This is why Instagram matters to Artists and Makers

On Mar 5, 2020Apr 24, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn art, Serendipity, Social MediaLeave a comment

Yesterday was an interesting day. A coffee meet up with a friend serendipitously introduced me to an artist and jeweller . Then an unexpected printing hiccough gave me some water colour scraps to create a new image.For interest I though I would use the Instagram Grids of the three people I met to illustrate this blog.

Coffee was with tessajanedesigns at Ocean Studios. We were just having a social catch up after teaching a Social Media workshop earlier in the week.http://www.tessajane.co.uk/

Mark Wiggin saw us nattering and came to join us.

https://www.markwigginart.com/

Then we popped upstairs to see Val Muddyman. Her current work recreates the tiny details of the beauty of a beach really close to her workshop at Devils Point.

https://www.valmuddyman.co.uk/shop-1

Hugo loved her workshop.

For completeness here is my Instagram grid.

I met all these people in just one hour, the images I found of their work on Instagram is such a simple illustration of why Instagram is a great piece of Social Media for Artists and Makers.

The image above is a future palimpsest but for now it’s a collage.

#foodporn

On Mar 4, 2020Apr 24, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn Food ( but this is not a food blog)Leave a comment

Grey rainy mornings have been a constant companion of 2020. Some days the subject for the daily pondering is obvious, other days nothing seems quite interesting enough, today, with the early rain, is one of those days. A quick skip through the image archive tempted me towards writing about rust, but ultimately one of the rust coloured images I retrieved pointed me the way of a saltier story. Baked goods, in particular the Cheese Straw.Starting at the top I present the Gail’s Cheese Straw made with Mature Cheddar Cheese and Comté. This tasty little pile photographed at Gail’s Dulwich VillageI have a long history with cheese straws. My mum used to make them with left over pastry. Hers were pale and flacid and only as tasty as the cheese she had laying in the fridge. On fancy days she made a ring shape of cheesy dough and enclosed three or four skinny cheese straws within the ring.A fellow blog writer has taken the time to write the history of the cheese straw. It’s a fascinating read on a rainy morning.
https://thehistoricfoodie.wordpress.com/2018/10/30/cheese-straws-a-quick-history/I loved these unsophisticated treats eaten warm after school. For much of my life they were the only cheese straw I knew, I make them myself with left over pastry.At some point in the Baking Renaissance of the 21st Century . Cheese Straws became bigger, puffier and altogether much tastier.Armed with a Gail’s cookbook and a bit of creativity, cheese straws started to look a lot more fancy in my own kitchen.I don’t know if people feel particularly passionate about cheese straws. I suspect they are overshadowed by prettier and sweeter ‘show stopper’ baked goods.But without the cheese straw would it’s savoury cousins, the bacon or sausage tasty even exist?

One clean finger and a camera phone.

On Mar 3, 2020Mar 3, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn art1 Comment

Artists and makers tend to be isolationists. Not, perhaps, deliberately but almost certainly circumstantial.

In order to create original work a space is required. Those spaces become a unique location where the artist or maker has the tools and ingredients of their production alongside reference materials and importantly the space to think.

Even in the most delicious communal art spaces ,artists quickly set about erecting boards and barriers to mark their own individual territory.

Shared areas, the loo or kitchen have an almost international grubbiness to them . Marked with indelible signs of the artists that have passed that way. Artists ,Mark-Making on communal areas like a tomcat with territory acquisition and the balls to do it. Just like tomcats artists communal spaces have a distinctive odour.

As an aside I believe the art world has missed a trick. Imagine an exhibition of Butler’s sinks, or local type, brought together from around the world’s greatest artists studios. All displayed in a huge white space. With their original fittings and adjacent work surfaces. Imagine the smells!

Social Media allows artists to maintain their isolationism and yet join with like minded people without the effort of putting on their arty clothes and washing their faces. Social media just needs one clean finger and a camera phone.

Last night we had a real-time gathering of artists from the Tamar Valley to share and expand their knowledge and use of Social Media . Everyone arrived with at least a clean finger and a camera phone. Everyone left with fresh knowledge, a few more followers and probably some new friends.

https://drawntothevalley.co.uk/

Meteorological Spring/St David’s Day/ March 1st/ Inadequate footwear.

On Mar 2, 2020Mar 2, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn Home Towns

What to do on the first day of a new month having lived through the wettest February on record, in England and Wales.

The sun is shining and my feet scamper past both the wellies and converse and look optimistically at my twinkly golden Birkenstocks.

Let me just say the ladies (my feet) have not prepared for this. They are blue white and toenails have not been painted. The last time they were truly out was Christmas Day when waterproof Birkenstocks facilitate our traditional paddle.

I allow my feet their moment in the March sun and wearing wholly inadequate footwear we set off for the twin coastal villages of Kingsand and Cawsand .In honesty this past month of wellie wearing has inflamed my big toe joints, this horrible sensation also encourages wilful and inappropriate nakedness of the foot.

The poor choice of footwear immediately identifies itself when I want to take photos of fields of Daffodils on the way. Each field is surrounded by slithery red mud.

With my trusty wellies on I would have easily gathered arty shots of budding daffodils, stretching towards the horizon for this blog . Luckily sunshine and geology will give us a pop of colour that inspires as much as daffodils.

The sea wall at Kingsand is a thing of vibrant beauty on a spring morning. This whole area of the Tamar estuary is alive with geological colour.

March 1st had other plans for my poor feet , by coincidence a friend of ours was on a cliff watching the weather from inside a cosy bar. Moments before we were hit with a soaking deluge she sent us this picture not knowing we were less than a mile away.

Luckily we were very close to The Devonport Inn.

Good chips, beer and seats indoors solved the problem of inadequate footwear.

Sunshine in poster form

On Mar 1, 2020Mar 1, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale

All over Cornwall, daffodils have been raising their heads, looking for sun, in the darkness of winter in preparation for a big Spring reveal. Similarly artists and makers have been using the snatches of winter daylight to create work for this art exhibition in Gunnislake, Cornwall. The first visible sign that an exhibition is beginning to come together is the arrival of boxes of posters and flyers.

@theoldmortuary also has two pieces of art featured so that is another reason to feel zippy and spring- like this morning.

March, how lovely to see you.

Leap Year

On Feb 29, 2020Apr 24, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity1 Comment

What to do with the extra day in 2020.

©Hong Kong Ballet

Obviously after just one Barré lesson we are fizzing to leap around on Leap Day, but this young man does it so much better .

February always needs more red.

Leap Year attracts flimsiness and fun, see my efforts above, or read Guardian flimsiness.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/feb/29/leap-year-day-how-you-could-and-should-celebrate-29-february

But it exists to keep us all ticking along nicely in time. Introduced by Julius Caesar over 2000 years ago.

Leap day recalibrates and corrects time keeping because every year is actually 365 days and 6 hours long (one complete earth orbit of the sun) so once every four years those extra 6 hours are gathered together to make an extra day.

29 pictures in red to fill your extra day.

Gipsy Hill Brewery at The Lord High Admiral , Plymouth

Dodging the spray, Niagara Falls, Canada

Muscle Memory

On Feb 28, 2020Feb 28, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn FitnessLeave a comment

It’s been a while since attending a ballet based class was a thing for the humans @theoldmortuary.

An exercise class called Barre enticed us in.

My previous ballet experience was in a mirror- less room at the Institute, Braintree so even the word Barre was a little bit exciting. Holding the Dado rail was the Essex way. Plymouth Ballet lessons were a lot posher for Hannah and involved lessons from Wayne Sleep and Bonnie Langford as well as mirrors and Barres.

As it turns out we didn’t touch the Barre.

The movements and language were a revelation. I had completely forgotten that French is the language of ballet.

The strange thing is that our bodies had not forgotten, effortlessly getting into the positions required before our brains had fully processed the command.

‘Effortlessly’ is slightly disengenuous, we didn’t turn into giddy, gauzy, whisps of women seemingly floating across the dance floor in a chiffon of pink. How I wish that were the case; but it was noticeable that none of the moves were unfamiliar to us and we threw in little ‘Jettes’ quite naturally and our ‘arabesques’ felt as beautiful as the word suggests. As with all things exercise there was a punchy soundtrack that encouraged movement and time keeping. The only downside to all this ballet nostalgia was the mirror, in keeping with its well-known cliche. It didn’t lie.

Digital Learning Day

On Feb 27, 2020Feb 27, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn art

Every day is a digital learning day @theoldmortuary as we are both digital migrants, very far from Luddites we are early adopters of technology who have a fondness for the hardware of the pre-digital age. Currently involved,and failing, to engage local artists in the benefits of Instagram , this morning I adopted irony with my post.

This image captivated me over the weekend, it illustrated an article about Hilary Mantel and her new book. Another image from the weekend was this typewriter in Joe and the Juice, Wimbledon.

I love that the hardware of the pre-digital age are loved by so many people and not all thrown into landfill.

Joe and the Juice, Regent Street had another gorgeous typewriter when I was there in the winter.

Lurking in the studio @theoldmortuary there is a collection of wooden letterpress letters.

The sentiment is somewhat appropriate.

And, thank goodness, neatly brings me back to art.

I would be really grateful to anyone who has an idea or experience of engaging artists and makers to engage with Instagram and Social Media in general. Comments either on here or on theoldmortuary Instagram/ facebook page. Thanks in advance.

Bright shaft of sunlight.

On Feb 26, 2020Apr 24, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn Drawn To The Valley Artists, Home TownsLeave a comment

This morning the sunshine demanded to be noticed @theoldmortuary.

It highlights.

1. Tissues, we have been bogged down with a shocking virus this weekend. Not the headline grabbing sort just one that saps the strength and deadens the creative soul.

2. Hidden books, I have no idea how they get there.

3. Shadows, we have cast metal fish in our windows . In spring as soon as the sun comes out the fish shadows swim all over the ground floor.

4. Phalluses

Today is Ash Wednesday, an important date in the Christian calendar and #ash is the prompt for the social media account of Drawn to the Valley an artist collective I am involved with.( I used David Bowie’s Ashes to Ashes lyrics to fulfil the prompt) I mention this only in passing to illustrate that although I am not an active Christian I do have a good grip living opposite a church and being culturally shaped by Christianity, the gentle moves of the Christian calendar and it’s feasts and rituals are integral to the shape of our daily lives. Weddings, funerals and baptisms shape the way we park if nothing else. Paganism too plays it’s part in todays blog about Bright Shafts of Sunlight. There is almost an eponymous characteristic to those words. #4 explained

Our garden traps confetti, even after a winter of harsh storms and few weddings, today’s ‘ bright shaft of sunlight’ has its own special meaning @theoldmortuary as the garden twinkles with golden phalluses.

What becomes of a careless Seagull? Not exactly Mardi Gras.

On Feb 25, 2020 By theoldmortuary.designIn abstract photographyLeave a comment

Obviously theoldmortuary has some history with the deceased. Today is Mardi Gras in many countries and I was trawling my photo files for masks as you do, and these popped up. I can think of no time when it would be appropriate to share these images of forgotten Seagulls extracted from our chimney, but they do have a feel of Mardi Gras. So today they are getting their moment in the spotlight.

I posed them on decaying flowers and in bright shafts of sunlight to enhance the feel.

	beth on #1401 theoldmortuary ponders
	beth on #1400 theoldmortuary ponders.
	beth on #1399 theoldmortuary ponders
	beth on #1398 theoldmortuary ponders.
	beth on #1396 theoldmortuary ponders