More lepidopterophobia

And now,
here's some REALY beautiful things about butterflies:

Alex Earl lampshade

Butterfly Ball by Diffuse Studio

Oh and this incredibly gorgeous chandelier, which - in fact - is made out of... fairies :-)

designed by bodo sperlein as part of the re-cyclos collection for lladro, the niagara chandeliers feature porcelain butterflies suspended on sideglow optic fibers. ceiling rose is fireproof black lacquer. 150W halide projector.

my work: Lepidopterophobia - fear of butterflies (1)

I do not have a fear of butterlies. However, I have a friend who does. I can really see where she is coming from: butterflies look careless and colourful as they flutter aimlessly, but one close look reveals their hairy heads and alien eyes.
Horrible creatures.
Well.
For some.

Affected by all this (above) I tried to make a book. Oooh, dear! Because of the nature of the course I am on, I am so conscious about making specifically artist's books. And it is really not good to be conscious about it - I tend to produce rubbish when I am.
Anyway, I made a book, trying to deal with the restrictive power of fear: how it paralyses our senses and our ability to think clearly. Pages do not fully open for the butterflies: the text inside is very hard to read.






I don't think much of this book (or most of the others I have made). It could be an interim stage to somewhere else. I like the simple quality of it and the structure, but I find it lacking substance. The stuff I said about Charlotte Cory. I should find ways to dig deeper, but still look like fun.

"Introducing Wittgenstein" to those who get easily bored

That could be me :-)

Heaton and Groves show, that one does not have to bore readers shitless when dealing with the "serious" philosophy. Fantastic illustrations and a great sense of humor throughout the book.

In Introducing Wittgenstein we meet a strange man, a rigorous logician who prized poetry above philosophy, who inherited a fortune and gave it away, who sought death in the trenches of the First World War, a great teacher who advised his students to give up philosophy, a solitary man who nonetheless inspired lifelong friendships. We are also given a clear and accessible guide to Wittgenstein's central works.

88 Constellations for Wittgenstein

Witgenstein has been extremely well written about and painted about. As a result, it is hard to come across something fresh. Especially, because a lot of the visual artists seem to have a very bleak grasp of Wittgensteins ideas (or any other language matters, in fact). I will get back to this subject later.

Anyway, here's what I have found and I thought it was really good and really well made.

“88 Constellations for Wittgenstein (to be played with the Left Hand)” is an interactive artwork by David Clark. The piece is a sprawling, non-linear contemplation of the life and work of the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein consisting of 88 interactive flash animations each corresponding with one of the 88 constellations in the night sky. The viewer is invited to navigate through a maze of interconnecting narratives – moving from association to association – in a way that brings Wittgenstein’s work into conversation with our contemporary digital culture. As a nod to Wittgenstein’s concert pianist brother Paul who lost his right arm in World War One but continued to perform work for the left hand, the piece invites the viewer to ‘play’ with the collages using the left hand on the computer keyboard.

At the centre of piece is the number 88. It is both the number of keys on the conventional piano and the number of constellations in the night sky (as determined by contemporary science). Music and the night sky both seem to me to stir up the limits of our understanding of existence. The constellations also provided me with a structure. The work is like a ‘connect the dots’ portrait of Ludwig Wittgenstein. I have drawn the facts of his life together and numbered them but it is up to you to connect the dots.

The Happy Lion

by Louise Fatio - pictures by Rodger Duvoison

A beautifully illustrated book. Love the quality of lines, colours and textures.

84 Paintings at Wilkinson Gallery

What you see here are the paintings produced as part of ‘84 paintings’, a project which took place at Wiels, Brussels in late 2009. From the 2nd - 16th of November 2009 three painters worked in the Wiels project space. Each artist produced two paintings every day, with the aim of producing 84 paintings over the two-week period of the project. During the fortnight an open invitation was given for anyone to watch the development and discuss the project.
The conclusion of the project would always be dependent on the progression of the work during the two weeks. However, no emphasis was put on the project to produce a final event or exhibition, the conclusion would inevitably be 84 works.
Participants
Fiona Mackay b.1984 Aberdeen, Scotland
Morag Keil b.1985 Edinburgh, Scotland
Manuela Gernedel b. 1982, Bad Ischl, Austria

This is a good one.
Because it is clear and concise.
I often get surprised, when galleries/artists bother with pages of press releases and artist's statements, when so many people in the arts are dyslexic. But that is another subject.

There is no grand eco concept in this and there is no painful self-regurgitating. Just 84 painings. The "Display Instructions" are interesting: the paintings only exist as part of the group of the 84. There should be no hierarchy, no names. A kind of communist state order. The paintings can only be read in a group of all 84 paintings present. Like a text of some sort, where each painting should represent a fragment of meaning. Except that there is no semiotic meaning attached to any of them. And for that reason they could be mixed up and changed around or substituted without any effects on the reading. Or is the meaning of that work, that there is no meaning to it? (oh, I love that idea!) Just 84 paintings. Full-stop.

London Original Print Fair

We went to London Original Print Fair yesterday. Oh, I do have a very low tolerance threshold for that sort of activities. Like going shopping. As usual, in these fairs, after having seen three or four galleries I get an information overload and I need to get out. As a result, I stick the grin on my face and concentrate as hard as I can to view the rest of the fair. Kas ieško, tas randa. Seek and you shall find.

This time I am most pleased having come across Dorothy Cross folio "Tears" at Stoney Road Press. Dorothy Cross must be the greatest living Irish artist. She mainly works in 3D, large scale, producing arresting and often disturbing pieces on identity, her identity, woman's identity, sexual identity Like that shark skin, she found and gilded on the inside.
Well, at the print fair she had ...er... prints. And how beautiful they are!

The artist isolated small sections of an old engraving – a page from a bible found in her family home – and combined the detailed engraved lines with colour photographs of the sea taken near her home in Galway. The result is a remarkable series of poetic images from which parts of the body emerge through a skeletal topography of engraved lines and photographic stills of a restless ocean.

There was also a stand for Imprints, from France. Unfortunately, their website is not functioning at the moment: I forgot to bring my camera to the fair, therefore I only have a few pathetic snaps from my mobile phone to illustrate the stunning Stephen Chambers & Moro folio book "The Long Feast". It is very graphic. I like that is it is not bound, but folded and assembled: it feels less restrictive. Moreover, I liked that they had the whole folio/book displayed page by page on the wall as a series. It was a bit like reading a comic: complete sequence on one spread.

Then there was Charlotte Cory at Rebecca Hossack Gallery with the selection of her Victorian animal people. Oh well, whatever you say - they are incredibly cute. Totally unassuming in their cuteness, the way small children are. I would love one of her brooches! However, every time I see those Charlotte's portraits I can't stop myself from thinking, that if she dug deeper and darker her work might become so much more substantial.
Unfortunately, I could say that very same thing about myself...

Pteronarcophobia - fear of flies.

Musca domestica.

Flies are gross.
Every year they flock into the very highest corner of our white bedroom ceiling (on the farm) and form a black lump and hibernate there. Others hide in the walls, under the roof, in the window frames.
Then, in spring, as the weather warms up, they come out. Hundreds! Thousands of them! Millions and gazillions! They are sleepy. They drop on the floor and buzz there annoyingly. All surfaces get covered with them. I kept the hoover next to my bed for three nights. Aghhh!!




When the flies are awake and gone, these other ones start waking up. They are far less repulsive and less noisy. However, they do come out in hundreds, thousands, millions and gazillions as well. They flutter flutter at night: around your face, get trapped in your hair, drop on your pillow! Aghhh!!!
Unfortunately, I do not know what those insects are. I like knowing the names of the things, that share my space: birds, trees, reptiles, etc. This friend of mine said, they call them "fėjos" (fairies). What a beautiful name, I thought. Faea domestica?

As a result of this beautiful name, I went through a stage of fascination with them. The insects look wonderfully translucent and ephemeral. When alive, their colours range from diaphanous pink and lilac, to lime greens and yellows.

Last year I made a few plates (as testers) with the "fairies" (I was working with "cosy musty grandma's home" imagery). This year, I will be trying to do something more interesting. Possibly involving the play of words.





Work in progress.



P.S.: 2001.05.04

I have finally found their name: Chrysopa. Lacewing. Like a flemish curtain or a crochet tablecloth. Or a veil covering the face of a bride or a widow. Auksaakė in Lithuanian. "Golden eyes". Something fairy tale. King's daughter under a spell. To fight a dragon.

Lacewings usually have bright green bodies, prominent, golden, metallic eyes and green veins on delicate, transparent wings. However some species are browner in colour.

There are 14 species of lacewing in the UK, although they are less common in Scotland. Both the adults and larvae are carnivorous and often feast on aphids. The larvae suck the aphids’ juices and may even use the drained bodies to hide under.

PPS Now this blog is related to Lepidopterophobia - fear of butterflies and Cluster Thoughts.

About the little things.

Our holiday in Lithuania has been extended by the volcanic ash cloud. Hurrah!
Unfortunately, a long holiday does not necessarily mean a productive one. I took a some photos and I did a bit of thinking. I was thinking (thinking!) of the small things that make my farm world what it is. They are little fragments of my place, my life - like two minutes out of a film. Six words out of a paragraph. Six paragraphs out of a book.