Another filter
Another day
Another drawing
With which to play.
Some of them work
Some of them don’t
But without trying?
You never learn nowt!
(Nowt in The UK is slang for nothing)….
Solarised
Tag: Learning
Fireflies
Imagine a glass box of fireflies all flying around. Cold light from their abdomens? Could you use it as a torch, or would they all settle down in a corner and go to sleep? I wouldn’t want to catch them and trap them so I will use LED lights instead.
We have choices, we don’t have to trap or kill anything, we don’t have to be cruel. We can try and do better than we do. Realise people are not perfect. Learn to forgive if we can. Let the fireflies fly free.
Up and down
At the moment I’m up and down. One minute trying to plan things, the next remembering what has happened. Disbelief is my main emotion. That and loss. I feel like writing things down is helping a bit, so I’m here, blogging and sharing my thoughts. I hope that’s OK for people. I’m gradually working things out, grateful that I have hubby, friends and family there for support. When you lose a relative it’s a shock. I have cried, I will cry again, how long for, I don’t know. Its turmoil and chaos sometimes, then I calm down for a while. X
Mourning and bereavement
When you lose someone it is complex and confusing. Especially when it is a sudden event. First there is disbelief, and that keeps flooding back. I keep wanting to talk to the person who is gone. Then I swear at them! Angry with them. Asking why did it happen? It’s unbelievable and shattering. Everything is on hold, I can’t decide what to do for the best. I’ve talked to lots of people, shared some of my feelings. I hope that’s the right thing to do. Life seems bad at the moment but at least I’m still trying to cope. Sleep is another problem. If you see me here late at night I might just be trying to take my mind off things.
Where have all the clouds gone?
Parts of Britain and France are turning brown, fires are burning in France. Its happening across Europe. Its happening in America. Where has the rain gone? Crops are withering in places where the monthly rainfall has dwindled to almost nothing. Will the climate recover? Will rainfall be abundant again? The weather has only been overheated for a short time, but the damage is being done. What will happen in the future if we don’t reduce Carbon emissions and slow the increase in temperature we are currently experiencing? We are such a destructive species and we have started to overwhelm Earth. We only have one planet. Let’s try and take care of it.
Sleep and dream.
Insomnia is a nuisance. It’s upset my sleep pattern for years. I still have trouble sleeping but someone told me a way of trying to alleviate the problem. I was told to think of the word ‘the’ to help me sleep. ‘the’ has nothing to latch onto, so while your brain is thinking of the word ‘the’ it’s hard to think of anything else. It actually seems to work for me.
It’s been a few weeks and I’ve actually found that I can get better sleep. My mind is sneaky though and as I’m starting to drift off it seems to insert the worries I’m trying to avoid, then I have to go back to ‘the’ again…. And sometimes again.
Another effect is that I’m having dreams, lots of them, I can’t remember them, but they seem quite interesting at the time. Maybe I should write them down.
Cat time
Cat time, time for your cat. To love them, feed them, play with them, let them ignore you, hide from you. Disagree with your choice of food for them. Accept that sometimes they will bring you unwanted ‘presents’. They go away for a few days, just so they can worry you. Eat your food off your plate, ignore the toys and treats you get them. Sitting in empty boxes so you can’t throw them away.
When your cat friend scratches or bites you it’s probably because you have been a bit heavy handed or frightened them. It’s always better to be gentle. Remember that a cat is probably a fifty or hundred times smaller than you! They have interesting and intelligent abilities, it’s good to find out about them. X
Experiment
When you’ve got a painting partly done it’s interesting to use a photograph app to play with it and see if there are things you can do to change it. Having done this I don’t think I will take it in this direction, but I may change things a bit. I need to have calm areas as well as jazzy patterns, otherwise I think it will be too much just an all over pattern.
My portfolio
One of my portfolio pages on screen. I was pleased by some of the comments about my book. Juxtaposing black and white images against coloured abstract ‘scales’ drawings. I’m not keen on PowerPoint but it’s better than Word for trying to position images. In Word the pages skip about and then you find your picture on one page and the title or the description on another. Now all I need to do is think about getting the book published if I can.
I passed!
I have just received my marks and I have passed the MA in illustration!
Now for the anti- climax I guess. The world is still spinning, I still have my difficulties to deal with. Its funny how you build yourself up and worry, then you get your marks and they are still there. But it is an achievement at one stage I wasn’t sure I wanted to carry on. I got a decent mark too and some pointers on how I could have taken my research further. Will I ever write MA after my name? I don’t think so xx
Mallaband-Brown 