Sea Monster

Over the past two weeks, myself and a friend built a boat and paddled it 10 and a half miles down the Union Canal. We documented the entire process, as well as the trip and made a really nice book of photos and lists and other bits and pieces.

It started off as a bit of a silly challenge to see if we could do it, but it actually turned out to be quite a nice project about being two little boys on an adventure. We initially intended to get to Glasgow which is close to 70 miles, but at a steady pace of 1 mile an hour that goal stopped being realistic pretty quickly.

Totally different from my usual stuff, I know, but it was a lot of fun all the same. There's a short youtube video about it and this is a link to the pages of the book.

Terra Nova

Here are a couple of photos from my last project. The paintings on the wall are the ones from previous posts. I filled the little book full of drawings telling the story of Robert Falcon Scott's expedition but I'm a bit stuck on how I can get it uploaded, so this will have to do for now.

It was really nice to present the work in this way and kind of create a little world to jump into, I think installations like this are a really great way of putting work into some kind of context.

Plus it gave me an excuse to make weapons out of clay.

Mast Hangers and Death Tents

These are two paintings from my Antarctic project. They are both much smaller than the seem on here, and better for it. 

I will upload the photos of the actually installation piece and a few ages from the book I made this week when I get hold of them.

Lawrence Oates

I've been working on some really small paintings and drawings over the past couple of weeks based on images I found from Robert Falcon Scott's "Terra-Nova" expedition to the Antarctic.
This is one of them.

Antarctic Sketches

Sylvia

This is a painting of Sylvia Plath I did just a couple of weeks ago. It was done at the request of someone to give as a Christmas present, but I left it in the studio over the holidays and it never got there on time.

January

 

I've started carrying around a pocket sized sketchbook with me recently and being a lot less precious about what I put in it. A big chunk of it is really bad, a lot of illegible scribblings, to-do lists and messy drawings but some of it has been turning out all right.  

New Year

 

Christmas is over, New Year has just gone and I'm about ready to get back to work now. I've done nothing over the past few weeks but eat, see people and generally do nothing constructive, which has been lovely. College starts back up on Monday so expect some more interesting updates to be on their way, I'm planning do try some large scale mural work and generally more ambitious things. But in the meantime, here is a picture of the moors covered in snow, looking like the moon and a link to a really awesome painter, Stephen Chambers

Menageire

I seem to spend all my time apologizing on this blog, but I've sorry these are so over due. This is what I exhibited for the last project a couple of weeks. Again, you can see the rest of the photos here.

If anyone would like any of the original paintings, get in touch coz there's tonnes and I have no space in my flat. Cheap cheap cheap.

So Far Exhibition

Apologies for the awful photos, reflections and blurs and crappy colours etc. This what I exhibited. You can see the rest of the photos (of equally terrible quality) here.

Framing bits up

I think I'm finished. This is a cut out section of a bigger painting I did earlier today, in a frame I forgot I had. I'm planning to exhibit this, a smaller version of it and one of the landscapes I've done, under some pretentious title I'm yet to decide upon. I love putting things in frames, everything looks so much nicer in a frame. Especially when the frames cost 50p and are a bit battered.

The show opens on Friday and will be running for a week. So if anyone is in Edinburgh do try to pop along to the gallery and have a look. Should be dead dead dead good.

Splodge

I'm thinking of exhibiting the landscape I posted about last, along two sections of a more abstract painting, like the one above. I've been toying with some more narrative based paintings but I don't think what I'm trying to paint is figurative at all and they've not been having the same impact as the stranger ones.

Three Weeks

This is something I've been working on today. I've been having a good think about what it is I want to say and I've decided that it's less about making the viewer feel uncomfortable and awkward and more just about putting them in a thoughtful kind of reflective, mellow place (which is at the same time a little unnerving.)

I noticed around the three week mark of last project and what was for most people their third week of living in a new place and not knowing anyone, that everyone kind of got a touch less enthusiastic and a bit quieter. I was no exception. I think it was the excitement wearing off and I was faced with the fact that as nice as all these new things and new people were, I kind of missed the comfort of home. I'm going to carry on working around that idea I think.

So Far

I have been slacking majorly with this blog recently. I've done a whole project, doing new work every day, an exhibition and not one sign of a blog post. I'm very sorry and I'm going to say I'm going to try to update a bit more regularly.

I'm currently working on a new project titled 'So Far', the end result of which will be exhibited along with all the other first year's work at a gallery in Edinburgh on the 12th of November. It's going to dead good.

I'm focusing my work on how awkward and kind of lost I've felt at various points over the past couple of months. University has been a lot more difficult than I had anticipated and I think being put in an unexpected and sort of uncomfortable position is really interesting place to be. So I'm trying to do a painting of that, which turns out is really difficult to get down on paper.

My motive for the landscapes is sort of about feeling lost and overwhelmed, not in terms of being in a bustling crowd; It's felt much more thoughtful and reflective than that. I think it's been a bit like a misty bleak moor. The shapeless dark shapes in the corner are intended to make you feel slightly uncomfortable - this unrecognizable form that you can't say what it is. But I'm not sure it's getting that across too well really.

Vogelkop

We were given our first uni project last week and I have been pretty busy with it over the past few days. I'm trying to get across the story of the Vogelkop Bowerbird, something I was toying with ages ago but never really finished. These are just a couple of experiments.