A crisis of confidence.

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art, artist, arts, brush strokes, bubble gum, canvas, Christian artist, east sussex, Edgar Degas, girl, Mademoiselle Hélène Rouart, oil paint, oil painting, paint, painter, picture, pink, portrait

I know you shouldn’t compare yourself to someone else, down that road lies disappointment and inferiority, but, if you’re asking yourself if you’re any good, then comparison is inevitable. Happily in my case that comparison is evoking more of a challenge to exceed my current abilities, but comparison could just as easily lead to what used to be called melancholia… the blues.

“A boy who practices painting too much may be overcome by melancholy. He should learn to play string instruments and thus be distracted to cheer his blood” – Albrecht Dürer

I mean, look at young Edgar Degas. If you look at some of the detail in his paintings – detail that I’d sweat buckets over – it’s terrible! Hands that on close inspection are nothing but a few raw, loose brush strokes that at a distance look depressingly sublime. That sort of skill could easily lead you to what Dürer calls melancholia indeed.

Just look at this: (Mademoiselle Hélène Rouart)

I couldn’t sleep at night if I left a hand looking like that, but Degas could. He could see the image as a whole without sweating the tiny details. In fact if he had sweated the tiny details his images would have lost much of their vibrancy. That said, he did get looser in technique as he matured and was much tighter stylistically in his youth. Old age obviously agreed with him.

One of the problems I have is that I’m somewhat isolated from my peers, not part of an artistic community. My family see my work, but they see it at every stage of development, so by the time I’ve finished a piece they’ve seen it for days/weeks and I’m lucky if I get a “uh huh, nice”. I often feel similarly.

My wife Michelle has suggested I cover it up, so that when it’s finished I can unveil the painting with a “ta dah!” Accompanied no doubt by rapturous applause, the popping of champagne corks and gasps of wonder from my assembled family, perhaps even a shed tear and an exclamation of “my goodness, such beauty!”.

However this isn’t the present reality and I have to wrestle with my doubts myself. What seems a little disturbing, is that the more I paint the greater the self doubt and it would seem I’m not alone. Many of my art heroes seem to have suffered the same affliction and it makes me wonder if there is a link to creativity and depression. I mean, if I’m gonna end up like poor Vincent I might need a less strenuous career like professional cage fighter or primary school teacher, and people say art is relaxing.

For now I’m taking all this as a challenge, a provocation to step things up a gear, to continue to go where no me has ever gone before. After all, with each project I undertake I learn something new. The current project is no exception, it’s taught me a lot and considering I’ve probably only done less than perhaps ten oil paintings in total ever, I shouldn’t be too hard on myself. Unless Degas’ first ten paintings were masterpieces of course…

If Robert Hughes (Australian born art critic) was correct then we’ve all got reason to hope. For he said:

“The greater the artist, the greater the doubt. Perfect confidence is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize.”

Anyway, here she is – Lily. This one is painted mostly from reference photographs, but I’m thinking that to get more depth I’m going to perhaps start working from live models.

iPhoneography V

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Agatha Christie, art, Art Deco, artist, arts, Bexhill, biblical epic, British, Christian artist, De la Warr, east sussex, faint aroma, fishing boat, George Lucas, Indiana Jones, iphone, iPhoneography, Italian Job, linseed oil, longboard, Modernist, Pavilion, photograph, photography, Poirot, retirement town, Richard Wilson, seafront, Shakespeare, Star Wars, turps

Iphoneography episode V seems to me to have strong George Lucas overtones to it. It’s funny isn’t it how our culture and our experiences soak into us in a sort of cultural marinade until our very being is infused by what we have seen and heard.

It’s the stuff that we have chosen though, the stuff we love or have loved that we choose to represent us in our speech, character or even our dress! At this point I’d clarify that I mean what we choose to wear… I don’t, and have never had the inclination to, wear dresses.

There is some stuff that gets into us that really doesn’t belong there. Stuff that has been inflicted upon us if you like, that’s the stuff that needs careful handling and hopefully healing, but that’s not what I’m talking about. What I’m referring to is the stuff we embrace!

For me that’s all manner of arty, geeky stuff. Shakespeare said , “If you scratch us, do we not bleed”, but if you scratch the surface of most us what bleeds out is our interests, our obsessions, our loves. Give me a metaphorical squeeze and I’ll probably exude the faint aroma of Star Wars, Indiana Jones, a biblical epic, or perhaps even turps and linseed oil! What we love is what we become.

Well yesterday we went, as a family, on a cultural trip down the road to the seething metropolis that is Bexhill. Now for those of you not familiar with the south coast of England, Bexhill might have a reputation for being a bit of a retirement town – I’m not saying it is, but it might have that reputation. However it is also the owner of a magnificent and recently beautifully refurbished seafront and beautiful Art Deco theatre called the De la Warr Pavilion*.

So we embraced Bexhill in all its sun-kissed splendour, walked the seafront, skated the seafront, ate some lunch on the beach and visited the De la Warr with its current Richard Wilson exhibit. I even took a few snaps…

A very British seafront… thing.

A… ? To be honest I’m not sure what these things are called, ‘pavilionettes’ perhaps. Whatever they’re called they looked great in the sunshine with the sea glinting on the sea behind them.

Fishing boat on the Seafront.

Ceramic cups from the Pavilion shop. They may look like crumpled plastic rubbish, but they are in fact, ceramic. Liked these.

Richard Wilson’s “Hang on a minute lads, I’ve got a great idea …” In my opinion this is one of those pieces that provokes the old argument, “but is is art?” It is however pretty cool to see up close though.

Art Deco or Modernist? Not sure, but Agatha Christie’s Poirot seemed very at home here during the filming of the television series.

*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_De_La_Warr_Pavilion

A moment of clarity.

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art, artist, arts, brush strokes, canvas, create, creative, east sussex, encourage, figurative, illustration, inspiration, Jenny Pockley, Lauren Morse, Nick Archer, oil painting, paint, painter, painting, picture, uncomfortable weather

I was going to sit outside this morning and write this post, but it would appear Autumn got there first. So I retreated from the unexpectedly cool weather indoors instead until it warmed up a bit.

It’s interesting how such a small shift in temperature can change summer into autumn, pleasant into chilly, comfortable into uncomfortable!

Weather and temperature can often be described as favourable, or unfavourable and a change in it often provokes a change in us too, much like peoples opinion. Opinions can be cool and discouraging or warm and life affirming, which brings me to the subject of this post.

Having admired artist Nick Archer’s work from afar for a while now, I boldly went a step further the other day and e-mailed him to ask if he could spare some time to chat over a cup of tea and, much to my surprise and delight, he replied that he could!

Well on Monday we met up and I got the chance to meet Nick face-to-face and discovered that he’s not only a brilliant artist, but he’s also a really nice chap.

After patiently answering some questions over that cup of tea (and biscuit) that I mentioned earlier, Nick gave me a tour of the building that houses his studio. Once an old primary school building full of small creative minds, it’s now a network of studio spaces for large creative minds. And one of those creative minds is that of Nick’s wife, Jenny Pockley. Incidentally if you’ve never seen the work or heard of Nick Archer or Jenny Pockley, then you need to. They aren’t nationally and internationally famous for being rubbish, they’re brilliant!

Anyway as I chatted to Nick I thought how curious it was that as you vocalise things and thoughts to someone, how much more ‘real’ they become. Thoughts, once abstract and nebulous, become flashes of clarity and revelation! Somehow, speaking a thought makes it real, grounds it and makes it strangely clearer and more visible.

A friend of mine (Lauren Morse. Check her blog out here: http://lonnyopolis.wordpress.com/) recently had such a personal ‘flash’ of reality after reading Scott Belsky’s book Making Ideas Happen. She said: “I’d never felt that I’d been told to really grasp my ideas and take them seriously until I read this. This creativity I play with, live my life with, live in, is not simply a toy or a hobby, something to be trifled with, to be put on the back seat as soon as something ‘serious’ or ‘real life’ comes along. It IS real life, it IS serious. It is important. It is my life, not merely something I spend time with.”

I had a ‘Lauren’ moment like that when, as Nick introduced me as a fellow artist, I got asked twice, “What type of work do you do?” On one level these introductions were great. Here I was being accepted and welcomed by other artists, as if I were a long lost missing member of the artist tribe. On the other hand, not being able to answer the question came as a bit of a shock to me.

I suddenly realised in sharp focus that questions like “what sort of work do you do?” need an answer and I needed to be serious about asking myself these questions and finding an answer. They needed to be resolved!

Happily, while I stood there like a frightened rabbit in the lights of an oncoming awkward question, Nick replied “Ian’s work is very figurative”. Thankfully that seemed momentarily to provide a satisfactory escape from the spotlight, but I knew it was a question I also needed to answer for myself.

Odd isn’t it, how we are often the one least perceptive of ourselves and how others can sometimes see us more clearly than we see ourselves.

I tried to encourage Nick and Jenny to have a picture taken with their work, but sadly they were both far too modest, but I’ll try to include an image or too gleaned from the magical world of the internet.

I’ll let the images largely speak for themselves:

Nick Archer – I don’t think he could avoid this shot as it was for a publicised worthy cause.

This one was hanging on the wall of the studio and is painted on a black canvas…ish. I say ‘ish’ because I’m not sure if the actual material it’s painted on is a strict Nick Archer trade secret. I don’t want him hunting me down with a sharpened pallet knife in one hand and a stern rebuke in the other.

Flight. This was also in the studio and is huge. Awesome in size and effect.

I couldn’t find a photo’ of Jenny (Pockley), as she’s obviously famously camera shy, but I could find some of her work…

Anyway in good Oscar winning style, I’d like to thank Nick, Jenny and my fellow artists for their warm welcome and encouragement. I’d particularly like to thank Nick for his insight and encouragement and his willingness to nurture talent in others. Finally I’d like to thank China for inventing tea and Marks and Spencer for making great oat and raisin cookies.

Nick Archer and Jenny Pockley can be found at:

http://theschoolcreativecentrepress.wordpress.com

http://www.sarahmyerscough.com/index.php/artists/

http://www.longandryle.com/artists/nick-archer/

Elegy.

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1969, art, artist, arts, astronaut, brush strokes, camera phone, camerphone, canvas, Christian artist, create, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, inspiration, iphone, lunar, moon, Neil Armstrong, oil painting, paint, painter, painting, picture, Robert Frost, Song of Solomon, space, Vita Sackville-West

A closely guarded secret (more so the older I get), is that I was born in 1969. Well actually it’s not closely guarded at all really, in fact I love having been born in 1969!

It was the year that man first set foot on the moon. An era of rocket ships and space travel. An era of techno’ pioneering for a modern age. Just like the plot of Toy Story, cowboys were out and astronauts were in!

Well, on the Saturday morning that was August the 25th I woke up with inspiration for a new painting. I had just completed a project and I needed an idea to get under way for the coming Monday. I was cutting it very close to the wire, so the idea came as a very welcome revelation indeed.

The image I had in my mind on that Saturday morning was one of the moon. Not much else, just the idea that painting the moon on a large canvas might be pretty cool. So later that morning I went out and bought a 1mtr square canvas. Initially I thought I was going to draw a blank, because most of the canvas in the shop were bent, but tucked at the back of the stack were two completely different and entirely superior canvases. Incidentally, if you’ve never painted a large canvas and thought you might like to give it a go, if you don’t make it yourself, you might want to check it fits in the car first. Mine did… just! I had to slide through the back hatch and the kids had to hold it over their heads like some sort of peculiar canvas parasol.

Anyway, so the idea was in place and the canvas procured. I just had to wait until Monday to begin work.

This is where things get a little surreal. You see later that day I started to pick up rumours (that would later be confirmed) that Neil Armstrong had died. Mr. Moon himself had passed away on the very day that I had received the idea to do a lunar skyscape.

So the project was going to be partly elegiacal (thought I’d slip in that unusually long and impressive word there… I had to look it up. It means “In literature, an elegy is a mournful, melancholic or plaintive poem, especially a funeral song or a lament for the dead”).

Apart from the elegiacal (used it again there) element, the painting is a comment against the exploitation of space. Chiefly the mining and exploitation of the moon for its mineral or metal wealth. In my view the moon doesn’t belong to any country or corporation just because they land there and stick a flag in it and happily, “at present, nations are forbidden under international treaty from making territorial claims to the moon”*. The moon is not The New World to be raped and plundered by techno conquistadors, it should be under international and global guardianship and I find the idea of new venture space .coms exploiting* it offensive… good grief that was quite a political rant!

The text radiating out from – or to – the moon is a selection of quotes from some of our best poets (except the anon piece, that’s me) that have been inspired by its beauty, serenity and other qualities.

Apologies for the poor cameraphone quality, but perhaps because of its size the painting is really difficult to capture. The full picture is a pretty good representation of the colouring, but the detail shots hopefully help too. If I get a chance to use a better camera I might update the shots. The text “NOT FOR SALE” is in vermillion as is the strip along the left edge. I have no explanation for the red strip, other than it seemed necessary. Oh and the two wooden pegs along the base are part of the easel.

Detail

Detail of text in clouds.

Robert Frost – excerpt
I’ve tried the new moon tilted in the air
Above a hazy tree-and-farmhouse cluster
As you might try a jewel in your hair.

Vita Sackville-West – excerpt
Then do the clouds like silver flags
Stream out above the tattered crags,
And black and silver all the coast

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow – excerpt
Now hidden in cloud, and now revealed,
As if this phantom, full of pain,
Were by the crumbling walls concealed,

Song of Solomon 6:10 Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?

Full or crescent, bright or pale, the moon in essence is not for sale
Anon

*http://www.specintel.com/lunarROC/index.htm and  *http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2007/oct/27/comment.comment

That original spark

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art, artist, arts, brush strokes, canvas, cave painting, Celtic, Christian artist, eye, illustration, J B Phillips, Mischa, native american, oil painting, paint, painter, painting, Paul, portrait, princess, quotes, urban, war paint

What a morning! The unusually hot weather we’re having at the moment made sleep last night, well… challenging. The result was that painting today felt at times like wading through treacle, mentally and physically! However I think I’ve come pretty nearly to a point of completion for my latest project.

I wanted to portray the elegance and perhaps naivety of a teenage girl. She has perhaps, a desire to want to be treated like a princess, but life has almost certainly shown her by now that she’ll have to fight for that! Mischa in this painting has a slightly Celtic feel to her colouring, so I swapped her jumper for a simple dress and embellished it a little with a Celtic knot motif, but I also wanted to give the background an urban feel as it hopefully reflects the reality of her environment. Hopefully I’ve achieved a balance of the two.

The hand is symbolic in Native American culture of success in hand-to-hand combat, or of preparation for war (I also liked the amusing connection to the slang term “war paint”, for a woman’s makeup). This princess, even at the tender age of fourteen, has almost certainly had her share of conflict by now and if she wants to be treated with respect, not only will there be a responsibility upon her to act in a way that deserves respect and to respect herself, but she’ll also need to issue a decree of intent of war upon anyone who wants to treat her disrespectfully!

In the New Testament, Paul writes to the church in Rome, “Don’t let the world around you squeeze you into its own mould.” (Romans 12:2. J B Phillips translation) and I couldn’t think of a better bit of advice to give to any teenager, girl or boy. Each one of us has a unique character, purpose and destiny, but the pressure upon us to conform to someone else’s idea of what that is can be tremendous!

It’s obviously a subject that’s occupied many greater minds than mine, as the following selection of quotes illustrate:

“He who trims himself to suit everyone will soon whittle himself away.” ~ Raymond Hull

“God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.” ~ William Shakespeare

“The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another.” ~ J M Barrie

“Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.” ~ Judy Garland

“We are so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others that in the end we become disguised to ourselves.” ~ François Duc de La Rochefoucauld

“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.” ~ E.E. Cummings

“Never be bullied into silence.  Never allow yourself to be made a victim.  Accept no one’s definition of your life; define yourself.” ~ Harvey Fierstein

“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.” ~ Dr. Seuss

“What I am is good enough if I would only be it openly.” ~ Carl Rogers

And my own personal favourite….

You were born an original. Don’t die a copy. ~ John Mason*

Mischa was a great sport in whiting her face with face paint and then allowing me to paint around her little sister’s (Phoebe) hand in order get a photo of her with a red hand on her face.

Here she is finished… probably:

*http://www.quotegarden.com/be-self.html

You can’t paint what you don’t see.

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art, artist, arts, Batman, brush strokes, canvas, Christian artist, Chuck Close, create, illustration, Inspector Dreyfus, Jim Lee, oil painting, picture, portrait

Due mainly to a string of late nights and information overload lately, I am… knackered (British slang for being extremely tired). I’m so tired in fact that my eye has taken on the Inspector Dreyfus twitch. You know, when your eyes get so pooped that they kind of twitch involuntarily giving you that crazed psychotic look.

Talking of eyes, eyes are not only the window of the soul, they are also the visual input organs of the brain. They’re a kind of organic scanner and the more they stare at and study a subject, the more information they take on board. Very similar to the way a scanner works then! If you scan an image in low resolution on a flat bed scanner, then the scanner passes relatively quickly over the image, but if you crank up the resolution, then the scanner moves much slower taking in more detailed information.

Someone once said that if you ask a European painter to paint a duck, he’ll get a duck place it in front of him and do his best to reproduce a perfect replica of a duck on the canvas. But if you ask a Japanese painter to do the same, he’ll watch ducks on a pond all day, then come home and paint the essence of what is a duck!

Both produce a duck, both spend the day visually scanning the duck. Is one way better than the other? I don’t know to be honest. Depends on your taste I guess, but my point is that both have painted what they have seen. One has scanned and reproduced the image on the spot, the other has visually scanned it, committed it to memory and painted what he has seen. Both however now have a good mental image/memory of the duck.

This is what makes a good artist capable of reproducing an image from memory. They’re not super cool savants, (some are, but they are very, very rare) with a natural gift of draftsmanship, they are normal human beings that have put hours, days, months etc, into studying and reproducing subjects. That’s what makes an artist like Jim Lee capable of printing out awesome sketches of Batman! … obviously he hasn’t taken hours observing Batman, but he has spent years studying human anatomy.

So don’t get suckered into believing that your talents are never going to equal your favourite artist’s. Natural talent does play a part, true, but there are plenty of people out there with the natural talent, but not the inclination. You may never get as good as your hero, but… with hours of practice and observation you will improve! If we are born with artistic ability and don’t need training, then surely guys like Jim Lee or Chuck Close would still be drawing stick men with crayons? Artistic ability needs development and training.

And yet, as Picasso points out; art isn’t all about technical ability…

Every child is an artist, the problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up – Pablo Picasso

Anyway, here’s a couple more centimeters of my current project:

Copying is NOT for cheats!

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art, artist, arts, brush strokes, canvas, cave painting, Christian artist, create, faint aroma, George Bernard Shaw, God, illustration, inspiration, literature, Neil Gaiman, oil painting, paint, painter, painting, Phoebe, picture, portrait, Radiant, style, Van Gogh, Van Hals

Today is a good day. The weather is disappointing for the middle of an English summer, it’s cool, overcast and windy (and no it’s not like that all the time in England), but today is a good day because I’m coming to the end of my latest painting and it’s turning out… well, I like it.

It’s also been nice for me to realise that some of my journey artistically, is becoming familiar. There are places on that journey that I now recognise and stages that no longer scare me like they once did… well, not as much anyway.

Now when I start a picture I can begin to see a clear process. Before, it was like having all the parts, but not a clear plan of how they all go together. Now however, I can see how it goes together from the start. Working practices are beginning to form. A plan, if you like, is developing.

I still don’t know how everything will turn out, which is great, but I do have a plan of attack technically. In fact, better than that, I think I’m beginning to detect the faint aroma of a ‘style’, something that is me. From where it comes I don’t exactly know, but I thank God it’s there anyway.

So where does style come from? What makes us identifiable? When someone rings up on the telephone we normally know right away who it is, their voice is instantly recognisable, but how does that happen with our work? What makes a Van Gogh stand out from a Van Hals (yes I know they’re completely different stylistically, but I was trying to make a point and their names are similar, which is nice… from a literary point of view).

I’d like to suggest that before we get our own voice artistically, we copy a lot of others first. Neil Gaiman gave a University address recently in which he said, “Most of us only find our own voices after we’ve sounded like a lot of other people”, and he was absolutely right! What is annoying however, is that from an early age we are dissuaded from copying. You know how it goes, copying’s wrong, unimaginative, cheating and all that other crap.

But if you were to be left in a blank room with no windows and only your clothes, a flat surface, a piece of paper and a pencil (crayons if you’re more creative) to work with, what are you going to come up with? Unless you’re a savant, a very experienced artist, or The Good Lord himself, not much!

We all need inspiration, we all need something to copy and often someone to emulate. Stylistically I’ve copied or borrowed from many people down the years. I probably still do if I see something that inspires the “that is so cool” response but slowly I’m developing my own “voice”. I may be saying something that’s been said before, but perhaps it’s not being said anymore and perhaps it needs to be said now. I don’t know. All I know is that I try to paint what interests and moves me.

Finally, George Bernard Shaw said;

Some see things as they are and ask why? Others, dream things that never were and ask why not?

Seeing things as they are and asking ‘why’ is a good point to start learning and observing the things that we want to represent (or change), but at some point we might also begin to see things as they could be and ask ‘why not’?

When we begin to see ourselves as we could be and not as we are, I believe a vital shift takes place in our thinking that impels us towards that change.

So, with “could be” in mind, here is Phoebe. Phoebe is a greek word that suggests radiance and I hope that is suggested at least in her portrait. She’s kind of in the bottom right hand corner of the canvas in landscape and not slap bang in the middle as in a ‘portrait’ style canvas. But then again, “why not”?

Here’s a slightly closer shot. I still need to add a couple of finishing touches that I can’t do while the paint’s wet and the dodgy camera phone shots never do it justice, but…. sorry, I’ll stop whining now.

Ne m’oubliez pas – Forget me not

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art, artist, arts, brush strokes, canvas, Christian, Christian artist, energy, forget me nots, myosotis, oil painting, opinion, paint, painter, painting

Okay, so I’ve officially had enough of this picture now. Last post we discussed when is a picture ‘finished’ and last week I thought it was, but I didn’t take Michelle (my wife) into account…

(At this point in my blog, after nearly finishing today’s post I clicked ‘save draft’ and… lost all my work! Bum! Will check I’m logged in properly next time.)

What I was going to say, is that we all need the opinions of others, but that we also need to choose who to ask, wisely.

For instance, my son Caleb is always free with a very enthusiastic opinion. He’ll come in from school, run upstairs to get changed and nearly always offer a positive and encouraging comment. Even if I don’t like what I’m doing, he’ll usually say something that will boost my confidence.

However, that opinion, whilst it may glue back together fractured confidence, is not always what I need. The opinion I normally value most is that of Michelle. You see she will look at my work, ponder it for a while and then ask the sometimes difficult questions, like “is it finished?” (when I thought it was) or “are you going to do any more work here?” etc. She’s a very brave woman my wife, because giving a truthful opinion is often the most loving (if done with the right intention) and the most dangerous, especially if your husband is short tempered and “of an artistic disposition”!

In truth, we probably need a healthy balanced diet of both types (nobody wants a bad opinion). We need honesty sprinkled with lots of encouragement!

Anyway here are the final shots of Forget me nots. I’ve added some detail and sharpened up some areas. Nothing world changing. On to the next project now:

Value yourself and your work!

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art, artist, arts, brush strokes, canvas, Christ, Christian, Christian artist, creativity, forget me nots, illustration, inspiration, Jesus, jubilee, oil painting, paint, painter, painting, picture, Psalm 139, valued

Thanks to the Queen celebrating her diamond jubilee, we’ve got four days off. Which is great, as it’s given me a little time today to get to ‘nearly finished’ with my Forget-me-not project.

I say ‘nearly finished’ because I’m at a bit of an impasse at the moment, unable to decide whether to put any more work into it or not.

Did you ever get that with a picture? You know, where you keep looking at it thinking “I think it’s finished, but I can’t decide whether to leave it alone or not”. One more stroke could be the difference between genius and disaster! Well that’s where I am with this piece right now.

That made me think about how we present our work. I don’t mean in terms of frame and setting etc., I mean about how we talk about it, describe it. Because presentation can make a world of difference between someone liking it or being indifferent to the work. It’s very similar emotionally to how you offer a gift.

If you offer something with a “do you want this? It’s no use to me anymore”. Then the person being asked will probably tend to feel that the object in question is of no value. They’ll probably be kind of thinking “well thanks, if it’s no use to you what makes you think I’ll want it. I’m not a charity you know”.

But if you present a gift as if it is of value to yourself and treasured, then the recipient is much more likely to feel a sense of honour and responsibility for that object.

Talking about your work (and yourself for that matter) is a similar process. If you talk about it as if it’s not very good and you’re not happy with it, then people may tend to feel similarly about your work (or you). If, on the other hand, you are positive in your assessment then it may well colour the viewer’s opinion much more favourably! Of course if it really isn’t very good, no amount of positive spin may change the facts in front of the viewer, but at least they’re more likely to be polite!

So making the decision to like your work and value the time and effort that you’ve put into it will hopefully help others to feel similarly about it too. Perhaps if we decide , intentionally, purposefully, to feel similarly about ourselves, then our whole outlook on life and our work may change too. If we feel that (as I believe) we are unique, a one-of-a-kind, a masterpiece of creative thought and intention, loved, purposed and intended, then others may value us more too!

Anyway here are today’s shots of the Forget-me-nots:

“Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.

You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born.

Every day of my life was recorded in your book.
Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.

How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered!
I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand!”

From Psalm 139

“… In the eye of the beholder”

Tags

art, artist, arts, brush strokes, canvas, Christian artist, create, east sussex, eye, gallery north, God, Hailsham, inspiration, oil painting, paint, painter, painting, portrait, Tony Blair

It’s been an odd weekend in places and today, it would seem, is no different.

Saturday was the opening of the local Open Exhibition at Gallery North in Hailsham (a little town of the south coast of England, for anyone reading this overseas), and I’d had two paintings selected to be included in the show.

Our boys had gone in first and had hurried from room to room looking for the pictures, while Michelle and I had tried to look more casually around the show. Secretly I guess I was doing exactly what the boys were doing, but trying to be more polite about it. I was itching to find out where they’d hung my pictures! Eventually there came the sound of young boys finding what they’d been looking for, so we politely elbowed past the crowd of folks with the glasses of white wine and tiny crackers and jogged upstairs to where the sound of small boys in a state of excitement (and amusement) was coming from.

There, in a room at the end of the hall facing us as we came up the stairs, was the painting of Tony Hawk, but strangely in a pose like he was worshiping, not pulling a trick upside down on the edge of a half-pipe like he should be. He was upside down. Next to him the other painting called ‘We’re full of stars’ was on it’s side and the little hand in the painting was reaching down to the larger one – it looked like God needed a hand up from a small child, not Him reaching down and out to us across space and time like He should be… that was kind of funny too.

Anyway it took seconds to fix the problem. I only hope that some well meaning person doesn’t think I’ve committed an act of vandalism and puts them back up the wrong way again!

Today was weird in another way. It’s been raining on and off all day today, so between hanging out washing and rapidly getting it back in again, I’ve been painting. That wasn’t that odd, just inconvenient. What was odd was that Tony Blair is apparently trending* on Twitter at the moment. Apparently he’s been giving leadership advice (positively Twilight Zone weird) at a conference and people have been Tweeting his advice and pithy quotes around the globe.

Now if you’re British, and have lived under the Tony Blair government, the idea of Tony giving leadership advice sounds bizarre at best, but to have him quoted globally for his sage-like wisdom is astonishing… here I sit in fact, astonished.

What’s even more bizarre, if that’s possible, is that his advice is really good. Honestly, I’ve read some of it! Which leads me to conclude, that we’re all imperfect and that most of us strive towards being a better person, but being imperfect doesn’t mean we haven’t got a voice.

I believe if we have wisdom, a good idea, something positive to add to society then we should. What we shouldn’t do is hold back because we feel inadequate or that somehow we are unworthy to be heard, or seen! Tony Blair is far from perfect, but that isn’t stopping him from blessing thousands of people (it would seem) with his advice on leadership. It’s good advice, it’s being passed on. People who don’t know him that well will be all the more blessed, those who don’t know him at all might be totally blessed and those of us who do know him might think “well there’s a turn up for the books, Tony Blair is actually a fount of useful advice after all”! Who knew?

So if you’ve got it, flaunt it. Your advice or inspiration may live on in someone else’s life long after you’ve gone, or moved house etc.

Here’s the latest update on the current project. It’s amazing the difference hair makes to a portrait. A couple of brushstrokes and transformation begins!

There’s at least another half to two thirds on the canvas left untouched to left of this image. It’s a kind of portrait in landscape, but the inspiration for the other half eludes me at present.

*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter

Updated images. I’ve added some detail:

Here’s the whole canvas, but I’ve painted out the previous blue background ready for over-painting (sorry about the dodgy camera-phone quality).