pennywhistles and moonpies.

Live to work, work to live.

2012-02-08T02:18:00.000+11:00

Ok, so I'm pretty much a complete workaholic: I derive most of my pleasure in life from work-related activities, be they actual paid work or extra-curricular activities like botanical drawing. Even when I'm not working, my idea of a relaxing evening is writing about said work in this blog...sad but true. Still, even I have my limits and I think last week I nearly reached them.; in a single week I spent about 60 hours in the tattoo shop, 18 hours at my plant dissection workshop, and another 10 or so hours at home drawing for my appointments. Still, if I hadn't done all that work, what the hell would I post about on here? Besides, I'm working this hard to save funds for a very exciting trip to the UK that I'll write in detail about on here soon. In the meantime, here are a few pics of what I've been working on lately.

Poppies around Kate's zebra:

Some lotus flowers for Katherine:

Anthony's pirate ship...what's kraken?

Vampire lady for Maddi...will look a bit nicer healed. The text says 'cursed beauty':

A tribute to the lovely Anneke, on her also lovely husband Ryan:

A six-armed dingo goddess back-piece for my fellow belly dancer Briohny: final design is a little different but didn't get a photo.

And...an homage to the mothership for the epic photo-collage album cover that Shaun and I are working on for our good friend Ishan. More on that soon.

I have a bunch of other new photos on different cameras around the place, but have been lazily using my phone camera for most stuff lately. More pics coming up when I get around to it.

Dylan Carlson solo project.

2012-02-07T02:40:00.001+11:00

Dylan Carlson makes some of the most melancholic and profoundly beautiful music I have ever heard. I don't know exactly how to describe it, other than that it's slow and patient and meditative, and at times incredibly sad. To me, this music is the sound of a man's intimate relationship with his own being; a life-time of painful reflection, and an exploration of the way chords and melodies and lingering moments of empty space can become extensions of ones self in order to communicate those abstract sentiments that words can't possibly express.

Appropriately, Dylan's band, for which he is the founding member and principle songwriter, is called Earth. The only comparison that I can think of is Popol Vuh, because their spacious and repetitive music, used to great effect in Werner Herzog's slow-paced movies, invokes the same kind of meditative visions that Earth do for me. I remember discussing both bands with Shaun once, and saying that I felt it was impossible to have mundane or vapid thoughts whilst listening to their music - it almost demands that you slow down and reflect, and contemplate matters of importance instead.

But enough about Earth; the reason for this blog post is to bring some attention to the fact that Dylan Carlson is currently trying to reach his funding goals for a solo project called Wonders from the House of Albion, and he only has one week left. The album sounds like it will be an ambitious and deeply personal work, involving a visit to his ancestral homeland in the UK to make recordings at megalithic sites, and investigate his experiences with suspected ffayre-ffolke or familiar spirits. As Shaun and I shall be making our own gnostic odyssey (to put it in Julian Cope's words) to the UK in about 5 weeks time, the concept behind this album is particularly exciting to us. If you would like to help with his project, no matter how small the amount, please visit his Kickstarter page and donate what you can. In the meantime, enjoy some Earth.

The secret teachings of plants.

2012-02-07T01:27:00.000+11:00

As if in obedient response to my recent expression of interest in illustrations of plant dissections, my botanical illustration teacher Mali held a plant dissection workshop over the course of three days last week. As it turns out, she teaches them over summer every year; but I'm not going to let that ruin my enjoyment of the coincidence. I was particularly happy that it would be Mali teaching this course, because I'm extremely fond of her and find her love of scientific drawing contagious. This is an example of an exquisite Boronia painting with dissections by Mali:

Needless to say, I was very excited to be learning these skills and was determined to get as much out of the course as I could. I managed to scrounge up enough pennies for an old stereo microscope that I found on ebay, and swindled a free dissection kit from my kindly vet-student sister Kate. Although was looking forward to it immensely, I actually enjoyed dissecting and observing plants even more than I had anticipated; and despite the fact that I barely managed to dissect and illustrate the inner workings of a single flower over the whole workshop, when the three days were up I was left wishing it wasn't over. Three days of staring at such microscopic detail ended up feeling like three hours, and I felt as though I would need another month to actually complete what I was trying to draw...which amounted to little more than a few pencil sketches and some notes:

Just to deliberately confuse and challenge myself, being the contradiction-loving Gemini that I am, I chose to read a book called The Secret Teachings of Plants on my way to and from the workshop. The book, a gift from my very dear friend Jerome, discusses the limitations of science to accurately describe nature, and specifically plants. Not that the book dismisses science altogether, as it necessarily covers a lot of scientific ground, but it does call into question the sense of certainty that people derive from the process of scientific reductionism. I haven't finished the book yet, but what I read of it served as a nice reminder during those three days that I was merely observing patterns that frequently occur in nature, rather than discovering cold hard facts that were indisputable.

So anwyay, onto what I did during the workshop: first up was pulling apart a lily and bud to see what a fairly simple flower looks like when pulled intro it's various sections. I was rather pleased to be working with lilies, as the ones we used were very similar to the gorgeously scented Stargazer lilies that I had in my wedding bouquet, and that I am familiar with from years of drawing them. As I'm sure many of you have noticed, these flowers have one of the most visible reproductive systems of any plant you're likely to see:

Once we'd pulled them apart and identified the various parts - petals, sepals, stamens, anthers, stigmas, styles...then we got to cut them up and look at them under a microscope. It was pretty awesome. I can't show you any images from under the microscope because mine is a rather old one (there are new digital ones with a usb cable you can connect to the computer), but maybe that's better anyway - all the more reason to draw what I'm seeing accurately so there's no need for photographic documentation. We learned a fair bit about basic botany on the first day, and about how images are sized, scaled and arranged on a page both for scientific and artistic purposes.

On the second day we got to dissect flowers from the daisy family, and happily Mali had brought Echinacea flowers which happen to be another one of my favourites. Echinacea was my introduction into the world of herbalism, a subject close to my heart, and I've always loved the flowers as a symbol of that initiation. Like lots of things I love, I originally thought they were weird and not particularly beautiful at all, which I think is what makes me all the more fond of them now.

The reason Mali had chosen daisies for us to dissect is because they're thoroughly complicated, as I soon found out. The really interesting thing I discovered about the Echinacea was that the actual flowers - ie the section of the plant containing the male and female parts used for reproduction - were in fact covering the entire surface of the spiky receptacle in the centre. This was not one flower, but many flowers combined, and the long orange spines that protrude from each flower are just the bracts. This meant that dissecting one of these tiny flowers in order to find out how it reproduces involved picking one of them up with tweezers and cutting it in half under the microscope. In the cross-section below, each of the orange spines represents one flower, and the halved seeds can be clearly seen at the base of each one:

flowers and bracts:

Each flower was only about 9mm tall and 1mm wide. Below you can see my sketch of a seed on the far left, then a flower in the middle, and a bract on the right, all magnified by 10. I couldn't believe how long it took to draw those simple little things, and it occurred to me that perhaps I was taking more care and spending more time observing rather than drawing because I knew I didn't have the benefit of photographs that I could refer to later.

Unfortunately I wasn't able to take my echinacea specimens home after the class due to current restrictions on plant matter leaving the gardens, but I have them sitting in the fridge at the botanical garden observatory where my classes are held, and I intend to squeeze some more drawing time out if them before they perish. Hopefully one day I'll have time to complete a full scale painting of an echinacea in colour, and with all the dissections and individual parts illustrated also. One day.

New Moon

2012-01-23T13:23:00.000+11:00

Ok, so I missed the boat on a timely new year's post, but since it's the first day of the new lunar year today it seems like an appropriate subject to write about. I had intended to write a post much sooner, but this first month of 2012 has thus far been astoundingly busy and my blog has been neglected...which is a shame really, because I have lots of things I'd like to write about - in particular, my growing fascination with and collection of these vintage new year's cards featuring my favourite mushrooms...they'll just have to wail 'til next time.

My new year's celebrations comprised a romp in the forests of Daylesford with some of my favourite people, far away from the city and the brutal heat, and under the spectacular night sky that you can only appreciate when you get that far out. We spent the afternoon playing hand drums and singing bowls amongst the trees, and the evening camped around a fire, admiring the silence and beautiful stars in the crystal-clear sky. It was exactly what we all needed, and a perfect way to welcome in 2012.

I don't usually celebrate the new year with much enthusiasm, mostly because I associate it with the kind of awful public drunkenness we're all familiar with on such occasions, but I felt this year was an important one to acknowledge. 2011 was the lunar year of the rabbit, and the year Shaun and I decided to start our own business which we named for the rabbit in the moon, unaware at the time of the significance of doing so. I'm so fond of these serendipitous things that seem to happen so often these days; in the past few months I have been seeing rabbits absolutely everywhere, including a few feral ones up at Daylesford which Shaun and I took to be a lucky sign, (we also found an Amanita mushroom in the pine forest completely out of season, which we took as another sign of luck) and I have become completely engrossed in studying the moon and all symbols, traditions and deities associated with it.

Greek goddess Luna, also known as Selene

I think the first inkling of this fascination may have occurred a year or so ago after reading a wonderful book called Full Moon Feast, which discusses how the various cycles of the moon related to the changing of the seasons and subsequently of our available food supply, as well as issues like light pollution and how this affects our connection with the moon. More recently my interest has shifted towards the lunar cycle's effect on human fertility, as well as it's role in astrology (something I've been secretly interested in since I was a teenager). Since I have neither the time nor the inclination to write about such things in any detail, I am working on a number of paintings that explore my fascination with La Luna and all related subjects. In the meantime, the new moon today welcomes in the Year of the Dragon , which promises an exciting shift in consciousness, luck and prosperity. Happy New Year!

2011-12-19T13:19:00.001+11:00

La Louve art prints.

2011-12-18T21:16:00.001+11:00

Limited edition of 23, up now on the Lepus Luna website if anyone’s interested. AUD$160 shipping included.

Happiness of late.

2011-12-18T20:37:00.001+11:00

Amazing Moss Agate ring from my local crystal shop:

Kooky tiger painting from my boss Jane:

Origami unicorn tattoo from my friend Dan, in homage to my favourite movie ever:

Scans of old family slides my Dad gave me recently. I don’t remember this occasion but I do remember the Rainbow Starbright mirror I’m holding. I think this is the coolest photo of me ever taken; I look like I’m donning my war-paint and bearskin in preparation for some kind of school-yard battle or shamanic initiation:

Speaking of bears…this is the cat I grew up with, whose name was Bear:

Porch-side drone jams with Shaun and Jerome:

and Saturday afternoon break-beats…

Semi-precious

2011-12-18T18:48:00.001+11:00

I’ve been experiencing some synchronicity in relation to crystals recently, so thought it was about time I wrote some blog posts about them. Crystals are something I’ve always been interested in, and a large solid sphere of rose quartz that I received for my 21st birthday is among my most treasured possessions; but there’s always been something holding me back from diving head-on into an enthusiasm for these mineral friends. The thing I am referring to will be familiar to anyone who has ever entered a new-age or Theosophical Society bookstore, and was once succinctly described by my friend Jerome as The Purple Horror. As you might expect, one of the best books available on crystals features a cover that suffers terribly from a case of the purple horror - so much so that a friend of mine went to the effort of covering hers with black contact so she didn’t have to look at it ever again. I’m considering doing the same to mine…but in the meantime, I’ve been really enjoying this beautiful King Penguin book from 1952 which features one of the coolest book covers I’ve ever seen, inspired by the beautiful mineral Malachite.

The very same day that I’d been discussing my love of crystal illustrations with my friend Jeanne, who recently included some in a painting she did, a customer of mine brought this book in as reference for a tattoo of jewel that she’s getting. I immediately jotted down the name and found myself a copy on Bookfinder (best website ever), because I really love these scientific illustrations and don’t come across them very often. My scanner’s not the best so I photographed the most interesting illustrations, all by an artist named Arthur Smith, for you to enjoy.

This first illustration is definitely my favourite. Something about the combination of the triangular facets of the quartz and the more organic composition of the minerals growing on it just seems magical to me. I have a bit of a thing for this trinity of colours too, pink yellow and blue being visually harmonious variants of the classic primary colours. Also, as Shaun pointed out, with its overlapping triangles it rather resembles a Valknut.

Since discovering this book I’ve also been led to a whole host of other crystal art which I intend to share when I have a spare minute. I’ve also been inspired to use the skills I’m learning in my botanical illustration class to do some paintings of minerals that interest me in the same sort of style. First on my list is my current favourite stone, Moss Agate, which is reputed to encourage a stronger relationship with plants among other useful qualities.

Lepus Luna

2011-12-04T15:33:00.001+11:00

So if you've noticed that I haven't been posting here as much of late, that would be because I've been busily working on an exciting new project with my husband Shaun, which we've named Lepus Luna. Motivated in part by the desire to spend more of our time working together from home, as well as by the numerous requests we've received for prints of our respective paintings and photographs, Lepus Luna will be a mutable space that can accommodate whatever we're working on at any given time, either individually or together. This is our brand new logo!

The most significant move we've made towards getting this thing off the ground is the purchase of a large-format digital printer that is capable of reproducing artworks and photographs at museum quality standards - commonly known as giclée printing. Not only will this make it possible for us to make our personal art available to people, it will eventually give us the opportunity to help other artists we know and admire to make prints of their work as well. With the photo-editing skills and printing knowledge that Shaun's been gaining at his photography course, he's able to achieve printed results that are as close to the original artwork as possible, which has always been a challenge for me in the past.

As we are both still working full time, progress with this thing is going to be slow, but we plan to have our first print available before Christmas this year - a very limited edition of my painting from earlier this year called La Louve, signed and numbered with some hand-painted gold detailing. Check out our new blog and follow by RSS, or like our facebook page if you're keen to get updates on prints and other things we're doing. Cheers!

Victoria Amazonica

2011-11-28T12:59:00.001+11:00

I stumbled on these incredible botanical illustrations of Amazon Lilies recently and can’t stop looking at them. It’s difficult to tell from the pictures, but the pads of these lilies are enormous and covered in extremely sharp spines – nothing like the quaint lily pads you see floating on ponds in most gardens. I have witnessed these amazing things first-hand at the Adelaide Botanic Gardens, where they have their own enclosed pond that I recommend you visit if you get the chance.

The first image is a beautiful example of my favourite type of botanical drawing, with the cross sections and individual parts shown in separate diagrams – they’re so much more appealing to me than a simple image of the specimen as a whole. I think maybe I respond to them so much because they occupy a particular space in the scientific world that photography never can, and because they reflect mankind’s profound desire to not only appreciate these beautiful things, but to explore and understand them. I can’t wait to do a more thorough rendition of an Amanita muscaria mushroom in this style, which hopefully might happen next mushroom season.

The first four of these images came from the NYPL Digital Library, and I found the last two in the exhaustive collection of images from Curtis’s Botanical Magazine on Wikimedia Commons. Enjoy.

Chapel Tattoo flash set

2011-11-23T23:28:00.001+11:00

All of us at Chapel Tattoo were recently asked to paint a sheet of flash for a shop set, which I thought was an excellent idea. I’m really glad we were made to do it because I’ve always meant to try painting flash, but never did for some unknown reason. I’m not sure my style of painting is very suitable for it, and I definitely added some embellishments here and there that you wouldn’t bother trying to put in a tattoo, but I think the designs could easily be modified or adapted to be tattoo-able, which I guess is the idea anyway. Whether they end up being used or not, I had fun painting this sheet and might even try doing some more one day.

I’d been playing with some small sketches of magic and witchcraft inspired images for some time, so this seemed like the perfect opportunity to flesh them out.

The full page: (click for bigger res images)

Mandragora, or mandrake. I am super fascinated by the folklore and mythology surrounding this plant, so will probably paint more of them in time.

The spider lady was an excuse to paint a lady face with some creepy extra eyes and legs; I like images of animals crossed with humans, or humans wearing animal pelts, because to me it suggests the transformation of a witch or shaman into their animal form.

Hissing kitty. Included because it’s a popular image for tattooing, and because cats are common familiar animals. And because, well, it’s a cat.

Ritual objects. Once again, skulls are such a timeless tattoo image that you can’t really go wrong with them; I included the other objects to resemble a ritual alter setting.

Hand of Glory. This is an intensely strange and grim piece of folklore that you can read about here.

Voodoo doll or poppet. This was inspired by a protective doll that a friend made for Shaun, and that has always fascinated me. I feel like the creation of dolls for magical purposes is a really powerful and intuitive way of working that I’d like to try some day.

This sheet was mostly painted with Indian and Sepia inks on Arches watercolour paper, with a few touches of white gouache which was originally there to cover some boo-boos, but that I included more of because I like the blue-ish colour it created. The background was painted with good old black coffee dregs from my stovetop coffee maker. I’m not sure what’s happening with the prints of this set, but when I do know I’ll be sure to post the details up. I saw all the finished sheets the other day and it’s really nice seeing all the contrasting styles and personalities in our shop reflected in the designs.

Gramophone for Anna.

2011-10-24T08:24:00.001+11:00

I had the pleasure of tattooing a lovely couple named Anna and Matthias recently who both got quite personal and unusual custom pieces done. I haven’t got pics of the finished pieces yet, but I do have one of Anna’s gramophone which I’m rather proud of. This took longer to colour than I’d care to admit, but I think it was worth it. Thanks Anna.

Michael’s lady sleeve.

2011-10-23T13:31:00.001+11:00

Having lots of fun with this new sleeve I’ve been working on, consisting of beautiful ladies with jewelled insects and snakes. Finished this first lady a few weeks ago:

and started on another:

…more progress photos to come.

Sleepy Sun

2011-09-30T17:16:00.001+10:00

I’ve acquired quite a lot of new music recently, but right now as my poor workmates know all too well, I just cannot stop listening to Sleepy Sun. I’ve been addicted to both their albums ever since I heard them a few weeks ago, but it’s this amazing first track on their latest album Fever that kills me every time. Here’s some cool footage of them playing it live in Barcelona.

Unfortunately Rachel, the female vocalist featured on those albums and in the footage above, has since left the band which is such a shame because I find the male/female harmonies in Sleepy Sun thoroughly mesmerizing. Hopefully her absence won’t spoil my enjoyment of any future offerings they have in store, but I’m definitely sad to hear she’s gone.

You can buy their albums and some pretty great merch from their website here. Fever especially is worth getting for the gorgeous cover which was done by one of my favourite artists, David V. D’Andrea who I talked about on here a little while back.

Go buy some of their stuff, and with any luck they’ll be touring our neck of the woods some day soon.

Ravens for Cass.

2011-09-29T20:38:00.001+10:00

Speaking of animal friends, I’ve just been reminded of these matching ravens I did a while back on my lovely fellow tribal belly dancer Cassandra, who totally has a thing for birds. I also recently completed a large owl in a similar style on her leg, which I am yet to photograph but hope to soon. Thanks Cass, it’s always a pleasure.

Finished stuff on Leonie.

2011-09-28T20:45:00.001+10:00

Got some nice healed photos the other day of these two fun pieces that I did on fellow tattooer and all-round good lass Leonie from Voodoo Ink in St Kilda. A botanical-style pineapple, taken from the fabulous Taschen book Garden of Eden:

And a harpie on a seashell, which you’ll have to enlarge to see properly dude to my poorly attempted stitch-job on these photos. Photographing these kinds of tattoos is always a pest but I think you get the idea anyway.

Thanks Leonie, and come get more soon!

Ramsey Dukes Wisdom

2011-09-28T08:35:00.001+10:00

“When I was young the accepted wisdom was that our primitive forebears, being ignorant and brutish, used to do silly things. This we call ‘magic’. Through many millennia of doing silly things they learnt to do silly things rather well. Doing silly things well is what we call ‘art’. Through further millennia of doing silly things well, plus increasing civilisation, they learnt to do silly things with authority. This we call ‘religion’. Then at last, during the last five hundred years, we grew up and learnt to be sensible instead. This we call ‘science’.”

Animal friends.

2011-09-28T08:31:00.001+10:00

I’ve had the pleasure of tattooing some stellar individuals recently, and they’ve been getting some really fun designs to boot. For some reason I seem to be doing a lot of animal designs, many of them totem or special animals to the wearer, which always makes them more enjoyable for me. Yesterday I started this cute robin and olive branch on the very lovely Kat, who works across the river at Fox Body Art in Collingwood.

Got to test out my new camera on this one too, which takes way better photos than my phone does. Hand-me-down cameras are just one of the perks of having a photographer husband!

Another totem bird, from a few months back now…a little swallow for an awesome fellow named Drew, who I had great fun tattooing and talking shit to for a few hours.

A tiny lizard on Ainsley as part of her Celtic shamanism-inspired piece; this is just one of many animals I’m doing on her leg, including a stag, a fox, a hedgehog and an otter…but no decent photos of any of them yet.

Also fun recently was this zebra on beautiful Kate from Dukes, my beloved local coffee shop. Soon we’ll be adding poppies to this for some extra colour, and I shall get a less gross-looking photo as well.

More Louis Wain kitties on Sally…I’m gonna be so bummed when we fill this arm up, which will be happening rather soon. Hopefully she’ll let me start filling the other arm after that though.

Perhaps the most unusual request I had these past few weeks: a lynx and a pine martin running alongside eachother. There was an awesome story attached to this tattoo that I have sadly forgotten, along with the cool Polish name of the nice chap I did it on… but I know it was inspired by a sci-fi or fantasy novel.

And last but not least, a bordering-on-silly kitten playing with yarn tattoo for my darling sister Kate. The first of many cat tattoos I’ll be doing on her, I imagine.

More AJ Fosik

2011-08-17T22:13:00.000+10:00

About two years ago I posted a short blog about a wonderful man named AJ Fosik, who makes some of the most awe-inspiring sculptures I've ever seen:

There aren't too many artists around these days whose work is truly unique and memorable to me, but I really think AJ has created something pretty special with these creatures. So imagine my delight when I discovered that he would be creating the cover art for the new album by Mastodon, my favourite metal band, and that they've made a cool video to promote their new single featuring the sculptor at work:

More of AJ's goodness:

I'm not sure exactly what Fosik is getting at with these sculptures, but I don't think it matters because one thing is for sure: they are at the opposite end of the art spectrum to all the annoying, ironic, post-modern wankery that the chin-scratching gallery crowd are so very fond of. It's refreshing to see art that appeals to the viewer in such an honest, uncomplicated fashion - you don't need to read his manifesto or ask him about his childhood traumas to appreciate what he's doing. In the little artist profile posted below, he talks about a fondness for folk-art which is a nice point of reference, and one that I can relate to working as a tattooist.

Here's hoping I can have an AJ Fosik original hanging on my wall one day.

Painting and cats.

2011-07-25T13:01:00.001+10:00

Trying hard to get these cat paintings done, but Monty seems determined to get in the way.

So far I have outlined three of these and haven’t ruined any of them, which is a good start…although I did have a near miss last weekend when I stood up after painting for a while and discovered that the end of my plait had been resting in a pot of black ink. I’ll just add that to my long list of stuff not to do, along with keeping spray bottles of coffee lying around.

While I’m on the subject of painting though, I’m going to indulge in a post about materials that most of you will find boring. But it’s really cold and wet outside, and I have so much trouble finding the right stuff to paint with that I feel compelled to share it when I find something great; and I have actually found a few things lately that make my life as a painter a lot easier.

Firstly, any of you who work with paper will know that masking tape which claims to be ‘low tack’ is very rarely useful. Either it peels half your paper off with it after you’ve spent hours on a painting, or it’s so low-tack that paint seeps under areas that you were trying to mask. So I recently splurged on a roll of $20 masking tape, recommended to me by the nice lady at the art suppliers, and I am super glad that I did. The blue stuff you can see in the photo above is a brand called hyStik, and as you can see from their website, these guys are serious about masking tape. I bought the long-lasting one, which means I can stick my painting down with it and leave it there for 14 days before the tape starts getting harder to peel off. So far every time I’ve used it I’ve been able to get it off easily, with no paper tears or sticky residue, and all the edges I’ve masked with it have been perfectly clean. This in particular is of vital importance to me because of the paintings I do where certain parts of the image extend beyond the masked edge, like the wolfsbane piece I did recently:

Another thing I’m pleased with having found recently are brushes with ergonomic handles. One of the things I found incredibly frustrating over my one-month painting holiday was that after a certain period of painting or drawing, my hand was so sore, and particularly my thumb and middle finger where the brush/pencil rests, that I was constantly forced to stop and let it recover. Even layers of band-aids on both my fingers and the brushes are not enough to prevent this from happening, because I like doing work with loads of tiny details and have to use the smallest brushes, which also generally have the thinnest handles.

SO, I went hunting on the internet for brushes with fat handles, having seen some before in a similar post to this on the rather excellent Wandering Genie, and after hours of searching I found some. This picture is of larger brushes, but the handle on the 000 brush I bought is the same size.

Within Australia, these Roymac Purity bruishes are the only ones I can find (which is fine because Roymac make good brushes), but on Dick Blick in America I managed to find several brands that make a range of wide-handled brushes, mostly for detailing. I ordered a bunch of different ones that haven’t arrived yet, but they look excellent. The ones I’m most excited about are these:

The brand is Robert Simmons Expression Series, and these spotter brushes are smaller than any brushes I’ve found in Australia. They’re also a hell of a lot cheaper, like most things in the States, but the cost of having them shipped here cancels that out somewhat. So far the work I’ve done with the Roymacs has been far more comfortable so I’m looking forward to getting these.

Also making my life way easier these days is Saral Graphite Transfer Paper, which I only recently discovered:

Until now I have been using a glass-top table from Ikea with a desk-lamp underneath it to trace images onto my painting paper, and when I’m using toned paper or really thick card it doesn’t work well at all. For anyone who hasn’t used it, this stuff is re-usable and comes in a roll, so you can cut a piece that fits your paper and just trace right over the top of it. I’ve been using computer print-outs of the line drawing and tracing it though with a ball-point pen. The greatest benefit of doing things this way is that you’re not actually placing a pencil on the paper, and therefore avoiding the tiny grooves and scratches they cause on the surface, which annoyingly show up after putting colour down or rubbing something out.

I also just bought some stuff called Mask-It, similar to what Americans know as Friskit, which is a masking film for use with airbrushes and the like. Apparently it won’t damage paper and is useful for watercolour painting too. I haven’t tried it yet, but have some bits on these new cat paintings that I plan to mask out, so intend to try it in the next few weeks.

If this doesn’t work though, I learned a good way to apply large areas of masking fluid from my botanical drawing teacher, which is to apply it with one of those rubber-tipped paint shaper thingies you can buy:

Anyone who has ever accidentally dipped an expensive brush into masking fluid will understand why it’s important to use one made of rubber, not hair.

So now that’s all off my chest, I guess I’d better go do some painting. I have some technique/materials tips for graphite drawing that I might share down the track some times as well, if anyone finds this stuff useful. I’m always happy to share whatever knowledge I have with people who would like to know how I achieve certain effects in my work, and appreciate it when others do the same. The importance of good materials and knowledge of how to use them cannot be emphasized enough when it comes to painting and drawing, at least in my experience.

La Louve

2011-07-25T12:11:00.001+10:00

Shaun took a better photo of this for me last night. Prints should be available soon, when I get my shit together.

Some works in progress I’m excited about.

2011-07-20T00:05:00.001+10:00

Snake with poisonous herbs on my lovely Adelaide client Amy, who is studying to be a naturopath. Way too much fun. Anyone who can name the three plants gets a gold star.

An octopus for Adam’s head. WHY THE HELL NOT?

Gypsy lady for Michael, soon to become a full sleeve. Fun fun fun.

A portrait of Pauline’s Grandma, with licorice and candy. Actually finished this today but didn’t get a photo...real happy with how it turned out. Grandpa to come next, with cards, dice and dominoes.

Super-fun jellyfish on beautiful Anneke, almost finished but didn’t get time to colour the bubbles.

Also outlined a collection of totem animals from the tradition of Celtic Shamanism on Ainsley the other week, which I enjoyed immensely. Pictures of that as soon as I have some worth showing.

Psyche and Cupid.

2011-07-19T23:24:00.001+10:00

Based on, but not identical to, this amazing painting by William Bouguereau.

Art Sabbatical

2011-07-18T00:27:00.000+10:00

So I've been away for a little while, having just taken a month off from tattooing so I'd have an opportunity to work on my personal art for a bit, and I was hoping to return with all sorts of new achievements and some personal paintings to show off. Frustratingly, my art sabbatical didn't quite go as planned, and despite the fact that I did nothing for a whole month other than sit in my little 'office' and draw/paint/read/take notes, I actually accomplished very little; most of the drawings I did are now filling up my recycling bin. All I really have to show for that time, aside from a notebook full of ideas that are primarily still half-baked, are three pieces, two of which were in the works before I took my break. The first piece I finished was a coloured pencil illustration of my belly dance teacher Melusina, which she intends to use for a new business card and website:

While I am actually happy with how this turned out, the process of creating it was an epic disaster from start to finish, and it ate up an entire week of my break as a result. This image was in fact my third attempt, because I started two before it that both failed for various reasons, the main one being the paper I used. I won't go into a boring rant about art paper here because it's really not very interesting, but I will say that I have now learned a few painful lessons about the importance of choosing the right paper for my art work, and this drawing was the first. The second lesson was delivered during the final stages of the next piece I completed, which was another Amanita Muscaria mushroom:

You can't actually tell from this photo, but the paper in all the dark areas around the cap of the mushroom is torn to little shreds due to the paper being too soft for intensive pencil work. It's not a complete disaster because it's only by looking at the original in direct light that it shows - but it's still a massive bummer after 20+ hours of work, and it renders the original unsuitable for exhibiting. From now on, no matter what anybody tells me, I shall refuse to draw on anything less than Arches cotton rag watercolour paper - the only paper I've ever been truly happy with, and seemingly the only one that can withstand all the layers of burnishing and erasing required for this kind of pencil work. This is the kind of stuff that makes me wish I'd gone to art school, so maybe I'd know what the hell I'm doing.

So just in case those previous disasters weren't enough, I also ruined probably the best drawing I've ever done, and one that my botanical drawing teacher was hoping I would exhibit next year:

That stain there is coffee that dripped from a spray bottle I use for doing coffee washes on my paintings, and in all likelihood, it's never coming off. Be very glad you weren't all here to see the sad, teary tantrum I threw when I discovered that this had happened. I swear there's some kind of curse attached to my artwork because this kind of thing seems to happen to just about everything I do. Over the course of many years I've had art stolen, water damaged while in a gallery, pissed on by my cat, and thrown in the bin (thanks Mum) along with all the indignities I seem determined to subject it to. Sometimes I think it's remarkable that I even persist with making it.

So anyway, as for my third accomplishment, that didn't quite go as planned either...but I've grown to expect that now so it wasn't such a big deal. I actually feel ok with how this one came up in the end, and the only real issue I had was due to an experiment I tried with using a sepia toned black ink rather than straight black.

(I'll get a better photo of this soon.) For this sort of work I always outline and shade the whole painting with varying dilutions of indian ink, then paint over that with watercolour; I thought using sepia would give the whole image a sort of subtle warmth, but in reality it just muddied the colours and meant I had to paint over a few bits with opaque ink, which is kind-of a no-no in watercolour painting. But who gives a shit, right?

This is the first in a series of paintings I'm working on that are based on poisonous/healing/visionary plants and the folklore surrounding them. Some of you nerds out there (I'm looking at you, Jeanne) will recognise these flowers as Wolfsbane, more commonly known as Monkshood, which is one of the most poisonous plants in the world. The mythology surrounding Wolfsbane includes everything from people using it to kill wolves, to people using it to protect themselves from werewolves, and most excitingly to me, people using it to become werewolves. The idea that witches practised lycanthropy by donning wolfskins and employing toxins from magical plants may seem far-fetched, but it's certainly a more interesting and inspiring reality than the one I encounter most days, so I'm choosing to indulge in it.

Aside from this excellent book I've been reading, I think some of my love for themes of this kind comes from one of my all-time favourite movies, Altered States, in which the main character experiments with altered states using psychedelics and isolation tanks. In one particularly memorable scene, he reverts back to a primitive being and breaks into the local zoo where he kills and eats an animal with his bare hands. For the uninitiated:

Ken Russell is fucking awesome.

So aside from doing the above pieces, I also started a series of drawings for another new series based on cats, sketched out some ideas for a potential folklore-themed flash set, received this extremely beautiful Austin Spare print from Shaun for my 30th birthday, and became infatuated with the Legendary Pink Dots. Some more stuff has happened since then, but it can wait for another post.

Flapper girl.

2011-05-19T21:55:00.000+10:00

I was gonna tie this pic in with a blog post I've been working on about how awesome the 1920's were... but I don't have the time or the energy this week so that will have to wait. Outlined this on the lovely Andrea's leg last Monday, but forgot to take photos as usual.

Coffee, flowers, thinly-veiled mushroom references.

2011-05-19T21:44:00.001+10:00

Some stuff I’ve done this week; a coffee branch on Ashleigh who is a passionate coffee roaster:

A peony on Kate to extend her peacock/lady tattoo as seen earlier in this post. Still have to do the green in the leaves on both these.

And a Russian doll on Bryony, into which I managed to sneak a red scarf with white dots. To be fair, the actual photo reference she brought in had a similar scarf on anyway.

I did some other fun stuff this week but I still forget to take photos half the time. Should have some nice photos of finished pieces to show soon though.

2011-05-07T21:34:00.000+10:00

Pineapple time!

2011-05-06T19:42:00.000+10:00

Still unfinished but I had to share it anyway...working on this made my week, thanks Leonie! Why the fuck hasn't eveyone got tattoos of pineapples?

Mushroom drawings part 1.

2011-05-04T08:14:00.001+10:00

So this is how I spent my day yesterday. Probably close to 15 hours of it.

I had yet another all-day cancellation, and rather than try to find an appointment to fill it at the last minute I thought I’d stay home and draw. And I’m glad I did, because as luck would have it the mailman arrived early in the morning with an unexpected package for me, and it just happened to be an awesome drawing lamp my Mum had bought me with a daylight bulb in it and a magnifyer, which made the experience of drawing in my dingy little room a much nicer experience than it usually is. Thanks Ma.

I think this is my best botanical drawing yet and it was loads of fun. (This is not a great photo but Shaun will be able to take a nice one later). A very pale, detailed line drawing with minimal shading was done from life in Adelaide a few weeks ago, and then I did the rest of the shading yesterday from reference photos that I took:

I’ve taken some artistic license with some of the shading and a few other things, like removing the little tears in the stem near the bottom because I like the ambience of the texture without them. One of the things I’ve really noticed, which is partly why you have to draw from life whenever possible rather than from photos, is that a camera lens simply cannot capture the same information that your eye is capable of taking in at any given time, so the photo references always differ a little from what you’ve drawn.

I think my next Amanita drawing is going to be in colour, either watercolour or coloured pencil. I really need to either get over my fear of paint, or switch to pencils altogether I think. Either way, I’ll have more drawings to show you soon.

Ploughing the Clouds

2011-05-02T01:56:00.001+10:00

Ok, so this is part one of my blog post about mushrooms, because there’s too much stuff to cram into a single post. For a fair while now I have been becoming gradually more and more obsessed with a particular species of mushroom called the Amanita Muscaria. It’s the one everyone will recognise as the archetypal red-and-white spotted toadstool from children’s stories and cheesy goblin art, and up until the last few years I had no idea that they are in fact hallucinogenic.

Not only that, but an investigation into the history of their use reveals that they have been suggested by various scholars, academics and mushroom enthusiasts as the possible basis of many religious and shamanic traditions, up to and including Christianity. As with most literature concerning the use of magic mushrooms, there is much to be gained from contemplating these ideas (if only the willingness to think open mindedly) , but probably some to be taken with a grain of salt. Maybe.

painted ceiling in a German church, 1192 AD.

I’m currently in the midst of wading through countless websites and books on these mushrooms, which I simply cannot read fast enough. It all started a couple of years ago with a story that was relayed in Daniel Pinchbeck’s excellent book Breaking Open the Head in which a man named Robert who identifies as a ‘plant shaman’ eats three Amanitas that were growing in his garden. To abbreviate the story somewhat, he is greeted by three anthropomorphic Amanita mushrooms, ranging from three feet high to five feet high. They ask him why he ate them, and seemingly satisfied with his answer about following a dream he had they promptly vanish. When one of Robert’s friends ate Amanitas some years later, he experienced the exact same thing but when asked why he ate them he replied “I was trying to get high” to which the mushrooms said “well, if you ever do this again, we’re going to kill you.”

handmade mushroom toy by cart before the horse.

The next thing to really pique my interest was the connection between these mushrooms and our modern Christmas celebrations. I’m not convinced as some mushroom fanatics seem to be that the entire story of Santa Claus and his flying reindeer can be explained by the historic use of Amanitas by shamans and reindeer in ancient Europe, but there’s definitely something to it. For a crash course in this theory, check out this article from a not-at-all questionable source. This book looks promising but I haven’t bought it yet:

New ears for new music.

2011-04-29T22:21:00.001+10:00

I just rediscovered this photo of a tattoo I did last year on one of my old faithful clients Tra-ill and thought I’d share it, if for no other reason than to let everyone know I will NEVER be doing anything like it again!

While I wholeheartedly approve of the sentiment behind getting the introduction of The Antichrist of Nietzsche tattooed on your forearm, any tattoo artist will tell you that all those letters with all those serifs are pretty much the biggest nightmare in the world. It took 7 straight hours to complete this tattoo, and afterwards I thought my hand was gonna fall off. Still, I do kinda like it.

Mushrooms, Swords, Booty.

2011-04-28T23:09:00.001+10:00

I’ve done so many fun things in the last few weeks I don’t know where to start. First was my lightning fast trip to Adelaide for the sole purpose of drawing mushrooms up at Kegan’s farm, where he treated me to delicious coffee and a tasty lunch fresh from his garden. This was where I spent most of the day, under an oak tree with lovely dappled sunlight streaming in while I drew:

Autumn in the Adelaide hills is incredible. I shall write a much lengthier post about these mushrooms and my myriad reasons for drawing them when I find the time.

The following week I had my first ever sword-dancing lesson, which as it turns out is every bit as cool as I had expected. I have been discussing swords with my sword-smith friend Tim and he will be making me my own sword soon, about which I am suitably excited. Hopefully I will look as tough wielding it as my teacher Mel does:

After that it was Easter and I had 5 days off with Shaun all in a row, as well as a lovely visit from our sister Kate who brought us some amazing farm booty, because she’s the best sister ever:

Kate is studying Veterinary Science at Uni, and has to do work experience on farms, where it turns out animals die all the time and leave cool skulls lying around. The two big ones are cows, and the little one is a sheep, along with a stray jawbone thingie (they have a name but I can’t remember it) and a sweet curly horn which Shaun intends to turn into a traditional Viking drinking horn. Seeing as we are Duncans, and hail from Viking heritage (and King Duncan of Macbeth fame), this seems a fitting thing to do with it.

Here’s Kate hanging out with Austin in our back yard:

What is it about moving away that makes family time so much better?

Thrones

2011-04-11T02:48:00.001+10:00

I just arrived home from the second Thrones show of the past week, and feel compelled to express how wonderful I think Joe Preston is. Aside from making solo music that is entirely unique and personal, utilizing primarily a bass guitar and drum machine, Joe exudes a certain intelligence, loveliness and humour that all contribute to his enormous charm as a human being and performer.

I remember when I decided that I really liked this man, and it was several years ago after reading a blog post on his myspace page about the passing of a Portland wrestling icon named Buddy Rose. In the post he had expressed with absolute sincerity his sadness at the loss of someone he associated with his home town, and underneath it someone had thoughtlessly commented “LOL”, presumably because of Buddy’s now-outdated blonde hair. Joe responded with the line: “do you honestly think someone's death is worth laughing about? fuck you”. A small thing perhaps, but in a sleazy world where bands often pander to their fans in an attempt to sell them more albums and merch, I found the integrity of his sentiment rather touching.

Unfortunately both the Thrones shows I was at were woefully under-attended, especially last Saturday’s in Geelong to which approximately 12 people turned up, including the support acts. Despite being visibly saddened by the rotten turnout, Joe proceeded to play one of the most hypnotic and intimate live sets that I have ever seen, opening with the slow and melancholy Ephraim from his album Sperm Whale. His delivery was surprisingly gentle and I found myself mesmerised by his use of string bends and vibrato which I’d never seen played on a bass guitar before. Sadly, he only played a few tracks and the whole show was over in less than half an hour, leaving me hanging for more; but as Shaun remarked at the time - “he’s Joe Preston, he can do whatever the fuck he likes a far as I’m concerned.”

Joe seemed a little more cheerful tonight, and opened the set with Manmtn, a much heavier, dirgier track than Ephraim, and his song choices followed suit for the rest of the show including The Anguish of Bears, Nuts and Berries and Obolus, which was the closing song for both nights. Admittedly I was so blown away by his performance in Geelong that he wasn’t able to top it, but the show was highly enjoyable nonetheless. I especially liked the timing of his pleas for the audience to buy shirts with the repeating Exorcist sample “the power of Christ compels you!”.

The video below shows a live version of Ephraim, although it’s really not the same as being there. People often talk about Joe Preston’s stints in bands like The Melvins, High on Fire and Sunn as if they bring the man some kind of prestige; much as I enjoy those bands -and I really do enjoy those bands - I’d take Thrones over all of them any day.

Keeping me busy.

2011-04-08T00:20:00.002+10:00

So much stuff on the go at the moment, and with most of it unfinished it’s nice to review it all every now and then so I can feel like I’m going somewhere. This year I’m going to try and document my works in progress better so I have something tangible to show for all the work I’m doing.
A few new finished pieces:

This one is a full sleeve that I recently finished on my neighbour Michael, who is also getting the lily plant pictured further down. Angels are not something I’d usually be into, but Michael is ace and I really enjoyed doing it. Better pics of this soon.

Some works in progress:

ugly little dog portrait for Nique:

Loving this lyrebird sleeve on Nick, who I bond with over Can and Grails and The Black Angels:

Buddhist sleeve on Earl who finally just got this finished after 2 years or something. Better pics soon:

Something different for me – a sewing-themed sleeve for Anneke:

Stargazer lilies for Michael: so excited to tattoo a bulb on someone!

some sketches for tattoos I’ve started but don’t have good pics of yet: a super fun harpie for my lovely client and fellow tattooist Leonie:

strange Victorian tea-drinking wolf-man for Anthony:

an epic Kuan Yin back-piece for Caroline, who got it outlined today and sat like a trooper:

And completely unrelated, a drawing of some dandelion leaves that I have been working on for weeks in my botanical illustration class:

Now I don’t feel so bad about not having a life.

John Austen’s Hamlet Illustrations.

2011-04-04T11:50:00.001+10:00

I’m really loving book illustrations at the moment, so I think I’ll keep posting more of them. In particular, I’m fascinated by these sorts of intricate, high-contrast black and white ink drawings, because it’s more or less the opposite of what I do – I can’t seem to draw anything without adding layers and layers of shading, and I admire artists who can create the illusion of depth and dimension without the need for it. So anyway…

John Austen was an English illustrator inspired in his early days by the very stylish pen and ink work of Aubrey Beardsley. Though he soon left this style behind in favour of a more modern art deco approach, his illustrations for a 1922 edition of Shakespeare’s Hamlet are quite spectacular. Not surprisingly, Austen was a friend of Irish book illustrator Harry Clarke, whose incredible drawings for Edgar Allen Poe’s Tales of Mystery and Imagination I intend to scan and upload here soon.

These images, which I have cropped down from the original scans, came from Chris Mullen’s website The Visual Telling of Stories where he says of the book:

“John Austen 1886 - 1948, was a distinguished and inventive artist.

Nevertheless he illustrated this book where there are too many illustrations, there is an insecure balance with the weight and meaning of the text, and in design terms throughout, hopelessly overblown and inappropriate.

That being said, you will be entertained by them.”

Thanks to two of my favourite bloggers, Thom at The Pictorial Arts and John at Feuilleton for introducing me to this artist.

Nigel Jackson’s book illustrations.

2011-04-03T17:29:00.004+10:00

Nigel Jackson is an esoteric artist and writer whose main interest these days is astrology, but was some years back more centred around traditional witchcraft and European folklore. For a few years now I’ve been trying to little by little wrap my head around the contents of his earlier works, which to their merit are an immensely challenging read. As with most books of any value that fall in the esoteric/occult category, the purpose of these works is not to spoon-feed the reader historical information or fact, which is scarce on these subjects anyway, but to inspire the imagination and encourage personal understandings and insights.

As usual, my focus in interpreting Jackson’s ideas has landed primarily on the illustrations, because at this point they speak to me louder than the words.

From The Pillars of Tubal Cain (co-authored by Michael Howard):

From Masks of Misrule:

From Compleat Vampyre:

From Call of the Horned Piper:

These books are available from Capall Bann Publishing.

Amazing Holy Sons live footage.

2011-03-29T21:24:00.000+11:00

A rare treat; The Feral Kid, More Mind Briars, Drifter's Sympathy and Gnostic Device, live from SXSW.

Sketch for Mel.

2011-03-13T21:32:00.000+11:00

My lovely belly dance teacher Melusina and I have agreed to a trade in which she will give me some private dance lessons in exchange for a new business card design. I have a pretty high bar set for me with this one because Mel is so incredibly beautiful, and I want this to look as much like her as possible. I based this image on a clip of her performing a mesmerising sword dance that I posted on my blog previously. Her end of the bargain will involve helping me with a choreography to some of my favourite music, which will most likely be either Take Refuge or Deep Politics by Grails, depending on her preference. I'm very much looking forward to having a choreography that I can practise and enjoy at home, to the music that I feel inspired by.

Deep Politics 2

2011-03-04T23:37:00.000+11:00

The new Grails album Deep Politics, from which I shared an awesome video recently, has now been released and as expected it's absolutely superb. If my word on the matter doesn't count for much, and I suspect that it doesn't, you can listen to it streaming here and decide for yourself. You even get the bonus of an amusing commentary by Emil Amos to accompany each song.

As I discovered today while I listened to it through headphones on my way to and from work, this is one of those albums that has the ability to elevate the way you perceive almost everything around you to a whole new level: the junkie lady you see every day on the tram suddenly wears an indescribable sadness on her face, the drunk meatheads on Chapel Street seem more hostile and sinister than usual, and the sun coming through the trees or the sight of a kid rolling down a hill in the park feel somehow profoundly beautiful. Inspired in part by a love of long-forgotten library records, these lush instrumental songs are like the soundtrack for a movie that's playing out in front of you in realtime, with no script and no direction - just pure atmosphere.

Something about the use of piano and strings together on several of these tracks is completely magical to me, particularly as they're instruments I'm not usually fond of; Daughters of Bilitis has been stubbornly stuck in my head since the day I first heard it. I think the thrill of discovering a love for something I didn't know I had, and hearing something unlike anything I've heard before, might be what makes this band so special to me.

Buy the album here.

New Zealand, High on Fire, 10 Years of happiness.

2011-03-04T02:39:00.000+11:00

So this last week and a half, I have been to New Zealand to visit my dear friends Kerry and Susan (and their two adorable ratbags Oli and Rudy), hung out on beautiful beaches and among fields of cows at their place in Matakana, seen High on Fire twice with some of my favourite people, and as of today celebrated my tenth wedding anniversary with Shaun. As if that's not enough, next week I shall be seeing Swans play over two consecutive nights, and Shaun has an interview for a job that won't involve working permanent graveyard shift. My already excellent life just keeps getting better.

This is an old volcano, the first place our good host took us when we arrived in Auckland. Apparently Kerry rolled down the side of this thing when he was drunk once, passed out at the bottom and then woke up incredibly sunburned with Asian tourists taking photos of him. I miss Kerry's drunk stories.

Nobody seems to have uploaded any videos from the incredible headlining show High on Fire played in Melbourne, but I found some old footage of them playing Hung Drawn and Quartered from the album Surrounded By Thieves, which along with Speedwolf from the same album was one of the highlights of both shows. I have waited so many years to see this band, and they did not disappoint at all. Des Kensel makes drumming like an absolute demon look like a cake-walk, and Matt Pike is just a magnificent, sweaty beast of a man whose gargantuan riffs and gravelly bourbon-infused vocals are unmistakably unique. Also, I'm pretty sure his gut is at least twice as big now as it was in this video.

This photo taken at Snells Beach near Matakana pretty much sums up how I'm feeling right now.

Cavewoman for Tori.

2011-02-16T01:09:00.000+11:00

On Sunday I had the pleasure of starting this cavewoman tattoo, which is now fully outlined and partially shaded. I won't bother posting the progress photos because they turned out crap, but I will post the drawing, which took me a really super long time - mostly because I was attempting to translate a strong image that Tori had in her head. The cavewoman was loosely based on a character named Ayla, a cro-magnon huntress and medicine woman, from the first in a series of books by Jean M. Auel called The Clan of the Cave Bear. I haven't actually read any of the books, but given my interest in all things primitive I was really keen to work on this piece with her. Although the process of designing it was difficult, this was a really rewarding tattoo, aided by the fact that Tori was exceedingly happy and appreciative of my efforts. I can't wait to finish it now.

Cave Bear Clan Ain't Nuthing Ta Fuck With!

Deep Politics

2011-02-15T00:52:00.000+11:00

The new Grails album 'Deep Politics' comes out soon, and by the sounds of this I predict it'll be sensational. Like there's any chance that it would't be.

GRAILS - Daughters of Bilitis from The Fact Facer on Vimeo.

Loving the dolls and theatrical Argento-style stabbing in this clip - I might have to hunt down the original movie this footage came from, 'cause it looks like it might be a corker.

Robin Artisson Wisdom.

2011-02-06T14:58:00.000+11:00

"The more I study mythology and folklore, the more I come to the same conclusion that people from every age of this world have come to: myths are the most precious treasures bequeathed to us by generations long past. It has become very fashionable to look down on mythology and other narratives that feature elements that are seen as “supernatural” or which border on the “irrational” as though they represent failings of human reason in the face of the unknown, but it is my opinion that the true "failing"is found in people who cannot think multi-dimensionally about the things they experience."

Visit Robin's website here.

Plants and more plants.

2011-01-28T01:06:00.000+11:00

I just spent an enjoyable few days in my home town of Adelaide, where among other things I photographed the roses in my parents' yard, wandered through the Botanic Gardens, visited my friend Kegan's budding permaculture garden in the hills, and finished reading this exquisite book on 'plant powers, poisons and herbcraft' by Dale Pendell, which I intend to blog about another time.

So as usual, I have plants on the brain, and the next book on my reading list is one that I picked up at the Gardens about my new favourite place in Adelaide - The Museum of Economic Botany. I had never heard of the museum before, and stumbled across it thinking the name sounded promising - to me it conjured images of old herbariums full of plant specimens known to be of interest or benefit to mankind; and that's exactly what it was. Some of my favourite plants were represented there, beautifully preserved and presented in glass display cabinets, alongside charmingly hand-written cards to identify each specimen. Apparently the collection has survived since the museum first opened in 1881, but has recently received a makeover. It's the only one of it's kind in Australia, and apparenlty one of only four in the whole world.

My favourite of all poisons: coffee.

If you check out the website or the book you'll also get to see the incredibly ornate ceiling in this building, which was a work of art in itself, recently restored from the original. The stuff in the cabinets was better though. Also exceptional viewing at the Gardens was the pond full of Sacred Lotus flowers in full bloom:

Strolling through Kegan's pine forest/front yard had me wishing I lived closer to the hills...apparently Amanita Muscaria mushrooms are to be found here in Autumn, which I may just be tempted to fly over for - so I can draw them, of course!

The rather impressive view from the back porch of his parents' house.

Some of the yummiest strawberries I've ever eaten. The magic of food plants, and of eating said food straight from the garden, will never be lost on me.

Proud dad with one of his zucchini offspring.

Hopefully this year Kegan will be helping me set up my own garden, a project I've put off for an eternity due to a combination of insecurities from past failures and a general lack of time and know-how. But I've been dreaming of a garden for so long that I can't put it off any longer, so 2011 is the year it's gonna happen. In the meantime, I'll keep posting photos of other people's.

Angel's Trumpet.

2011-01-14T00:00:00.000+11:00

Some photos of the incredible Angel's Trumpet growing in my friend Sue's garden, which I will be incorporating into a portrait of her. More on that soon.

Dale Pendell Wisdom.

2010-12-23T20:32:00.000+11:00

"Become one with the work. The true alchemist is no different from the work itself."

Chapel Tattoo sideshow poster.

2010-12-23T00:03:00.000+11:00

Exactly a year ago, when I had my annual break over Christmas in which I attempt to make as much art as possible, I started work on this painting but totally fucked it up. I spent enough time on the sketch though that I didn't want to give up completely...so this year I tried again with a little more success. This was a gift for everyone I work with at Chapel - a great big thank-you to Jane, Kate and Andrew for giving me my dream job, and to all the other lovely people I get to hang out with every day who make my working life enjoyable.

(click to enlarge)

It's been too long since I drew this for me to remember why I chose to make it a sideshow poster, but it was super fun anyway... I did it mostly in Indian ink and watercolour, with some coloured pencil over the top in places. Thanks again you guys, I love ya guts.

Chris O'Donnell interview on Art Talk.

2010-12-16T01:46:00.001+11:00

An excellent video interview with my favourite tattoo artist, including some cool old photographs of him and various other notables. Saw this a little while back but it just got reposted on Chris's blog so thought I'd share it.

Shell drawing.

2010-12-12T22:44:00.000+11:00

This is a sort of Christmas present for my boss Jane, who loves seashells and has been very, very good to me this year. It's a good thing she doesn't read this blog, becaused if she did it would ruin the surprise. Although shells and skulls and things aren't botanical items, they fall under the same 'natural history' umbrella so we can draw them as part of our course if we want. They're nifty subjects in hot weather because they don't wilt and die like plants do. It's a pretty lame excuse, but my scanner really doesn't capture the details of these pencil drawings very well at all...they do actually look better than this.

Anyway...thanks Mama Jane, you're the best.

Dandelions

2010-11-29T22:04:00.000+11:00

This is my first finished watercolour painting for my botanical illustration class, and I guess I'm kinda happy with it. One of the ladies in the class offered to buy it, and our teacher made everyone come and look at it so I guess that's a good sign. You can't tell from this scan but the flowers are life-size (the whole painting is about 3 inches high) , meaning I did the whole thing with tiny brushes that had about 5 hairs in them. One day I'll do a proper dandelion with leaves and roots for my good pal Jerome, who loves herbs and never lets me pay for my massages.

Nice people and cats.

2010-11-21T01:09:00.000+11:00

OK I'm not gonna lie, these last few weeks I have been grumpy as hell (sorry about that everyone). But nothing cheers me up like nice people and cats, and this week I got both. Amongst other things, I had the pleasure of tattooing one of these Louis Wain paintings on my lovely client Sally, who will eventually have a whole sleeve of them, with a view to possibly filling the other arm too. I think more people should get tattoos of cats, because I am having way too much fun with these.

The day I did this fiddle-playing kitty was a particularly memorable one; right before I started it my very dear friend Carrie had a baby boy and named him Austin, which is also my beautiful grey cat's name. That day was also notable for my boss Jane tattooing Sinead O'Connor (who was dagging out in trackies and ugg boots) in the booth next to me, and Mariachi El Bronx playing a headline show for the Melbourne Arts Festival, which I attempted to enjoy despite not being in the mood for the rowdy drunks in front of me.

Another tattoo I enjoyed this week was this delicate leaf on Kate, one of the gorgeous waitresses from Dukes, my local coffee shop. I had been cancelled on for about the squillionth time, and I was broke and miserable so went to get a coffee and have a grizzle about it. Being the wonderful lady that she is, Kate took pity on my sorry soul and arranged for both herself and fellow Dukes customer Jade to get tattooed by me that afternoon. I didn't get a photo of Jade's lightning bolt, but doing both these tattoos brightened my week, as did sharing a drink with them both after work. Thanks you guys.

Peony

2010-11-15T22:22:00.000+11:00

Couldn't resist drawing some beautiful peonies I picked up at the florist the other day, although they all died before I had a chance to see them open unfortunately. I'm struggling to get past the drawing stage with my botanical illustrations, because painting super detailed and realistic things with watercolours is unbelievably hard! (who'd have thought?) But I am working on a painting of a little bud from this bunch that hasn't died yet, and if it's any good I'll post a pic of it. I really hope it turns out ok because my inability to progress with these paintings is starting to bother me, but one good finished piece should be enough to get the ball rolling.

Oh yeah, and if you're in Melbourne you should check out the exhibition of incredible botanical art currently being held at the Royal Botanic Gardens, including some art by my lovely teacher Mali - details here. it closes on November 21 so be quick.

Serpentine

2010-11-08T01:21:00.000+11:00

I just ordered this new instructional DVD by Rachel Brice, and I am so ridiculously excited about it. This clip won't be very interesting to most of you because it's just an ad for the DVD and features Rachel talking about yoga and drills (although the demos alone are amazing to watch), but get a load of the performance clips interspersed with it all! They appear to be her best performances yet, and she looks exquisite as always.

I'm so pleased to see that she's incorporating more of the rhythmic hip movements which caused me to fall in love with belly dance to begin with. Beautiful as her trademark snakey arm and torso undulations are, I think they feature in her dancing a little too strongly sometimes, and I feel like I want her movements to address the rhythm more directly as they do here. I'm especially loving the choreography at the end of this clip, which is set to to Borino, my favourite track from the Beats Antique album Collide. If you like what you see, also check out the video below which is a live improvisation...incredible.

Holy Sons live.

2010-10-30T22:24:00.000+11:00

"THE FACT FACER" (live in Bloomington) from The Fact Facer on Vimeo.

And then, suddenly, something interesting happened...

2010-10-29T22:54:00.000+11:00

http://shaund.posterous.com/

Riding the ascending comet of bad postmodern art.

2010-10-28T23:08:00.000+11:00

Actually, the full title of this photo by art-world-hating photographer Les Krims is 'Two Feminist Artists Riding the Ascending Comet of Bad Postmodern Art, Buffalo New York 1976'. Lord only knows how jaded he must be by now.

Survivalist Tales!

2010-10-13T23:38:00.000+11:00

After months of anticipation the new Holy Sons album is out, and I have eagerly commenced the relentless back-to-back listenings that accompanied the arrival of all the previous albums. I'd already become thoroughly addicted to 'Look of Pain!' and 'Slow Days', two songs from the album which were available before its release, but now I have a bunch of new songs to wrap my head around which is wonderful. I struggle to find any appropriate words to describe how I feel about this music, which whilst frustrating is probably part of its magic; I think if you can pin-point exactly why something is pleasing to you it maybe loses some of its lustre.

One of the reasons I love music so much more than other art forms is precisely because I feel as though the creation of it requires some sort of supernatural power that I simply don't have, so it's a constant source of wonder and excitement for me. Sure, you can break a song down into its more mundane parts like words and melodies and rhythms, and that may help towards understanding why the song is successful...but no matter how great your appreciation of those elements, with truly great music there's always something infinitely more mysterious and alchemical going on under the surface of its creation. Here's hoping the mystery of why I love Holy Sons so much remains a mystery to me forever.

Appropriately titled collage by Emil Amos.

My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope to the Sky.

2010-09-27T00:05:00.001+10:00

The new Swans album is finally out, albeit with a delay on orders due to ‘overwhelming demand’. Nonetheless, you should go to the Young God Records Webstore and buy it. Why? Michael Gira himself can explain:

“What, are we all supposed to be hippies or anarchists with rich parents or something? I work extremely hard at what I do, with considerable financial and personal risk involved in the making of the music, and the same scenario applies to just about everyone else I know that’s made the disastrous decision to make music a career, so we deserve to be paid for our efforts. You wouldn’t expect a book by an author you admire to be free, nor would you expect an electrician to come to your house and rewire it for free. How are we any different? This is our work, what we do for a living (of sorts), and if you like the final results, buy it, you spoiled brat.”

While you’re waiting for it to arrive, you can listen to some of the new material on their Myspace page.

Birds and blossoms on Tai.

2010-09-25T23:16:00.000+10:00

Ambient abstracts.

2010-09-25T22:16:00.001+10:00

Some of the photographs Shaun’s been taking recently, which can be found on his Flickr page. Together with the futuristic-sounding names he’s given them, created by a random word generator, some of them seem to me like they’d make great Autechre album covers. Apparently they’re mostly photos of concrete and other ordinarily boring surfaces that he’s carefully processed to bring out the textures and colours. Also check out his newest blog (replacing all his other ill-fated ones), Lucida Obscura, where you can find some of his photography, music, influences and ideas.

Apelecon.

Ans.

Neboachea

Wuhad.

Cropan.

Plone.

Diogredh.

Disor.

Nizardech.

Sheighain.

Arthur Rackham’s Comus

2010-09-25T21:53:00.001+10:00

Comus is a 17th Century masque written by John Milton, which I will confess right now to not having read. But according to someone at Escape Into Life:

"The masque is a semi-allegorical portrayal of sin, or temptation, in the character of Comus, and chastity or temperance, in the character of Lady. Despite Comus’s attempts to trick Lady into drinking a magical cup (representing sexual pleasure), Lady refuses to give in to the sinful Comus. Comus challenges Lady in various other ways, such as arguing that desire is natural to a human being, but Lady will not be seduced. The rest of the masque involves the Attendant Spirit, an angelic figure, who comes to rescue her."

If you really want to read the text, you can do so here, or you can read more about it on Wikipedia. But if you’re anything like me, you’ll get the general gist of the story and then lose yourself in these amazing illustrations by Arthur Rackham. To see the entire collection, visit archive.org, and if you really like them you can buy prints here.

One of the things I like about Rackham’s work is that his goblins and ogres are strangely reminiscent to me of the numerous satyrs scrawled by my favourite artist and all-time hero Austin Osman Spare, whose work I will post about on here one day when I can be bothered scanning all my books. I say strangely because from what I’ve read the two men could not have been more different in their characters and ideologies. There will be more of Rackham’s work to come on here too.

Incidentally, there is also a superb psychedelic folk band from the 70’s named Comus, who have recently reformed and played a few live shows at festivals like Roadburn. They sound a bit like the deranged love-child of Amon Duul II and The Residents, as you’ll find if you play the clip below.

2010-09-19T21:55:00.000+10:00

Killing Joke

2010-09-17T01:41:00.001+10:00

I fucking love Killing Joke. There's not enough hours in the day for me to elaborate too much on why, but have a listen to the three tracks posted below and you'll have some idea. Even though they're still going 30 years on, and still making amazing records, for some reason my favourite tracks are all from their earliest years, and two of them are b-sides. First up, a song from their 1979 debut ep (Turn To Red) called Nervous System, which doesn't appear on any of their actual albums:

Pssyche, the b-side to the 1980 single Wardance which appears on their self titled first album.

Tension: the second track on their second album called What's This For...! which was released in June 1981, which is precisely when I was born. I will never get this rhythm out of my head, ever.

Killing Joke have a new album coming out soon, and I'm very excited about it. I hope they tour.

Tattoo sketches.

2010-09-15T01:09:00.001+10:00

I'm not sure I'll ever get bored with drawing girls...though I don't really know why. I've always drawn them, and in fact I'm certain my Mum thought I was a lesbian when I was a teenager because of my fondness for depicting well-endowed women in my paintings. Perhaps it's the endless possibilities for hair and clothing and glamour that secretly appeal to my (mostly well-hidden) girly side? After all, I would never spend hours of my precious time attempting to make myself look like this, but that same time spent on a drawing is justifiable...I'm not living vicariously through these women, I'm just doing my job! At any rate, I'm looking forward to starting this one on Sarah's arm tomorrow:

Having been inspired by a few entries on my friend and fellow artist Jeanne's excellent blog, I thought I'd give some insight into my drawing process. With a girl like this one, I start by gathering the basic do's and don'ts from my client: do add some feathers, don't make her boobs too big etc. Once I know what I'm aiming for, I try to think of an appropriate pose which is definitely the most difficult part for me. I often end up taking photos of myself or sometimes Shaun in the pose that I'm after, because the ones found in books never quite match the one in my mind's eye. Luckily in this case, I found an image that inspired me in the wonderful book Jazz Age Beauties, and I based the girl's pose on that.

Because I like to make life hard for myself, I rarely trace the image, preferring to do an observational drawing from it instead which takes ten times longer to get right...but I figure it's a skill I'd like to hone and that will diminish without practise. If I can't get the proportions right and the deadline is approaching, I occasionally trace a hand or something but I try hard not to. From the basic pose I play around with hair and feathers and jewellery and things until I find a pleasing composition, and then I flesh out the details enough to feel happy with where it's going. Then I figure out what's wrong with it, (head's too big/small, the expression is wrong, arm is too long etc) and I trace the whole thing again with the amendments made before adding the shading and other fiddly details. Usually I'll run off a few copies on the photocopier to shrink or enlarge a few things, or occasionally mess around with a scan of it in photoshop to fix the offending areas before the final re-draft.

So in case you're interested, a few other drawings with the images that inspired them. For Brendan, who wanted a Gothic Gypsy:

The face is clearly based on this gorgeous image of bellydancer Zoe Jakes, but the hand belongs to my friend Kegan who was hanging out with me in the shop after hours while I was drawing it...somewhere on my hard drive is a pic of his hand holding his bike helmet which I then slimmed down and added nails and a ring to. The skull is from the indispensable Skull Reference Book by Matthew Amey.

For Alex, who wanted a Burlesque Dancer/Gypsy:

This one is based on another bellydancer, (and possibly my favourite bellydancer), Rachel Brice. The fan was an excuse to put loads of peacock feathers in there, and the arm was my own that I photographed in the mirror holding a fan I picked up at the $2 shop. On all these girls the jewellery and head gear is all referenced from modern Tribal Fusion bellydancers like the ones here, I can't get enough of their costumes and I hoard pictures of earrings and bangles and things that I find on etsy or ebay.

Anyway, time for me to stop writing about drawing and actually do some drawing...

2010-09-14T22:10:00.000+10:00

Experimenting

I hung the moon

On various branches of the pine

- Basho

Shaun, cats, interview.

2010-09-03T22:51:00.001+10:00

A few weeks ago Julene from the blog Tattoo Snob requested an interview with me, which you can read here. When I told Shaun I was feeling anxious about my responses, he said "Well you're an idiot; but ironically that's not going to come across in the interview." Bless.

Speaking of Shaun, today marks our tenth year together, so to celebrate I'm posting this picture of him under a pile of cats.

Going to work is fun!

2010-08-24T23:47:00.000+10:00

Ok not always, but it is when I get to do tattoos like these. I started this Medusa on Saturday, still just lined and shaded...it's all going to be in colour eventually. Tricky shin placement makes her face look a bit weird in the photo but I'll get a better pic once it's all finished. We have tentative plans to complete the leg by adding Medusa's offspring Pegasus and Chrysaor, a winged horse and winged boar respectively, taking form in the blood that pours from her neck as desribed in the myth of her death.

Another unfinished piece that I'm really enjoying, a dancing gypsy girl on the lovely Rosy's arm. I haven't got pics of it yet but there's also an anthropomorphic bunny on the inside playing the violin for her. This will all be in colour when we get around to it, and that old 'cellar door' tattoo at the bottom will be covered eventually too.

Lastly another shin tattoo, this time inspired by Steppenwolf on my dear friend Kegan. The Herman Hesse book, not the band! Rough as guts compared to my usual work, but that suits him perfectly...note the rugged scars all down his shin from too many bicycle stacks.

The Ballad of Daykitty

2010-08-22T23:15:00.000+10:00

The Ballad of Daykitty is a rather sentimental song by Lou Barlow about his cat Ray, pictured here in one of the many cat photos you'll find on Lou Barlow's Vast and Confusing Website. Clearly a bona fide cat fanatic, Lou invites his fans to mail him photographs of their own cats, saying "I find collecting pictures of them calming...send me some." What a lovely man.

Ladies, some bearded, some not.

2010-08-16T20:20:00.000+10:00

Selected Ambient Works 85-92

2010-08-15T00:17:00.002+10:00

Having recently purchased an iPod and begun the painstaking process of loading all of my music onto it, I've been rediscovering a lot of my favourite albums from days gone by. Music has always been important to me, and a great many nostalgic feelings are attached to the various soundtracks of my youth, but I've been somewhat surpised to find that a lot of the music I am most sentimental about is electronic. While most of my peers in the tattoo world seemed to have spent their teenage years drinking and going to punk or hardcore shows, I was more likely to be found at an outdoor doof party in the Adelaide hills, with bonfires and U.V. art, and teepees with weird dudes selling chai tea and space-cake. Unfashionable as it may be to admit, this underground rave culture and the characters I met within it shaped me a lot as a person, in ways I am still only realising now.

Some of the most profound moments of self discovery that I experienced occurred in the year I turned 16, which was also the year I attended my first outdoor doof party (and the year I made that awesome holographic, toy fur-trimmed purple number that I'm proudly displaying in this photo). I was living away from home with some slightly older teenage girls, and we were playing in a band together and making art and philosophising about things we didn't fully comprehend but really wanted to. We had lots of older friends who would lend us books like T.A.Z. and the Tibetan Book of the Dead, and it made me desperately want to be an adult so I could escape the ridiculousness of adolescence and experience life in ways I could then only imagine. So I guess it makes perfect sense that my favourite music from that year of my life would remain some of the most important and nostalgic for me as an adult.

Above all others, the album that still wraps me up in a big soft blanket of wistful analogue happiness every time I hear it is Selected Ambient Works 85-92 by Aphex Twin. As you can see from the scan of my cd, I have loved it half to death over the past 13 years, and in fact for a very long time I would listen to this album every night while falling asleep, to the point where I couldn't sleep without it. To this day, it is still my go-to if I'm having a horrible time and need to induce feelings of childish happiness; for me, listening to this cd is akin to something like trepanation, but without the undoubtedly unpleasant drilling-a-hole-in-your-skull part.

Along with other outstanding electronic artists of the same era, like Autechre, Future Sound of London, and Boards of Canada, who I also love dearly and may post about down the track, Aphex Twin and his many aliases bring an emotive, human element to a genre of music often dismissed by non-believers as cold and mechanical. If you listen to the clip below of Ageispolis, probably my favourite track on Selected Ambient Works, I think you'll agree that cold and mechanical are the last words that spring to mind. Enjoy.

More Shaun appreciation.

2010-08-14T20:38:00.000+10:00

The other day we received Shaun's results for first semester of photography studies, and he got straight high distinctions... I'm a little bit proud. Here are some of his recent photos, taken after breaking into an abandoned brick factory:

and a few of me at work for his photojournalism assignment:

Fat birdies.

2010-08-08T23:06:00.000+10:00

I got to do some more work on Jen's bird sleeve the other week. I think the nest is my favourite part, and was really fun to do...such a glutton for punishment.

Tulips

2010-07-30T22:11:00.000+10:00

Watching 'The Botany of Desire' the other night, a documentary based on Michael Pollan's excellent book of the same name, inspired me to try my hand at drawing some tulips, and it turns out they're mighty challenging with all their inward-curling petals and striations in colour. It would help if they didn't open while I'm working as well, but that's just what flowers do (bless them). The tulip I was drawing from was far more beautiful than I can possibly capture in a lead pencil drawing, all orange and red with streaks of green through it. Keep trying I shall.

Gumnuts

2010-07-28T00:05:00.000+10:00

My first finished botanical drawing. I was concentrating so hard on it during class that I actually dribbled on myself...I wish I could say nobody saw it happen, but in fact one of my fellow students was watching me draw at the time so no such luck. Ah well, at least I got it on my shirt instead of the paper. We're still only working in lead pencil but in a week or two we'll be doing watercolours so can't wait for that.

Jean Marembert

2010-07-22T12:57:00.000+10:00

I've been collecting pictures of 19th century/early 20th century book illustrations for a while now, particularly black and white ink drawings, and I find them to be infinitely more exciting than most modern art that I come across. Whether this is due to some kind of failure on my part to connect with the collective consciousness of today's youth (entirely possible) or whether it's because they're legitimately of a higher standard is a subjective matter, but either way I can't get enough of them. These images by French artist Jean Marembert come from a book (which I haven't read) called Le Lycanthrope by Petrus Borel, courtesy of the excellent blog Au carrefour etrange. I didn't have any luck finding out what the book is about, but the art features a lot of cats, which is always a sure-fire way to get me interested in something.

Botanical Illustration

2010-07-19T22:54:00.001+10:00

I took my first ever class in botanical illustration today, at Melbourne's beautiful botanical gardens. I've been somewhat preoccupied with both natural history art and with plants for a while now, and this seems like the logical way to explore these interests. So far we've only done some sketches of gum nuts, but already I get the impression this is going to be a life-time passion, and something that feels natural and intuitive for me as an artist. There's something about the meditative process of observing nature so closely, and the discipline of replicating it as faithfully as possible, that I find really appealing - perhaps because the focus is on the inherent beauty and perfection of the subject, rather than on the artist.

For me, obsessing over how impossibly beautiful something is, whether it's a flower, a melody, a sentiment or another human being, is precisely what inspires me to make art in the first place. The art may not always resemble what I'm obsessing over, but profoundly emotive responses to things are always what inform my visions and stimulate my desire to put them on paper. It's only when my whole being is consumed with that kind of euphoria that I can make art that really feels alive and meaningful. I think this is why music provides me with the most inspiration of all - because as a visual artist it communicates to me in a way that feels entirely mystical and beyond my comprehension.

There's nothing nicer than recognising in another person the same creative impulses that I feel, but expressed in a completely different way, and I think that's why I have a tendency to become enamoured with artists who work in formats other than my own. People I find hugely inspirational like David Lynch, Werner Herzog, Justin Broadrick and Emil Amos are all operating from a sincere and deeply felt desire to express themselves, and they do so tirelessly and without compromise. Often it's their approach and dedication to their art that touches me more than the art itself, but the one commonality between them all is their ability to make me feel as though the world is essentially a beautiful place. Looking at some of the botanical art pictured, it's an easy thing to believe.

I scanned these images from a Taschen book called Garden Of Eden which was my birthday present from Shaun this year. Thanks babe.

Happy

2010-07-17T22:34:00.000+10:00

So I've just had the privilege of attending three Om shows and a Holy Sons show in the space of a week, and they were without a doubt some of the best live performances I have ever witnessed. Biased as I may be, I don't think I'm alone in feeling that these shows were pretty damn special.

I never got to see Om with their original drummer, but I really do think Emil Amos breathes new life into their older material, and even more so into the new music that he's written with Al for the God Is Good album. A definite highlight of every set was the song Cremation Ghat from said album, which features a simple but distinctive, stomping rhythm that departs somewhat from the traditional Om ride-groove formula, and provides Rob (also of supporting act Lichens) with an opportunity for some of his incredible vocal wailing.

The other track that had me grinning stupidly from start to finish was 'To the Shrinebuilder' from Om's split with Current 93, (as seen in my previous post here) during which Emil's drumming reached it's most exciting and bombastic, as did Rob's seriously enthusiastic tambourine playing. I've never had so much fun watching a live band before, and it really struck me how sad it is that Om get lumped in with the stoner metal and doom genre when to me they have very little in common with any of those bands, aside from the fact that Al was in Sleep. Anyway, I enjoyed every performance immensely and can't wait to hear what they record next, which shouldn't be too far off according to an excellent interview with the band that you can read here.

As for the Holy Sons show, I wasn't quite sure what to expect that night because he doesn't play live often, and when he does it's usually with a band. I was thinking that being a solo show he might do some of his simpler songs accompanied by an acoustic guitar, perhaps in the style of 'I Want to Live a Peaceful Life', but instead we were treated to entirely new and stripped back arrangements of some of my favourite, more layered songs like Drifter's Sympathy (original here), More Mind Briars and Gnostic Device, played on an electric guitar with what seemed like a fair amount of improvisation, on both guitar and vocals. Needless to say, they sounded absolutely stunning and I feel extremely lucky to have witnessed such a unique and rare performance. I also had the opportunity to chat with Emil briefly after several of the shows and he was remarkably warm, funny and friendly, which was just the icing on the cake really. I couldn't have asked for anything more.

Shamaness

2010-06-26T01:17:00.000+10:00

So I finally finished this epic coloured pencil drawing that I started while I was on holidays over Christmas... at least I think it's finished. Why I decided to create an A1 size drawing with tools that can only cover about a milimetre of paper at a time is beyond me, but once I started it I just had to keep going until my fingers felt like those of an arthritic grandma and I was practically cross eyed.

Anyway, lesson learned...hopefully it was worth the bother. I am still tyring to come to terms with the fact that Shaun has described this piece variably as 'fantasy art' and something that looks like it should have been done on black velvet (he swears it was a compliment). The reality is that I was reading a lot about shamanism, and my fascination with that somehow became entangled with my love of tribal bellydance and gypsies and primitive cultures and voodoo...so I guess the result is a confused but honest salute to all of those things. In a way, this pretty much sums up how I feel about being a privileged white person living in an ethnically diverse country where our concept of culture is based entirely on embracing the bits we like of other people's.

In response to these feelings I've been reading more about the history and folklore of Germanic people, including fairy tales, traditional witchcraft and celtic shamanism amongst other things. It's a nice realisation that we do in fact have our own culture and it hasn't entirely disappeared - we just choose to ignore it in favour of things we find more exotic. Clearly I've been as guilty of this as anyone, but in light of recent discoveries some of my art might start taking a new direction now.

Holy Sons Wisdom Part 2

2010-06-23T23:11:00.000+10:00

"Open yourself to the world, and see if it loves you back."

2010-06-23T22:04:00.000+10:00

Chris Conn Askew

2010-06-21T01:54:00.002+10:00

Chris Conn has long been one of my favourite artists. A celebrated tattooist for 15 or so years, he has now retired from tattooing to focus on his personal art, and I for one am glad he did. Chris clearly possesses a strong and unique vision, apparently drawing inspiration from numerous and far-reaching sources, and it seems that as a tattooist he felt this vision was being compromised, as it always will be when working for a client. I personally feel that as a tattooist your job is to create a piece of art that first and foremost serves the interests of your client, and secondly serves your own; so if you don't want to make art that bends to someone else's will, quitting your job in order to paint seems an honourable thing to do. And in Chris's case, this decision has resulted in some truly exquisite paintings.

Littering his work with references to music, literature, history, folklore and cinema, and channelling the authoritative visual command of propaganda posters from Germany and Soviet Russia, Chris creates art enriched with a personal mythology that expresses something greater than the sum of its parts. The first time I visited his Myspace page I remember being thoroughly charmed by his unbridled enthusiasm for the various sources of his inspiration, which included photos of his cats, covers of albums he loves, a picture of puss in boots by Gustave Dore and film stills of Theda Bara. Unfortunately many of these pictures have been taken down now but the images of his own art remain, as do the details of how to order prints, so do go there and have a look. My wonderful boss Jane gave me my first Chris Conn print for my birthday last week, pictured above, and I love it so much that I now find myself wondering why the hell I've never bought any of them before. Anyway, here are some more of my favourites.

Om live.

2010-06-10T23:17:00.000+10:00

I am so incredibly happy that Om, one of my favourite bands, will be touring Australia next month. In fact I'm sure that most people reading this are sick of me banging on about it, and about (drummer) Emil Amos in general, but I get like that about my music and I'm not gonna fight it. Besides, I want everyone to come along and support them so the shows will be awesome and they'll come back again...and maybe they'll bring Grails with them next time! Although I think the excitement would kill me.

Anyway, in anticipation of the three Om shows (!) I'll be going to in July I've been watching lots of live clips and I thought this one was was particularly noteworthy. As it says in the YouTube comments, "cymbal ecstasy"... enjoy.

George Harrison portrait.

2010-06-10T00:00:00.000+10:00

As a genreral rule, I tend to find tattooing portraits incredibly stressful. When it's a portrait of somebody's loved one, you know they've spent so many hours staring at the face you're replicating that any tiny detail out of place will ruin the tattoo for them. When it's a celebrity or a famous photograph, as is the case with this George Harrison tattoo, you know that if you fail to get it exactly right your tattoo will forever be prompting that dreaded question: "who's that meant to be?" I guess I'll never know if anyone can tell who this is meant to be because I've put his name in huge letters in the title of the post, but I'd like to think I got this portrait down. It took me a whopping 5 hours to do, which my client graciously sat through on Sunday without making a peep, but I do think it's probably the best portrait I've done so far.

Spare Wisdom Part 4.

2010-05-26T23:34:00.000+10:00

“Great thoughts are against all doctrines of conformity.”

Sketches

2010-05-19T23:25:00.000+10:00

Some sketches for paintings that I've spent too much time on and will probably never finish.

The blue one will hopefully end up as a Space Bong poster, but we'll see.

2010-05-19T20:54:00.000+10:00

2010-05-19T00:27:00.000+10:00

Neurosis at Roadburn

2010-05-08T21:08:00.000+10:00

Ok so I apologise for all the video clips I've been posting, but I've been sick with the flu and unable to think straight or be productive for nearly a week now. This is the most amazing live clip of a band I have ever seen, and one of my favourite Neurosis tracks, Through Silver In Blood. The drumming alone is worth watching it for, especially the finale where Steve Von Till and Scott Kelly drop their guitars to join in. Heavy music doesn't get any better than this.

Amon Düül II

2010-05-05T14:27:00.000+10:00

This song has been stuck in my head for days...

Visionary plants and LSD trials.

2010-05-02T18:37:00.002+10:00

Having just finshed reading this fabulous book "Visionary Plant Consciousness: The Shamanic teachings of The Plant World", a collection of articles/lectures from various notables who believe in the importance of visionary plants and have fought hard to lift restrictions on their use, I was pleased when Shaun sent me this article from The Australian yesterday:

"After 40 years of being a medical research taboo and virtually impossible to use in government-approved studies, acid is finally making a comeback, with the US Food and Drug Administration relaxing the conditions for trials involving the mind-altering substance, and many doctors now convinced that the controlled use of LSD and other psychedelics (including psilocybin, found in "magic mushrooms") could hold the key to treating everything from severe depression to post-combat stress."

Read the full article here.

Then, if you're interested, get your hands on a copy of this book. Apart from a dreary and self-important piece by Alex Grey about his visionary art, which only occupies a few pages, I highly recommend it.

Tibetan Conch Shell

2010-05-02T17:30:00.003+10:00

My going away present from my friends and coworkers at The Body Art Shop when I moved to Melbourne was this lovingly decorated Tibetan conch shell, and it's one of my most treasured possessions. I have a personal infatuation with conch shells after I had what I can only describe as a mystical/revelatory vision of one a few years ago. I won't go into depth about that, but needless to say my friends could not have given me a more perfect gift. Shaun had to take some still life photos for his course this week and this was one of them. Check out his new photography blog here.

Black Tar Prophecies IV

2010-04-30T19:23:00.000+10:00

Emil Amos has just uploaded another one of his tenebrous film collages that I love so much. This one is a sort of commercial for the new Grails release, Black Tar Prophecies volume IV. I can't fucking wait.

GRAILS- BLACK TAR IV COMMERCIAL from The Fact Facer on Vimeo.

Drums

2010-04-30T00:47:00.005+10:00

I embarked on a new adventure today, and it's one that I'm very excited about. Between the ages of about 14 and 16, playing the drums was my favourite thing in the world; I spent more time drumming than drawing or making art and I formed several half-arsed bands with various musical friends. As friendships dissolved and access to practise rooms became more difficult, I gradually ceased playing altogether, and I never quite forgave myself for that. Nothing compares to the feeling of beating a drum, or even better a whole kit of them, and it's something I've missed for so many years now that this year I decided to do something about it.

Some months ago while I was watching the rather excellent local band Fangs Of... for the first time, (whose bass player Michael works with Shaun), I decided that their incredible drummer Jem was the man who could pull me out of my drumless rut. And that he has; today I had the first of hopefully many lessons with Jem, who turns out to be warm and friendly and lovely to talk to. His approach to drumming is a perfect blend of technique and intuition, and I couldn't be happier to be learning from him. Do yourself a favour and check out Jem's many musical projects, including the well-loved Fire Witch, at his indy label We Empty Rooms, who put out beautiful limited edition cds and vinyl with hand-printed covers that you can buy for a very reasonable price. But first, check out this awesome clip of Fire Witch playing live in August last year.

Amelia's Hummingbirds

2010-04-29T01:20:00.001+10:00

Over the last few years I have been fortunate enough to have Amelia, the owner of this hummingbird tattoo, as a client of mine. This young lady is one of those people who really reminds you of how lucky and ungrateful you actually are, whilst being a perfect client and lovely company. Never have I met anyone with a story like hers, and yet despite her hardships Amelia remains strong, optimistic, warm and gracious at all times.

The last time I tattooed her, which was several weeks ago now, Amelia had been recently diagnosed with a rare and as yet incurable disease that affects her connective tissue, resulting in her having to endure multiple knee and shoulder reconstructions among other painful and complicated conditions. We had just finished covering a multitude of scars with these hummingbirds and morning glories, and now she's going to be left with a whole lot more. Even though she can no longer walk without leg braces, Amelia continues to work two jobs to support herself and her younger teenage sister, and to pay for her soaring medical expenses. Add to this the possibility of being wheelchair-bound before she reaches 30 and this girl's unwavering pleasantness really starts to make me feel like an asshole.

The next time I'm feeling self-pitious because I have too many drawings to do, or because I don't see Shaun enough or because my thighs are too fat, I hope I can snap out of it and remember that problems like these are a privilege not afforded to everyone.

Some new tattoos.

2010-04-25T19:25:00.001+10:00

A few pieces I've enjoyed doing recently. I use the term 'recently' rather loosely since I did Jen's back with the blossoms on it over a year ago. Updating my portfolio seems to be a rapidly diminishing concern for me, which I guess is not a bad thing since it means I'm more focused on doing the tattoos and making my clients happy than anything else. Still, it can be a little depressing when you look at your book and see nothing but tattoos you did two years ago, and no evidence of your recent achievements. I've been doing a few really fun custom pieces lately that hopefully I'll have photos of soon so I can feel good about how I've spent the last year of my working life.

Family Portraits

2010-04-18T20:21:00.001+10:00

John James Audubon

2010-04-17T22:32:00.001+10:00

John James Audubon was America's most prominent and celebrated ornithilogist, so much so that this portrait of him now hangs in the White House. His dedication to the thorough and accurate documentation of America's birds was (and still is) unsurpassed, and resulted in some truly beautiful images. Audubon was a talented painter and possessed a strong sense of aesthetics and composition, setting his images apart from previous works of a similar kind. He was also a hunter and taxidermist, skills which he used to create life-like images of the birds he painted, always incorporating elements of their habitat and lifestyle such as tree branches, nests, eggs, flowers and associated wildlife. For a lengthy and fascinating history of the man I recommend visiting his Wikipedia page, or one of the many websites dedictaed to his work. Otherwise, just enjoy these examples of his stunning bird paintings, the complete collection of which can be purchased in The Audubon Society baby elephant folio edition of his magnum opus, Audubon's Bird's of America.

Eggs eggs, I love eggs!

2010-04-17T21:25:00.001+10:00

I'm channelling Edith Massey for this blog post today, but in this case I'm not talking about the eating of eggs...I'm talking about paintings of them. These beautiful images came from a blog called The Graphics Fairy; from the name it sounds like something I wouldn't visit in a million years, but the lady who runs it works at an antiques store and collects vintage graphics (long past their copyright) which she scans and uploads for people to use as they please. As luck would have it, she seems to find quite a lot of natural history illustrations which are my newest obsession. These images of eggs are presumably from old books on ornithology, which will be the subject of my next post. I think they're exquisite.

Drifter's Sympathy

2010-04-16T02:03:00.001+10:00

Holy Sons makes me feel a little bit happier when I'm sad. Watch this clip, it rules.

DRIFTER'S SYMPATHY from The Fact Facer on Vimeo.

Jeremy Boot Tattoo

2010-04-08T00:51:00.001+10:00

There is a wonderful wildlife artist from my hometown of Adelaide named Jeremy Boot, who is known for his beautiful and accurate paintings of birds. His images can usually be found on quaint little teacups and the like, but recently I've had the opportunity to put some on a young lady's arm and it's a piece I'm having lots of fun with.

It's always nice when you become really entranced with a particular subject and your psychic feelers somehow reach like-minded people and bring them to you. This has happened to me a few times recently, and Jen, the lovely lass I'm putting these birds on, is a sterling example. Both of us feel an inexplicable connection with birds, which we are yet to understand but happy to explore...and what better way to do it than tattoo them on our arms? I have my own exquisite sleeve of feathered friends from the rather lovely Geordie Cole, which I may post photos of some day, but in the meantime here are some progress photos of Jen's Jeremy Boot tattoo, and the gorgeous images I'm basing it on.