Hello.......Again!

My last blog entry was about a house warming present I had just made for The Boomerang Child, well it looks like this summer she will be back!
I shall comment no further.

Since the last time I wrote my all things green has escalated I am now a member of FREECYCLE CARDIFF and whilst I get rid of lots of things,some of the members really do push their luck by not showing up to collect things.It seems that other members also have this problem.
My favourite things to get rid of on FREECYCLE are jam jars with lids,egg boxes, used packaging and big bags of mixed items to be used for car boot sales. The car booters always show up!


And I am slowly but surely spring cleaning my house and de-cluttering.
It feels very good.

A VERY LIMITED VIEW OF THE BACK GARDEN

Last year I also managed to grow lots of things in planters and I grew all my own lettuce for the summer which is quite an achievement when you consider I am a vegetarian who loves salad!
I have begun to plant my garden and tidy it for the summer and it is looking very bright and cheery. It has lots of windmills and Gnomes and bright things just for Beauty and YES she loves them.
She may be 8 but she loves the visual stimulation of a toddler.

BEAUTY IN THE FRONT GARDEN

I wonder if I will ever achieve my goal of a perfect garden and home........I don't think so!

STILL LIVING THE GREEN LIFE

I may not have written for a few weeks but I am still trying to live the greener healthier lifestyle and keep up with some art work.
I made collages for Beauty's teachers and teacher's aides as end of term presents and I have just completed a housewarming present for SnoWhite called The Boomerang Child which is painted using acrylics on a canvas, I shall load a photograph of The Boomerang Child when I can find my camera(Fiona usually has it!).

An example of my continuing healthy eating
today's menu
Breakfast
Fruit and Fibre with semi-skimmed milk
Snack
Mixed salad with Ryvittas
Lunch
Corn on the cob
and I still haven't decided on my evening meal yet but a mixed bean salad is looking good-nutritious AND filling.

You need to check out these recycled birdhouses

they are so beautiful.

I also love this collage very much

The Trick

link

check out the website


The Trick
collage on paper
4" x 4" 07.11.07
SOLD

And finally here is her Saint Rose of Lima.


what an amazing painting.
Check out Wendy Ryans Folk Art
Bloglink

I LOVE ART

What an impressive piece of recycled/altered art. Well done to the children who painted this.
link

A broken down Iraqi army tank that children have painted on as a colourful protest against war.

Iy sits in the middle of the road from Kirkuk to Suleimaniya

You just have to check out this website-
Collectors Quest
link
the work is amazing. It has made me look at art in a different way.

Check out this website-this person has major talent

The Art of Sand sculpture
link

What is it about me and sand sculptures?

I am amazed at these artists, they must take such a lot of time to create these pieces of work.

THE UNFINISHED PIECE

These are unfinished pieces in my collage notebook. I have heard of people who set a time limit when they create a piece but I find completion a difficult thing. I am always finding pieces that I would really like to put on a page and so it becomes increasingly difficult to know when a piece is DONE.

I'M BACK!

When the building work started on the extension all of my art work went upstairs into the front bedroom. It is still there and as yet the room is not completely sorted but I am working on it.
I have been saying that I will do my art work when the room is sorted but I have been so inspired by artists that I have met on the web that I have made the decision to re-start my art work now. Collage is one of my favourite mediums and I have notebooks full of collage and boxes full of stuff to use.
Yesterday I began a new notebook. A note book is an unplanned thing that I work on everyday and is really more like a WE'LL SEE WHERE IT TAKES ME. As all of my stuff to collage with is still upstairs I decided to use only things that I had around me, magazines, newspapers, junk mail and the general 'rubbish' that any collage artist knows they cannot throw away and HAS to be used.
Here are a few pages that I created.

WHERE IS THE SUNSHINE?
Inspired by the fact that we are in what seems to be a rainy season
However, seeing the Baby in the Sun, Beauty re-named it
Teletubbies

I am in desperate need of a new camera, my camera is dying, SnoWhite dropped it on Sully Beach( funnily enough she dropped and broke the last one too!)


REMEMBERING
These pages are about Tony Goble from Llanover hall, I received the new Llanover Hall prospectus in the post and used the pages in the book to create a REMEMBRANCE.

TONY

TIME TO ACT
A compilation of bits and pieces found in my kitchen
Notice how Beauty gets everywhere!

PIGGY CRAFT

A website to check out , these are such cute creatures.
A real brilliant website.

3 little pigs

You HAVE to check out HummingBird Eyes
Ooh,Ooh,Ooh..........the noise I made on seeing the above!
Ooh,Ooh,Ooh..........the noise that I make when I see something that I LOVE.
Funnily enough my girls make the same noise when they see something they LOVE.
With Fiona it is anything Cath Kidston that she sees (or of course Hello Kitty) and with SnoWhite it is anything Boyzone, Westlife or Sam Winchester!I can understand the Sam Winchester Ooh,Ooh,Ooh but I still don't get the anything Boyzone or Westlife. Sorry lads...........and this from the woman who has NEVER stopped liking Donny Osmond!


Check out the Bag Snob

A website you will love girls.

You lucky citizens of California will be spared this eye sore from Carlos Falchi when shopping at Saks because California state laws prohibit the sale of python skin (I do apologize for assaulting you with these images online though). I burst out laughing when I read the description of this unsightly bag on the Saks website, "a seductively luxurious mix of anaconda and snakeskin". What kind of drugs are they on? Who would be seduced by this? What they should have written is "a repulsively overpriced and deformed collage of reptile scraps". At least then consumers like yourselves will be able to make an informed choice. By the way, they are asking $2,995 for the bag, can you believe it?

As a vegetarian I find it just unacceptable, I just can't imagine why a person would want to buy it, PLUS it is ugly!

WHEN I AM OLD I SHALL WEAR PURPLE

A beautiful piece that I found on a website called NZ ART ELIZABETH LOVE

LOVE Hearts (48)
July 2007
Mixed media on canvas
150x150x35mm
POA

I have always loved hearts in art, I really don't believe that you could call me a romantic but heart inspired art does it for me.

Even the heart art of Frida Kahlo does it for me. In a different way though.
link

Las Dos Fridas by Frida Kahlo
Exhibited in Conaculta (Mexico), Museo de Arte Moderno

I love this papier mache art

Hoodies - the positive side

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Local young people have put on a brilliant art exhibition at 334 Caledonian Road. They have taken the demonised 'hoodie' and used it to express the influences on modern young people. The hoodies (papier mache and collage) make a huge impact. Photographic flash emphasises the shadow of the empty head spaces and give a sinister air that is offset by the hope and optimism of the magazine cut collage that coats them. When you see the hoodies up close up in real life the shadow isn't there - the camera flash brings it out. To me this contrasts the press reporting of young people with the reality when you meet and talk to them face to face.

Hoodie Art- what a brilliant statement by the young people that produced it.

Has anyone noticed that I love so many different forms of art?
I just cannot comprehend how individuals can like one thing to the exclusion of everything else, there is so much out there.
Take music for instance, Pianoman loves Jazz and classical music, to the exclusion of everything else, what a waste, there is so much out there to listen to.
I personally CANNOT listen to jazz as it does nothing for me though I find modern Jazz singers pleasant enough to listen to. Listening to jazz music for me is as excruciating as listening to an M&S food advert, sorry but I just can't do it. And this from the sad person who loves Brutalist architecture.
Perhaps it is that I am sadly lacking in any taste, I watched My Name Is Earl last night and I found it hilariously funny when Randy used the urinal in the art exhibition.

Yet I am a huge fan of found art

Fountain by Marcel Duchamp. 1917

Perhaps now that I am growing old(50 is the next big birthday) my behaviour should mature-we shall see.