I can't quite believe it was June 1st when we last posted, much has happened since then, including the tartists' birthday just a week ago. One of the more unusual presents she received was a packet of soup mix, even more unusual as you can see is the flavour, suffice to say we will be conducting a taste test very soon and will report back with our findings.
Well, the month of June is here and I've spent a good deal of today in my studio. I've finished off the old road sign watercolour I've been working on and have stretched a whole imperial sheet of delicious 'Arches' (140 lb rough) paper for a large commission I'm planning to start in the next couple of days. As for the road sign paintings, I can't quite put my finger on why I like to keep painting them, but it's certainly to some extent sentimentality for things quintessentially British and these old cast iron signs are gradually becoming extinct. In fact the one above only has it's post, a small part of one of the direction pointers and the little crescent shaped parish badge left, so I had to radically repair it using artist's licence. For those of you curious as to where this sign is, you'll find it at the junction of Colchester Road and Mill Road in West Mersea.
After a rather prolonged Lenten sabbatical from all things twitter/facebook/blog I thought I'd better try and get my hand in again with a post or two. I had been finding inspiration hard to come by, but then by chance my Mum came to the rescue with another of her eccentric plans. She's quite remarkable and keeps us amused often with various projects and schemes totally without realising how much entertainment it gives both family and friends. A couple of weeks back we were all together for a few drinks and a spot of tea to celebrate her birthday, the conversation meandered round as it does in most families after a couple of glasses of wine, you know the kind of thing "...did you ever get a reply from that message in a bottle you threw in the sea beside the Esplanade in 1958?" or "...why did great aunt Agnes run off with that brush salesman and leave a husband and five children?" For some reason on this particular evening Mum asked "I wonder if I put a stamp and address on a bank note and posted it, if it would reach it's destination?" Our Dad's retort was unsurprisingly something like "don't be so bloody stupid woman, of course it won't, some bugger will nick it straight away, I tell you what, I'll set fire to the money now if you like and save you the stamp!" which of course was throwing down the gauntlet so to speak. If there's something Mum can't resist it is a challenge, so she decided to send each of her grand children a fiver through the post in a clear plastic envelope with just a stamp and address.
Well, the bank notes were posted and all arrived safe and sound at their destinations. So it would seem good old fasioned honesty is alive and well and mum has been vindicated in her hare brained experiment, plus each of her grandchildren got a drink out of it too.
Would you believe it, human interface design at the Artcafé ?!. An interesting and pithy piece on theartist's brother & sister in law's blog 'You May Also Like' Who'd would have thought that 'Dymo' tape could be so fascinating?
I'm just back from the beach where I have been collecting some shells and doing a little drawing in the bitter early March wind. The beach here at West Mersea is completely littered with oysters of the Pacific/Gigas variety these days, totally out numbering our native, so I brought some home with me along with mussels, winkles, limpets and some very tiny, pretty whelk-like shells, in order to do some more detailed studies for some larger work I have been planning for some time. The wind seemed to be coming directly off the North Sea and up the River Blackwater, so with eyes streaming and shaky hands, 10 minutes was my limit for each sketch. But I feel totally invigorated now I'm home perusing my finds with coffee in hand and stove alight.
For nearly two years I have been trying to pretend that the things that happened to my dad when he died were a tragic one-off but now I realise the sad truth. I can barely stand to hear the terrible things in the news about neglect of the elderly in hospitals, the removal of all their dignity and total disregard for their human rights.
My father died in hospital. He had dementia which had advanced very quickly and after a short time in a care home was admitted to hospital after a fall, just a fall. Within the first few days he had another fall but it was not noticed that he had broken his shoulder. When it was noticed, he was bandaged with a pillowcase because they "didn't have the right dressing".
There followed a catalogue of neglect bordering on abuse and he wasn't the only patient I saw left to their own devices, without drinks, without help eating, without any caring attention. My dad was nil by mouth and so slowly, over a month starved to death. We made an official complaint to the hospital and were fobbed off with excuses which we accepted because at that time it was too painful to pursue it. I wish now that we had been stronger, louder and more determined.
My father was in the Royal Navy during the 2nd World War, so he survived Hitler. He had T.B. and diabetes which he survived. He survived the death of my mother from lung cancer, only to die scared, confused and neglected.
Yesterday my good friend 'Banksy Boy' and I were having one of our deep discussions, over a pot of assam/ceylon blend, about the relative merits of musicians who are readers, (usaully) classically trained and those who come from a more contemporary background, from say a jazz/blues tradition. Our discussion came hot on the heels of loads of stuff we've been reading in blogland about music for worship, both good, bad and in some cases ugly.
We both wondered why is it that in our experience musos. who are classically trained, and more often than not 'technically' far better than their jazz/blues contemporaries are so flummoxed when asked to improvise. A simple question really. To use your instrument to express yourself, that's all. After all they have the knowledge of scales, arpeggios, modes etc. in thier arsenal but when asked to open up and be creative for a few bars the result is often at best stilted and wooden.
Now my alterior motive behind this post is to share with you one of my favourite saxaphone solos, by Pee Wee Ellis playing with Van Morrison at Montreux in 1980.
Van's singing style also exemplifies the nub of our discussion as it probably breaks all the rules that any music teacher would espouse, but, it reaches deep into both song and listener, in short it has soul.
The artist's mother's intriguing biography of her early life on Mersea Island from the outbreak of World War 2 through to 1968. Available from The Artcafe!
