New paintings and regular art updates.
Just doodling, keeping my hands busy. I might find something to paint but I’m going to give up my studio at Spode as I can no longer afford it. I’m sad because it feels like quitting and I don’t want to but you can only do what you can do. I’m going to try and find a cheaper studio. In the meantime I have a lot of art work that I hope I can get sold. It’s time I had a sale. We will see what happens.
I saw this at tonight’s performance and it made me chuckle. The way the lights are set up looks like eyes and a mouth. The shadow above like a set of long wolf like ears! The pinkness is really dramatic.
I have always seen faces and patterns in everyday shapes. Like paintings of flowers that look like lions to me, or the spindly abstract pattern of tree branches turning into a galloping horse. It’s a phenomenon called Pareidolia.
This could also be a riotous robot, a frankenstein style monster, or a dancing ghost, see what I mean?
I just got back from a Claybody Theatre production, an Audience with Toby Jones. He’s the actor who recently appeared as Mr Bates (in Mr Bates versus the Post Office) the sub postmaster who was accused with hundreds of others of stealing money from the post office when it was actually the horizon computer system that had caused the problems. The ITV drama he was in really bought the scandalous treatment of sub postmasters out into the open.
He’s also been in the Detectorists, played Truman Capote, played Neil Baldwin in Marvellous and has been in many more plays, films and TV series. He also played Dobbie the House Elf in Harry Potter.
Toby Jones talked about his university experience, his further studies with a French drama school, how he went from wanting to be a director to being an actor. As he explained he doesn’t have control of what’s coming up. Actors are lucky to get parts and they have to go with whats available. He explained he’s not bothered about fame, and came across as a genuine and funny person. He had come to Spode in Stoke upon Trent to support Claybody Theatre.
His father was the actor Freddie Jones and had lived in Longton in Stoke-on-Trent. He had taken up acting quite late in life and Toby wasn’t sure if he wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps.
It was a thoroughly interesting evening. I was so glad to have seen him in person.
Artrage oils drawing from several years ago. This is the free version of the app. You only have the oil pen tools but it certainly can be used to create interesting effects. I like this a lot, I used the metallic option to give it this sheen. If you tone down the metallic effect the colours become paler and you can draw over the darker parts (where I have outlined the bird) as it seems to be more opaque and covers over the darker areas.
A local author and friend, called Fred Hughes, wrote an article on Facebook and in our local paper talking about how, as he has grown older, he has found himself crying more. One example he gives is when the Leopard Hotel in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, burnt down two years ago. He lives nearby and found himself bought to rears because of all his memories of what had happened in that place, meeting people, enjoying good company and hospitality. He said that apparently hormonal changes can affect men because they are bought up to be stoic and strong. It must be a real shock to the system to allow grief and sadness out.
I think crying is good for you. Women do seem to be able to cry more often? I have wailed and cried and felt deep grief recently, not least because of the Leopard fire. The last two years have affected me a lot with various events. I’m not a stoic person although I try, when you have worked with people you have to try and stay professional. But without crying I would have exploded!
Snoozing cat having a lie in after a night on the tiles? He snores, he dreams, paws twitching. He greets me with a little purr. I think I have got three familiars (I have two other cats). They all have different traits but they are all very loving.
I don’t name them on here because of online security. I could call them all by pseudonym, but I don’t think it matters. They are big, medium and small!
This is big (used to be ‘outside’ cat), he sometimes pushes the cat flap door loose because he has got quite fat. He has a barrel shaped belly and seems quite content. When we first met him as an abandoned cat he was already an adult, I guess he’s over 13 years old now. Middle aged and happy.
Cat playing with toy mouse. He pounced on it when he came in from the garden. It’s good to see him happy, belly up. He snuck in past my other boy cat and grabbed it before the other one saw it. He’s throwing it around now.
I usually get the cats catnip toys a couple of times a year. I have a box full of old toys that they still sometimes play with. Cats are funny creatures, they make me laugh when they fling toys about. But I’d rather they play with toys than real animals. X
My hubby had a blue scrap book he wrote in about his life. A4 pages that have anecdotes of when we got together, his thoughts about college, other things that meant a lot to him. About thirty years ago we visited Laugharne in Wales and went to the Boathouse where Dylan Thomas used to live. There was a museum about his life and a cafe. Hubby kept the receipt for two coffees and two Welsh cakes. That was in the book….
Then we walked up the steps from the Boathouse and along the path to where Dylan writing hut sat above the river estuary. We looked into his shed and could see papers and books and pens as he had left it. I remember the green of the trees and sparkling water.
We walked back along the path through a wood and down through a churchyard where I think he might be buried, then into the little town of Laugharne itself. We called into Brown’s hotel? If I remember correctly, I think it might have been where he drank. We chatted about Dylan life. Hubby loved his work and had taped himself reading some of his writing. I think we might still have the tapes, but I doubt if our cassette player would play them.
It was a perfect day, part of a week’s visit to Tenby and it’s surroundings. I wish I could time travel back.
The train stamps were on the same page in the book. Another love of his.
If he saw this tractor he would have known exactly who the maker was. A Fordson , John Deere, Zeta, New Holland, Massey Ferguson?
He knew by their colours /livery., by their shape, by the setup of the wheels. Whether they were row-crop tractors, diesel, paraffin. So much knowledge.
I used to guess what sort they were and he would congratulate me or correct me. Now has gone, I can’t remember.
We would sometimes go to agricultural shows. Hubby would have a pint in the beer tent, avoiding wasps, have a bite to eat, and then watch the tractor or steam traction engine parades in the main show ring. Then a ride on the steam gallopers, or trying to win a teddy bear on the air gun shooting range.
Memories are what I have….
When he was young he used to climb
But I had no head for heights
He’d climb down cliffs
Or up tall pikes
While I stood by in fear
He’d disappear below my view
And I would cower in dread
Till he came back from his perch
On steps above the sea.
He never slipped, or dropped or fell
I was so proud of him
While I crawled on hands and knees
A victim of vertigo,
Atop the smallest hill!
Now he had fallen out of sight
Never to reappear
But I will wait and hope one day
I’ll join him safely, my fate?
Mallaband-Brown