UP TOWN / DEAD BIKES

Posted on June 11, 2011 by splashingpaint

Uptown New York is where all the pointy bits are. One of the tallest buildings is the Rockefeller Center and for a few bucks you can rocket the 70 odd floors to the top and take in an amazing view of the city in all directions.

Another uptown attraction is time square. It has to be the most animated architecture in the world. Every facade facing the square is covered by massive screens. They pump a barrage of advertising images at, what seems to be, the entire 8 million inhabitants of the city packed into the pedestrian plaza.

There are some weird things in New York – here is a Policeman writing out a ticket for a horse.

Time Square movie shoot.

Occasionally you get a glimpse of something that reminds you that America really is the Land of Milk and Honey.

Uptown window chef 2 (cake decorator).

Uptown window chef 1 (pretzel maker)

Scattered around the City of New York are hundreds of dead bicycles. You come across one on just about every street, and wonder why they have ended their lives chained to a city pole with rusting paint, flat tires and missing parts. Here are a few of the sadly neglected skeletons.

Leaving the uptown area and heading towards the Brooklyn Bridge there is some interesting graffiti. The elevated ramps give a great view of the surrounding roof tops which, over the years, have accumulated an amazing coating of graffiti.

GLEN DAVIS

Posted on May 26, 2011 by splashingpaint

A couple of weeks ago I joined large format photographer, Tony Lewis, for a few days painting and photographing up over the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney. Our subject was the ruins of an old oil shale works tucked under the escarpment at Glen Davis. It’s a spectacular location and Tony and I plan to base an exhibition on these and other abandoned ruins in the area.

The dominating structure at the old shale works is the abandoned retort building. Its interesting brick work, steel strapping and monumental scale give it a unique and menacing presence.

The contrast between the hard, geometric ruins and the soft, organic landscape make stark and beautiful subjects as the sun goes down.

Tony waits for a shot through the early morning fog. Large format photography is a time consuming business – calculating exposure, loading film, framing shots and then waiting for the perfect light.

We were lucky to have atmospheric foggy mornings and mostly clear days while we were there. The fog soaked everything, saturating the colors and stretching the tonal contrast – ideal conditions for taking photographs.

We started and finished each day in the dark. My intention was to do a few watercolor sketches, but there was so much interesting stuff to record , I only managed one painting of the old retorts.

I’m looking forward to getting back down to the area with Tony and exploring some more of these old ruins he has discovered.

Tony’s large format images can be seen on his website “A Brief Vision of Time”

WALLS AND DOORS

Posted on June 25, 2010 by splashingpaint

It’s good to be back in the studio again after our Italian workshop break. Over the next few months I will be kept busy working on an Exhibition for late October. These first few paintings of architectural subjects will probably find their way into the exhibition. They will also be used in an article on The Illusion of Accuracy for International Artist Magazine.

“Notes on a Door” – Watercolor, Ink and Gesso on Arches 300gsm paper

“Medievalness” Watercolor and Ink on 300gsm Arches paper

“Village with lake and Olive Trees” mixed media on 300gsm Blue Lake Paper

TAORMINA WALLS

Posted on June 19, 2010 by splashingpaint

Arriving home means sifting through thousands of photos. Some are rubbish and should be discarded, but rarely are, others are really interesting.

While wandering around the streets of Taormina I couldn’t help photographing some of the incredible old stone work. Not scenic and spectacular, but amazing just the same. I didn’t notice when I took the photographs, just how interesting and varied the walls were.

Looking at them, one after another, on a computer screen shows just how unique the stone work is. Layers of broken roof tiles and terracotta paving blocks are woven between the large pale stones which are occasionally punctuated by black lava rocks from Mt Etna.

The ancient binary data hidden in the layers of this wall is surely the basis for a best selling novel. Possibly called “The Sicilian Code”.

AIRPLANE SKETCHES

Posted on June 16, 2010 by splashingpaint

How do you kill 30 odd hours strapped into the seat of an airplane? Movies on a tiny screen with the background drone of jet engines are OK for a while, reading is fine for a couple of hours, but scribbling in a little sketch book eats up the hours and is a lot of fun.

To keep things simple I use a tube of black and a tube of white gouache, a small brush with a built in water reservoir, a charcoal pencil, glue stick, fine line black pen and a liner brush cut in half.

I once tried a uni posca white paint pen, but the change in atmospheric pressure at 30,000 feet caused it to empty half a cup of white paint all over my sketch book on the first stroke. The Uni Posca is only used at ground level now.

All stored in a ziplock plastic bag. Cut down rigger – still in the seat pocket of a Jumbo Jet somewhere?

VIA HONG KONG

Posted on June 9, 2010 by splashingpaint

After the busy pace of the workshop, we figured a week relaxing in Hong Kong would be a good idea. The idea of relaxing in a city that only seems to run at full speed, was probably misguided. So, rather than relax, we went for the full on shopping, galleries, bars, tours type of recreation.

Hong Kong seems to run full paced 24 hours a day.

The Harbour is spectacular, serving as a transport route and recreation area at the same time.

The citys heart is buzzing with lights and color, while above street level is the patchwork of balconys, windows and washing that make up the high rise appartments of the inner city dwellers.

The shops are interesting but some of the names don’t translate too well to English.

Across the boarder into Shenzhen, pressure from street vendors increases as does the number of taxis waiting at the local rank.

The Rickshaw may have disappeared, but the chicken delivery cycle has sure taken off.

The humble push bike in China has resisted the temptation to switch to light weight aluminium and carbon fibre construction. Instead, preferring the solid reliability of braced and reinforced steel.

For me, the most fascinating area of the city is the food markets, which in the Mon Kok district seem to blend with the bird, goldfish and pet markets. These live sea snakes fall into the food category.

This bag of tasty live toads are also classed as food (and delicious according to the store owner).

These weird, distorted goldfish are from the pet market…

…as is this strange little kitten.

Strangely distorted rabbits are also available from the pet market

At the bird markets you can pick up birds from all over the world. There are bags of live grass hoppers and packets of writhing grubs available to keep your bird in top condition.

The food markets not only sell live produce, but will chop up almost anything for you to take home and barbecue.

Store holders engaged in a game of some kind of checkers.

This man, sitting on a tiny stool with a handful of tools, will fix up your worn out shoes in next to no time for a couple of dollars.

In the half light through our hotel window, primitive bamboo scaffolding contrasts starkly with the modern high rise construction. It seems to sum up the strange, diverse character of Hong Kong.

STREETS OF PALERMO

Posted on June 6, 2010 by splashingpaint

We had planned a day painting in Palermo, so after some questioning, decided the Plaza Marina was the place to go. After a long stop start procession through the town our bus driver stopped by a small park surrounded by dilapidated buildings. We couldn’t work out why and, after some head scratching, discovered it was a “photo stop” – the only problem being there was nothing worth photographing!

After a traffic snarled circuit of the waterfront we decided to head out to Mondello to paint. That was our introduction to Palermo which tainted our enthusiasm to stay there before flying back to Rome. However, intriged by the infamous mafia history, we stayed a day to have a look around.

We were told that, around the time two high profile, anti mafia judges were killed, there was a 12 month period in Polermo that saw almost 1000 murders! This grisly fact also influenced our perception of the city.