| (no subject) |
[Feb. 2nd, 2009|07:01 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  artistic | ] |
This is the view from our living room window:
and this is my new art blog, which I will probably be updating a lot more than I will be here.
Precious Messes
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| Hi guys |
[Jan. 30th, 2009|12:52 pm] |
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| |  cheerful | ] |
Let me see... where were we?
I have the internet again.
oh yeah, and i got married. and its pretty awesome. |
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| (no subject) |
[May. 13th, 2008|12:41 pm] |
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the seagulls are having sex on my roof again. |
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| (no subject) |
[May. 9th, 2008|08:06 pm] |
I totally walked past Jodie Marsh sitting outside a café literally around the corner from my friends house in london today.
It was a surreal moment of 'ooh celebrity!' and 'Do i actually really give a crap?'
yeah. if you dont know who jodie marsh is, i highly advise you DONT google her. |
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| (no subject) |
[May. 1st, 2008|02:54 am] |
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Is the repeated pattern too much on the back of my LJ page? come check and see! I wish to know. |
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| (no subject) |
[Mar. 17th, 2008|06:25 am] |
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| |  annoyed | ] |
Here's the deal, Apple and all you greedy record companies. When I buy something, I want to be able to play it on the media of my choice. That means, if I buy a CD, i want to be able to rip it to mp3 and play it on my computer and my mp3 player. If I buy an MP3, i want to be able to play it on my computer and my mp3 player, and write it to a CD if I really want to.
What I DO NOT want, is to have to waste time and money and CD's by writing all the DRM protected music that I OWN to a CD, just so I can play it on whatever machine I want, or take it with me on my MP3 player. If I wanted a CD in the first place, dont you think i would have bought one? This isnt on. This just forces me to download illegal mp3's because I refuse to spend money on something which I am prevented from using how i want to for my own, personal use unless i go out of my way to make that happen. GET RID OF THE DRM. It hurts consumers and artists alike. |
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| Rebellion is too ingrained in my nature |
[Mar. 5th, 2008|03:03 pm] |
I am struggling right now with the idea that women cannot lead in church. This is a commonly held belief by Catholics and also a belief that divides Christianity.
To be frank, it really, really pisses me off. I want to know WHY. someone explain to me WHY women cannot lead in church, and I want an answer that doesnt have its roots in 'women are less than men'. Because to me, thats what it amounts to.
here is my reasoning:
God created Male and Female equal. Different, but Equal in gods eyes. there is no male nor female, slave nor master.
Yes men and women have different roles, but both men and women are capable of leadership and have all the skills required for it.
In leadership in the church, gender should not come into it. The church is made up of male and female, therefore the leadership should be able to be male or female.
Why is there fear there of female leadership? is it that she will be 'incompetent'. that she will 'usurp the mans authority', or is a protection against a man's own weakness?
I know there is the model of the church being the bride and so on, but does it really stretch to men having authority over women to the extent that women cannot lead men? |
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| moar book covers for your enjoyment |
[Feb. 25th, 2008|03:59 am] |
These are LONG overdue. dissertation got in the way and then i just didnt do enough work. Its as simple as that...
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| (no subject) |
[Feb. 1st, 2008|04:40 pm] |
while im here, I just had to write down the thought that the general anecdotal claim that 'hardly anyone was ever obese before the last half century!' comes from people that don't know jack shit about their history.
Obesity most definately existed. and at the turn of the 1900's, obesity had almost just as many quack doctors and phoney dieting guru's trying to 'solve the problem' . the interest in obesity didnt arise because of the health implications at all, what started the obsession was in fact revulsion, and the moral overtones of the appetite. Health didnt come into the picture for a good while after the obese were being chastised for their size.
guess what we have now? a sticky mess of health replacing the moral issue of appetite with a heck of a lot of revulsion mixed in, telling us to treat people who lay outside what is considered 'good' by the mass media with utter contempt.
You're no leading thinker. You're just unable to break out of the circles of thinking that we've travelled round for centuries in attempt to justify bigotry. |
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| (no subject) |
[Feb. 1st, 2008|01:49 pm] |
here is an interesting thought: a engagement ring is a fetish object.
I attatch more meaning and power to it than it inherently has. Its just a band of tooled metal, but it symbolises a hell of a lot more.
then again, all commodities are fetish objects.
damn marxist theory. does my head in!! |
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| (no subject) |
[Jan. 30th, 2008|01:18 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | annoyed | ] |
I am currently being hounded by the idiots who run the National Student Survey. (the idiots = the government)
I don't object to being asked once to fill it out. Thats fine. they invited me, and i decided not to.
What i object to, is that to opt out of the subsequent emails TO MY PERSONAL EMAIL ADRESS and TEXT MESSAGES TO MY PERSONAL MOBILE NUMBER asking me repeatedly to fill our the survey. I consider that a huge breach of privacy on the colleges behalf, for giving them my personal details. My college email address is not personal. this kind of thing should be restricted to the college email and the college email alone.
Oh and get this, to stop recieving these 'reminders', i have to go in, put my details in and CHOOSE TO OPT OUT. I dont friggin want to. So im not going to. They apparently need me to do this so they know who's opted out or not, but i dont give a damn single crap. Im not responding, because im so pissed off at the circumstances that they are contacting me. they have my personal details without my consent, and they are using them to keep tabs on what my actions are. I strongly, STRONGLY object to this, no matter how trivial it is. its the principle of the matter.
Had they not breached my privacy, i might have actually filled it out. Now they are getting nothing, and i hope that many other students are doing the same. |
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| Project ECKSsssss.... |
[Jan. 25th, 2008|02:34 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | art | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | angry | ] |
This was a horrible brief.
Well, in my last year of uni i pretty much negotiate my own briefs, which means i get to do whatever the hell i want, to an extent. Only, i signed up for this ultra mysterious, ultra awesome project called Project X.
Project X is where our tutor gives us a specifically tailored brief and we have to do it in the timeframe of a week, no questions asked. Its usually something that suits you but you wouldnt really think of doing - some people got some awesome projects to do with advertising, some storybook illustration, some editorial...
I was hoping for a nice, juicy book cover to sink my teeth in to. or maybe some narrative. "That'd be cool", I thought.
But of course, i got stuck with the DUD. please tell me that this means the man (Alan Male) doesnt in fact hate me, but instead thinks i am capable of carrying this brief out and its a testament to my ability and potential.
what did i get?
I got editorial, for a piece of travel journalism titled Israel: footsteps through the remnants of the bible land.
Not so bad.
Only, consider that 1. I have no article. just a title. not even a synopsis. which is made worse by 2. Israel is probably THE MOST political country. egads, even the people who go there on holiday get engaged in politics, and of the worst kind, because its politics AND religion. and oh guess what, 3. IM NOT SUPPOSED TO GO POLITICAL.
Cant do maps. Maps are hard when the countries BORDERS are so up the spout that whichever way you draw them you might offend someone. and then theres the fact a few of the more important sites to do with the bible are technically in the West Bank, NOT the part marked as Israel, like i dont know, BETHLEHEM and MOUNT OF OLIVES. and Jericho too.
So i had to basically go completely safe and rely on my awesome skillz to carry me through. I camped out in the library and computer room for two days, trying to get my head round the history, geograpy and POLITICS of Israel, so i could actually maybe draw something of worth.
I came up with this, kinda, a montage/sketchbooky type illustration. The idea is that it evokes a travel sketchbook. The smoke trail is history/religion/pathway ... uh, insubstantial, incensy, creating a trail? yes? you get it? good.
yeah, it could be nicer. I'll post the individual sketches later, i'll be using a couple of them as potential spot illustrations even though i wasnt asked to do those. bonus!
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| (no subject) |
[Jan. 3rd, 2008|09:50 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | giddy | ] |
Most of you probably already know this, but i think i should put it up here for continuity's sake.
On the 23rd of December, my beloved Norwegian and I walked up a very nearly mountain in Norway at sunset. It was crisply cold, all the water was frozen and the ground had the most interesting texture, mossy, grassy, lumpy and strangely beautiful. There were huge stones the size of cars just nonchalantly scattered between the trees and scrub as we walked up the slope, giving the scene an eerie feel.
We saw a hare, a pure, stark white in the fading sunlight, silently racing away from us in one little magical moment, and we pressed on higher, determined to get to the top. We climbed a fence, a barbed one with no stile or gate, and he put his coat down over it so I wouldn't get hurt or caught. It was like balancing on stepping stones as we walked on, each footing mattered and if you slipped, your foot became swallowed, or you broke some ice of a little stream. At one point, we walked across some low lying bushes and i realised we really WERE walking across them, my feet were not touching the ground! It all added to the surreal feel of the afternoon.
He suggested we stopped next to a wide wedge of stone to sit on and watch the remaining sunset, I said, no! Lets go higher. I wasn't stopping now, not when the top was so close. So we jumped another fence, and we raced to the top as fast as we could. Then there was a huge rocky mound and we climbed it, and even more still. ( he must have been so impatient at that point) and at last! i looked around and saw such beauty around me i couldn't bear to climb any further. All around me there were rolling, mountains, trees, fjords. to the right, steep sided giants shrouded in mist, to the left, lower lying mounds interspersed with more water, silvered in the sunset. In front of us was a steep, rolling hillside and at the bottom was his hometown, a glittering crescent shape along the shoreline. Small islands scattered themselves out towards the other side of the fjord like ink blots, and the sun set a crimson red in the far distance over the picturesque hills.
I wish i could have photographed it. It was perfect. Every single little detail was perfect.
We sat down (on mats - its was COLD) and i was waiting for my well-deserved cup of thermos flask coffee, when he passed me a small gift-wrapped object. I opened it, laughing, knowing, half crying, my heart beating almost irregularly with excitement. A small, beige ring box, and i opened it, not believing it was ACTUALLY happening. Then he jumped off the stone and knelt at my feet, in the mud and the ice, and asked me to marry him.
How could i have refused him? I knew he was 'the one', and I've known for a long time. Besides, I'd actually half joked, fully dreamed about this exact moment happening exactly like this. I think God has a sense of humour sometimes and he just likes to show off with what he can actually give us. He gave me this, a perfect moment of my dreams.
So, We had our coffee, and our christmas cookies. We sat there the short while until it was too cold, and too dark to sit still anymore; then as the full moon shone brightly over the magical landscape he proceeded to DRAG me down the hill. I discovered what a Norwegian footpath is (oh look, a footpath! *points in random direction that has absolutely no difference to the rest of the ground*) and that my boots aren't waterproof if i step on some ice and go up to my knee into water.
Oh man, did he ever drag me. A good job too, because as we reached a road the moonlight faded fast and it was extremely dark. wouldn't like to have done that descent without the moon, i can tell you.
So yes, I did have a good time in Norway. I will remember it for the rest of my life.
you know what? He said he wanted to ask me to marry him the day he told me he was in love with me.
I would have said yes then too. |
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| look look! im a pruhfessunal! |
[Dec. 5th, 2007|04:02 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | art | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | accomplished | ] |
whee! after much slaving over dreamweaver and photoshop, I have this...
Welcome to my wonderful portfolio website.
for more illustration graduate websites, go here
tell me what you think. not bad for a first time website, huh? (nevermind that i dont have a clue how i did it. just that dreamweaver is deceptive, so easy yet SO HARD if you go wrong.)
edit: dangnabbit, the menu image swap doesnt work properly in firefox. ARRGGHHHHH!! the writing glows then doesnt. curses.
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| Sunshine, a labour of love. aaarrrggggghhhhhh! |
[Nov. 23rd, 2007|12:42 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | art | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | sunny delights - I monster | ] |
I love this damn book. I love it to pieces, and the english version of the book has a cover that is well... PANTS. Its boring. Uninspiring. Slightly spooky, but so clearly in the 'adult' market, all creativity sacrificed to differentiate it from a lot of Mckinley's other work which usually wrongly ends up in the childrens/teens section.
So I tried, I really did! I tried to give it a cover deserving of its contents. No greyed boring houses, no stock photos, but a proper, lovely illustration. I have actually done a gazillion different damn versions, and my God, if my tutors dislike my FINAL one in favour of the earlier ones, I shall be ohsoangry, and cry, because I love it and I think it suits the book and I think it also doesnt look too young.
So without further ado:
And then after the cut, you can see the process I went through to get to this point. I did far too much work this week.
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| a meme with a twist! |
[Nov. 13th, 2007|12:52 am] |
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Okay, with this meme you have to type in the answer for each question into google image search and pick one image from the front page of results. It was fun, and i pinched it from Kate Hardings Blog. Some of the imagest are pretty big, so if youre on a smelly computer be prepared to meet your doom.
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| a sketch i like |
[Nov. 12th, 2007|01:22 am] |
Yeah, Im pretty taken with how she turned out. |
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