I always enjoy Claudia McGill’s poems for their quirky nature, none more so than her ‘Little Vines’, which she has been propagating for a number of years.
This one from her recent post reminded me, of one of my all time favourite cartoons by Clement. *
4338.
Simpering clams, you said?
No, simmering clams.
Oh. I did wonder how you could tell.
* I think this cartoon dates from the early 1990’s. I have kept it in my recipe book since I cut it out from the newspaper.
For a few months now I have been joining a group of people via Zoom for Sunday Art Time. They live on the other side of the world to me and I didn’t know any of them when this started. That hasn’t stopped us getting together for an hour each week just to chat and make art.
Working with collage and simple book forms let’s me make work that can be finished in one or two sessions. I like the ability to make a work quickly, given most of my serious textile work takes ages to complete.
I have also found some good ideas from the broader reaches of the “junk journaling ” movement, such as cutting up large print books for useful phrases.
These mini-zines and collages give rein to the less formal (aka sillier) side of my art and has given me a lot of enjoyment in these grim times.
You can find some other examples on my collage|books|zines page.
I like this juxtaposition of my latest collage with the cover of a book on Degas’ monotypes.
Then in a random act of art I have left it in a niche we found near a local path. I hope it finds a new owner.
Last week we finally left our Canberra for the first time in months to drive an hour away to the country town of Braidwood.
The village of Braidwood started to form around the 1840s and has retained many of it’s older 19th century buildings along the main street. As such, it’s a great place to sketch.
I was sketching across the road from the CWA (Country Women’s Association) building and the post office and then later further down the main street into town.
My first sketch was made on a page that I had prepared with white gesso and ink a few weeks back. I also collaged some paper onto my page, which I had made by printing from a gelli (gel) plate. That saved me from having to paint the mountain.
Along the street my eye was caught by an interesting combination of rooflines and light poles.
I was just getting stuck into my blind contour drawing when I had to go for lunch which we had booked at the Albion Cafe.
I liked this last one best of all. It’s probably a good thing that we had to go to lunch before I ruined it.
Artist Rebecca Mayo has launched a collaborative art program examining “the role of trees during uncertain times”. Participants are being invited to take a rubbing of their favourite local tree. She asks “Has this slower paced, looped walking (where we set off to get out of the house, rather than to reach a physical destination) allowed us to pay a new kind of attention to our neighbourhoods and what grows there?”
I received my kit last week and took advantage of the relatively windless conditions to take a rubbing of my favourite tree. In this case one of the remnant Eucalyptus melliodora (Yellow Box), that started life on Ngunnawal land (before European colonisation), survived pastoralism and having a suburb and an oval built around it. We guesstimate that the trunk is more than 3 metres in circumference (I forgot to measure the rubbing before I sent it off).
I had some help with friends to hold the paper as I circumnavigated the tree’s large circumference.
We also had some discussions with passers by who were happy to share their thoughts on this tree with us.
The rubbings will form the basis of an exhibition by Rebecca to be held at the Tuggeranong Arts Centre in 2021.
