reading and watching

Here's a book that I'm reading, along with the Air-Conditioned Nightmare by Henry Millar. Great. Fantastic, click here to read a brilliant piece about the role of the artist.
And watching this.
The latter is problematic, but more on that later.

plaster poured finally....after 100 days

Well, the next phase of this piece was to pour twenty litres of plaster over the finished, waxed moulds/casts/tiles and now to let it thoroughly dry!!!!! Impatience at this point would see the whole operation kaput ( or maybe not)

Some satisfaction here and renewed excitement.

wood block and formless ( what I think I am doing)

100x100cm on brown kraft paper, water based printing ink, wax
This was begun some weeks ago and I decided to do more work on the negative spaces.
I decided to finish with it, finish it off.
After inking it up and running off some straight/simple prints, I was satisfied with the functionality of the block....then I began experimenting directly with the paper ( wax) and the block, coloured ink 'blobs', and the paper which I saw as a common, mundane surface/support.
I decided to not try and achieve crystal clear print definition, preferring to develop a direct spontaneous 'fluxus'. The addition of the wax to the paper proved to be a effective operation, introducting another layer sonmewhere between the more static wood block and the equally static or flat paper. Traces of a wax, repellant shadow ( are) present. The grid pattern ( of one hundred square) creates an information overload effect, that combined with the ill defined printing transfer, the random colour element and the etherial wax 'watermark' all conspire to subvert the passive viewing moment whilst supporting a shimmering moment of emptiness and formless quietude.





detail of block with wax gestural before printing.
( introducing wax onto the flat etched surface creates releif and a random uptake of the ink from the block to the paper; 2nd operation)



collage of block, ink, rollers, kraft paper and studio.
I'm pleased with the new studio which Niko and I built over the summer, nice views into the bush and over the river, I can hear it from inside. Big overhead lighting and white walls and wood ( sarking), nice. I've started using the liquid wax product, this after working with the hot wax on the NZ07 piece (posted below)
As to what I think I'm doing, it's ongoing, that question. Some reflections and soundings are posted here.



This is a detail of 1% of the whole metre squared print. Top left hand corner. I say, there is some depth and intensity present in areas. Sumptuousness, extravagance and meaninglessness.
It is not a wax seal upon an important letter. It is not a thumb print, and yet it does not stop trying to be.

NZ07

1000x1000mm wax, india ink, acylic, brick dust and oamaru stone dust

Finished the collaboarative work yesterday. We are both pleased with the result.
On collaboration, something going on there, some violence and boundaries, some rules and much more. There is letting go and there is control.
The end result is truly more than the sum of it's parts.
Shocking moments and new spaces opening up all the time. In the end it took over two months to emerge.
On the piece itself, I think it works well to undermine and also support a story about surface , about where the viewer stands, perspective and about the whole visual field.

Working with wax and taking away layers produces a dense medium, seductive and overwhelming perhaps.....

week two and it's still hard

It's poor of me to feel obliged to write here when everything about my work is static and irrelevant and I want neither advice or contradiction. These images are of an experiment which is not complete. I cant find my way back home.........................this is old hat.
What I was working with last year was an exciting adventure, searching for new ways to make marks, unfolding the unconscious, process, formless and working with chaos ...infinite,
and now I feel as if am standing outside and it is all foreign babble.
I am increasingly plagued with feeling that I should do figurative work, faces, people, landscapes, trees, tractors, cows, babies, shops, cars, waves, boats, sheep, boys, nudes, hair, skin...........


these images are details from a 1000x1000mm stretched canvas
using india ink and wax
unfinished
the detail at the top ( green) is roughly equivalent to a posted below.