Random Writes.

Leaf Sewing: The Next Generation.

The mess in my studio has reached critical mass, I can’t begin to describe the layers of…well mess. I start to sort it out, titivate around the edges, I put like with like and throw out anything mouldy or rancid. And then I come across a dried up leaf conglomerate but as it almost leaves my hand on its way to the bin, I remember what it is.

In the summer we were invited to a neighbour’s special birthday barbeque party, it was a lovely day in their beautiful garden with a live band and even livelier dancing on the lawn. Early on, finding my way to the glorious pop-up bar (installed in the garden shed) I passed a very large fig-tree, oddly moving and shedding leaves. As I got closer I saw four little girls inside busily pulling off leaves and branches. They were making a den and the bit of me that is still six, got quite excited, growing up in a big family with a large garden in a village provided endless den-making opportunities.

However, I had a simultaneous thought from the tidy well-behaved part of me that worries about the fig trees and possible damage. Looking on was the hostess and grandmother of one of the girls, I relayed my thoughts to her and she replied that she didn’t mind at all, the fig tree would grow back and if the shed had not been turned into a bar she would have fetched her saw to help the children with their den. My admiration for her increased.

Later the girls left their den and were clustered, heads together on the grass. They were sewing leaves. In my previous blog Two Steps Backwards I sewed leaves, well darned leaves to be specific. Each girl had two large fig leaves and a collection of long sharp pine needles which they were using both as needle and thread (See picture). I felt like an early anthropologist coming across some potentially ground-breaking evidence of huge ethnographical importance. And I could not help think about gender itseemed to me thatthere was something so essentially female in their behaviour. I talked to the girls about what they were doing, they were making purses they said, and explained their use of materials and techniques with great seriousness. It made me think about something called Isolate Song, that is: pure birdsong the part not learned by imitating the parent, the part the bird is born with. Perhaps playing in nature releases our own wild, Isolate Song still available to us in childhood and might explain why to me as an adult, it seems almost unbearably precious.

Nurture and Nature debates aside, I am collecting leaves again which is a great distraction from clearing out my studio.

My thanks to: Ella, Connie, Willow and Grace.

What do Artists do on Holiday? Part 3. (Final part)

One day I was sitting on the beach writing and something happened that I would in the past have always drawn or painted. Perhaps because I already had a notebook in my hands or maybe I was too lazy to set out paints, I remembered the opening passage of Iris Murdoch’s The Sea The Sea and I think a superbly artistic depiction. I decided to write a painting. It felt deliciously subversive and yet when I wrote the blog post yesterday I felt shyly reluctant to share this new thing. It is a serious attempt to bridge the widening gap between writing and making, I have no idea where this is going…

A Word Drawing.

The sky is the colour of mouthwash and out of the still sea, mountains rise like the backs of dinosaurs, the shallows are oily flat and edged with turquoise.

Nearby a man sits high on terracotta rocks cleaning fish, a large bird stands at a respectful distance. The man’s hands move in an easy repeating rhythm, broken only to throw fish guts into the sea which boils in anticipation. Occasionally he tosses a small silver fish to the bird, careful not to make eye contact. The bird grateful for this cross-species generosity warily hops from one foot to the other held back by an invisible force-field.

The man’s body is the same colour as the rocks, his olive shorts sun-dried and salt-stiff. If you didn’t know he was there you wouldn’t see him as so perfectly does he assimilate into the landscape.

What do Artists do on holiday? Part 2.

But there were times when I wished I could just be on holiday like a normal person and not driven to turn every encounter into a pop-up studio…

…And then, one day we drove up a mountain to a fantastic monastery, there was a very deep cave with an exquisite pale blue hidden chapel, it was as cold inside as it was hot outside, you could see your breath. The views were stunning, colours amazing but I felt that same niggling restlessness and then I noticed a dark doorway and peering inside saw a monk in dark robes, on the floor in front of him was a small, very pregnant cat and in front of her a silver dish with money in it. The monk was explaining something earnestly to some German tourists and I guessed he was asking for money for the upkeep of the cat. As a very large German man bent down to put a coin in the dish, the monk simultaneously whipped out a feather duster (Ken Dodd style) and stuck it between the man’s legs, causing him to yelp with shock and then laugh heartily but not quite as heartily as the monk. It was a really bizarre unexpected comedy happening.

My husband shot me a look guessing what I was about to do…I really didn’t expect Father Simon to agree to sit for me, but it turns out he is an artist too, he paints religious icons to sell to the tourists. Well that night I couldn’t sleep for excitement and had to get up very early to get a bigger sketchbook in the town but I can honestly say drawing and talking with Father Simon was one of the highlights of the holiday. Originally from Syria he has been at the monastery for seven years and is very involved with the pastoral care of the islanders. Wherever I went everybody seemed to know him. He was one of those rare people who can be perfectly himself in another’s company, not needing to speak but somehow tacitly encouraging. His face at rest was less twinkly and more reflective and I imagined him as a vessel for other people’s troubles. So deeply did I get into this drawing that I would forget his vocation until someone asked him about detailed aspects of his ministry followed by a lively and techie iphone disscussion.

When the drawing was finished he saw that I was covered in lead dust and insisted on taking me into his private apartment to use his bathroom instead of the tourist’s paperless, outside toilet. He also insisted on a photo session even though I promised to come the next day with a photocopy. On the last visit I gave him a good paintbrush for his icons and in return he gave me an alabaster bust of Pythagorous. I absolutely have to go back with a bigger piece of paper.

http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g644219-d2693876-Reviews-Monastery_of_Panagia_Spiliani-Pythagorion_Samos_Northeast_Aegean_Islands.html

What do Artists do on Holiday?

So, we went off on holiday to the lovely Greek island of Samos, the first proper holiday for a while. We planned for rest, sunbeds, swimming, eating, you know, the sort of stuff regular people do on holiday. The first few days we did all those things but I am ashamed to say, that I felt restless, uneasy. On the third day I started collecting bits of salt-dried, sea-tumbled, plastic in beautiful harmonic colours. I got out my paints and didled about trying to be Paul Klee (too horrible to show) finally managed a freehand fairly spontaneous watercolour of my husband (too personal to show).

Later in the evening we stopped at a local café on our way to dinner and I saw three wonderful old ladies sitting together and something about the strength of their faces made me want to get my pencil out. None of them spoke English, one spoke a little French about as well as me, so we didn’t get very far. Fortunately the café owner acted as interpreter and negotiated a drawing session for me the following evening, I immediately felt better, re-oriented, purposeful.

When my children were small, I used to spend a lot of my holiday painting anything I could get my eyes on. My husband would happily take the children off, knowing that I would reciprocate while he went fishing, we had an understanding. I am now wondering about other artists, am I particularly obsessive? In fact the only holiday where I made no creative effort at all was directly after the finish of my M.A. studies. I sat drained of all creativity, on a beach unable to be a holiday maker without a creative process.

When I got to the café the following night, the ladies were there waiting impassively. I learned from the owner of the café, that they were in their eighties and had been friends since primary school and separated only by war. Unfortunately my small sketchbook ruled out a group drawing and I was forced to draw them singly. Toula went first and as I got into the drawing which had to be fast (20 minutes-ish each) Aphrodite kept bobbing up and going behind me to see and gave a running commentary to her compatriots-catching sight of her face she seemed deeply unimpressed. Aphrodite sat next and visibly softened under my intense gaze, I think won over by the attention and then lovely Maria. It was a wonderful experience for me as relieved of the necessity to speak, I could completely focus on their unfamiliar faces and there was still the transaction of communication, a heightened awareness of each other.

This was the real start to my holiday, from that point every excursion seemed to lead to another encounter. The museum in Samos Town is truly amazing, I spent a morning there intending several drawings but never got past a beautiful statuette of a Kuroi, boy soldier. While drawing I met and talked to several interesting people including museum staff and visitors.

Likewise, at our favourite restaurant I saw a young waitress and I was struck by her open face and wonderful way with customers, it was clear she loved her job. The beautiful Patrizia happily agreed to sit for me. Drawing her was a joy especially as she spoke good English and slowly I learned more about her. Of mixed Italian and Dominican Republic parentage, she was staying in a room behind the Bakery and worked every day of the season with no time off, she was returning to Italy within the week.

I returned with photocopies to the café where the three old ladies were completely underwhelmed to see me, until I promised to put them in the blog at which they became very animated. I would love to know whet they really thought about the drawings…

There’s more in Part 2.