show an energy explosion) and a site devoted to cataloguing onomatopoeia like 'kaboom' (apparently first used in The incredible hulk, vol 1, no. 229, 1978).

In the light at St Ives

2008-04-29T14:35:00+02:00

Ivo (or Yves or Ives) of Kermartin, the patron saint of lawyers and abandoned children, is said to have been commemorated with the inscription "St Ives was Breton/ A lawyer and not a thief/ Marvelous thing to the people." It's somehow reassuring to know that lawyers were mistrusted even in the 12th century, and that there was at least one that broke with convention.

However, that St Ives has nothing whatever to do with the Cornish town of St Ives, which is named after a notoriously tardy 5th century Irishwoman who literally missed the boat that was supposed to take her to Cornwall with her chums St Erth (patron saint of gardeners and electricians) and St Uny. St Ia gamely made her own way across the Atlantic in a coracle, an act of such monumental foolishness that the townsfolk of St Ives decided to name the place after her.

Cornish people still honour her when they say they'll do something "d'reckly" - meaning at some vague time in the future, when they feel like it. Two days in St Ives this April converted me (again) to the relaxed ways of the place. People take the trouble to say hello just because they saw you out walking the day before; the staff at the Barbara Hepworth Gallery are happy to chat; and even the man who sold me tea took extra trouble to make sure it was just so.

Hepworth picked up on it when she wrote "St Ives has absolutely enraptured me, not merely for its beauty, but the naturalness of life". She loved the sense of community as well as the:

"remarkable pagan landscape...which has a very deep effect on me, developing all my ideas about the relationship of the human figure in the landscape - sculpture in landscape and the essential quality of light"

In the mid 20th century these key ideas - about connection to the land, community, and light, drew dozens of artists to St Ives. Nicholson, Garbo, Frost, Heron and the patron saint of British pottery, Bernard Leach, were the most notable, but you don't have to be a painter to appreciate the light in St Ives. It has a remarkable clarity - a sharpness that dazzles. Spoil from tin-mining and powdered granite in the dazzling sand are the prosaic explanation.

That light, the fresh sea air, the art, and the friendliness of the locals make St Ives just perfect for a break away from it all. We watched the surfers, walked the coast, visited the Tate St Ives and stayed in the Ped'n Olva hotel, on a rocky promontory with wonderful views of Porthminister beach and the harbour. The train from the London and the Thames Valley takes around 6 hours and costs as little as £30 return, including a trip on one of the loveliest branch lines in the country.

The beast within?

2008-04-20T13:10:00+02:00

A report in Pravda (of all reliable sources) says that centaurs were real. Researchers decided this because of the number of cave paintings depicting the chimeric creatures. The article states, in a somewhat old-fashioned translation, that:

"Historical sources reveal that buggery was very popular among ancient Greeks and Romans. A legend says that Greek scholar Thales recommended his master Periandr not to engage unmarried shepherds nor to produce more centaurs."

That interpretation may not convince, but there is no denying the creatures' pervasiveness. For 3,000 years or more the half-man, half-horse has been lodged in the collective consciousness, inspiring myth-making and art, standing both for animal passion and for the genial guardianship of knowledge.

The Centaur's Smile: The Human Animal in Early Greek Art is the catalogue of a 2004 Princeton exhibition which charted examples from as early as 750BC. In Pindar's poem, the kindly centaur Chiron 'smiles greenly' (as if with secret knowledge) at Apollo when he seeks advice on seduction techniques.

Guido Reni (whose 'Rape of Dejanira' is above) is one of countless gay artists since who have been fascinated by beastly half men.

Bruce Rogers' beautiful typeface Centaur was first used in 1915 for an edition of de Guérin’s prose poem Le Centaure. The font was later issued in a commercial version developed by Rogers and the Monotype Corporation. In de Guérin's sensuous story, the aged centaur Chiron describes his early days to a young mortal who seeks him out on a mountain top.

Other interesting editions of the de Guérin story include one printed by Ricketts and Shannon at the Vale Press in 1899 and this art deco interpretation featuring a distinctly un-menacing centaur by George Barbier (1928). Ricketts returned again and again to the centaur theme. In 1902 the artist and his long time collaborator Shannon were the models for a small painting of Nessus and his stolen bride Dejanira in which:

"This bold defense of Nessus’ “rape” portrayed a willing Dejanira with strong shoulders, arms, and calves."*

Evidence that centaurs still hold a considerable homoerotic charge is provided by the recent phenomenon of 'boytaurs'. They are celebrated in a somewhat indecent website featuring 'Online resources for boytaurs, multilimbers, shapeshifters, and their friends'.

One lexicon defines a modern day centaur as "A gay man who lives openly in a predominantly heterosexual suburb."

Artwork

2008-04-19T22:45:00+02:00

Experience every sight as though it were a painting, every sound as though it were music, every smell as though it were a perfume.

My Shop is Open!!

2008-04-12T17:25:00+02:00

I am so excited! I’ve just opened an esty shop selling note cards from paintings I’ve done. When I was handed the first print a wave of some unknowable felling went all over me. I just beamed all day, thrilled.

Etsy.com is a place for artists of all kinds to sell there homemade wares. My cards are from original art work that I have done. I’m a mixed media artist using, markers, pens, pencils, paint, charcoal, watercolor, color pencils, collage, stamps, stencils, gel pens, etc.

Everyone please stop by my shop and have a look. I would love to hear from you :)

dinah

http://DinahPowers.etsy.com

Four days in Vienna

2008-04-06T20:25:00+02:00

“If you start to take Vienna - take Vienna” said Napoleon. A tall order for the art-lover with just four days in which to attempt to do justice to the major sites. The Kunsthistorisches, the Albertina, the Belvedere, the Imperial Library, the Ephesus and the Musical Instrument collections, the Hofburg, the Schönbrunn. The Cathedral, the Karlskirche or the Peterskirche? Canova, Dürer, Caravaggio or Vermeer? Baroque or Secession?

All the booty of empire gathered within the 4km ring, lined with palaces cascading with statuesque caryatids and writhing atlantes. Churches with walls coated with plaster angels forever tumbling into the inferno. A Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven or Strauss commemoration on every corner. And the cakes!

Vienna oozes history and its unconcerned citizens embody a favourite word of Queen Victoria's. They and their city are 'Gemütlichkeit' - contentedly belonging, polite and unhurried. On the plane a Viennese offered tips on getting the best from his home town. In the Graben, the city's busiest shopping street, half a dozen people stopped and waited while I pointed my camera up at a building across the street. At junctions cars halt and pedestrains are waved across. Gentlemen of a certain age wear hats. Their ladies are impeccably (and somewhat conservatively) dressed. Even the frock-coated touts for Strauss concerts are polite in their salesmanship.

We marvelled at the Prunksaal of the Imperial Library with its ravishing ceiling decorations and perfect proportions, justifying the claim that it is the finest library hall in Europe.

Mohr in Hemd (chocolate pudding) or Kokosbusserln (Coconut Kisses)? The cakes are as elegantly refined as the Viennese. We ate Sacher torte in a relaxed and splendidly old-fashioned café by the rear entrance of the Hofburg Palace. A Secession facade there so offended the emperor with its 'plainness' that he reputedly never passed it again.

We resisted other temptations including the discrete entrance of the exotically Turkish Centralbad which was a haunt of the Archduke Ludwig Victor, a brother of the emperor Franz Josef I, who 'was famous for his love for beauty'.

We admired Canova's tomb for Maria Christina at the Augustinerkirche. It was such a success that Canova himself was buried in a copy in the Frari in Venice. In the Kunsthistorisches we ate more cake and lost hours in the galleries. Not one but three Rembrandt self-portraits. Exquisite Roman cameos and gold jewellery quite unlike anything I had ever seen.

An incredibly myopic Jehovah's Witness seemed to be stalking us in the clock museum. All three floors are choc-a-bloc with chiming timepieces. He was a museum warden and seems to spend his days reading scripture, held at about 2" from his nose. In the museum of musical instruments (rooms of shawms, serpents and Beethoven and Chopin's pianos) another warden was nervously writing who knows what never to be published masterpiece on scraps he carried round with him.

Austrian Art Nouveau toyed with plainness but finally embraced ornament with relish. We admired Otto Wagner's Majolica House which is a riot of coloured tiles and ornamental balconies. The secession building has a glorious gilded dome of glittering laurel leaves. More pictures here.

Uganda, Janet Museveni for Iraq

2008-03-21T01:10:00+01:00

Janet Museveni the wife of Yoweri Museveni will continue to support George Bush's War in Iraq because that's what fundamentalist christians do!

Art song

2008-03-20T14:36:38+01:00

Art songs are songs created for performance in their own right, or for the purposes of a European upper class, usually with piano accompaniment, although they can also have other types of accompaniment such as an orchestra or string quartet, and are always notated. Generally they have an identified author(s) and require voice training for acceptable performances. The German-speaking communities to refer to the serious art song, whereas in German-speaking communities the word "Kunstlied" (plural: "Kunstlieder") is used to distinguish art song from folk song ("Volkslied"). The lyrics are often written by a lyricist and the music separately by a composer. Art songs may be more formally complicated than popular or folk songs, though many early Lieder by the likes of Franz Schubert are in simple strophic form. They are often important to national identity. Art songs feature in many European cultures, including but not limited to: Russian (romansy), Dutch (lied), Italian (canzoni), French (mélodies), Scandinavian (sånger), Spanish (canciones). There are also highly regarded British and American art songs in the English language. Cultures outside of Europe may have what they consider to be a classical music tradition, such as India, and thus feature art songs. good and very usefull. The accompaniment of pieces of this period is considered as an important part of the composition. The art song of this period is often a duet in which the vocalist and accompanist share in interpretive importance. The pieces were most often written to be performed in a home setting although today the works enjoy popularity as concert pieces. The emergence of poetry during this era was much of what inspired the creation of these pieces by Brahms, Schumann, Schubert and other period composers. These composers set poems in their native language. Many works were inspired by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Heinrich Heine. Another method would be to write new music for each stanza to create a unique form, this was through-composed form known in German as durchkomponiert. A combination of both of these techniques in a single setting was called a modified strophic form. Often romantic art songs sharing similar elements were grouped as a song cycle.

Uganda today, beauty from the Great Lakes

2008-03-13T15:05:00+01:00

Its not everyday that we spend time with a Congolese beautiful sister from Rutshuru, in diaspora [uganda] as most sisters are either scattered in refugee camps around the great lakes region, experiencing discrimination and missery from fellow africans who are too selfish to look beyond their little tribes and small clans.Discrimination has also found its way into the Rutshuru humor: Two Congolese sisters are gossiping with their mother. The first is complaining that her Hutu husband only has intercourse with her in the missionary position, and the second is complaining about her Tutsi husband who only has intercourse doggy-style.The Mother sighs and says, “God have mercy on your father. He never discriminated against missionary position or doggy-style.”Uganda today is here!!!

Top of the art pops?

2008-03-09T01:50:00+01:00

Which are the world's 50 greatest works of art? The Telegraph has published Martin Gayford's list. It's necessarily a fabulously subjective exercise, running all the way from an Egyptian sculpture of 2800 BC via van Eyck, Michelangelo and Velázquez to a sculpture by Donald Judd from 1982.

I was pleased to see the haunting Pompeii 'Villa of Mysteries' frescoes included, together with Giotto's breathtaking Scrovegni Chapel in Padua and Constable's 'Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows'.

But no Sistine chapel, or Turner 'Rain, Wind and Speed'! The Mona Lisa is knocked off her perch in favour of the same painter's 'Lady with an ermine' in Krakow. What about David's 'Death of Marat' with its superb handling of paint and poignant mythologising of the French Revolution? None of Ingres' portraits, with their relentless scrutiny of subject and no Delacroix or immaculate Vermeer interior? And what about the searing intensity of El Greco - and the homespun passion of Stanley Spencer?

And are the terracotta army and the Easter Island statues art works in the same way as the Jackson Pollock is thought to be? (I would have replaced it with something by Mark Rothko). Both the Easter Island statues and the terracotta army seem to me to be functional objects, created to fulfill a specific purpose, quite different to the making of an art work for its own sake.

I counted a respectable eight or so I've seen, but (with the help of some carbon offsetting), there's clearly plenty more prime art waiting to be discovered.

Truth in art at Christ Church

2008-03-03T01:55:00+01:00

What is the 'real meaning' of art and what value should be placed on what is 'authentic' over the work of copyists?

At Christ Church Picture Gallery, Oxford, Curator Jacqueline Thalmann provided a fascinating introduction to the collection which is housed in a striking subterranean gallery from 1968 by Powell and Moya.

Although best-known for its collection of old master prints and drawings, over 200 paintings were bequeathed in 1765 by alumnus General John Guise, whose somewhat robust taste includes a Martrydom of St Lawrence by Tintoretto and a large and gruesome 'Butcher's shop' by Annibale Carracci (1560-1609) which since it was judged unsuitable for the contemplation of women hung in the College's kitchens for some 200 years.

Before the Renaissance, the best religious icons were those that faithfully copied from precedent. The essence of the divine could only be transmitted by the careful replication of visual convention. Any notion of artistic originality was irrelevant.

By Dürer's time the artist, not the subject, was the focus. His work – including a prominent monogram – was faithfully copied by a highly talented printmaker called Marcantonio Raimondi. In 1511 Dürer issued a devastating warning to anyone tempted to infringe what he was effectively asserting as his copyright: "Hold! You crafty ones, strangers to work, and pilferers of other men’s brains. Think not rashly to lay your thievish hands upon my works. Beware! Know you not that I have a grant from the most glorious Emperor Maximillian, that not one throughout the imperial dominion shall be allowed to print or sell fictitious imitations of these engravings? Listen! And bear in mind that if you do so, through spite or through covetousness, not only will your goods be confiscated, but your bodies also placed in mortal danger."

In what must be one of the first cases of its kind, Dürer succeeded in getting an injunction against Raimondi banning him from ever again misusing Dürer's trademark.

In common with the Carracci 'Butcher's shop', Anthony Van Dyck's 'Continence of Scipio' was revealed to be rich in multiple meanings. Van Dyck gave the famous Africa-conquering general filmstar looks, painting him into an epic scene reminiscent of Cecil B De Mille. Scipio's bright red cape billows as he nobly rejects the woman offered him in tribute. Her face is downcast and classically impassive whilst her betrothed, hand on heart, gazes beseechingly deep into the General's eyes.

The work was commissioned from the young Van Dyck by his court champion the Duke of Buckingham, whose stone capital, carved with two male faces, frames the scene. But the connections with Buckingham run deeper – Scipio can be read as James I, and the beseeching figure as Buckingham himself – James' 'favourite' and lover.

According to some 'queer historians' at least, gayness is also to be discovered in Dürer's life and work, not least in the woodcut 'Men's Bath' which features a prominent monogram (and a rather suggestive tap). Dürer's lifelong friend was a bisexual humanist called Willibald Pirckheimer. The humanist sent the artist drawings of the two of them in flagrante together. Consumed with jealousy, Mrs Dürer accused her husband of having a sexual relationship with the anagrammatic Pirckheimer.

The power of ornament

2008-02-22T15:30:00+01:00

Web find of the month is a site devoted to complete reproductions of illuminated books. It includes Owen Jones' astonishing Grammar of Ornament (1856), a tour de force of nineteenth century letterpress and chromolithographic printing which has had an incalculable influence on artists and designers from the Art Nouveau to Gaudi in Barcelona.

Owen Jones' most influential book contains his own re-drawing on 'scientific' principles of over 2,000 decorative designs. The scope is vast: from designs created by 'savage tribes' to ornament from the ancient world, Arabia, China, India and Europe. The motifs presented range from intricate and highly elaborate high Renaissance manuscript illumination to apparently simple geometric tile designs from Moorish Spain and Persia.

A passion for the orient

Jones (1809-74) was an architect who became passionate about the superiority of non-European ornament after touring Turkey, Egypt, Sicily and Spain in 1831. Henry Cole, who founded the Victoria & Albert Museum, was one of his many collaborators.

Jones' passion for the near east found expression in his most significant work as an architect on the interior of Christ Church, Streatham. He was criticised for his 'excessive use' of Islamic motifs there.

Acclaimed for his decorations for the Great Exhibition in 1851, Jones worked for nine years on the publication of a lavish folio work, which exploited the capabilities of the relatively new and demanding process of chromolithography. He sold property to finance its publication, setting up his own press and training his own staff to produce it. He did not live to see it succeed commercially, and many copies were remaindered.

Besides including a historical survey and commentary on the many gorgeous full page colour illustrations, Jones developed a series of 37 'design propositions' which attempted to codify the construction of well-made ornament. For Jones: 'All ornament should be based on geometrical construction' And 'true beauty results from that repose which the mind feels when the eye, the intellect, and the affections, are satisfied from the absence of any want'. In his final chapter he advocated a new kind of architecture based on natural forms.

The rhythm of life

There is an enduring appeal in many of these stunning illustrations. They combine a remarkable and carefully constructed rhythmic intensity with a highly developed colour palette. Since the Modern Movement, architects and designers have associated ornament with the literally superficial, seeing it as a layer of irrelevant decoration that obscures the underlying nature of whatever it is applied to.

For me and I suspect for Jones, the desire to decorate is an integral part of human experience. His use of geometric reconstruction seems to link to metaphysical ideas of the golden section or 'divine proportion' which were taken up by Modern Movement architects such as Le Corbusier.

Good ornament is intrinsic to the very essence of things.

The Grammar of Ornament on CD-ROM for designers.

The Zen of being Sick

2008-02-17T17:07:56+01:00

Inspired by Zadie Smith's "the autograph man"

Why is it that the only time I have felt like taking naked pictures of myself in the past year or so was when I was sick?

Reason #1

Because after sleeping in one's cloths for on day and feeling like an old person with all the coughing and tea, it's my way to reconnect to my body.

Reason #2

Because feeling so shitty and ill at ease in my body, I seek the comfort of other people liking it.

Reason #3

Because after 2 days of not eating, I loose weight.

Uganda needs Real Change and not Kizza Besigye!

2008-02-13T02:40:00+01:00

Why do Ugandans have to put up with a rotten government made of thieves and proffesional criminals, are soldiers today cowards to topple such a regime, or has UPDF become an Army of cowards[girls] and they fear to die? Cowards will never be known by anyone because they will die losers!Fellow Ugandans, if you're waiting for Kizza Besigye and his FDC to liberate you, just continue sleeping and dreaming because Besigye and Museveni are the same people[sadists]: The GAVI thief "Gen" Jim Muhwezi, Chats with Besigye three times in a week. FDC are left-overs of museveni and their chief mobilisers, Mugisha Muntu, murdered many Ugandans in Cold Blood and he enjoys breaking people's knee-caps.That's why many young people went into exile during 1989 & 1990, to escape his brutality,[he suffocated many ugandans of Rwandese and Luo Origin] Do we really want to go backward or forwards? Fellow Ugandans, think about it!!We call upon the Female Gold-diggers Brigade, to start being active...the holiday is over, Saa ya Kazi!Don't forget to memorise his Debit card numbers, both in the front and back[the 4 digits]!!

Jimmy Hendrix

2008-01-22T20:25:00+01:00

Art and Crap

2008-01-10T21:02:56+01:00

Yesterday I got an e-mail from a friend, she's having an art show with another friend in some gallery in Bronx.

I knew it was going to happened, she's been working hard on her art and I've seen some of the new pieces on flickr. We haven't really talked in a while, it's not that I don't talk to her or anything, but we had sort of a fight a while ago, concerning an art show, and ever since then I was a lot less incline to trust people, And been pretty protected about making stuff in general. I don't know, I wrote this line and realize it's not true, not true at all, because at the same time, I'm more out there and I'm taking more chances then I've ever been before.

It seem like whenever I feel defeated or annoyed or upset or socially dysfunctional, I retreat to lick my wounds on line. Somehow the distance that the internet create makes it possible to function, and in this realm of shadows, everything is easier, and everything possible - partly because it's not real. Only it is real. It's so damn confusing and I'm struggling to make my brain realize and existing reality because I spend so much stupid energy in maintaining a false and harmful perception of reality.

Well the thing is this. A couple of month ago, I got into a big argument with a woman in a swap site I was a part of, After the argument, which like anything online, was public and involved many people all telling me I did something wrong, while actually I didn't, I decided to stop swapping in that site. It was a crouch anyway, I told myself, an excuse to make stuff and send it to people. And it was, also, in about 80% of the swaps I ended throwing what I got out because I never liked it and were disappointed. It was like getting paid for stuff I made with really worthless currency, however, the benefit was that in almost all the cases, people was extremely excited about what i made for them, so other then the stuff I got I got paid with appreciation. Even more important then that I got acceptance, there was no judgment, even the crappiest packages I got, I accepted with love and I knew other people are accepting my packages with love as well.

So anyway, I decided to just drop it after the argument. And then it turned out that I didn't really manage to motivate myself to craft or make stuff much anymore, because how many toys and silly scarf and cards do one person need? After getting all depressed about it, I decided to resurrect the etsy store, not so much to make sales, which at the time didn't seem even a remote possibility, but just to have a frame to make stuff in. It was just for fun really. So I made something for the store everyday, and stuff started to sale - and it felt really good to get money instead of crappy stuff, but also, it felt rally good, not to be just accepted, but to feel like everything that sales, sale because someone was willing to pay money for it, and choose it over everything else in the site.

I don't know why but I feel so guilty writing about it, like all those womanly fights and insecurities and stupid craft stuff is boring and uninteresting and no one would want to read about that, right?

But then again, why not, why is that not interesting, and also, why do I care so much.

The truth of the matter is, that I look down of craft, I feel it's not real art at all, that it's just something fun to pass time with, not serious, just a childish thing, I keep thinking of people buying my stuff as a charity or as a way to make me happy without really wanting them. I feel like a whole bunch of stranger portray my creation on their fridge, hanged with magnets, like something the kid brought for school.

So anyway, I made this deck of tarot for christmas and put it in the etsy store and it sold, and I made another one and another one and so far 13 of those sold, it's the most expensive and the most successful item in the shop. I made over 900$ on the etsy store alone, since the end of November, plus a little bit more on a privet sale and about 300$ in Ned's mom trunk show. It's the first month and a half this business is going and it's going so incredibly well. I'm actually making money of selling art. Yesterday something I did made it to the front page and got 1000 views - 100 views before getting bought by a nice lady in Australia.

The fucked up this is the math of this - at least 5000 people looked at stuff in my store in this months and a half, I made money, I found out stuff about marketing, running a business and taking myself seriously. I'm starting to think of it as a business. But somehow, a stupid show a friend's having in the bronx, which couldn't possible generate 5000 people to see it, feels so much more worthwhile to me then all this, I don't know why. It's not because the internet isn't real, it is, and there's money in the bank (well, in paypal) to prove it. It's that my notion of success is so limited and limiting. Why is it that i can only excel in something unless I don't call it "success".

I feel so limited, stuck in my own flesh, not open enough to accept the change in the world.

No, I feel not open enough to accept the change in my life.

Getting into a lather with Millais

2008-01-10T02:05:00+01:00

You have until 13 January to see the Tate's latest blockbuster: a seven room survey of the entire career of Sir John Everett Millais (1829-96), perhaps best known for his Ophelia and 'Bubbles' the Pears soap boy.

The greatest painter of his day produced what was then regarded as his greatest painting in 1854-6. The blind girl is a colossally garish exercise in high Victorian sentimentality. Patronisingly, we are asked to sympathise with the poor blind girl, who is unable to appreciate the sudden brilliant sunshine and rainbow that decorates a lead-grey Winchelsea sky. The two girls are awkwardly plonked down on a stream bank and (like several other of his paintings of the time) seem about to separate from the background. The 'pathetic' scene is completed with an improbably applied butterfly on the blind girl's right arm (delicate beauty she will never appreciate) and a toybox collection of country creatures which is randomly strewn across the irridescent meadow behind them.

Isabella (1848-9) was Millais first painting as a member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. It is both unsettling and unsatisfying. On the right a pink tunic wearing Lorenzo offers fruit to his Isabella, whilst a disapproving servant looks on. Lorenzo's face looks cut out and is curiously lit. On the left Millais casts some of his own friends, the affectionate reality of their portraits at odds with the fantasy scene across the table from them.

But it's not all bad. Millais was indisputedly an incredibly talented and highly precocious artist and draftsman. That we find his themed works not to our taste is perhaps because they were the soap operas of their day. We get these kicks from Eastenders and Corrie.

The Black Brunswicker (1859-60) is another exercise in popullist melodrama, only this time Millais has resoundingly pulled it off. On the eve of Waterloo a soldier departs to his death. Agonised, his wife tries to prevent his departure, her hand pushing the door closed as he opens it. As she gazes sadly at her imploring lapdog, an etching of Napoleon hangs behind them. The painting is quite sumptuous, the composition perfectly suited to its remorseless narrative. The work sold for 1,000 guineas and made Millais' reputation.

By 1864 Millais' style had evolved considerably. In 'Leisure Hours' (the quotation marks are the painter's) he has painted the Pender sisters as perfect ornaments, trapped in enforced idleness just as much as the goldfish in the bowl in front of them. The paintwork is a little looser and without distractions. The blank stares and suffocating stillness of the composition all add to the narrative, unlike some of his later portraits of women and children, which contrive to be either sickly sentimental or alienatingly haughty.

Painted at the same time, Esther (1863-5) shows brilliant mastery of the decorative use of colour coupled with an understated and elegant composition. Esther releases her hair as a gesture of defiance to entice a king. Compared with Whistler's full length female portraits and admired for its 'flashing whites' by Rossetti, this is a very satisfying work.

In his later period Millias painted some fine political portraits, inspired partly by Velasquez and Rembrandt. I was particularly taken with The Rt Hon. WE Gladstone, MP, (1878-9). Isolated of all props, Gladstone is austere, almost a visionary. With even looser brushwork and dramatic lighting, this is Millais at his most compelling.

In 1878 Millias was grief stricken at the death of his second son George Grey. He painted 'The tower of strength which stood Four-square to all the winds that blew'. – Tennyson as expiation and it makes an interesting comparison with Constable's Hadleigh Castle, on view at the RA and painted in similar circumstances. Urqhart Castle on Loch Ness is a Romantically ruin, dissolving in uncertain, smudgy paintwork. The overpowering sea and sky are thick with expressive paint, against which the heroic lone oarsman battles.

Millais' last works are an elegy to the Scots landscape. In them the painter achieves a kind of apotheosis.

positive and negative and realism and abstract

2007-12-17T02:25:00+01:00

Jo-Ann Golenia took my photos and played with them in Photoshop. Abstract realism? Lots of quilting ideas here. Thanks Jo-Ann.

Man

2007-12-15T21:50:00+01:00

Man vu par ced vernay

160 x 120

Collage papier

Mosaïc: Rodrigo Santoro, Steeve Mc Queen, Fidel castro, Ayrton Senna, Pedro Almodovar, Hugo Chavez, Paulo Coelho, Audrey Tautou, Francis Bacon, Piaf, Charly Parker, Diana, Keith Richards, Mick Jagger, Chico Buarque, Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Jimmy Hendrix
Portraits: John Malkovich, Le Corbusier, John Steinbeck, Clint Eastwood, Iggy Pop, Picasso, Ed Harris, Madonna, Serge Gainsbourg, Roberto Begnini, Pedro Almodovar, George Clooney, John Malkovich
Xposure: City, dock, metro, japan, ambulance, cargo...

Visitez le site officiel de Cedvernay

www.cedvernay.com

Celebrity Collage Paintings

Positive and Negative Space

2007-12-12T23:50:00+01:00

Kitchen Window with the sun streaming in.

Kitchen Window at night.With all the discussions on Quiltart about positive and negative space, I thought I would throw in something that could invite discussion without tearing apart someones work of art. Therefore, I took a photo of my kitchen window during the day and then at night. Which is more interesting?

Fairy Tale Dream/Landscapes

2007-12-10T23:10:08+01:00

TMN has an interview with the artist Didier Massard, whose "Fairy Tales" imaginary landscapes can be seen at the same site. Beautiful, ethereal, haunting ... what's another word for worth a look? In my current mood, I like the last two best.

Memory Quilt for Mom

2007-12-09T20:50:00+01:00

I finally finished the Memory Quilt for My Mom. It has been a long, slow road for a couple of reasons. 1. This is my first 'real' quilt; 2. I've been recovery from back surgery (and complications). I can only sit or stand for 15-20 minutes. Mostly I recline. The results are far from perfect. However, this was a labor of LOVE!

Gilberto Gil

2007-11-15T21:45:00+01:00

Gilberto Gil vu par ced vernay

75 x 80

Collage papier

Visitez le site officiel de Cedvernay

www.cedvernay.com

Celebrity Collage Paintings