Cat + detail from collagraph

Seeing that image below was driving me mad  so I just had to post a different image on here.
Also,  I am waiting for (above: detail from Print, featured in earlier post)  my SLR digital camera to recharge so I can finish my 'documentation' of stuff I have been doing of late.
Some of it,  is from before I went into hospital for the neuro surgery - as in the
"Bookmark Project" 
which I had signed up for, ages ago with Sarah Bodmin of the University of Central England.  It's been taking place over the past five or six years and I thought I'd give it a go.  I started playing around with thoughts and ideas about 3 months before the deadline but didnt buckle down to physically getting on with  it until about 6 weeks before it was due.
Then of course I began to realise that it was going to take far more physical effort that I had anticipated.  I thought seriously about it and because I did not know, the extent,  nor the duration,  of the increased pain and incapacity  -  I thought it best to 'resign' from the project.    I hated doing that  = I think it's the first time I have ever had to do it but it seemed best.  It was for an edition of 100 bookmarks.
Here's a link to the final bookmarks  project on the University  of the West of  England's  website
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As in the water color monotypes - which were the first thing I did following my adventure with the neurosurgeon.

411 Galleries

I am going through my blog folder (one of many blog folders!!) and adding much backdated items such as this. It's an image I sent to the 411 Gallery for the second last exhibition that I participated in there. The place is run by a chap called James Ryan and he seems to have achieved a lot with the place. I think that there have been about 4 or 5 exhibitions which were as a result of an open call to artists of Irish origin/association/residence. I have had a poster from them, at one time which was for one of the shows I was participating in and also a rather nice catalogue.
The most recent of their exhibitions I was featured in was "Drawing Eire"which included artists using drawing media in a myriad of ways as well as with a plethora of interpretations as to what drawing is. It opened in March of this year (2009) thereafter the plan was that the show would travel on to Beijing and then Hangzhou.
However I am still awaiting two other catalogues (of exhibitions I was in).   One had the theme of "showcase" although I can't remember what the gallery called the exhibition.   The other was "Cead in China"  ( for which I have the catalogue - and it's a perfectly good catalogue I might add).   I have emailed James quite a number of times and by now have grown tired of his assurances that he will send me one.............
The Drawing Eire" exhibition catalogue - I would have hoped to have received it,  by now.

FOOTNOTE

I just found this  picture (above)  of the artwork I sent for the Drawing exhibition on the 411 website  amazing !!!

I rather liked this one (left)  that I saw on there,  which was also in the exhibition. It's by Valerie Gleeson.  She is from Cork city in the south of Ireland, like myself.

B I B L I O D Y S S E Y a treat for the mind body and spirit

It truly is inspiring - I always imagine that everyone knows about this superb blog but it may be that  you don't.?? !!  ......whatever .......enjoy  http://bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/

There are  all sorts on there;  mainly though,  it is in the form of illustrations from books of old with the occasional  contemporary entry.   I can't remember how I first came across it but it was a few years back.   Weird animals,  monkeys and sea creatures, maps, divine comedy as well as images pertaining to  apocalyptic visions, are to be found on Bibliodyssey.
Botanical and Zoological illustrations along with illuminated manuscripts also feature.  One is often taken to other interesting blogs by reading what Peacay (the author, who I think lives in Australia) has to say,  on his various posts.    I very much admire this publication because it must take a tremendous effort to maintain it.
I even went so far as to purchase the book that has been published fairly recently , about the website,  a couple of christmases ago,  for my brother

 BIBLIODYSSEY BY CATEGORIES

• africa 
• agriculture 
• alchemy 
• america 
• arabic 
• architecture 
• argentina 
• artistry 
• artisty
• astrology 
• astronomy 
• australia 
• austria 
• belgium 
• bookart 
• brazil 
• britain 
• burma
• calligraphy 
• canada 
• cartography 
• chile 
• china 
• combat 
• costumes 
• croatia 
• cuba
• czech 
• denmark 
• egypt 
• emblemata 
• ephemera 
• estonia 
• ethnology 
• fauna 
• festival
• finland 
• flight 
• flora 
• france 
• germany 
• greece 
• history 
• holland 
• hungary 
• iceland
• illuminated 
• illustrator 
• india 
• indonesia 
• ireland 
• israel 
• italy 
• japan 
• kids 
• latvia
• literature 
• lithuania 
• machines 
• malta 
• marine 
• medicine 
• medieval 
• mesoamerica
• mexico 
• modern 
• monsters 
• multi 
• music 
• nepal 
• norway 
• nz 
• peru 
• philippines 
• poland
• portugal 
• printing 
• publications 
• puertorico 
• religion 
• repository 
• romania 
• russia
• science 
• scotland 
• serbia 
• shipping 
• slovenia 
• spain 
• surinam 
• sweden 
• switzerland 
• thailand 
• tibet
• turkey 
• ukraine 
• venezuela 
• voyage 
• wales 
• women

Envelopes and their Contents

This is a project I participated in towards the end of last year. It was called "Envelopes and their contents" which appealed to me. I seem to remember it was posted on the Arts Council's email news list bulletin that they send out daily.   Ninety nine per cent of the time there's nothing of interest or  relevance but occasionally I see something.    I sent the "Stitches" image because it was what I was working on at the time and it relates to my ideas about  the duality of the image .   As in the self,  the infant becomes through being adopted into a host family and the 'unknown' self as in from the biological origins etc.

 I found out about being adopted myself,  through looking in envelopes I shouldn't have looked in,  at the bottom of my mothers wardrobe in her bedroom.  Was'nt really supposed to be poking around in there but I was a very curious child ( in more ways than one !!)

The exhibition took place during the Liverpool Artists Book Fair at Wolstenholme Projects. It was curated by Sophie Loss and Mary Yacoob.
See more about the project HERE

Where do I begin ??

Its been so long since I posted here that I almost don't know where to begin. I was very busy the 2 or 3 weeks that took me up to the end of June because I knew I was going into hospital on the 30th for an operation on my spine called a "lumbar laminectomy". Sounds more like some kind of process that would be undertaken on a thick plank of wood to go on your kitchen worktop.
Anyway I had a print the collagraph with the little figure on a horse and the leopard silhouette. I wasn't too sure how soon again I would be fit to do any printmaking so I had to get that piece resolved so that it would be ready to go into the "silver exhibition" for FDPW's touring exhibition. I already had a piece in a frame for it but I had never been that happy with it and so worked on this 'replacement' piece..

After all the weeks of work on it, in the end I had to use some hand coloring with some water soluble pastel pencils to get it looking right. BUT - I got it done and that was the main thing.