New paintings and regular art updates.
I’ve added a cleaning service on my phone. But it seems to have done slightly too much of a deep clean on it, or at least that’s my guess as a non technical person.
My WordPress account is shooting straight across to Facebook again. I will have to try and get help sorting it out. It is annoying, it makes me feel like chaos is taking over….
So apologies if my posts are a bit confused.
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It’s been suggested that I carry on with this, so I will try…
I closed the front door and reached for the light switch. Nothing, the house was in darkness. My partner was not about. I used my phone to light the livingroom while I tried to find the fuse box. But when I checked none of the fuses had tripped.
I tried the light at the other end of the room, but it was the same. Normally we leave a table lamp on if we go out, but this was off too?!
What was going on? The room was freezing and dark, the curtain was open on the side window of the house so a glimmer of sodium street light trickled in.
I walked past the barometer. The pressure had dropped. The snow was starting to drift past the window again. I could see snow flakes falling silhouetted by the street light.
I realised that I still had not heard my partner. I moved back to the front door and opened it. Any foot prints on the pavement had been covered by the drifting snow. What next? I walked through the kitchen to the back door. It was locked and the key was still it. Even so I opened the door to look out. I was not surprised to see a cats eyes reflecting back at me, there are always stray cats hanging around for hand outs.
But the eyes looking back at me looked larger than normal, bright gold, glinting. Perhaps a fox? I slowly closed the door, not daring to take my eyes off the steady gaze until it was locked shut.
Feeling dizzy and worried I used the light from my phone to climb the stairs. Thinking all the time that maybe I should have knocked on my neighbours door? The memory of people walking upstairs in horror films also crept into my mind.
“Hello” “you’re home early” my partners voice came from a chair by the window …..
(I’m not carrying on with this tonight, leaving it as a bit of a cliffhanger).
This popped up in my Facebook memories today. I have removed my partners name….
Another Sunday morning, my partner went off about 15 minutes ago, and me and Molly cat are here waiting for the sun to rise. The sky had gone from coal black to a dark shade of Paynes Grey, in fact in the few minutes since I sat down it has lightened considerably….. The cat is happily lying on the desk next to the computer, turning over to have her tummy tickled, she doesnt like being ignored and keeps trying to sit on my drawing tablet that also acts as my mouse! that knocks the text off so I have to reposition the cursor every couple of minutes…The blackbirds were singing in the garden at 6.30, hubby went out to listen and one carried on while the other Pink, pinked its alarm call… the song continues high and beautiful, shapely whistles that vary over different combinations of notes…. I am staying up in case my partners bus does not arrive,. One last look at the sky, only slightly lighter, blue grey, no glimmer of sun yet and overcast with lowish cirrus? clouds…thank goodness for the prospect of a warm bed and a book if hubby does not come back. (It has happened in the past when the bus driver forgot to get up!).
(I think the photos were taken a bit later on the same day.)
I’m a sucker for patterns. If I can’t think of any other art to do I will draw a pattern on my phone or tablet then play with it.
I do wonder where my ideas come from. I must be very visual. I never feel comfortable unless I’ve got something to look at. Minimalism is not for me.
I once had to live in a student residence while I was on placement somewhere. I had a room with a bed and a desk and chair. Blank walls. That dingey pale grey /blue /green that public buildings are painted. One kitchen between about 16 rooms and a toilet and shower block.
No home comforts and it was the start of November and I was based there for a months placement. I could only come home at weekends.
I went out and bought a couple of sheets of wrapping paper. A newspaper, a party bag made out of holographic shiny metallic paper. Also a few postcards and a sketch book.
By the end of the day I had 42 (honestly) pictures, photos, patterned paper, the beautiful wrapping paper all stuck up on the walls .. Then I felt much better… Its my visual brain you see…..
Things are changing on planet Mallaband-Brown so you might notice a few tweaks here and there thanks to my friend Mike from @staffsdesign.
I wanted to update my social media and make it easier for people to follow me. Being an artist has made me a lot happier and nows the time to try and make it work.
I didn’t realise amalgamating all my Web pages and sites would be so complicated and I’m so pleased to have had someone to sort everything out.
This is also a test to see whether it posts to my new Facebook page.
You should be able to follow me on the Internet at @mallabandbrown !
Excuse the picture. I tried to draw what Ultima Thule looked like.
I just watched a programme called “the sky at night” a BBC programme about the Nasa New Horizons mission that flew past a tiny planetoid called Ultima Thule (pronounced Thooley) on 1st January 2019. This was the same probe that sent back beautiful photos of Pluto a couple of years ago. Ultima Thule is only 21 miles long and the probe showed that it is made up of two lumpy spheres of material stuck together at a neck. There is only one clearish photo so far but they also know that it probably is a red colour. The pictures they published have been brightened to show details but the thing is probably a dark red colour.
The probe was apparently travelling at around 15 kilometres a second so it sped past Ultima Thule and is now several hundred kilometres past it and travelling further into the Kuiper belt (a ring of debris spread in a flat layer around the outer edge of the solar system). New horizons is nuclear fueled because solar panels would not work in the darkness so far from the sun.
It will take two years to stream all the data thay have collected from the probe back to Earth. This is the furthest world we have ever seen close up.
I love informative programmes like the Sky at Night. Its been on TV since the 1960’s I think. I have learnt a lot about astronomy over the years from it.
I just found this old photo from 2013. We were on the churnet valley light railway for a fun day out and when we got to Froghall Station at the far end we found a Dalek trundling up and down the platform!
It was surreal. I’ve been watching Dr Who on and off since it first started in the 1960’s. It’s a British Sci fi series about a time lord that travels through time and space in a TARDIS (time and relative dimensions in space). One of the doctors arch enemies were the daleks. Now the doctor has regenerated. ( the part has changed over the years, with different actors playing the part). The part is now being played by Jodie Whittaker, and despite concerns she would not be any good I think she’s excellent.
This new years eve Dr Who was a favourite. The Daleks (or at least one) returned. It seems we will have to wait a year till the next series. I wish it was sooner, I need a tardis!
There is a form of art called graffiti that has been created for centuries. But there is a modern take on it by artists creating pictures using stencils. The most famous of these is called Banksy.
Recently a painting has appeared on a garage wall in a Welsh town called Port Talbot. It’s of a fire burning on a garage and a young girl standing in that pose when you are standing in the snow, arms and face held upwards with the snow falling on them. But in this case the snow is actually the ashes falling down from the fire. I think it questions what sort of world young children are growing up in. Banksy paintings are worth a lot of money, so a fence has been erected around this one. His work has been defaced, painted over, removed and sold, and in one case shredded. It all goes to show what an influence he is having.
Art is fascinating because it is ubiquitous. Without it what a dull place the world would be. If we have to have graffiti I would prefer a Banksy to rude or crude images that sometimes appear on local walls. Art can be interesting, startling, ugly or beautiful. As can life.
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I did a calculation today because I love newspapers and we get them virtually every day, but a friend asked how we could afford it…..
The result was scary! It turns out if we buy a paper every day of the week it costs hundreds of pounds!
Hiw on earth didn’t I realise this. My partner also buys a magazine every week… Help!
Luckily I’ve realised if I subscribe just for the weekday papers it would cost 2/3 the price (or we could stop buying it completely, which is possibly the more sensible option.
We want to keep informed and find out what’s going on in the world. But with fake news on the Internet and a biased press I prefer to read a paper I trust…. So we will consider the subscription route.
Now there once were giant people throughout the lands. The Southern Giants were strong and smart, they were made of copper and bronze and shone in the sunlight. But the Northern Giants were also strong, and as they lived in the winter lands they were made of ice as hard as Iron. They could breath ice and snow when they fought. Because of this they were known as the Ice Giants.
After many years of war, Ralf, King of the Southern giants went to fight with them. He knew that if he did not win his lands would be forfeit and his wife would be killed by his enemies.
Lora, his wife, was scared when he told her his plans, but she knew he would have to go to save their fellow giants.
She watched him leave and cried tears which fell into her lap and made a huge pool of liquid copper, each tear making a ripple many feet high.
As she waited she thought she heard him calling her, she stood up and the copper spilled onto the ground, making a lake of copper at the base of the mountains where they lived.
Meanwhile in the North the Giants fought each other to a standstill. Ralf was winning, but as the battle came to an end one Ice Giant hit a fatal blow against him. He was dying but he hit back and felled the last Ice Giant.
His wife foresaw his death and started to weep again, she could not bear his loss. Her tears flowed over the land. Then the wind strengthened from the North. Forcing Lora to stand and start to run from its freezing grip. She was so tall that her tears fell from such a great height that they froze solid and shattered as they hit the ground.
It is said that there is a land in the south where her tears sit like trees in a forest, they are so many. And if you are far away you see the autumn colours of their copper and bronzes glinting in the sunlight.
Mallaband-Brown