I would be healthy

Describe your life in an alternate universe.

I would be happy and healthy.

Looking into another universe…

Another reality, another world, options widen out. I changed my lifestyle and health. A small butterfly flicks it’s wing in 1974 causing an earth tremor in ’89. No cycling at night, no accident. No drinking late into the night in my 20s, no regrets.

Take a job drawing canal landscapes in a different city. Stop being afraid to do more art, maybe I should have not done a long term job over many years that increased my stress levels?

Some of this happened, some didn’t, it depends what reality I have my feet in? Doc Martins and a  punk lifestyle, low heels and a suit, multicoloured, paint splattered happiness?

Yes, changing my mental and physical health would have been my choice.

Based on…

Top painting by Theodore Gericault of a French peasant woman. I used it to base my picture on. The bottom painting is my portrait of Molly Leigh. I know mine is a bit rough round the edges, but I wanted her to look wise with a glint in her eye. I hope now I’m getting my sight sorted out things will improve. I will try and keep posting here but I may have to be careful how much I do.

My Molly

My portrait of Molly Leigh the Burslem Witch. Painted after my mural of her at the Leopard Hotel in Burslem burnt down a couple of years ago. Acrylic on canvas.

It was used as a prop in the Who is Molly Leigh? opera that was on last week. I was so proud and excited to be able to display it in public. I like creating narrative pieces of art as well as portrait so of people which I would say is my speciality. I’d like to poss create further portraits of Stoke-on-Trent famous people… Just a thought.

First Night

Paddy, one of my set paintings

Tonight was the first performance of the opera, Who is Molly Leigh?

I enjoyed singing in the choir and got to watch a couple of scenes. We sing in the final scene and question who Molly Leigh was? Was she real, was she a myth? It’s amazing how it’s all come together. I’m pleased to say the audience enjoyed it.

I’m absolutely shattered now! I went to the fish and chip shop to get tea because I’m to tired to microwave something, but it’s going cold in the kitchen because I sat down and I’m too achy to get back up! Might have a nap.

Fire

Today I painted a fire for the play Who is Molly Leigh…. Not the fire surround or the hearth, or the objects around it, but a piece of cardboard with a brick chimney backing  painted on it and a coal fire burning strongly in the grate.

I asked another maker what she thought and she felt the flames should be more yellow and red, but the photo I worked from showed bright white flames surrounded by glowing yellow, orange, and red. It’s funny how people’s imaginations have stereotypical ideas of how things should look. I really enjoyed adding bright colours in between the coals to make it look really hot.

Painting and reading

Which activities make you lose track of time?

When I paint I lose track of time, the world goes away. Sometimes I lose myself completely. I know I feel pain in my arms nowadays, and I can’t always focus on the tip of my brush because I get slight double vision. But I have to do it. I’m under a compulsion to spread liquid onto a hard or soft surface (board, wall, or canvas) and recreate images or come up with ideas of my own….

My other passion is reading, I rarely read a book from cover to cover anymore unless it’s very short, my hands stick in place, my trigger fingers play up and I get cramp in them. But I do like using reading to send myself to sleep. I’m currently rereading The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton. It’s a sci-fi novel set in the 1960’s? It’s also a very good film…. He was the author of Jurassic Park by the way.

Goodnight, off to bed to read….I might just lose track of time again. X