because there hasn't been enough making on this blog...

...here's a preview of the book Byrd and I just collaboratively submitted to an exhibition called Into The Fold, opening at Artisan Books (Gertrude St, Melbourne) in August:











It's called

SNATCHES: a mystery in six parts.

Letterpress (using bits of 20 years worth of un-dissed hell type) and ink drawings on this funky polyester cover sheeting that I discovered and have been hoarding.

Not bad for a weekend's work, eh?

swoon du jour

Amazing calligraphic portrait by Lorenzo Homar, via BibliOdyssey.

Housekeeping

Actually, I'm house-ignoring, because there's a sick man inside mine, and it's always a good idea to stay clear. BB, bless his fuzzy little ipod-giving heart, picked up a dental infection in Norfolk Island (serves you right for leaving home, I told him) and is lying in bed with one side of his face blown up. It's not so bad that he needs nursing; he's always happier being sick alone, and I'm always happier leaving him alone when he's grumpy. As long as I get home in time to make him a delicious -- mushy -- dinner, he'll amuse himself with audio books and his crackberry. And thus a happy marriage progresses.

So I just thought I'd bring a few dot points together before they get overwhelmed by the busy-ness of next week.

-- I visited Mummy Crit on Friday, who has cleverly doubled her mumminess. Took her some smelly flowers and little yummy things, and had a cuddle of the lovely little new animal. I love the mewling noises and wriggles of newborns. Felt very proud of myself for not going home and getting emotional, as has been my habit with newborns for the last few years. (Not that the visit was a personal test or anything; just realised that night that I seem to be coping better with the reality of other people's babes in arms.) He's a lovely little baby, and I hope that you get a good night's sleep before too long, Crit :)

-- I went to the life drawing group yesterday, and had a fabulous female model who had lots of bulk and knew how to drape it in interesting ways. I mentioned in my last drawing post that

if C was a short, round woman, I would have packed the soft lush black charcoal. If tall, male and boney, it would have been the 2B pencil.

But it didn't work that way. I pulled out the soft charcoal, but it was so broad that I felt that I was missing out on all the interesting bits, and also felt like I was drawing a cartoon character. So out came the hard pencil, and I LOOKED. She had such great angles, even though most of her body was round. I haven't got the scanner or sketchbook next to me (I'm at the Bookstud), so I'll try to put a picture up tonight. It blew all my notions of models needing set materials completely out the window. I quite enjoy changing my mind about things.


As promised. Apologies again for the split image, it's a large sketchbook! This was a 15 minute pose, and I got so obsessed with the body that I forgot her head, something I hate doing. Come on, Jahteh, you could fit on my page, couldn't you?! ;)

-- One of the students (I always want to type studnets, and it would work, wouldn't it?) here has launched a new drawing website called The Flat City. He's been working with this drawing structure for a while, and is very excited about this project. Go in and have a play -- and if you submit your drawing in the next couple of weeks, you'll get to be part of an artist's book. I like the colour palette choices, especially the wood panelling. The launch was on friday night, in the art school gallery, with huge computer projections and other such interactivity, and cheap beer. Apparently it went off, and only finished when the security guards kicked them out.

-- I saw The Painted Veil last night (by myself, of course, BB being wurty), and thoroughly enjoyed it. I've always been a big fan of Somerset Maugham. He was trying to tell people in the 1930s that they really shouldn't be so hung up on the material things of life, that there are better values and approaches to take to life, and he tried to pass that message on in a non-preachy, very popularist way. I think that the gist of what he was trying to say in broad brush strokes is very relevant today. It's about being *useful* on a personal level, about caring less about what is 'in' and whether you're keeping up with fads. And Ed Norton looked fabulously authentic, with his funny-shaped head and high pants. I think he's a marvellous actor. And oh, the scenery! That was the real star of the movie.

OK, time to get printing. Have a good day y'all.

Making us ink

I'm a big fan of graphic novels that use their imagery to tell stories that need to be told. That's not to say that pure fantasy GN aren't interesting, but sometimes, when people don't dig things like novels, paintings or art movies, or even history books and the news, GN are the perfect portal to reach them.

I've talked before about Barefoot Gen, which deals with Hiroshima from a Japanese perpective. There's also Art Spiegelman's Maus, which talks about the Holocaust (Spiegelman also drew a graphic novel about 9/11, called In the Shadow of No Towers). And there's also Marjane Satrapi's fabulous GNs about being a woman in Iran during the Iranian Revolution and beyond. I have her Chicken and Plums, and her Persepolis is about to be released as a movie.

That's just a short list of the most obvious political graphic novels. If you're interested, get thee down to the local (good) comic shop and ask what else they have. Or share in the comments if you have a personal favorite.

Today, whilst doing my early-morning blogsphere cruise, I followed a Hoyden link to a very immediate graphic response to the Chinese earthquakes. Go there, but with a box of tissues. These excellent drawings do more to bring the suffering home than any number of news stories. They evoke compassion and even, in some cases, raise a smile. Highly recommended, especially for 'whatever' teenagers.

Distracted drawing

Forgot to mention that last weekend I went to a life drawing class organised by one of my colleagues at the art school. She'd mentioned in the email that she'd booked 'C' as the model. Having not hung around life modelling circles for a while, and needing to know what materials to pack, I wanted to know what C looked like (it's a name that can apply to both sexes). You know, if C was a short, round woman, I would have packed the soft lush black charcoal. If tall, male and boney, it would have been the 2B pencil.

Her email replied: 'C is a tall lean/ muscular dude.'

So I went along with pencils, hard charcoal, and a biro.

C *is* a tall, very muscular young dude, with a back, sack and crack job, I suspect, because he's pretty hairless. Very wide shoulders, narrow hips, a bit like Michelangelo's David, but with very straight dark hair that hangs lankly on either side of his face. Like most people who take up life modelling, he's determined to have a distinct personality: he only seems to wear white, with purple crocs, and his poses are extremely energetic, which is fantastic for the short poses, but a bit much for the longer poses because his limbs start to droop out of place.

It was a mildly intimidating morning, because the room was full of artists who either teach at the art school, used to be teachers, or went there as students and now have fab arts-industry jobs. C would freeze himself into a pose that always seemed to leave me with intense foreshortening, and all I could think about as I drew was that any minute now, Jahteh would burst through the door, grab C, throw him over her shoulder and run out the door again, taking him home to do her washing up and promising to buy him some new white clothes if he was a very good boy.

Postscript: I got a chance to scan a drawing. This relates to the comments thread if you check it out (although this is NOT my first drawing for the session. It's my second-last, and took 15 minutes. I don't like his upper shoulder/chest bit, but I'm quite pleased with this from the waist down.):



Apologies for the line down his middle. It's an A3 drawing and the scanner is only A4.

Thought for the day

Ord rocks.

Drawmo 30: the end, and a dog called Fish

Gah. Miserable failure. Oh well, Drawmo got me blogging more at least! I dunno if I'll be able to keep that up in the next few months. I'll do my best (what more can I say?)

Anyhoo, I started the month with a polemic about drawing of my own, and I'll finish with someone else's: my drawing teacher from art school. He was an old-school sculptor from Europe who treated most contemporary practice with a sour but good-natured 'BAH'. Read the following (from a hand-out he gave us) with a heavy accent, any heavy accent:

An ability to draw is a useful tool for any artist who is involved with visual expression. It is sad to note that the perceptual skills one develops through the act of looking and drawing are often dismissed as anachronistic for the 'contemporary' approach in art practices.

I strongly believe that the possession of these skills will enrich a student's sensitivity to all art experiences and enhance the flow of ideas and creativity. Drawing from nature in all forms is to my mind the best way to develop this sensitivity. By becoming aware of the subtleties and details one ventures into a newer and richer world. It is a hard language to master. It requires hard work, full concentration and perseverance.

The search for clarity of statement is of paramount importance. Avoid smudging and 'Arty effect'. Individuality is encouraged but it should be of secondary concern. be thorough, analytical, critical. Maintain the structure at all times.

I think there's something in that for all of us, don't you, children?

My last drawings from the vault (my excuse for this is in the post coming next) are to prove to people that I'm not cat-centric. These are two sketches of a dog I once went camping with. I can't even remember who the dog belonged to, which is shameful. The dog's name is Fish.

They are very light pencil drawings. I hope you can see them!





And thus the month ends.

Drawmo 29: drawing to a close (sorry!)

OK, I've been an utter drawmo failure. It's been more of an exercise in reviewing how little I draw these days and how much I used to love it. I think I've come to the conclusion that I really miss life drawing, and I'm resolved to do something about it next year. Either join a class or start a group.

Here's another thigh for you (done in the first half of 2000). Still no face or feet, but it's less obvious that they're missing this time! Lots of lushness. Charcoal can be ace sometimes.

Drawmo 26

Sitting outside the mostly-unused ex-primary school where Bumblebee does circus school, I noticed that one of the boarded-up windows had been graffiti'd with a tag that takes us around in a ever-decreasing spiral of irony.

I decided to copy it, but wasn't happy with my first attempt, so did it again and again, and then tried to perfect the little bits I wasn't happy with... is that why there are so many tags around? It's perfectionism!



This is a copy of graffiti that is a copy of graffiti... (it would have looked better if I'd had a marker or at least grainier pencil)

...and here is the copy I copied from



And here is the original.



(Mr Pooter told Jonah that Padge was a stupid fat pussy, so he helped him out a bit.)

Heh.

Drawmo 25 and 26

Two at once, so sue me. Yesterday I was so full of energy I did everything except draw (I mowed the lawn, back and front!). Today I've been watching this little cartoon run through my brain. So here it is.



My goodness, it's fun watching the Liberals implode. I always knew (and I bet you did too) that they were a bunch of bananas.

DRAWMO 24

very drunk.
very happy.
very drunk.

Drawmo 23

Best Beloved stopped jittering around the house listening to the radio nervously for long enough for me to do a -- gasp! -- pencil drawing of his feet.

Not brilliant, but it's a real, live drawing, made today!

Drawmo 21: The Black Bean Blower

Can I just say that, as challenging as my daily problem-solving regime is at the moment, there is NOTHING so challenging as a child saying 'I'm doing a play in Drama and I need a costume', and that the costume -- complete with props -- is needed the next day. This is, of course, said at bedtime. Again.

Yesterday I leapt out of bed to create a costume for the role of a superhero called The Black Bean Blower, who was the Star of the Show. Luckily we have various elements of superhero attire, and a black texta.



This is the black bean, drawn on a white Bonds singlet. Combined with the mask, some black footless tights, a pair of bright green soft boxer-shorts made from t-shirt material over the top of the tights, and a cunning green lizardy cape (lent to us by Zoe years ago, thanks so much!), he looked pretty cool in a kooky oddball sort of way, which was just what we needed.

The only thing we didn't have was a jar of black jellybeans, which was the essential prop needed. We rode our bikes to Woollies on the way to school, but they didn't have any. I suggested just buying a packet of multi-coloured ones, from which he could pluck the black ones out, but he looked a bit sad at that, so I promised to ride into Civic after dropping him at school and get some from Darrell Lea, then drop them into school at 3.00 before Drama started.

Puff, pant! I rode around, got the beans, and spent the rest of the day in a warm glow of Good Motherness. I haven't put in a big effort this year, school-wise, and a good burst of costume-making always seems to catch me up, like a big burst of brownie points.

So. I get to the school at 3, backpack bursting with black jellybeans, only to discover that the play had been performed at lunchtime for the whole school and was not going to be performed again. And that they'd used a packet of multi-coloured jellybeans provided by the teacher and he'd picked out the black ones for the blowing. And no-one had thought to ring me to see if I was on my way with the beans.

My face looked so downcast that the drama teacher instantly scheduled a special Parents-Who-Couldn't-Make-It-During-The-Day performance next week in drama class. A mother standing next to me while I took in the information gently leaned over to me and said 'It was really good, if that's any consolation.'

Thank you, but NO, IT BLOODY ISN'T!

I haven't been so disappointed for years. I was crushed and cranky at Bumblebee for forgetting about me and my quest.

I'm over it now, and looking forward to seeing it next week. Hopefully in a Brave New World with Kerry Tucker as Prom Queen of the Senate.

Drawmo 20: from the vault

A cartoon I drew in 2001 for a community consciousness raiser organisation. Of course, it's still relevant. Please peoples, vote the cnuts out on Saturday. PLEASE.

Drawmo 18

This is another conceptual drawing; well, I claim it as a drawing because I like the marks. It's the rag I used to skim the side of the wood engraving block I was printing -- successfully -- today. Each mark is a skim.

Forgive my brevity, I'm absolutely shagged. I printed about 300 pages today in total, including the bloody test prints and crap ones. I've been on my feet all day, and I see out the window that there is some refreshingly light rain to ride my bicycle home in.

Hooray!

Drawmo 17: desperate measures

Placement sketches made as I tried desperately to find the best position on the press for the wookblock I was printing. Each one gets simpler until I've made a quick final notation of the one that works.



The little circles indicate the gripper end of the press. The rectangles with circles in them are quoins.

Drawmo 16 (a day late)

Gah. I've had the most frustrating day, trying to print an edition of a wood engraving using the letterpress press. I solved the problem of the ink being grey (by adding pigment-rich woodblock ink to the letterpress ink) and I solved the packing pressure problem; now I've got to perfect the height of the rollers so that they ink strongly but don't leave a white pressure line on the far end of the block. If anyone out there has any tips for printing type-high woodblocks on a flatbed cylinder press, I'd be very happy to hear them. For the most part the prints are looking great, but to a trained eye like the expert printmaker who wandered in at lunchtime, the line is a problem.

Sigh. So I haven't managed any drawings, other than the ones in my head. So here's yesterday's, from the vault as usual (feeling very slack):



I drew this portrait of Australian poet Bruce Dawe whilst he was reading his work aloud at a Canberra poetry festival in either 2002 or 2003. Doesn't he have the best nose to draw? His poetry is good, too.

It's drawn right at the edge of a sketchbook page, hence the line on the left.

I'm still at the Book Stud, and there's nothing else in this particular sketchbook worth sharing, so I'll see what I can find when I get home for today's Drawmo. You never know, I might even skritch something up between riding home and going out to a friend's daughter's 21st (something that makes us all feel very old, like tribal elders. My friend was 16 when her daughter was born! Gawd, we could all be great-Aunties soon... if she was that was inclined, which she isn't.)

Drawmo 15: from the vault

Another busy Thursday, but I didn't do any working drawings at Bookbinding class, so I pulled something from the vault. I figure it's better than not doing any drawing...

This one makes me laugh. We were doing a project at art school where our brief was to make plaster casts of bits of our body and then use the casts to mould handmade paper, then manipulate those pieces and photograph them, developing the photos ourselves. Phew! It was very involved. But it meant thinking about our bodies as subject/object/whatever, and I'd JUST got accidentally pregnant to a man who wasn't the husband I was breaking up with. GAH.*



The funny thing is that if I was doing a self-portrait of my relationship with my body right now, this is pretty close to what I'd draw. That look on the face sums up my personal mind-body dichotomy. Heh.

This is drawn in watercolour graphite, with a touch of watercolour colour pencil, with the head on the left page of the sketchbook and the pelvis on the right. The book gutter really makes a gulf between the original drawings...






* I have NO idea why Drawmo is bringing up so many memories from this period. Maybe it's because it was a time when I really loved drawing, and filled lots of sketchbooks?

Drawmo 14

Computer drawing today. Zoe asked me to create a Keating of the Sacred Heart, and this is what I came up with.



Don't look for too long, or your eyes will bleed.

Drawmo 13

I make my own diaries these days, because I can't find a commercial diary with enough doodle space. In my version, every week has at least a double blank page for lists, ideas and mindless doodles. Is there any other kind of doodle?

This was done tonight at a Bookbinders' Guild Committee meeting. I'm their newsletter and web mistress. I don't take notes about anything else, and I listen better with a moving pencil in my hand. You should see my lecture/high school notes :)






[And yes, Ellis Hutch, I did wave at you today from my huge silver sigh of a car. Hai!)