Middlesex Filter Beds

Last Monday's cycling discovery, turning off the familiar path, was Middlesex Filter Beds (river water filtering slowly through sand). It's also a nature reserve, and where the path ends is a large sculpture, a sort of Stonehenge, by Paula Haughney, Nature Throne (1990), of which these are detail views -

Elsewhere, giant hogweed along the river, a swerving path -

Ah, the river....

On the walk to the station, the corner of Hollyhock Heaven is now dense with verbena -

 the hollyhocks gone to seed (and what wonderful seed) -

 Other seeds have flown -

How's that again?

"Intelligent electricity? Do they think they have smarter ohms?"

aww, sweeeet.....

Gone wrong, gone very wrong

Elsewhere on this blog is my tried-and-true recipe for "easy-peasy brownies", which I made today in a bit of a hurry. I've made it in a hurry many times before, but this time something went wrong. The dough is mixed in a saucepan - you start by melting a big block of butter and then add the cocoa, sugar, eggs, flour, walnuts, and vanilla, in that order.

Yes, it looks like brownies ... but that dish of golden liquid is butter. The butter separated out, and the baked brownies (if they can still be graced by that name) feel rather rigid when tested with a fingertip. I suspect they will be ... chewy, at best.

Are there any food scientists or home ec teachers reading this? What did I do wrong? Is it a matter of too much stirring?

Journal quilts, second batch

These seem to be going from separately gathered sections to one big piece. It's stowing away all the thread ends that takes the time, so doing it all-in-one makes sense.

Method: Gathered synthetic organza, with applied snippets of fabric, and the gathering threads left in. The pieces are steamed and then spread out to measure 6"x12", and fixed to a backing. They are palpably springy, as well as a little bit glittering ... something to tempt the hand as well as the eye.

The first batch of these purportedly monthly creations are here on this blog, finished just before the due date. The next batch are due to be posted on the CQ yahoogroup at the end of the year. I wonder how many other people leave making their JQs to the last minute, rather than actually doing it month by month?

Stitched marks

Continuing with mark-making in different materials - this time cloth and stitch, using the twist of the thread to vary the marks it can make. Above, adding thin strips of fabric adds another element; below, thick silk thread and thin cotton, both using two stitches in almost the same place, most of the time.

Drawing Tuesday - Docklands Museum

Attracted by the tools, I somehow got fixated on the saw -

and spent an inordinate amount of time trying to get the proportions right from this angle -

Lots of measuring ... and still not quite right. But there was more white space to fill...

and more tools to draw, such as these sail-makers seam rubbers -

and hammers and pincers and scrapers and the little knife and fork set, its loss undoubtedly mourned by its owner -

Meanwhile Sue was revelling in the huge capstan -

and the blacksmith's tools, and their shadows -

Must admit the blacksmith's tools brought on a feeling of "oh where do you start" - so seeing that Sue had bitten off just what she could chew, working steadily along the row, strikes me as a good approach.

Textures and marks and pattern

As part of the CQ self-study group, I'm currently well into the mark-making exercise. While looking for some mark-making tools I came across some marks from previous times:

Marks of stitches, petrified into porcelain -

 (the tealight is to give a sense of scale)

Teeny-tiny ink marks, made by spraying the paper and then touching each droplet of water with a pointy brush loaded with ink -

"Inking the waterspots" is a meditative, mindless, random activity. You have some control over it - in the amount of spraying, and whether you catch the small scattered dots before they dry, or focus on the central area ... and how fast you work.

Trying out some tools - making the same sort of marks with each one, dabs and flicks and suchlike, and getting into some lines, shapes, and patterning despite myself.

Looking up mark making (there's a lot about mark making in early childhood!) I found this to be useful:

" Marks are like building blocks in that they are individual and discrete, but can be used in a repetitive manner to render almost any visual effect. Marks can be highly gestural and expressive, or controlled and mechanical. The degree to which artists can achieve certain desired effects is determined by their choice of tool, the nature of the medium used, and the quality of the gestures employed. Marks can be descriptive, expressive, conceptual, and symbolic in nature."

Gestures in the next sheet are circular - twiddling the brush. They're still a matter of wrist or finger gestures, though - it would be good to do something Very Big, whole-body gestures.

 Using a rigger and a fan brush in various linear ways -

Another approach - using marks to develop an idea, the stitches into paper that I haven't yet started. Right from the start, this was bound to develop into pattern-making -

Using a 3/4" flat brush (top) and a rigger for dots and dashes

Top left, the simple expedient of scribbling with the side of a rigger - the ink leaves interesting tones as it dries on coated paper -

 Other marks are developments of feather stitch, with the "thread" painted onto the back of the paper too, and ways of using the big flat brush, moving along to music.

By now the brush had developed a shape of its own, spreading out to each side, useful for making patterns -

 Closeups -

The randomness of the last one appeals to me more than the rigid pattern.

Seeing these "results" makes me feel impatient and dissatisfied. Is it freeing perhaps, or instructive perhaps, to do this sort of exercise again and again? I did find it helpful to have a starting point, like the idea of making "stitches", and to have a goal of a certain number of pages to fill - though probably if this was 50 pages rather than 5, there would be some sort of glass ceiling that would be broken through at some point, if only out of the desperation of "oh whatever can I do now".

Or maybe it's all part of "developing a vocabulary" - trying different things and seeing what you "like".

As for marks themselves, their components are (in my mind anyway) pressure, direction, and speed (ie, the gesture) - and perhaps extent, though an extensive mark could be called a line. Additional factors that give them variability are the medium (graphite, ink, etc), the tool used, and the substrate (eg type of paper).

Mysterious

The mystery isn't "who is the subject of this photo" - it's Coco Chanel; rather, it's a mystery to me why it's in my files! The layering and shadowing is rather fascinating; it could be a moment snapped by a papparazzo, though ... when? It has a timelessness... as does Chanel.

Chanel learned to sew during her convent education, and worked as a seamstress - and cafe entertainer. She began designing hats and became a licensed milliner in 1910, her Paris and Deauville shops financed by her lover, Arthur Capel. A subsequent shop in Biarritz was a big success, and by 1919 she was a licensed couturier. The rest is a history studded with stars and aristocrats.

She closed her fashion house, which employed 3000, at the start of the second world war, but relaunched in 1954, aged 70. She had introduced jersey, until then used for underwear, as a fashion fabric, and based her style on designs influenced by horseracing and yachting of the glamorous world she moved in. As well as the famous perfume, there's her famous Chanel suit, custom fitted to enable its wearers to perform daily activities with comfort and ease. And it was Chanel who made suntans not only acceptable, but denoting a life of leisure and privilege.

Stitched with paper thread

Japanese paper stitched with paper thread - the front is at the top, the back below. Here you can see the entire object - part of a costume, we are told. 

Paper thread is used to weave shifu, a rather special type of cloth. It's the thread itself I'm excited about - and you can make it yourself, how good is that? Have a look here. (It probably helps to be able to sit on the floor and to have reserves of patience and prior knowledge of spinning.) 

Failing the making of paper thread, it could be that some stitching into handmade paper will have to be done soon. 

Let us waste no time: As the first step(s) in this sudden endeavour, I have unearthed a big box of handmade paper, made in classes and at home about 20 years ago -

A frenzy of paper-making, last century

from which four sheets have been chosen to be gessoed - to get that wonderful whiteness -

It's pink, really...

From which procedure, I have learned to choose thick rather than thinner paper. One of the four sheets, now gessoed (on one side) and drying, has a delicate hole in it ... a happy accident perhaps...

As for what sort of thread to use instead of paper thread - and what sort of stitches: "we'll see".

Poetry Thursday - Ode to the Oyster Card by M@

For visitors to London, here's a poetic guide to using the Oyster Card...

Always touch in and always touch out,
When using your contactless card.
Except on a bus, where you only touch in,
Remember: it isn’t that hard.

Always touch in and always touch out,
When seeking a vehicle on rails.
Except on the tram, down old Croydon way,
Where touching out leads to big fails.

Always touch in and always touch out,
But don’t touch a thing in the middle.
Except if you travel through some outer zones,
Where pink readers add to the riddle.

Always touch in and always touch out,
Your card works on all transport modes.
Except for the bikes; to hire one of these,
You must dick around with pin codes.

Always touch in and always touch out,
You don’t need to wait in a line.
Except on the Clippers, where tickets are king,
You’ll need one to ride on the brine.

Always touch in and always touch out,
You’ll soon reach your maximum cap.
Except on the Javelin, Dangleway and Clippers,
Who’ll all give your wallet a slap.

Always touch in and always touch out,
You’ll find you can board any train.
Except for the grouchy old Heathrow Express,
Conformity is such a pain.

Always touch in and always touch out,
For Oyster is now here to stay,
Except that we’re shifting to contactless cards,
And the hipsters all use Apple Pay.

Words by M@. Image by Matthew Gidley in the Londonist Flickr pool.

Always something new to see in a tree

You walk along the same old paths and suddenly something "new" hits your eye. It's been there for ages, of course, but you've never noticed it before -

The darkness of the web of branches. Then, that angle... due to the tree being half out of the ground, leaning like that for some years --

 Helping to support it, a dead branch -

I'd been picking up bits of broken pottery from the path - shards are mixed in with sand and gravel used for repair - and some ended up as unobtrusive "land art" in a nearby trunk, wonderfully folded and rippled -

Daily delights

Some unexpected encounters ... while doing errands ...

The plant shop (which is also a pet supplies shop!) wrapped the cyclamen in paper before putting it in a bag for me ... shades of Winifred Nicholson's flowering plants wrapped in tissue ...

Add caption

At the library, how nice to run into Suzi - and to find these items from the reference collection on the sale trolley -

Reference volumes from the 1990s

 At the local organic shop, turmeric root is a new line ... but what do you do with it? -

Back home, my little garden is a blast of zinnia-brightness, with an excess of nasturtium leaves in some areas -

view from the path

view from the steps

Some people have cats ... this year, I have zinnias ...

Drawing Tuesday - China gallery, British Museum

A busy place, the Chinese gallery! We tucked ourselves into corners and let the hubbub wash over us.

My niche displayed objects from the Eastern Zhou and Western Zhou, which took over from the Shang dynasty in 1050 BC. It was in the Shang that bronze casting flourished and some amazing vessels were made (Jessica Rawson's book on the subject has been on my shelves since 1992). Later the motifs changed, from the tao tie "monsters" to plumed birds and dragons. 

A tao tie monster, part of a harness (3000 years old)

... another on a vessel

There were decorative motifs galore  - 

Serpents

More serpents, cunningly intertwined

Are they dragons? are they birds?

The interlacing makes logical sense, but getting it down on paper  was a bit of a problem for me.

After a page of patterns, wobbly ones at that, I moved on to vessel shapes - many are represented in the British Museum's collection of "ritual vessels". 

It often took a lot of looking to make out the patterning - though these coiled dragons were quite clear -

And behind the main patterns are a web of fine lines that were inscribed into the mold. Rather like the all-over patterns in Celtic art.

My plan to go back to the museum during the week and photograph the objects that the others had been drawing came to naught. You will have to take the drawings at face value.

Porcelain lions by Nathalia, and also some little objects she has at home -

2nd century pots and some large (mysterious) stone bars from Malaysia, made 2500-1500BC, drawn by Jo -

Having nipped along to the Indian gallery, Jo also captured "The Departure of Prince Siddhartha", his horse borne aloft by robed figures. This was mounted as part of a shrine at the entrance of a ruby-digging in Mogok, Burma, and was given reverence every time a miner was lowered by basket into the pit many metres deep -

Sue's porcelain ewer, phoenix-headed - " among the most remarkable of all Chinese ceramics; no closely comparable pieces have ever been excavated" -

Among Sue's other drawings, we were intrigued by the bundle of coins, which were part of a sword used for exorcism -