Thursday, April 30, 2015

Ecoute - The end of April...


Poor April - the month I always neglect, without fail. And I never fail to regret this neglect as April is when the most impressive buds burst open, leaves unfurl, dandelion clocks feather all spaces and the seasons literally change in front of our eyes. And yet again, my vision (and every other sense) has been obscured by other 'stuff'...
Anyway, just before the month draws to an end, here is the vast Ecoute sculpture in Paris. This is to be found alongside Les Halles, which I passed through yesterday. I quite liked the idea that the man in the background had recreated a similar pose, unintentionally, I presume. In so doing, he most certainly drew attention to the impressive scale of this piece by Henri de Miller, dated 1986...

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Urban Art...Again...


Spring is here, accompanied by the usual flourish of greenery and ever-brighter colours as flowers and street art go into full bloom...


Actually, that's not entirely true, as far as the urban art is concerned, as this is not a season-specific activity, as I've learnt over the past few months.


And I have been taken off guard several times now, not suspecting that the street artists would be so busy throughout the colder, greyer times.


But, of course, they have. Prolific even...


And thankfully too, in this singularly unattractive part of town, termed 'une zone'.


The designs that I've admired have repeatedly been replaced by others...


Or have been altered somewhat or added to, as the one below, becoming ever more intricate...


And even when I think they can't possibly change again, they do.


Bursting out of the grey concrete surfaces...


The only difference this time, was that I finally had the chance to meet the artists themselves. Unfortunately I was without my camera on that particular day.








               

 





 I was really pleased to get to ask the questions that I'd been asking myself about this urban art...


The first questions being, when did they come to paint, as I'd certainly never come across them before then, either during the week or at weekends...


Apparently they tend to come at the weekend, mostly Sundays, but don't appear to limit themselves to that, as I later saw one artist retouching a work in the week, as the shoppers were loading up their groceries. The other site that I was aware about, namely the nearby car park of the Renault garage, has a more limited access due to the locked gates at the weekend, whilst the volume of parked cars must limit painting during the week.
















         In answer to the question about how they could afford to do so much work, with the vast quantities of cans of spray that must entail, they told me that they shop online and get discount prices on larger orders.

This is probably just as well, since they seem to apply a base paint as a background, rather than simply painting over past works. With the extensive surface area of the walls, this must represent litres of paint.


As I spoke to the group, one artist was applying the turquoise background that can be seen on the first photos, and that has since been largely replaced by a brick red.


They also told me about the other site where they work; the docking area for a concert hall. As I hadn't discovered this one myself, I was pleased to visit it...


Yet it must be said, I ran in and out to take these photos because the area is quite creepy, in spite of all that colour. It is one of the places where you can't work out if it's worse to encounter somebody or nobody at all....


As can be seen, every possible surface has been decorated....


This created weird patchworks and overlaps...


That seem to explode out of those (originally) dingy, grim walls...


Incidentally, for all the colour of their art, the artists themselves were all dressed in very unassuming, non-descript shades...


The group that I met was quite large, dispelling the notion that it might have been just a few extremely active artists...


 Presumably it was the art that brought them all together because the age range went from young teenager to adult.


There were no girls in this group, but they said that there are female urban artists and it's true that I've already noticed a few decorating the tunnels next to the canal.


Nevertheless, the local urban art here is the best that I've seen around and about town. I was pleased to get the chance to tell them how great I thought their work was, but addressed the older ones... 


Understandably, the younger artists looked duly horrifed to have an admirer, at least the age of their own mothers! How uncool is that?!!. Oh well....


The one question I really wanted to ask was how they found their ideas and inspiration for their forms and colours, and if they had any art training. 


They said that their work was just a giant version of all the drawings and designs they'd scrawled over their school books. Finally, I asked them if they kept a record of all of this great art, through photos or film, but they didn't really appear to. That seems to make it all the more special and, of course, unique.



Monday, April 6, 2015

Reeds, Beads, Pods and Branches...

With or without a garden, wherever I've lived has always ended up with an assorted collection of dried 'scavengings' that I've retrieved from whatever bit of wilderness I've come across.


Twisted lichen-covered twigs, tortuous branches, gnarled drift wood, skeletal leaves and seed pods, dried flowers, husks and grasses...


All have all vyed for space with more predictable groupings of shells, pebbles and seaglass, while a cow's skull, wild boar's jaw, giant snail's shell, feathers and butterfly wings have likewise squeezed in...


I just love the spindly shapes and forms, colours and textures. This appreciation has been shared by the cats, of past and present, that have been with me, although their pleasure has invariably been more of a shredding, clawing and chewing variety rather than just visual aesthetics.


Here's a video of some of these images, set to the Kate Bush version of Donovan's Lord of the Reedy River... 


I finally finished my latest wooden-bead hanging, though it might not be the last since I still have so many beads left. 


Nevertheless, there's a bit more room in the old bead box...


The new hanging is long and totally unphotogenic in its intended position, so here it is on the floor and over the radiator just because I love the colours...


But, as always, these will never be as wonderful as those found in Nature, simply because they are just natural...