The Longest Day
yesterday went: Door find your o
today went: wn elsewhere.
Plus I did some of the blank area at the bottom. It was a midnight finish. I had a second wind, aided by playing Shirley Collins, kind like she was singing in my workshop really odd sensation. I was told the site will soon be ready for the other half of this work. I think it spurred me on as well.
At one point I had to lay on the floor totally unable to face a particularly convex e and the w was a real MOFO. I listended to church music which was by Hildegard Von Bingen…it was kind of astoral and really worked well, lasted ages before I had to change the CD. I passed through this door and went onto somewhere, cant quite explain where. It was relevant as this work will go in a ruined abbey…so astoral worked. I tried it a second time, later in the day but it had lost its magic.
I also worked out that ‘the cooler’ is the 12th workshop/studio I have used to work in. It is the longest I have worked anywhere, must be 5-6 years in there, not the biggest but manageable.
Inside the Cooler
Yesterdays work went like this:
back again. This
Another long day in cooler yesterday till about 11pm really mentally shuting down last night. Started to wonder how I was going to do the bits without lettering? A small world in my head with worries about how the white and off whites were distributed. Was there too much varition, not enough?
The fairies did not visit last night, I am waiting for them to continue the work while I sleep!
Such a small world in there. Playing Cd’s means getting up to change them when they finish which is a bit of a drag. Radio; endless talk about football managers. My head asks is the lower part of that c the right shape. Its such a small world with only your own thoughts. Yesterday was actually quite productive in terms of area covered, high price in my mind.
I feel fine today and enjoyed washing off the mess to see what yesterday looked like. Today will actually take me through ‘this. Door’ into somewhere beyond? But I know it will be that small place again….but I have to go there.
John Kenny Illustrator, was a total legend
My stint in the cooler finished at 11pm yesterday. I must be somewhere like 2 thirds, 3 quarters of the way through now. about a month of solitary, its not been too intense. But I am slowing down, and it really needs the momentum to keep running. I have stuff on the horizon which will keep me out of the cooler And another project banging on my door which will very much keep me in the cooler. I need this to keep moving forward.
I will spend another good long day in there today. Yesterdays work went like this o stone, . Then
The day before went: omed t
The day before that: n. Bloss
The fairies have not visited during the night.
Once I have started its not too bad. Starting is the problem. I have added an image by my favourite illustrator John Kenny http://www.ladybirdflyawayhome.com/pages/kenney.htm
and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_T._Kenney
who did Ladybird Books which I grew up with. This image shows how I feel, Alexander the Great’s army lost in the desert struggling for hundreds of miles in unknown lands. I feel like one of the soldiers on this march, and if I look back I can see the sick and fallen in the dust. His illustrations have stayed with me all these years. He did Thomas the Tank Engine and I belive some Airfix model boxes as well.
Got to keep going.
‘The Cooler’.
I’ve got to spend a lot of time in there. The faries don’t come during the night and progress the work.
I’ve done about 3 weeks so far. But the time has been dispersed with plenty of other activities so the ‘Lonely Madness’ has stayed away.
Todays work went like this:
ird, Where the
Tommorrows work is 150 miles away, so no Cooler for me for a day.
A Blast From The Past.
I had to go up into my loft the other day and while I was up there I rummaged for something else I had a feeling must be up there. Even though I knew there had been several of these in 1986, the question was…..was there any left.
The answer was Yes. One.
Here it is a slide of a painting of Steve MacQueen I did in 1986. It is oil on canvas and I poured a load of hot wax onto the canvas while I was painting it and worked into it directly. I dont know why, just a spur of the moment thing to see what would come out. I did actually sell this painting in a solo exhibition I had back then, to an Irish restaraunt owner called Thomas O’conner.
Ever since I started this blog called the Cooler King I remembered I did this painting and thought I must look to see if I have a slide of it. Back then slides were the main tool for showing work.
So here he is The Cooler King.
