And I'd like to be king of all Londinium and wear a shiny hat

I love animals, but I'm starting to get so fed up with turning them into headpieces! I really need to step it up a gear and start plotting out compositions and roughs...it's all in my head, but that's not much use really. I don't even have a proper image for the Signal Arts catalogue...I'll have to send them one of these poor little roughs. I have two new sketches to put up here, but every time I try and photograph them they look dreadful...so I'll just upload one joint photo, taken from a safe distance. The bird lady isn't even finished, but whatever...baby steps!
Besides half arsed sketches, I've also been hanging around with my beloved cat Belle (all in the name of research), trying to get her to believe I'm a cat. She wasn't fooled.I also saw the most amazing, disturbing plastic animal masks that I'm going to buy and ,they don't know it yet, but I'll be photographing my siblings wearing them (and Chris too...plus Seanna if I can nab her!). Orla will probably be off being an enemy to the state and frolicking about in England!

Dress Up In You

It's really time I try and give my poor blog back even a semblance of dignity...I keep forgetting people can see the bullshit I post. Those poor dashboards. Anyway, here is what I have so far on the Signal Arts exhibition...it's going pretty slow, but it's not really something I want to rush...for once. I also have a tentative name for the show...I'm thinking "Dress Up In You", named after the Belle and Sebastian song ("If I could have a second skin, I'd probably dress up in you"). I'm worried the work looks twee..I'm trying to steer away from drawing children, as I look back at previous work and cringe. I hardly ever use pencil, but I've been trying that out with a little bit of pen and watercolour on my beloved brown paper and I'm actually enjoying using it. I had planned on doing all the work on wood, but am wondering if I should now...hmmmn. Also, these are just rough sketches, ideas on how I'm going to place the animal heads on the humans...the finished pieces will be nothing like this probably! And I know the animals are shockingly bad, but I just painted them roughly...I'm going in to the Natural History Museum tomorrow for research purposes and I can't wait! It's so creepy.:)

The Turtle man is from a story about a turtle and a coyote who fight to the death! The bird man is about a lonely bird who can't get a date( my sisters got a great laugh from that one)..originally I was drawing a younger boy until I remembered how I'm trying to avoid that...I'm thinking loner business man instead now.

Regards the cat on the old mans head...take that whatever way you want-Karen Vaughan certainly did!

For Seanna

Mein Führer! I can walk!

Same thing again...half finished, half arsed stipple drawing from one of my favourite films...and the connection to Laika must have been subliminal, as I really didn't have a subject theme going on! (Though I just realised and I am SHOCKED to discover this, that I has of yet neglected to use this blog to rant on and on about my fear/fascination with nuclear war! I still remember when there was all that talk and fear about a nuclear emergency a couple of years ago...I still have all the information and leaflets...just in case!)
Anyway, I have no idea what I was doing sticking the brown paper down...I had either planned to draw over it or I was trying to cover up some dodgy drawing...think it was the latter actually.

And whale and dolphin killing...and overfishing...how have I neglected to rant about all of that? So yeah...that's something to look forward to I suppose...!

This is true of men as of dogs

I have been doing some sketchbook work...half finished stipple sketches that go nowhere really and are a total waste of time when I have so much proper work I REALLY need to be focusing on.

Anyway, this is an unfinished drawing of Laika, the Soviet space dog was the first living thing to leave the earths atmosphere and also the first orbital death. I am always boring people by talking about her, but she never gets the credit she deserves! She was a stray who was found wandering around Moscow and chosen for the Sputnik II flight because the scientists agreed that a stray dog would already be used to enduring extreme weather conditions. She died within hours of the spacecraft being launched due to over heating and the scientists admitted afterwards she had always been intended to die.

Whenever I think about loneliness, I always think of this little dog.

The Bagpipe Who Didn't Say No

I knew vaguely of Shel Silverstein, but I never realised he wrote children's poetry until this months issue of Dodgem Logic. There's a really cool article about him and afterwards I had to look up the poem about the turtle who fell in love with a set of bagpipes! It is beautiful...so sad and cute and oh so sweet...but still really sad!

The Bagpipe Who Didn't Say No

It was nine o'clock at midnight at a quarter after three
When a turtle met a bagpipe on the shore side by the sea,
And the turtle said, "My dearie,
May I sit with you? I'm weary."
And the bagpipe didn't say no.

Said the turtle to the bagpipe, "I have walked this lonely shore,
I have talked to waves and pebbles--but I've never loved before.
Will you marry me today, dear?
Is it 'No' you're going to say dear?"
But the bagpipe didn't say no.

Said the turtle to his darling, "Please excuse me if I stare,
But you have the plaidest skin, dear,
And you have the strangest hair.
If I begged you pretty please, love,
Could I give you just one squeeze, love?"
And the bagpipe didn't say no.

Said the turtle to the bagpipe, "Ah, you love me. Then confess!
Let me whisper in your dainty ear and hold you to my chest."
And he cuddled her and teased her
And so lovingly he squeezed her.
And the bagpipe said, "Aaooga."

Said the turtle to the bagpipe, "Did you honk or bray or neigh?
For 'Aaooga' when you're kissed is such a heartless thing to say.
Is it that I have offended?
Is it that our love is ended?"
And the bagpipe didn't say no.

Said the turtle to the bagpipe, "Shall I leave you, darling wife?
Shall I waddle off to Woedom? Shall I crawl out of your life?
Shall I move, depart and go, dear--
Oh, I beg you tell me 'No' dear!"
But the bagpipe didn't say no.

So the turtle crept off crying and he ne'er came back no more,
And he left the bagpipe lying on that smooth and sandy shore.
And some night when tide is low there,
Just walk up and say, "Hello, there,"
And politely ask the bagpipe if this story's really so.
I assure you, darling children, the bagpipe won't say "No."

Poland is really happening in a far out way

It really is such a beautiful country...but at times it's got a strange subdued quality to it...which I guess might have something to do with one of the biggest tourist attractions being Auschwitz...and also being constantly reminded of how human ashes were once used to fertilize the crops. It's a cruel legacy. The communist influence is still really obvious in places and it's pretty grim...but fascinating-restaurants where the plates and cutelry are chained to the table!

On the upside, Krakow was so amazing and so pretty and full of swallows! And every so often all the birds would suddenly take flight in the main square and no exaggeration,the whole sky was filled with hundreds of birds....it was magical! There are also loads of chubby, friendly pigeons swanning(?) around, and according to local legend they are in fact spellbound knights! Obviously I will have to paint a bird headed Knight very soon...!:)