Author: theoldmortuary.design

theoldmortuary has been a blog for about five years. It has evolved into an almost daily event. Pondering on the things that are inspired by my daily life. Often mundane, sometimes repetitive I swerve from hyperlocal activity to big and small thoughts without blinking an eye. I am an artist and writer. My hometown is Plymouth in South West England, part of me will always be connected to London and another part loves to travel.

#1275 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, Serendipity1 Comment

Beltane , Mayday, caught me out yesterday. It was a day filled to the brim. Not another thing could have been squeezed into any second of the waking day. So much so that the blog was brief and largely unexplained.

I combined two exercises from Paint Like Turner to create a painting of our local tidal pool.

The first big takeaway was that watercolour painting 250 years ago was not done on paper that was anywhere near white. So the process took about 24 hours as I dyed paper with cold tea.

The process and the result.

Then dried the papers in hot bright sunlight, which bleached out the colour a bit. I think I quite like painting on imperfect slightly beige paper. In real life the image has a warmth about it which I quite like.

Then to read the instructions and dig around in my paint store for the suggested colours or as close as I had.

I was working from one of my favourite, very atmospheric photographs of the pool.

At this point I should point out that this is the pool on an excellent day.

And this once again is the painting. Very curious to create art from firm instructions.

I need to sort this horizon out before actually attaching the mount.

I was quite thrilled that the painting more or less has a Turner colour palate as demonstrated by the biography I am also powering through.

But the painting is nothing like a Turner in reality and much more like my photograph.

Which rather neatly brings me to the end of the day. Which was spent with a huge glass of Pimms , celebrating a friend’s success in the London Marathon. 26 miles of determination and endeavour.

This photograph has the colour palate of the sun going down through a glass of Pimms.

A Beltane well spent.

#1273 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Words1 Comment

What is your favorite holiday? Why is it your favorite?

An evening walk at a marina gave me the perfect image to describe a favourite type of holiday. And I am not a boaty person, but the name says it all.

Not just holidays though although I may have to google the word holiday.

Holidays are just an extension of ‘ moments’ or ‘taking a break’ Periods of life that differ significantly from the mundanity of the norm.

I had loads to do yesterday but the two big dog walks of the day gave me the chance to take two mini coddiwomples. The one in the boatyard and one in a city park.

The city park, courtesy of Victorian municipal planning gave me quite the tiny coddiwomple in bright April sunlight. From a shady English Woodland…

To the fiery colours of  Far Eastern Azalea bushes, simply by turning my body 90 degrees.

Two unknown destinations when I set out on my mini coddiwomple.  A tiny holiday from the days admin.

#1272 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art1 Comment

I can never be sure where a book will take me and this one is no different. But the project for today is unexpected.

Drum roll…

Turner did not use white paper or canvas, his whites are created by white paint. Which I am slightly averse to. True Whites in my paintings are usually gaps in the paint. Today I will be soaking paper in cold tea and drying it in the sun, for a more random 250 year old look.

These slightly mad little experiments are unlikely to make it into the public domain, even at a Turner inspired exhibition, but the way colours react in different circumstances is fascinating to me.

But none of this is where this book has taken me in the last few days.

While I was busy doing a job not involving art. I was on a parallel and self guided path of art appreciation and dabbling with watercolour. Until I decided to give art a more academic and educational  space in my life by committing to many years of part-time study doing a Foundation Degree and then a Fine Art degree. While still studying the essential science stuff for my career.

Without much research I started the journey towards a degree in Fine Art, imagining that I could immerse myself in the world of artists from Turner to the Impressionists. Not to be. Without due diligence I had signed up for a Contemporary Fine Art Degree. One of life’s awkward moments, regrettable at the time, but the fees had been paid. Turner and the Impressionists slipped from view, pushed out by Rothko and Grayson Perry and many late 20th and 21st Century artists*.

*This was the best learning experience ever, so glad I made this error.Contemporary Art really stretches thinking, and thinking makes for great pondering.

This last couple of months has been the first time I have been truly back with the older generation of artists for 20 years.

The things I did not know about Turner are manifest. In the last few weeks it has been easy to find Turner locations on the Devon/ Cornwall  border. But unknown to me my London life was very Turner centric. The number 3 bus from Crystal Palace to Oxford Street is like a Turner Experience. If only I had known when it was my daily commute.

I took this quite a few years ago because life was mimicking art.

©Pedro Poyatos

https://www.saatchiart.com/poyatos?srsltid=AfmBOoqlBPpGody31sBnGfvkHpSZvIQoErt2Gd3VhHHeUw74brUQqcj2

Which brings me to a brand new-to-me artist.

Books really do take me on extraordinary journeys.

A ponder for another day, Turner and my daily commute. For now though I am tinting paper with Tea Bags…

#1271 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity1 Comment
13 years ago

Wisteria in April is a fabulous herald of a properly established Spring. The Wisteria above and the white spider set the bar very high. The Wisteria grew on a pergola in my Cornish garden and attracted white crab spiders, who could be a little spooky.

Another one that we visited yesterday in Cornwall was in a glorious mood.

Ours in the yard in Devon after just under a year of being in our possession, is not so forward . In fact it is seriously behind the curve. But one day I might feel the urge to paint it. For now the Wisteria of Pentillie Castle will have to do.

#1270 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Procrastination, Serendipity2 Comments

A big but belated event is occuring today. Very late into the project to create art that is inspired by the JMW Turner 250 celebrations, a book, How to Paint like Turner, will arrive.

Coupled with the discovery that my pastel store has only deliciously soft colours  lurking in its dusty drawers. Apart from the new, vibrant, kids on the block, who are not actually as fabulous as their much older colleagues. I want to paint flowers.

Is there any jeopardy to this book arriving? Of course there is! I am the woman who always wanted to study anything but the thing I should be studying.  So creatively there is now an annoying little worm in my head that is telling me to paint flowers. Mr JMW Turner did not paint flowers.

This worm is an old associate. When I should have been reading this many years ago.

He told me to leave my books and go to the Tate and study the works of Mr JMW Turner. Which I did.

Now I actually need to study Mr JMW Turner the worm calls my mind elsewhere. This morning I am thrilled to look at this physics book as if it is an old friend. The words, essential at the time, beguiling me because they are part forgotten or so embedded in me that I no longer notice them.

Of course the worm is actually procrastination. Something I am particularly adept at, and curiously good at concentrating on. Happy Sunday.

#1269 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Drawn to the Valley, Serendipity1 Comment

A very long while ago I was gifted these fine art pastels. They had belonged to a friend’s mother who had been a well received flower artist. On her death the pastels found their way to me. I have had them nearly thirty years and she was very old when she moved on to the great studio in another realm, so these are probably more than 50 years old.I worked out yesterday that in my 30 years I have used about 20% of what I was given. After a sort out I had 5 empty drawers. For the first time ever I went into an art shop and bought some pastels. Some really bright pastels to create a specific image.

I really only needed  red,orange, bright pink and black. But the local art shop didn’t sell single pastels. Although made by the same manufacturer as my old pastels these giddy contemporary pastels are a little more difficult to use, they are possibly a student version . A bit of research tells me that Rembrandt pastels were first introduced in 1924. There is every chance that some of my pastels are nearly that age. Some of them certainly lived through World War 2 in London with their previous owner.

Favourite tree on Mount Edgecumbe

  Which is rather fabulous as I am creating a time warp landscape that features Devonport, formally Plymouth Dock, a favourite tree, duplicated.

Fireworks or Incendiary Devices over Devonport formally Plymouth Dock

Fireworks or incendiary bombs  and of course, given the current project Mr JMW Turner.

Mr Turner under a tree.

I think the landscape, should it need a genre might be classified as Magical Realism.

Turner overlooking Plymouth Dock for 200 years. Inspired by Wallpaper.

And a direct Turner quote

My blacks are deliberately very black and the brights are either sombre or joyful. The Plymouth Blitz or Firework night.

All this from a box of old pastels and a few gaudy new ones.

#1268 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn artLeave a comment

As I lay in bed writing this blog, I realise that by chasing down references to JMW Turner’s painting and sketching exploits in the Tamar Valley I am going down some fascinating googleholes.

https://www.grahambrown.com/uk/product/turner-plymouth-dock-bespoke-mural/119027-master/

Curiously the location of Mr Turner’s position to paint Plymouth Dock is very similar to where I sometimes watch the British Firework competition, although I face more to the right.

Maybe I can paint a Turneresque Firework painting…

This week I was at Newbridge. Mr Turner did not leave much more than a blank page

Following my own Mr Turner theme of Mists and red splodges. I have done two Newbridge sketches.

Mr Turner’s Daily Commute.           © theoldmortuary
Mr Turner returns to his lodgings at Newbridge. ©theoldmortuary

But now I am thinking that my bedroom is lacking a little Turner ‘ something’. But I could put that Mural in my loo/futility* room. A mural in there would just add to our eccentric smallest room.

*the futility room is tiny and yet somehow completes all of the tasks of a utility room but not in any logical way. Hence the name futility.

#1267 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, Serendipity4 Comments
Crossing the Bar II

Describe a risk you took that you do not regret.

Now I am very much risk averse , harm averse would better describe me. But if I switch the word risk for unpredictable outcome or experimentation then I am much more comfortable with the whole concept of taking a risk. I am not a huge fan of timid or obnoxiously certain people because their place on the risk taking spectrum is so different from mine.

Arty and creative risks are my favourite things to do. A bin full of failure is the foundation of my creative practice.

I took a risk with the picture above. I had a stash of very old  (20 years) but very good quality Ink Jet paper.

This image is a bit of everything, gelli printing, collage, watercolour and pastels. Under such pressure many papers would fail and this one was no different. But the failure, where the surface pulled off is almost its greatest success. The orange area above the boat got a bit too wet in the process and the surface started to lift off. Working into the area with pastels created the cloud texture.

Then a bit of photo meddling created two different images.

Crossing the Bar III
Crossing the Bar IV

Each one is a risk I am happy with.

#1266 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Meddled Photography X Watercolour, Serendipity1 Comment
View from the Quarry, definitely at Saltram.

An Easter weekend of socialising and doing yardening jobs meant that the jobs were all done, but the resulting need to visit the tip was put off until yesterday. Which turned out to be a gift from the Goddess of Serendipity.

Yesterday was the 250th anniversary of the birth of JMW Turner, the artist whose works are the inspiration for the next exhibition I am entering. On the drive to the tip I listened to the radio and two very interesting women were discussing both his work and the changes that he caused in the critical thinking of Landscape painting.

JMW Turner was a regular visitor to Saltram House in Plymouth, as well as the wider Tamar Valley area. His work is held in collections the world over. In London Tate Britain holds not only a collection of his works but his papers, sketches and other items

The Turner Bequest comprises the majority of Joseph Mallord William Turner’s works at Tate. It was established after the artist’s death in 1851 and includes nearly 300 oil paintings and around 30,000 sketches and watercolors. The collection is now housed in the Clore Gallery at Tate Britain. 

One such item is the sketch below,

And where was I as I listened to this…

Chelson Meadows Recycling Centre (Tip). Definitely at Saltram

…at a tip, on the site of an old quarry. Definitely at Saltram. From famous English Romantic Painter to the distinctly unromantic dumping of a stinky, old, water butt.

I marked the serendipitous moment with two photographs, one an image I meddled with.

And the other an image of the most optimistic placement of a chair to sit and take in the view.

The chair is just under the red star. High tide visits only and only by using a small boat. 250 years on, what would Mr Turner make of his  Quarry location?