Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
May 1st, 2010
I am a dunce. The last time I was down in London (a few weeks ago) I was determined to visit the National Portrait Gallery, having heard so much about it. So off I toddled, only getting slightly lost and confused on the way.
Fantastic place. Great images. Loved it.
Oh yes, discovered yesterday that the National Gallery (where I was) and the National Portrait Gallery were not the same thing. Oops.
So yesterday I met Philly at the National Gallery and she dragged the three hundred odd yards to the National Portrait Gallery.
Fantastic place. Great images. Loved it.
We went into see the Irving Penn exhibition, and whilst I was familiar with some of his work, in a very loose unconnected way, I was unprepared for the sheer quality and power of his image making. Concentrating on his photographs of the great and the good, the exhibition shows his stylistic and creative evolution from the 1940s up until 2007 when he passed away.
His early work defied portraiture convention, placing his subjects at the centre of bland empty spaces, or in the corner of converging walls, forcing the focus solely on the character and personality of the person being photographed. Other images focused in more tightly on the face, yet often these images defied convention as well, with the subject closing their eyes covering part of their face with prop, hand or clothing. In the vast collection of works displayed, the images were striking more often than not, encapsulating Penn’s sense of empathy and humour with a deft use of shape, texture and space.
Particular favourites:
Max Ernst and Dorothea Tanning, New York, 1947 – beautiful composition and shape, imperious and powerful in the confidence of the subjects
Peter Ustinov, London, 1947 – another striking image, the pose unusual and contorted but lending an air of almost bored contemplation
Pablo Picasso at La Californie, Cannes, 1957 – a close up, wearing a hat, his face partially covered by the lapels of his coat, forcing you to focus on the intensity of Picasso’s gaze. Incredible.
Saul Steinberg in a Nose Mask, New York, 1966 – unbelievably cheeky. A large paper/cardboard sheet covers his face, with two blank holes for eyes, nose protruding through the hole below. Layers of humour and mischief here.
Issey Miyake, New York, 1988 – head covered in a cowl of textured material with three quarter lighting, casting part of his face into shadow, this image exude intensity and a formidable personality. One of my favourites.
The Irving Penn exhibition is well worth visiting, £10 a ticket, free if you are a member of the NPG (or know someone who is). It is on until the 6th of June.
April 25th, 2010
Sometimes the idea of being a drunken writer, haunted and gaunt of feature, harrowed by late nights and fevered mornings, burnt from within by too-tight intensity and snarling need, is an appealing one. There is a seductive air of eloquent distress to such blatant drive and self destruction.
On the other hand, being me is just fine, with a little more cake and a bit more discipline. Okay, perhaps a bit more than ‘a little’ and ‘a bit’. Especially the latter.
Today progress has been made. I seem to be developing this story in a somewhat organic manner, layers of context and understanding coming in fits and starts. I have the characters and the main story arc but I am trying not to be too prescribed and too planned, I know from my NaNoWriMo experience that the characters can take me in unexpected directions, leaving me ruing the mercurial nature of their decision making.
The last time I blogged about the story I had finally nailed the nature of the opposing protagonist(s), and today I finally understood the relationship between the two contexts in which my two main plot-lines will be operating.
I have written chunks of the story, and now I just need to write the rest. I need to make it all fit together and complete a rough draft to be cut, expanded, reshaped, torn down, rebuilt, agonised over, stripped down, bulked up and made final.
I wish I hadn’t just written that. The enormity of it looms over me, but you know what they say about eating elephants. Yes, one spoonful at a time.
April 25th, 2010
It is 12.30am, and whilst that doesn’t ordinarily count as late, I did try to go to sleep some 2 hours ago.
I am very much in the mood to get up and do some writing. The middle of the night is one of my favourite times of the day, and it is often when I am at my most creative and contemplative.
I wish this country had all night cafes. I would go and sit in one, write, drink coffee, eat cake and watch the night-time world go by.
That isn’t an option. So I will probably go downstairs, sit at my kitchen table, put something suitably soothing and creativity provoking on the music system and write.
Well, think and write. Or hallucinate and write. Maybe mumble to myself and swig port out of the bottle and sing snatches of inopportune songs.
Maybe I’ll just write. It’ll be easier to clean up in the morning.
February 2nd, 2010
Some days I just don’t seem to fit in anywhere. Some days I am all angles and elbows and finding a space, a comfortable, welcoming space, just isn’t possible.
I seem to be having a lot of those days lately.
Some days I would just love to slough off my existence, slip away into the proverbial night, itinerant and self-sufficient.
Just my feet, my backpack, netbook, camera, some clothes and a book or two. And the world. The whole, wide, open world. Yes, that sounds good. I think, maybe, then, some day, one day, I may just fit.
December 25th, 2009
I am suddenly aware that my last post was not the most, ah, happy, uplifting and joyous of posts for the occasion, which is very much a result of my being in a somewhat reflective mood more than anything.
So, to remedy this, I hope you are all having a fantastic holiday, whether or not you are Christian, practicing, or otherwise; whatever your race, creed, religion or philosophy. Enjoy the company of friends and family and special loved ones. Eat lots, indulge more, but please spare a thought or an action for those in the world less fortunate than yourself. Most of all, be content, be happy and be loved.
Wishing you all the best, on the 25th day of December, and hoping tomorrow’s hangover is a mild one, and the stomach ache well earned.
Jx
December 25th, 2009
It is the 25th day of December. It is cold outside, the wind bitter and icy, the sky dark with night’s kiss. I sit inside, in the warmth, awaiting breakfast and lunch and a different type of day.
It is 24 days since I last posted on here, and I have found it difficult to do so since I wrote that last post. I have tried, several times. Five draft posts lie fallow, bereft and dry in the barren wilderness of my inspiration, tragic companions to the loss of my writing mojo.
The city outside exists in patchwork of bright lights and darkness, reflections abound, scintillating amidst the shadows, ghosts of a momentary reality. The world outside turns and people stir towards a new day, or sit in the midst of it, or approach the end. Sated, hungry, indifferent, empty of meaning, lost to commercialism, found in the heart of family, wrapped in faith and celebration and contemplation, shattered by the uncaring and malicious, existing, hoping to just make it to the end of the day. People live and breathe and die out there, lost to heat and cold, to darkness and loneliness. People live and breathe and dream out there, cocooned in happiness and joy, surrounded by those who matter most. People live and breathe and exist out there, untouched and unaware.
The 25th day.
A very odd day.
***
I stood mesmerised yesterday, watching ‘Out of Blue‘, a short film by Zarina Bhimji, a Ugandan photographer and film-maker. The room was darker than dark, the faint silhouettes of those sitting and leaning against muffled walls barely evident. The room was filled with a vast disturbing soundscape; voices and the aural detritus from the land of Africa providing a perfect counterpoint to the film thrown against the wall.
The barred window of a prison cell, pulling back from that brief glimpse of a blue sky, the ruined patina of the walls stained with long streaks of dried blood, the loud buzzing of flies overlaying the sussuration of faint voices.
A ruined doorway, panning across broken walls, shattered plaster, the light and movement from a bright day moving in the background.
A man stands, a black outline leaning against a cell door, the regular flick of his beating stick the only thing that proves that this is not a photograph.
An airport tower, abandoned and desolate, a succession of glass panes, punctuated by the unmistakable shape of bullet holes.
A village, green and hot, children running backward and forward in the light of the day.
Shattered buildings, ruined worlds, a battering ram of images masquerading as film, a soundtrack that disturbs and unnerves with each new vista.
***
In another part of the world my mother and my brother, his wife and sons, plus the extended family, all sit together for lunch, celebrating being together.
This the first time I will have spent this day apart from them. It feels odd and it would be dishonest of me to say that I did not miss them. I do.
***
I have a lot to write, and I haven’t cared to these last few days.
My NaNoWriMo novel stands a third done, but I have replanned it, and now have a much stronger vision for it.
I have a short story to write for a flash fiction competition – 275 words for the Women on Writing website.
A short play has been started, abandoned and rethought – the Tobacco Factory’s Script Space competition the inspiration and target.
I still have posts and columns to write for the lovely isca media, iwalkdevon and Film and Fly; some drafts and synopsis written with much more to do.
Plus all the other projects floating around in my head.
All in all, a pretty busy 2010 to come.
***
In another part of the institute is a wall covered in 6×4 photographs, spaced deliberately apart to allow you the opportunity to savour each individually.
These are ordinary photographs, sent from one person to another, sent with purpose and meaning and intent, and we cannot see them.
They are affixed to the wall, their backs exposed to the eye; covered in scrawls and messages and blotches, in ink or pencil, brief moments of stories to diverse to know. They are poignant, illegible, daft, surreal, functional, simple, joyous and sad. They are flip side of the tale, the explanation and the tell-all, mysterious codes and occasionally untouchable in meaning.
August 22nd, 2009
A change of pace, courtesy of my friend Elle and someone called Sanchita.
Per required cup
One fresh cardamom
One fingertip sized piece of fresh ginger (heavily crushed)
Sugar to taste
Milk or soyamilk
Assam tea leaves
Put the ginger and cardomom and sugar in a pan and cover with water and boil for 2 minutes.
Add the tea and a little more water. Boil for another two minutes.
Add the milk or soya milk and bring to the boil for two more minutes.
Strain into cups.
Enjoy 
[picture of a successful attempt to be inserted]
August 18th, 2009
this is the last of my breaths
this one
the slow silent draw
rising
my chest
the plunging cool
hinting with its final texture
at long drawn out lives
moments
precious moments
flickering and spinning away
like the relentless hands on a clock
terrifyingly
important
each and every moment
and its sibling breath
remembering
summers scent
the exhilaration of the breath
drawn from your breast
from your
lips
sweet as a winter storm
clinging like autumn haze
mountain air in some
distant
distant
past
deeper and deeper
air flowing
swirling with graceful
elegance
over my lips
down
and then the pause
remembrance
stillness
the dying embers of a kiss
the cusp of our passions
held
silent and long
each moment an age
this final moment
trapped and made
prisoner
servant to this mortal will
this dying
dying
moment
filled with the breath of you
memories of your intensity
the fire of your taste
the scent and strength of you
held
as precious and as magnificent
as all the moments
all the breaths
that sang their silent song
before
and then
with reverence
release
with sadness
surcease
the ending of it all
memory
moment
a lifetime
breathed back into the world
given
in despair
with melancholy
the triumph and the tragedy
of a life lived
surrendered
as we surrendered
this moment
this final moment
this dying of our kiss
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August 18th, 2009
Today I am exhausted. I am tired. I am rent.
I am sitting here, on my sofa, catching up on blogs, somehow hoping that the outside world will make me feel a little better. And, strangely, in some very small ways it has. Shauna Glenn’s two recent posts (Not that its all Croc’ed up to be and Beautiful Misery) both put things into perspective and put a smile on my face, no matter how brief and sad and small it may have been. Mary’s recent book related post reminded me of the things I could do to get through this, and the DailySnark’s post Binge and Purge reminded me that this is probably the best time to sweep away some of the relentless accretion of life that has built up around me. PleaseKissOff’s Reading in July post has reminded me that I have accomplished very little reading this last few months and maybe I should rediscover it again. Jessica’s Meandering Thoughts post highlights to me that these things happen and life is about picking yourself up, learning and moving on. And that cake is very important too.
Last night the Girl and I split up, ending three and half years of a relationship that has seen the last third gradually deteriorate into unhappiness, quarrelling, disappointment and sadness. That isn’t to say we haven’t had high points, we have, but there has been a slow descent to where we are and we can’t deny that any longer.
The hard part is that we still love each other. I know I am the main culprit; whatever my expectations of the Girl, I have become more remote and withdrawn over the last few months. She has tried so very hard to make things work, and for some reason I just haven’t been able to respond, to work at it in the way she and the relationship deserves.
I have not been the best of boyfriends. I know it. But as ever, the knowing is too late, the understanding too little.
I do love her. She is a wonderful, clever and caring person. I will miss her quirkiness and her unique way of looking at the world. But I don’t know if I can change quickly enough, and she doesn’t know if she can take any more. Neither of us want the continued pain of the last year. Neither of us wants that for the other.
And so it ends.
July 12th, 2009
loving you
i betrayed myself
put to rest
those self serving lies
cremated in the fire
of my emotion
the belief I once
owned of myself
knowing you
I revealed myself
emptied
the walls of rooms
shattered doors
bound in the steel
of solitude
offered myself
to the altar of
your sun
and in that conflagaration
burned the eyes
that saw shadows
amidst the lights
stood alone
these many years
watching a world go by
in the café of my life
sipping the dregs
of false memories
listening for the sound
of another voice
been alone
these mortal years
grasped in the fist
of my belief
till
the loving you
that with loving slices
destroyed my introspect-
ion
revelled in my destruct-
ion
until haunted
like a ghost’s
chime
i came home
and in your sight
rediscovered
myself
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