"edge"

"edge" is an artist proof for a larger book I hope to complete later in the year about "Kati Thanda-Lake Eyre which had historically high levels of water in it during 2019. I have been trying all sorts of work to try and come even a little close to this wonderful experience. This is my first attempt that gives just a small feeling of awe but I will keep trying for better results. 

You can't really get to the actual edge of the lake, it is too shallow and boggy as the water just keeps oozing out over very flat expanses of desert. It starts to evaporate almost immediately so that its edge is not "fixed" but is very elusive and varied.


















The cover is handmade paper using grass and plant fibre as the surrounding desert country near Kati Thanda - Lake Eyre is transformed into beautiful grasslands after the rains. The paper is dry but dry and fibrous with little shiny, silk-like fibres from native grasses.

Our flights over the inland sea also went into the Channel-Country and the Diamentina and Warburton rivers. The water spreads and meanders snake-like through the sand hills bringing new pastures and fish in the streams and billabongs. It is a truly wondrous sight which images can only approximate the overwhelming beautiful experience of being surrounded by it.

The book has little flaps that can be lifted to reveal surprises like small maps of descriptions of land and features. This is meant to pay tribute to the experiences of early explorers in these areas - searching for an inland sea. These can be lifted with a little lifter (DIG) provided inside the front cover.

The  thin rice-paper pages are folded to make a double sided page to allow the pockets and tabs to be lifted to reveal the inside surprises - like a turkey nest.

Mixed- media used included mangrove and pomegranate inks, acrylic paint, coloured pencils, china graph pencil, maps and pastels.

The stab-bound pages roll over like the north-south sand-hills of the desert in the Simpson Desert and around Birdsville. 

"A well kept footpath"

"a well kept footpath"

Recently I met up again with friends who are one of my longest art supporters from the early 1980's. They have just downsized from an old Queenslander and moved into a new apartment. I was thrilled to see that they still have one of my very early works on the wall . When I saw my early work from 40 years ago, I was reminded of some good advice from my favourite art teacher Roy Churcher. "Don't be in a hurry to exhibit, wait a while till you find your feet or you will want to buy back some of your early work as you will move on so much." While coming face to face again with one of my first paintings out of Art School was a little daunting, I could see a connection with  my work today and felt comfortable that I didn't show too early.

My friends are great travellers and like ourselves, include Prague as one of our favourite cities. In 2001, since my daughters were both working in London, my wife and I met up with them in Prague to explore the city together for a week. 

Later when I got home, I used my diaries and ephemera in a series of mixed media works for an exhibition -  "In Praha 2002" at Doggett Street Gallery. The exhibition was only a very modest success and I had some works left unsold. What better way to downsize myself than by giving my friends a choice of some of these reminders of their favourite city to book-end my other earlier work.

"linkages"

I always find it amazing how others can find their own links and connections with artworks. Often the original connection or meaning can be quite different but still very valid. If you click on the images and open them in a new tab, by right clicking, you can enlarge the work and see some of the detail like in "A well kept footpath" :  "Massive City Cleanup planned ". Just what was being planned for the poor dogs???

the translation

About the size of a playing card "the translation" is the latest little work to fly to Finland. Although Carina and I, both speak several languages, English is our common one. The book is made from different kinds of papers, of different sizes and textures. It includes text in different languages and is an attempt to show the differences and similarities in translating.

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Just finished putting the rest of my mugshots into a cover and thought they might be worth a look. You'll have noticed that all the faces are composed using the same mixed media arranged differently and the added text highlights that we are all far from perfect(a bit like the real world). 

These faces were not planned or organised beforehand, they simply happened and the text was discovered and added after they were completed. Once again there is plenty of opportunity for chance happenings that somehow make sense.

what is this?

A little while ago I read an interesting book "A Field Guide to Getting Lost" by Rebecca Solnit and made some notes to come back to for an artist book later (perhaps). 
I  also revisited Michael Leunig's "Holy Fool" and was delighted by some of his thoughts on creativity and the need to lose it sometimes. I was in the process of making a small book for my friend in Finland and was reminded of what I too think is so important in my creative endeavours. Bring out the pomegranate ink and search for the B&W photos.

Once we concentrate on the difference between 'not finding one's way' and 'losing oneself in a city' we can achieve a practice of awareness. Leunig talks about "how not to know" and "how not to care", "to follow the messy path of unexpected regression" and achieve a state when "ego and ambition have sufficiently crumbled."
Solnit says it as "it's ok to sometimes experience not knowing what to do next -to run into a barrier." Or "it's ok to realise that life has a mysterious quality to it... an element of uncertainty. This is what drives my creative practice and helps me make new work. It is this collaborating with chance that provides the spark. 

Here's a final quotation from Michael Leunig that I think really nails it:
"getting lost in regression and solitude, a subliterate, semi-delirious way in the depths of one's being for a while- there to invent one's art freely and there to find enchantment, infinite surprise and the bright wonderous question - 
"What is this?"

Boekie of the month "exercises on loci"

Even though it was never his favourite subject at school, Spiderman has just completed a little boekie for lovers at the intersection of art and mathematics.

After repeated "brushes" with my favourite Golden Orb Spider smack bang across my face, I have been using the experience as a source of ideas for exploring more images and ideas.
The spider has gone, my boekie is finished and I have more images to share if there is any interest. (I know how frightening spiders can be for some people). Let me know and I'll post a few more.

Manly Library Artists' Book Award selection

Last year Helen Malone and I  finished our collaborative book "The Future of an Illusion". (For details and images of this book please click the link.) Since we haven't had a chance to show our book , we were both delighted to be selected by 

the judges Michael Hedger and Ben Rak for exhibition in the 2017  Manly Library Artists' Book Award.

In addition I also had a little book I had made by myself accepted - "Redacted in Limbo".

“[Redacted] in Limbo is informed by my concerns for refugees who to come looking for freedom from persecution and a new life as migrants in Australia. The triangular is a metaphor for the tents they live in or the boats they use to make their journey.

The title of the book refers to source of the text which is from the “Nauru Files” published by the Guardian Newspaper in November, 2016. Most information of conditions in the camps and treatment of the refugees has been kept secret from the public by the Australian Government.

The book has felt covers from old Army blankets which have been waxed to make them still like sails and the book has been designed to stand up so that pages can be viewed and turned. Bitumen and canvas have also been used to suit the rugged outdoor feeling of the book and make it waterproof.. 

 The design uses some of the text from the “Nauru Files” and image repetitions of cut-out stencil people who are confused, damaged and mixed up as shown by the random crumpling of the paper, to a more ordered, peaceful one. 

The individual waxed pages of the book involve crumpling, and layering and repetition of images and text as metaphors for the mental health and physical damage caused by the harsh process used to settle our new citizens that came by boat. 

Although the crumpled marks can be smoothed they can never be removed.

"Counting" SECOND BOOK for 2017

Still keeping up with my goal of a book a month. This new one"counting", (my second for 2017) is a small mixed media concertina using some of my travel photos in B&W and text. Haven't used photography much for my bookwork in the past but finding it opens up an exciting new area for exploration.