three blind mice

Ahh just one month tomorrow till I FINALLY get tattooed again. I can't believe November was the last time, I've got an unbearable itch right now. My brain is literally working over time conjuring up new ideas. I'm definately plotting a 'three blind mice' tattoo. I'm not even going to start explaining where all my bizzare ideas come from. Although the one I'm getting by the lovely Sarah Schor next month is a squirrel. Eurasian squirrel infact filling the oddly shaped space at the back of my arm.

Anyway, on Monday it's my birthday. Easter Monday. I have no idea what to do, although drinking is definately off the cards. I'm not one to celebrate my own birthday but I definately want to soak up the opportunity to hang out with friends and family. I think so far the plan is to have a meal with some selected friends at AGP's house. Vegan roasts and hopefully a Totoro cake will be on the cards. (Maybe I'll actually get some photos to blog about), I also got my 'Vegan cupcakes take over the world' book in the mail a few days ago so those are going to be tested out. Too excited.

Anyway, for now I'm going to list some of the things I'll hopefully be able to afford next month from birthday money.


This is the Deluxe Kit but I'd gladly own any type of Diana +F cam. AHH the mini one is so cute too.


A Chris Conn Askew print. Naturally. If you've never heard of him, firstly, shame on you, and secondly hurry and see at sekretcity.com


My plane tickets to America incase CCUSA application was recieved to late. (looking likely, but I'm going none-the-less)


in desperate need of new Polaroid film! PLEASE Ilford buy the rights and start making it again!!!

And pretty much anything from the Spitfire Girl website.


A girl can wish.

pins and needles.

This remains one of the best photos I've found on a blog hunt.
Even though I'm not entirely sure how old that women right there is, I hope I'm still getting tattooed way past my youth. And no doubt that'll be the case.

until the light takes us.

At 6pm yesterday me and the guys headed to Chapter Arts to see this black metal documentry titled 'Until the Light Takes Us'. It's a documentry about the story of black metal and it's rise during the early to mid nineties. Following and interviewing members of the bands Dark Throne, Mayhem and Burzum and outlining the string of suicides, murders and church burnings that took place during the rise of black metal, and discusses how these events and stories have shaped and redefined what "heavy metal" and "black metal" is considered to stand for today.

'Until The Light Takes Us' manages to look at all of these main focus' without condemnation. Examining the misunderstood principles and beliefs that led to this huge rebellion against the crux of modern culture and Christianity. This is a must see documentry, no matter what you're stance on black metal. It's truely eye-opening and completely shocking in some areas. I'm not entirely sure if you can stream it online or if you'll have to find your local 'independant cinema' centre but definitely try get your mits on it.

There isn't a great deal to say about it. It's a documentry the answers are there for themselves. I'll leave you with the trailer and hope that it entices you to go watch this film.

au natural

Even though this project has only been in line for two weeks, I'm going to post one of the small 3x3inch paintings I've done.
Considering it is the complete opposite of my 'normal' themes I feel rather proud of my first piece that'll enter a four piece collection with 6 other additions to be added over the next 6 weeks.
Hopefully we'll get a exhibition in the studio space for all this stuff.

Anyway - I'll briefly describe what it is I'm looking to achieve.
In terms of subject matter I tend to focus on working with things that are anatomical whether it be life drawing - portraiture (in various morbid themes) - skull work etc, and ofcourse the illustrative side that I've posted a few entries of on here. This brief allowed us to venture into a completely different world of painting. One that we may not be so familiar with, quite a fearful prospect when you've got into your comfort zone. It requires us to create 3/7 paintings that are the complete opposite to our normal practise in both subject matter and medium.
I chose to venture into the world of nature and oil paint. Nature being something I haven't dabbled with since the tender age of 16 when I left GCSE and oils I've used sparsley and have no real education in this format. For some reason they now seem completely beyond me.
In terms of nature, I still don't feel interested in the 'landscape' or 'still life' in the form that most people would think of - so on a walk through local woodlands I depicted the fungus and moss that grows increasingly on old oak and silver birch trees. Because my work tends to be very representational of the subject I'm painting I wanted to experiment with an abstract feel focusing on different textures and how I can allow oil paint to represent these textures.

Anyway - here is the first 3x3inch painting.


Pretty shocking picture I forgot to upload the white background ones. So this is it complete as of yet. It's in impasto style which means the oil paint has been built up to give a 3D effect. I can't believe I'm saying this is something I've done, it's worlds away from my comfort zone, but insanely enjoyable and energy absorbing!

Luckily through spring break our studios are being kept open so I'm going in to work for 3 days a week to achieve my goal of 7 paintings (more like 10 including all little ones) and sketch book work.

I'm going to try and keep updated but my sleeping pattern has been varying going to bed at a very early (for me) midnight and awake by 8am. woosh, never thought I'd see the day I'd havemore than 5hrs sleep.

march to the beat of a dead horse.

Ahhh!
Having entered my specification in University I seem to have little time for blogging. I have so much to catch up on!
Unfortunately I've completely abandoned camera ship this week in exchange for sitting in my studio space painting....abstract? mmm.
Tomorrow I'll get some movie reviews up, some painting snaps and general (un)interesting stuff.
Movies I've as of late:

Alice in Wonderland
Shutter Island
From Paris with Love
The Lovely Bones
The Crazies
American Splendor (DVD)

Until tomorrow dear followers.

pocket money punk party

wow, what an amazing weekend I've had!
I'm slightly delusional from the lack of sleep but I'm going to briefly describe the rad activities and post some pictures.
This post will be seriously picture heavy!

Ok first up, Friday I attended my lecture on Abstract Expressionism and Feminism. Really interesting and I'm sure I'll make another blog all about it when I delve into some of the artists we talked about during the Seminar. Afterwards I headed home in preparation for Pennie coming around.
Saturdays fun has been planned for a couple of weeks now, and we'd spent Thursday and Friday setting the basement up for some extreme noise.


Yes, we decided that on the 6th of March, we'd organise a gig in my basement.
My friends bands played which makes the whole thing even better!
Goodtime Boys and The Muscle Club.
We also spent those two days of setting up, praying that we wouldn't get shut down by either the crack-heads on the street or the police.




It was a pretty crazy experience. The basement isn't a huge space just decent enough for a lot of hot sweaty bodies to be crammed right up next to each other listening to some sweet music. I'm so shocked at how many good photos I actually managed to get considering I had to ram the camera between people's heads.




not entirely sure what I'm attempting to do with my face but whatever ha.



I'm really liking these photos. Well done me.
Yes, that is my friend Paul "crowd" surfing. It's kind of weird that this was in my house!

Muscle Club played afterwards but my camera battery died so I'm hoping other people got some shoots that I can pinch just for memory. We had the whole thing filmed so I'll try get that too!

We stayed up partying with everyone til about 5/6am. Yes. Really.
Most people left around that time so everyone hit the sack. I set up the bed/sofas for all the guys who needed a place to kip.

I also, woke at 9.08am. I needed to be in work at 9am. Mad rush, and they didn't notice. So now, naturally I'm incredibly tired!

Keep eyes peeled for basement show round 2.

quick, March.

It's the 4th of March already and I haven't blogged yet! It's been an incredibly hectic week yet I feel like I've nothing to show for it.
Monday started off with a tutorial from Ken, the second of the writing/book-making tutors. Although his voice is rather monotone he has a lot of interesting stuff to say so I really force myself to interact and take notes so that my brain doesn't switch off or decide to go of into cuckoo land like it normally does. Irritating, most certainly.

The rest of the day was spent going to the doctors to check that the cuts in my throat (causing me to cough up blood) had started to heal. Judging by the fact the coughing has stopped and no bloody tastes in my mouth, I'd say it's been a success! Despite being in the waiting room for two hours I headed to Boxing followed by Yoga. Lovely 2 hour gym session really does make the whole day feel productive. And seemingly that was the end of Monday, maybe I watched a film? Oh yes, I went to see 'The Crazies' on my own!! Ofcourse I wasn't meant to but both Alex's were a complete let down and I didn't realise the film wasn't going to be as jumpy as it were.
I won't go into complete detail, but it started of ok, and by the end, the farcicle narrative completely made me lose all interest. A let down, to say the least. Oh also, my wonderful friend Kris & Lowri met their beautiful son Zach Maddox today! Having just seen facebook pictures he truely is a gorgeous baby! Congratulations guys!

Tuesday, I had my assessment with Mark and Luke to re-evaluate my work and look at how 'worthy' I was of going into Painting. It was a pretty tough session, and what would normally only take 15minutes lasted well over 40. I'm not to good at being in those sort of situations, especially when it's assessing my futher 2 years in a segment of Fine Art that I find so natural to me. I tend to panic, imagine the worst and get stressed out! And that's exactly what happened. Luckily, their advice really helped me form a strategic decision about how to deal with these situations in the future because ofcourse they will only become more gruelling. They assured me they'd ring me back in a couple of hours to set my mind at ease - or more panic.
3pm arrived and I was told I'd been put into Painting. I literally collapsed with relief!
The rest of the day is a complete blur.

Wednesday I met Lucy in town to get her printing done for our book project, buy some decent paper with a thicker gsm and slightly creamier colour (really we're that particular about it), eat some Wok to Walk (which is not near as good as Noodle box, far far sweetier, lacking in good ingredients and much more expensive). We also visited Oxfam Boutique. I found the most incredible Valentino (oh shit, a designer reference) vintage dress at the small cost of 75bucks. Blimey it was incredible though. Chocolate brown floor length dress with lace neckline maybe partitioning onto the chest a little, lace arm bands around the forearm and lace trim. BEAUTIFUL. Ofcourse, I have no place to where such a thing and my bank balance doesnt allow for the 'just because' purchases I'd like to make on times. Someone get married soon so I can wear something that spectacular.
Ofcourse, Lady Gaga was in town this day too! And I don't have tickets, tragically! ebay is offering 1 ticket for £130/150 and £240 for 2! It's sad, I cannot express how much I'd love to see her. I've even dreampt of seeing her swanning around Cardiff centre where I'd approach her in the vein hope she'd take pity and offer me VIP or something! Yes, dreaming can often seem like reality sometimes. However, I forgot it was my brothers 18th and my mom had booked us and a few other relevant family members a table at a rather suave indian. I am a bad sister!

And then today, doing some book art this morning (which I'll put into a blog tomorrow) and then had Alex and Tal around to set up drums in our basement for the show I'm having Saturday night. It's going to be a total blast, although a little nervous about the level of noise it's going to create. But I guess, there isn't a great deal we can do about that. Just have to hope and pray that everything goes well. Alex and I went to Gormet Burger Kitchen for food and a catch up and then chilled out with Tal, Sam and Laurence before I headed off to Pilates with Emma.

Boring blog I know. And I have no photo's to show. I need to get my butt into gear!