Dem Blues

Took a couple days away from the city. This is out the train window. I don't know much about the surrounding area of Bristol despite having lived there a year, but I know it's very flat. 

Made a painting of something that's been in my sketchbook a while. This guy is kind of like the other portraits I've been doing, kind of archetypal figures. I love all those delta blues guys, Bukka White, Mississippi John Hurt, Robert Johnson. Feels good to make some paintings again, and to be standing up while I work!

Found this guy. It's a book of drawings I never got round to finishing. I thought it was stupid how the other drawings showed through on the paper I had gotten for it, but now I see its charm. Might finish these off before I go away.

Bonjour!

Hello Blog brothers and sisters, I am offering a crazy discount of 25% on everything in my online shoppe! Simply use the coupon code BONJOUR

Why am I so kind?
1. I am naturally kind
2. I am leaving England/work/life/everything next month and going to France for a while and so thought I could send some art into the world, and raise some more funds. Just think, each purchase of a print could pay for some pomme frites! and une bière!

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paper bag makers

Here are some buildings from my neighbourhood here in Bristol. I live south of the river where there are a lot of old factory buildings, and I'm really into them. I wanted to show where I live right now because I'm moving next month and doing some travelling.

I've been getting into architecture a lot lately in a really broad sense after the mural I did in Plymouth. I've been reading this book, the Architecture of Happiness, which is kind of similar to Ways of Seeing, but with more fluffy writing. Here's a quote I like from it where De Botton's talking about a painting-

Behind wanting to own the painting and hang it where we could regularly study it might be the hope that through continued exposure to it, its qualities would come to assume a greater hold on us. Passing it on the stairs last thing at night or in the morning on our way to work would have the effect of a magnet which could pull to the surface submerged filaments of our characters.

oranges

Hello all, I made this desktop wallpaper for Bobby over at the Fox is Black. You can read what I said about it and get it all the sizes over here.

paradise piece

Paradise Piece

trudgy pudgy

Things-

- Trudgy pudgy

- Last month and a half in Bristol (weird vibe)

- Meet your death before you die actually

- Favourite old things becoming favourite new things

- Stupid things not heavy things

- Interview I did

- Space/space/space

- espresso the new wunder drink

- Beach baby (aka the sand in my shoe)

- the wonder of which we are apt to overlook from familiarity

the botanist

botanical

botanical garden sketches

I went (am) visiting my folk's house and it's pretty near these botanical gardens. I tried to go to the one in Bristol the other week but it was closed. I love them architecturally, both in structure and as a weird space to be in. Really surreal old fashioned places. I did a lot of paintings there and for a while was sat next to a man in crocodile shoes. It feels really good to be painting again, but they lose some of their charm on the computer screen, so here are just a couple.

the fortune teller

The Fortune Teller

Look into his little eyes an let your future be revealed to you. Are you a strong mountain tiger? Will you be an oil tycoon? Everyday you are getting better and better in every way.

newness of the new

Seaweed

here's a list for today (25.1.12)

- the newness of the new
- old shed smell
- the computer burnout blues
- peek at the void
- horseshoe dust
- the savage prince
- log stackin'
- greenhouse at night
- art rehab

Also this is from a sign, which is famous if you're me or my brother, but not until now have I realised its prophetic meaning. Think on this friends-

'Please do not step on the grass due to the newness of the grass'

tout a la mer

Ceramic pot with Money Tree

Hello blog pals, here is a new pot I made last week. It's got a plant in it. For a while now I've had this idea about a print of decorative pots with plants in them, but I haven't been able to pin it down.

 Somewhere along the lines I had the thought that maybe it wasn't a print, but a practical pot- a plant pot I had to make. Then I got really excited about the idea of something I had come to because of aesthetic reasons turning into something practical. It seemed like a good progress. So this is a pot with a plant in it.

milk city

Men at Bristol Temple Meads

Took the train to Plymouth for a couple days. I used to live there for uni and I have a lot of happy memories. Hung out with some old buds and saw some of the old things I used to like looking at. There's a lot of fishermen and manly goings on in Plymouth, surrounded by woods and water and Dartmoor, kind of like Twin Peaks-on-sea. Also it's home to my favourite shop, Goulds, an army surplus shop, which is where I'd buy all my clothes if I could. 

Plymouth museum is amazing. I love how things are displayed there. The city has a pretty rich history of explorers and adventure, and a lot of old guys who collected (and still do) lots of interesting things. It's not just the museum, there are a lot of junk shops and memorabelia shops. Everything from past eras piled on top of each other and arranged in weird narratives. I love how there are these patchworks of textures and type, colours and forms, symbols, objects, costumes- just weird juxtapositions. So much military/magic/pop culture/curioso stuff. I love it.
 

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Also got to see the window mural I did in real life. I love it. Not blowing my own primitive trumpet, I just mean the context of it, and the scale- regardless of what I drew. Definitly going to be thinking hard about all the questions it's thrown up. I'm super into the public aspect of it, how different it is to a print or a painting. There's a crassness in how loud it is to have a picture that big in a public space, somewhere where people who would never give my art a second look are confronted very physically with a thing. Obviously a lot of this stuff is old hat and graffiti has answered a lot of these questions already, but it's different when it's your art. Mind blower.

 The waterfront has all these weird concrete steps embedded in the rock. You have to climb over railings and it's pretty higgledy piggledy, but it's where you go in the summer and sit with a beer and your bros. 

 And when you do you sit and look at this- Woah.

Rode the train home, thought about moving back, got excited about the Hockney show in London next month.
p.s. is this a real blog post? Am I a blogger now?