Art show, Easter Sunday
I’ve been meaning to post these pictures for a while and since I’ve been a bit sparse on the blogging this seems like a good opportunity.
Please forgive my photography skills, I do my best but I’m not that good.
Fashion demon girl
Fashion demon girl’s pose and dress were based on a fashion picture that I saw somewhere once and then could never track down again. I did a base layer for this one, which was drummed into us hard in college art classes. Actually I used two base colours, first fluro magenta and then white over the top to tone it down. I had a lot of fun putting the highlights and lowlights onto her body and then adding the flowers.
This painting was gifted to Evie on Friday for her birthday, I thought she might like the fashion aspect and it kind of reminded me of one of her lj icons.
Note: could be the last monster-holding-flowers picture. It was a short run period in my painting career if so. Because now I have moved on to….watercolours!
Reclining tree nymph…this is based off a gorgeous photo shoot featuring Natalia Vodianova and her family. I added flowers to her dress, that’s me segueing out of ‘holding flowers’ and into a whole new stylistic period. I like the way this one came out but I suspect that the yellow of the sheet behind her is still too bright. I painted this one with Star’s character from Prime Time Adventures in mind.
Angel on the table. Marie Antoinette inspired wallpaper.
Lee said he liked this one, which is unusual for him. I am not yet convinced that it’s finished. I like the way her skin and features are completely black and white but at the same time I yearn to go in and add some shading. I also kind of want more detail on the wallpaper, maybe little butterflies stuck on or a floral design. Any thoughts?
Just for something totally different check out the Washington Post’s top 40 entries into their Peep diorama contest. Peepzilla, Sweeney Todd and Peepsalot are my favourites.
Point of Fashion: pjs
Current Obsession: getting things done
Things I Love Thursday
- Painting. I’m really enjoying using pictures of models, mostly taken from the lj fashion community Foto decadent as a base inspiration and then turning the women into mythical creatures. I started an angel ink and watercolour today. I think she looks lovely but I can’t quite decide what colour to make her skin. Anyway, it’s lovely, doing paintings.
- Oh the pretties, the Steampunk jewellery.
- This trailer for 300 but with Care Bears is rather well done. This Harry Potter 300 one is kinda cool too. Especially the ‘This is Sparta’ line.
- My Roleplaying games are very fun at the moment. PTA and Buffy and fun players and awesome characters….I am in rpg heaven at the moment.
- Cadbury’s hollow chocolate eggs eaten simultaneously with pebbles. There’s nothing like it.
- Easter holidays. I am really looking forward to the long weekend, and all the plans I have for it, be they full on or very relaxing indeed. It will be good to spend some time with my Lee too, because we’ve been busy this week.
- Having a lie down on the couch with a book. Which is what I’m going to do right now, thanks.
Honourable Mentions: Magical vagina ambrosia is possibly the best phrase ever, via the QI elves this article about unusual lobsters is pretty awesome, (love the half and half and the ‘phantom of the lobster’), warm dry towels, being warm in the night, crack-smoking dreams, getting to see my Giffy, Jem and the Holograms, Broken Picture Telephone games (Darth Vader smurf, winner’s stand: salt comes first bacon second) and receiving nominations for art awards on my pictures, sleep and laughter.
If you think of anything you love, or anything at all that you feel thankful for right this moment please do share in the comments.
art
I gave in to my urge to paint monsters holding flowers yesterday. I didn’t feel like I had any pressing writing issues and I wanted to paint so very much. It’s been a long time.
I didn’t buy any new big canvasses, I just used a couple of blank ones I’ve had forever. I did two small monsters on paper and two on canvas which I am very happy with. I share them here with you, because I am generous that way.
“First Date”
What would you say if this guy turned up to take you out? He brought flowers. He is wearing his best charcoal suit and his spotted tie. I had some trouble with his eyes but I like the way he came out in the end. I left the flowers til last and had great fun painting them.
“Emo Unicorn Boy”
Emo unicorn boy came to me at about 5am when I was trying to figure out how best to use the triangular canvas. I thought about Jared Leto’s leaning in My So Called Life and I had it. Leaning was the way to go, with the horizon lines breaking up the shape. I pencilled in the body and then hit on making him monstrous by adding a horn.
The red shirt is because I found my beloved red corduroy shirt again the other day and the charcoal cargos are made up of the paint left over from First Date’s suit.
I had fun with this hair spilling over onto the side of the canvas. I’m not sure if I should put in any colour in the background or not. I don’t want to on First Date because I don’t need it, but there’s quite a lot of white space around unicorn boy. It makes him stand out more, of course, but some background could be interesting. What are your thoughts?
Also, Lee and I had brunch, well, lunch really but neither of us had breakfast, at the Lido today and I had a prawn and melon salad with mint, lime and ginger dressing and it was amazing. Seriously, if the thought of prawns doesn’t creep you out you have to go to the Lido and eat this salad. It was all fresh crisp radish and lettuce and cucumber and so many prawns and the dressing was amazing and the melon worked well with everything.
They have a seasonal menu so head in soon and try it. I know I’m going back…
Point of Fashion: emo bear
Current obsession: mmmmm prawn salad.
Reviews
The Prestige. Is a cool, weird, dark, twisty confection of a movie. It’s by the guy who did Memento, so that gives you an idea of the likely tone. It’s about Wolverine and Batman fighting – well, really it’s about two stage magicians in the last years of the 19th Century battling to be the best. It gets pretty nasty pretty fast, but it’s all very interesting and saturated with period detail.
Plus Scarlet Johansen is hot.
There’s not much else to say without giving it away, so I’ll just say I approved greatly. Movies I can’t predict are frequently movies I’ll enjoy and I think this is as close as we’ll ever get to a movie of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell.
Eragon. I went in expecting it to be a derivative story, poorly acted and with disappointing special effects. I quite enjoyed it. The lead had some bad angles but he wore leather pants so I was entertained. The dragon effects were pretty good, I especially liked the super-cute baby dragon which looked like a blue ferret with wings.
I am seriously considering cosplaying Arya, the hot elf chick who Eragon has some weird psychic connection to. I don’t have red hair, but otherwise I think I could do it.
The Sam Taylor-Wood exhibition at the City Gallery. Lee suggested we go and see this, which is so unlike him that I nearly died. Lee doesn’t much go in for art, and although I know he doesn’t mind photography it’s still a shock to be walking to breakfast and hear him say “shall we go to the art gallery?” Of course, I wanted to and we went.
You’ll have seen the posters of Hayden Christiansen and Laurence Fishburne crying around, and if that doesn’t get you interested let me tell you to go and see it instead. Did that work?
The main part of the exhibition is random works of Sam’s including men falling or leaping and a couple of video installations which I really liked. (Man tapdancing on his own prone body with a dove on his head. Brilliant.) But the most accessible, most crowd-drawing and most affecting room is the one of Hollywood actors crying. I’m not sure how she gets these shots of them, I mean sure, they’re actors and can theoretically cry on demand but I have to believe that at least some of those shots are real.
The Daniel Craig one is so emotive, you can see his eyes are red and he’s really upset, and you start to feel for him. The Woody Harrelson one is very good too, his eyes are downcast and his jaw set like a petulant little boy, but you can see that he is really quite sad. After looking through the whole room several times I felt quite upset myself, and I think if I’d stayed I would have started crying in sympathy. We bought a poster of the Laurence Fishburne image, although it’s a little disappointing because it’s cropped at the sides. The full effect of the picture is quite magical.
I actually think it’s a pity they are using the Hayden Christiansen image, because it’s one of the weaker ones from the selection, but I suspect they are trading on his recognisable post-Star Wars face to draw the crowds. Link to some info via the City Gallery.
Sweet Mother’s Kitchen. The American/Mexican/Creole cafe on Courtenay Place. Awesome milkshakes. Seriously, among the best I’ve had.
I was a bit disappointed as I ordered waffles, and the waffle machine was broken so they made me pancakes without asking if that’s what I wanted done, but the pancakes were good so I wasn’t that disappointed. Tasty ricotta with them and lots of maple syrup.
Lee had a breakfast burrito was which actually really good even if I do baulk at eating mexican food for breakfast. We’ll probably go back.
Point of Fashion: stripey arm warmers
Current Obsession: scrapbooking. I am nearly done on my Wedding album!
Installation art
I really enjoy going and looking at art. My years of Art History and Practical Art at high school have given me a good background for understanding modern art and I don’t think I go out and look quite enough.
The exhibition I saw yesterday was Patricia Piccinini’s Another Life which is a kind of meditation on Genetic Engineering and all the complex emotions that are tied into it. The website I linked to yesterday has pictures of all the aspects of the exhibition and also has soundbites of the artist explaining how the works came about and what they mean to her. Well worth listening to, it takes about 15 minutes. Click here.
My favourite things were the cyclepups; little infantile motorcycles, all the same base but customised in different colours, with different details. They have the look of a small puppy who hopes you’ll take it home in real life. Quite, quite adorable.
Installation art as a rule is scary to me, and I think I’ve worked out why. It’s because you go into this space and you never quite know what will happen. Is the sculpture motion activated? Will it speak to you? Will it move? More often than not there isn’t movement but you just never know.
The beasties in Another Life looked so very real, human eyes, veins in their translucent ears, folds of skin and fingernails. I found I was waiting for them to shift positions, or to blink. It was a deeply moving exhibition and I’m really glad I managed to get to it before it closed.
I bought some postcards from the gallery, some of Patricia’s work, some of Peter Peryer’s photography (I remember seeing his stuff in a class field trip in about 1996) and another random picture with Marilyn Monroe in it.
I *heart* art.
PoF: Black and white and warm skirt
CO: sockses.
Art
Went to the art gallery today, it was the final day of the Piccinini exhibition “Another Life”. I’ll write more about it tomorrow, but for now take a look through her site.
City Gallery. Click through to her bit to hear her talking about the beasties.
Tomorrow: introspection and Why Installation Art scares me.
PoF: Honey sweatshirt
CO: OOS hand from online chatting
Chewsday sunshine
It’s very sunny and I’m feeling the hayfever without any meds.
I’m living on the wild side, not medicating. Yeah.
Has anyone got my copy of Lemony Snicket’s a Series of Unfortunate Events book 3: the Wide Window?
I haven’t seen it for months and months and I’m now thinking about replacing it so this is a kind of last ditch effort in the hopes someone actually does have it. It’s got my name written in the front and everything.
I’ve just finished reading the latest Lemony Snicket The Penultimate Peril and although it was funny and neat and exciting I can’t help but think he’s crossed a line into Young Adult content…I won’t say why, because it’s spoilertastic but yeah. Left me feeling pretty weird.
Yesterday Lee, C, Rachel and I saw Travellers and Magicians which I remembered loving in the film festival last year. It was slower than I remembered it being but then in the film festival a lot of what you see is paced differently to the normal Hollywood fare.
After seeing the preview for Murderball and realising that we could watch it when we went home, we all went home and watched Murderball. (Uhm, sorry, I’ve just finished the Snicket book it’s bound to have affected my writing style..) It’s an awesome documentary. Well made, well balanced, tough but surprisingly touching as well. It’s about paraplegic rugby players. Man, that stuff’s hardcore!
I got no crafting done yesterday, but I got on Lee’s non-angry side by doing dishes and washing and washing the duvet which was long overdue I’m sad and repulsed to say. It is now drying in the pseudo-sun by the window, draped over two chairs.
There was no drama at all about opening the bottle of mead. Nothing that needs mentioning. Everything went smoothly.
Point of Fashion: King Kong Crew shirt again
Current Obsession: why do my eyes hurt?
Edit: this week is the last week of the Small World, Big Town exhibition at the Art Gallery. You should really check it out, it’s neat.
I need this old train to break down
I had fun at Svend’s talking to people I know through roleplaying who I don’t see so much. Lee and I nearly didn’t come out at all on account of my being amazingly grumpy and the awful weather of hurricane strength winds.
Saturday I didn’t go to a movie with Rachel. We went to the art gallery instead and saw some neat stuff. I really like miniture dioramas with teeny people and trees and roads and so on, the one on display at the moment is actually fantastically vioolent with little guys in army uniforms attacking civilians but it’s neat all the same.
Weird moment of synchronicity when I thought I’d tell Rachel afterwards about the red, black and white aeroplane sculpture that I’d seen in 6th form and it turned out to be on display in that very exhibition! It was good to see it again, and I also love the 0.2 scale fully functional studio apartment.
The art gallery is good right now. Go and see the stuff!
Saw more pairs of shoes I want. I am now officially obsessed. There were two pairs at #1 shoe warehouse…and I didn’t even get to the sneaker section that Rachel got her purple stripey fakey converses from.
I watched Moulin Rouge last night. It had been a while and I enjoyed it very much.
Today I bought interfacing for my jacket. Now the next step is to cut everything out. I shall do it as soon as I stop procrastinating here and then I will reward myself with scrapbooking time. Can’t be bothered leaving the house again as I am still low level grumpy. It’s kinda simmering away there under a veneer of contentment.
Oh and I am officially now fashion police, despite my non-adherence to fashion, I am the judge, jury and executioner. (Rachel may be a fellow officer, and I know Lee is too.)
Bought some party supplies yesterday: plastic cups, serviettes, mini hot dogs, triangle samosa-thingies, a big box of spaceman cigarettes. (They’re space cause of the picture, and cowboy because of the smoking. They are Teh Awesome.)
Point of Fashion: Kapcon tshirt
Current Obsession: stoopid jacket. Why do I not want to make you so?
Jenni’s Goth Girl phase
Yesterday I picked up the ol’ paintbrush and did some art. It was very refreshing. I started with a fan pic of Death from Sandman, since I was reading the Sandman Companion and thinking and wanting…so I painted extreme close-up of Death.
It’s OK. Then I picked up a much larger bit of canvas and painted my Buffy game character Joanna. The body and clothes and hair came out very nicely, but I need to go back and re-work the face, so it doesn’t look quite so 2d. I also have a bunch of background that needs something. I am very happy with the way it came out though. I feel smart and skilled. Hurrah!
In other news Lee has decided to go on the uber-road trip with Giffy. This has put my stomach into butterfly frenzy. Not because of him being away from me, not because of him going away with girls who are not me, but because it means for like, ten days I won’t see him. I’ll be at the back all next week, but he won’t get back until the 20th. I’ll have nearly a whole week of apartment to myself. I’m only working a coupla days that week too.
So.
I’ll be able to do whatever the Hell I want. I’m thinking pizza for dinner every night and sims 2 24/7!
No, seriously it’ll give me a great opportunity to get some writing done, and some scrapbooking and some more painting. Plus I can see my folks and go to movies he doesn’t want to see, and go to the art gallery and Te Papa and ooh! It’s just too exciting!
I will also be very lonely without him so those with school holidays and such are encouraged to visit me in those times. If any of the above activities sound fun to you, please comment and let me know, we can plan!
What I did in my Film Fest vacation
Ok, so I didn’t blog about this at the time except to say that I went to the art gallery.
A few weeks ago I went to the art gallery by myself and I was freaked out by the art.
Normally art doesn’t scare me. I have quite a lot of experience with art history and doing art myself and studied it all through high school so I like to think I am past the point of being scared of it.
Not so. Installation art that you have to walk into is freaking scary stuff.
In particular there’s an installation upstairs in Wellington art gallery. It’s there *right now* although not for much longer since the exhibition is ending. I can’t remember what it’s called or the name of the artist, but it’s like a little wooden building that you have to walk into. Inside it is like a prison. On the left is a projected moving image of an idyllic landscape, on the right is a glass window that you can look into and see the artist lying on the floor. (It’s not literally the artist, but a realistic dummy wrapped in a blanket.)
Seeing the human form freaked me out. I steeled my nerves and went around the corner and there at a computer terminal was another “person”! This was a matronly prison guard reading messages from the artist. Basically I was waiting for the scary fake person to start moving and possibly kill me. There was a door to the main gallery just past her though, so I gingerly edged past and escaped out the back. I checked first that there were no more freaky fake people waiting just outside to freak me out more.
There weren’t.
and that’s my scary art story. God knows how I’d cope with a wax museum.
