On Children

On Children
Kahlil Gibran

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let our bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.


Marianna, Kahlil's Sister. Painting by Kahlil Gibran

Woolworths Exhibition: Pick N Mix

The iconic British store Woolworths shut down last year leaving large vacant department stores all over the country. A group of artists got together and staged an art exhibition in one in Leytonstone, London to coincide with the Leytonstone Arts Festival.

The problem was not that we didn't have lights. We did. We didn't have air conditioning. It was so sweltering outside that a few hours after the opening everyone was on the streets enjoying the warm summer air (and gasping for oxygen).

The view from across the street.

This was probably my favourite piece in the exhibition. Proposals to take part had to somehow relate to the environment. Here an artist takes old red buckets, lines a shelf with them, and lights them internally. Very effective!

The bar and DJ were behind the old check out till. The line up for drinks is pictured above.

My piece slotted perfectly into the old candy bar racks.

Click on the following links for publicity:
London Evening Standard - Woolies Pops up Again as Art Gallery
Time Out - Pick 'n' mix art: Woolworths returns as pop-up gallery
The Guardian - LEYTONSTONE: Former Woolworths building to become art gallery
Artists and Makers - Empty Woolworths Becomes Art Gallery
The Independant - Observations: Plenty of treats in store as empty Woolworths gets an arts make-over
Flavor Pill London - Pick 'n' Mix
BBC News - Art Goes 'Pop' During Recession

wimbledon

Wimbledon fever is going strong here in London.

We took a walk down to Wimbledon Park and strolled among all the hard core ticket buyers who were camping overnight and lining up for tickets.

Wimbledon brings a strange group of fans unlike any football match. You have a tent of older women out reading their books in the evening sunset right next to young teenagers who look like they are lining up for the next big concert.

The sky is beautiful as we stroll along and the atmosphere is great...like a weekend camping music festival.


We wander up to the tennis grounds (the green building above) only to find swarms of people and cars.

Some who live nearby have rented out their front driveway for eateries like this "All Day Breakfast" joint.

We risk our lives trying to work our way "upstream" in the crowds, which means we have to continuously step out onto a London road with the traffic coming from behind. DANGEROUS!

My last shot. An accident that turned out very nicely. It is begging to be a painting.

On Marriage

There is a wonderful woman I have met who lives in a windmill. The very same windmill that J. M. Barrie is said to have written Peter Pan from. Alas I did not take photos of her home, but she sent me two poems by Kahlil Gibran. This one is for friends who are about to embark on married life.

On Marriage
Kahlil Gibran

You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore. You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days. Ay, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God. But let there be spaces in your togetherness, And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

Love one another, but make not a bond of love: Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup. Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.

Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.

The Marriage of Tristram and Isolde (Burne-Jones)

Technical Skills

I've been sitting in the gallery thinking all weekend and have come up with a few thoughts. As I sit with Isa Genzken's sculptures I seem to have slowly put my finger on something I have been or am missing. Part of what was so frustrating about my masters program was realising how unaware I am of art theory. Most art these days is heavy on theory and light on technical skill. I happen to love painting. I am good with my hands. I have a skill and have tried to hone it. But painting in the art world is on a very different level than being overly concerned with a honed technical skill. (Don't get me wrong, I do think that theory has honed skills too, just different ones).

Iza Genzken at the Whitechapel Gallery

On the other hand, I am also not interested in a pretty painting for the sake of being a pretty painting. I want substance. I craved it after years of technical classes. Visually I want both a balance of technical and a breaking of all the traditional rules (see artist Justin Mortimer). Theoretically, I want some reason for making the work, whether technical (like experimenting with surface) or experiential (like documenting lives in Liberia), or philosophical (like any artist's current Artist Statement).

Justin Mortimer's painting Family Plot

I am more and more interested in delving into themes and ideas when creating work. I want to do a series related to the ever present Facebook in relation to identity. Wow, I am sounding remotely art-speak.

I think where my failing comes in are from a lack of understanding, interest, and involvement in current art theory and its consequent practice. It depresses me when it seems so far away from what I am aiming to do, which is paint. Theory often seems overly complex and caught in the cycles of thinking that don't free me as an artist.

It was summed up in an email I received back from a friend who is both artist and curator, after I had sent him some job openings for curating and involvement at a more theoretical level in different art venues. I added that I didn't have enough knowledge in art to pursue them myself. To which he emailed back "but you would be an excellent painting instructor in the right situation."

And suddenly it dawned on me that is precisely what my strength is. I am a painter. I like the challenge of the technical. I could think of quite a number of very successful artists (in the world of art) who built a career based primarily (but importantly, not entirely) on using that particular strength.

It is the opposite of growth to feel discouraged, lost, and inadequate when trying to move forward in anything creative. I may be in a slightly different camp than my theoretical peers, but at least I now know exactly what i need to do.

Carrot and Curry Lentil Soup

This has become our current favourite dinners. It is fast and easy to make. It reminds us of the B'sara soup in Fez, Morocco. It has a lime/olive oil dressing that is spooned onto the top for a tang. YUM!


SOUP
1 onion
1 garlic clove
500g carrots, chopped (about 6 generous carrots)
1 potato (sweet or regular)
150 g red lentils (about 3/4 cup)
1 litre vegtable stock
1 tablespoon mild curry paste
salt & pepper

TOPPING
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 lime, juice and zest

Fry onion and garlic. Add the rest of soup ingredients. Cook for 20-25 minutes. Puree. Mix topping ingredients in a small bowl. Spoon on top of soup.

Michael Jackson Wake

Late Friday night I wandered down to Trafalgar Square in London, UK, and found crowds of young people gathered in a wake for Michael Jackson.

Throngs of people came and went while the crowd would start singing one of his songs only to have it die off a few lines later.

Up against the gate of the National Gallery a candlelight shrine had begun as people came and read the messages and lit candles.

I love the dog in that picture.

Another shot of the square. I noticed the police quietly milling around just to make sure that nothing went wrong. What a nightmare job for them.

On Learning

"Emotions and motivations are also fundamental to learning. Strong emotion connected with an experience helps the brain store information in a way that is more accessible and more easily retrieved. Too much stress, on the other hand, can result in reduced blood flow to the frontal lobes, impairing the ability to think and remember clearly. Taking pleasure in a task is an especially good way to learn well. Our brains release a neuro-transmitter called dopamine in anticipation of the pleasure we expect to derive from a particular activity. The dopamine motivates us, increasing our energy and drive and encouraging us to engage in the activity. If our brain's expectations of pleasure in a certain activity is met, dopamine levels remain elevated. If the pleasure enjoyed is even greater that predicted, dopamine levels are increased and we engage even more persistently in the activity. Conversely, if the activity is less pleasurable than anticipated, dopamine levels drop sharply."

Daniel Tammet, Embracing the Wide Sky: A Tour Across the Horizons of the Human Mind

Working Art

I have been working at a gallery invigilating this week. Yes, this is the same gallery I worked at as a grad student in London. I had reapplied a few months ago when they were hiring 30 people and wasn't even shortlisted. I later learned 700 people applied. Such is the current job situation in London.

Despite this I found out through the grape vine they were having trouble filling shifts. I called and now I am working odd shifts here and there - as much or as little as I like. Conveniently it is very close to my studio.

What is interesting is that I now find myself sitting in rooms full of very avant-garde art, the kind that I don't actually understand (and as a result have a hard time appreciating). Perhaps this is my chance to engage it and try to understand where art has come from to bring it to this present day work.

The gallery is a large historical gallery that consists of 9 main rooms, an auditorium, cafe, restaurant, archives library, and book shop. I spend a half hour in each room rotating around with other staff. One of my favourite rooms is a display of early purchases made by the British Council of now well known artists. The pieces were bought early in their careers and the prices they were bought at is shockingly low when viewing their careers nowadays. A Damien Hirst dot painting (right) was bought for £8500 in 1994 (one of the most expensive aquisitions in the show). This is the artist who made headlines at the beginning of the current recession for having sold £111 million at a single auction.

Some of the paintings were particularly striking. I was most riveted by Frank Auerbach's painting, The Camden Theatre (below). It sold in for £1800 in 1976. Some works sold for as low as £54. An early Lucien Freud sold for only £157.

It all seems rather inspiring. The impression I have always had in London is that these stars were stars while still doing their graduate work at school and they then easily stepped on the fast train to mega-success as soon as they graduated. I don't know how that translates to my own practice, but I was left feeling really good about my own art.

Man Found Dead Mouse in Malt Loaf

Click here for the BBC story.

A Day at the Greenwich Market

We spend Sunday wandering around Greenwich Market.

To get there we walk through the University of Greenwich which is the grounds of the Old Royal Naval College, the centre piece of the Maritime Greenwich UNESCO World Heritage Site. The University has a 150 year lease on parts of three of the four Royal Courts and is breathtaking. Walking by the music wing one can hear wafts of music floating in the air.

Soon we enter the well known Greenwich Market.

There are all types of wares. My favourite was the jeweller making bracelets from old silver forks, spoons, and fish knives right there in front of us.

The market is relatively small compared to its reputation.

We wander the streets of Greenwich to find a few more open air markets selling what looks like "grandma's old things".

It is a sunny day and we wander up the Thames. It seems we are not alone.

There is a huge military ship docked in the river. Can you see the helicopters sitting on the front deck?

We pass another small market with candy.

A close up just to get your saliva glands going.

We wander through Greenwich and find a great little pub with the most amazing meals that we hunker down to with friends for several hours. Sigh, what a nice day.

Family Photo

This great photo was forwarded to me from my mom via her cousin. My grandma (from my mom's English-Canadian side) sits on the far right with her two sisters. Girls run on both sides of the family.

My grandma was as opinionated and stubborn as me. We often clashed as a result, but when we had the same opinion we were a force to be reckoned with (ie: pop is bad for you).
I love this picture and could stare at it forever.

Above is my grandma again (left) with my uncle and my great grandmother who I met very briefly as a young girl.

A Revolutionary Road

I quit my one week old job yesterday. If I am utterly miserable than best to change the current situation. This has occured once before and I remember someone telling me not to be a quitter and to stick it out. I was stunned. So stunned I didn't quit for a year and a half. Is this how the majority of the world think, I wondered to myself? Is that why so many people stay in jobs they don't like? I realized on the ship in Liberia that I had never worked for someone full-time for 7 months before. I didn't like the oppression or the dominion wielded over me. I have always worked hard in casual, part-time, or full-time seasonal jobs. I remained my own boss and lived a simple and frugal life. I admit this can become wearing in different ways.

I watched the movie Revolutionary Road and it left a bad taste in my mouth, as it was it was meant to. Like the heroine, I have pursued the dream of being an artist believing I would make it one day. What is your definition of success? This question posed in art school was meant to break down the superficial ideas and free us to make our own art. The right answer was wrapped up in increasing your own abilities and creating in realms that had not been discovered, whether by you or others. It was to broach your own safety zone and step out into a chasm ignoring societies pleas to play it safe.

"When the boy was a man he would be known as someone who took large and reckless actions, and he would often think that he had first been like this at Rebus Creek Road where he had first gone beyond what he was brave enough to do and changed himself because of it." (Peter Carey, His Illegal Self).

But I have never quite been able to convince myself of this notion of success despite developing my sense of what is accomplished and challenging art. I have humanly wanted to be recognized by my peers, by the commercial world of art and by the theoretical world of art. Fat chance, is todays feeling despite Nigel learning that artist's minds are either floating in a cloud of brilliance or wallowing in a sea of despicable loathing of ones own work.

My mind keeps slipping back to a friend of mine, another artist, who was struggling and from an outsiders view (the title I bestowed on myself at the time) I had the answers. I could see that she should market herself differently, should get a part time job to support her art while she was still fledgling, and start giving herself a time and money limit. Of course I placed myself in an entirely different category. I was beginning to sell, I lived simply, I had definite goals and time frames. Such are egos and my disbelief when she told me I didn't support her art.

Now I wonder how different I am from her back then. Do people look at me and in their mind know what I should be doing differently, think I should give up, move on, grow up, and finally enter the real world? I admit I am surrounded more by people now whose subtlies I read and I know this is what they are thinking. They don't need to say it or show it. It is more what they don't say. So I am left wondering what next to do and in my mind these are the only realistic alternatives.

1. Jump into my art with all the gusto I have, living, breathing, eating, and sleeping art for a time more before reassessing.
2. Look into something completely different, completely reliable.
3. Pursue something else artistic that would renew my passion, but place me at the bottom rung in another field.
4. Continue with my art alongside a part time job.

Careers

I have been doing a lot of pensive thinking lately. Some thoughts have to do with things I am doing, books I am reading, movies I am seeing, but most have to do with where I am currently in life and where I see myself going. Maybe I am at a crossroads.

I keep meaning to blog about all these things, but when it comes to sitting down and writing something, I am not in the mood. Maybe my thoughts are half formed still. There was a brilliant exercise I had to do in a writing/public speaking/art class I took in my undergrad art school. The homework was to write a page a day in a notebook...sort of like a journal. What we were to write were thoughts or opinions or anything as long as they were analytical. My two best ones were on why the world was so moved by Princess Diana's death (yes, this does date my schooling) and why cemeteries are so valued by the living. Perhaps I will try and repeat that exercise in this blog. It forces a further thought process in my half finished thoughts.

That said, I have been looking for a part time job lately to pay for my studio and my transit. A day a week would be ideal. But it seems that most jobs here in London are over applied for and not a single company bother to get back to you if you have not been shortlisted. This leaves you wondering if the job has been filled or whether you are still waiting to hear. I had my fingers crossed for the library job.

I have been thinking seriously about other careers too. Why? How could I when I have invested in this one so far? Well, this one can get discouraging not only with working long and hard with few monetary rewards, but the world of art is not always a savoury place. Part of the problem is when I do those on-line tests to discover what your best career fit is, it is always in the arts. Maybe I just need more structure. Maybe I need a bit of a change for a while.

I did in fact get short-listed for a part time job last week and started this week. Of course what was advertised is entirely different, both in location, in commitment, and in hours. There has been no training, the schedule is sketchy and I am expected to be flexible, make it my life priority, commute for an hour (each way), and earn minimum wage, while being sometimes abused by the public. I dread going, but admit it has had a one positive effect. It has made me determined to do something else. I am refocusing with an extreme intensity on my art work and studio time and am seriously considering other careers, not as a replacement, but as a compliment. I need something that is a bit structured and makes a bit more money.

Southend, Essex

A walk on the beach in Southend.

A blustering day.

Colourful beach houses.

Nigel walks ahead alone.

Beach front property for sale.

An English Summer Wedding

I have now attended my first English summer wedding in Rochford, Essex.

Some of the family members pose together.

The children run in the large fields and find the only mud slide in the area!



Yes, the wedding lover above does have a radio and earpiece and is listening to the football match.

Summer drinks of pims.

The flowers are all in bloom.

Despite not being a gardener, I am a painter and was taken with the colours.

More colours.



A view of the grand house from the lawn.


The wedding cake which turned out to be a fake.

Elaborate tables (with chocolate at every seat).

Looking down from the upstairs level.

Dessert.

The sun sets.

Saturday in London

Saturday in London is spent meandering through town from event to event.

Part of the Slow Down London Festival on in London at the moment includes a special free Wallpaper Printing Workshop with master printmaker, Linda Florence.

We team up and print a long roll of wall paper.

Some choose white stars.

We choose red on gold.

Next we take the Tube east.

To find ourselves wandering through Portobello Market in Notting Hill.

All sorts of antiques line the streets in stalls and stores.

Old film cameras.

Food stalls galore. We find a falafel place and hunker down.

Next we hop on a double decker bus to meander for most of an hour towards the city centre.

Through streets lined with taxi cabs and shoppers, we pass through Oxford Street.

A day of English folk-inspired performances are taking place in celebration of St. George's Day in Trafalgar Square.

The crowds gather in front of the National Gallery.

There are some great dancers that show up in toupes, thick gold glasses and and disco outfits.

All the while Napolean looks down on the crowds.

We wander off through the square.

And head over to Leicester Square instead.

We find a small cafe and get the best hot chocolate I've had in a long time made by the Italian owner, Fernando.

The drink has us under such a spell we accidentally leave our roll of hand printed wall paper in the corner.

We wander through China Town...

...and head over to Soho...

...where we gaze at more food in the windows.

Finally we settle into a cheap theatre to watch The Tale of Benjamin Button before heading back home to bed.

Mercy Ship Talk

I attended a talk this year by a dentist who had worked briefly on the Mercy Ships in Liberia. Nigel and I were invited as guests by a surgeon to the members only event that was made up of mostly medical doctors in different disciplines. I was very interested in hearing someone elses talk after Nigel and I had given two already on our experience.

Well, no one can quite prepare you for suddenly having background knowledge on what would turn out to be a bit of a scam talk. I can only say that Nigel and I were incredulous as we listened to tales of patients who we had been directly involved in.

One funny story he had involved the sunken ship that sat beside our ship in the harbour. He had some elaborate story about how it sunk and a dozen people were killed. They had never recovered the bodies but the ship had been dragged out to sea.

The photos show this very same ship, which still sits in Monrovia's dock half sunk. It was being loaded or unloaded and became unbalanced and tipped over. The ship loses the country US$3000 a day in port fees by just sitting there. There are so many sunken ships in the port that the port police have to navigate you through to your own dock. Fortunately, there were no deaths and the ship was still sitting there when we left, despite efforts to refloat it.

Getting Sucked In

I recently finished "A Thousand Splendid Suns" by Khaled Hosseini and cried my eyes out throughout the entire thing. I was warned it was sad (but good), but that did not prepare Nigel for a quiet evening on his computer and me curled up on a couch reading and weeping. He looked at me and in his usual dry humour told me to "stop it!" Of course I couldn't which fueled his next question, "why do you do this to yourself?"

It brought back a funny story we often tell when we were on a plane between Canada and the UK. I was watching a light Disney movie and Nigel was busy reading or listening to his iPod. The movie's plot had been about a young family whose father had died, but had come back to help his grieving child through a last task. I again, was crying my eyes out, but desperately trying to be as silent as possible, knowing I was on a packed plane.

Nigel at one point must have glanced over or heard a sniff and, nudging me, gave me a look that said, "why are you crying?" In my not-realizing-how-loud-my-voice-is-with-earphones-on I sobbed loudly, "the dad died and now his ghost has come back to help." Nigel rolled his eyes, "isn't this a Disney movie?"

UN Women

When I was in Liberia I was fascinated each time I passed the parliament building in the capital city, Monrovia, where I lived. I really liked that Liberia had the first female president in Africa, Ellen Johnston Sirleaf, who was transforming the country. I was even more fascinated with who was guarding the building.

It is well known in the area that the best body guards come from Nigeria, and the president herself makes use of them. But to guard the presidential building she chose the only all female UN unit in the world: the Indian Women's Unit.

I have to admit that of all the UN country units left in Liberia (the western countries pulled out much earlier perhaps due to lack of media in the area) these women appear the most attentive and fierce. I found this very attractive and was fascinated that such a unit derived from what I considered a very traditional culture.

From what I can understand, some of the other UN units from similar West African countries took advantage of their position and there were reported cases of abuse of power involving peacekeepers and Liberian women. To nip it in the butt, President Sirleaf had the women brought in.

On an official visit that some of the higher ranking ship members made to see the president, I hitched along and hung out outside with these women. They were shy and giggly, but loved to chat.

They told me they were career soldiers who had committed to the Liberia post for 6 months. While there, they either lived in their army base or they were on duty. All of them had husbands, families and children and immediately brought out pictures to proudly show me. When asked if they felt their families were missing them and unable to cope without their mother, I was met with confusion. It became evidently clear that in a culture with extended families all under one roof they were more free to easily go off on a tour of duty. Besides, they said, they all loved getting away and being somewhere completely different.

BBC links on these women:
Indian Women to Keep Liberia Peace
Liberia gets All-Female Peacekeeping Force
All Female UN Squad a Success