back to painting

Returning to painting... with the benefit of Tracy Verdugo's workshop and its participants, see previous blog entry.

I had not arrived with a particular painting in mind, wanting to work freely. My painting began as some do with the view to Jervis Bay, influenced in the past, as many, by Glenda Borchard's eye... though certainly already vanished in my own direction. [links open in new tabs or windows, close the new tab to return here]

Then as the picture built the landscape was subsumed into a nude form. Here began the serious laying down of base. I wanted blue depth under skin tones, something that stuck with me from my privileged access to the restoration work after the Florence flood of 1966, to which access for this young person in the Rome embassy because the Mitchell Library in Sydney had lent a world expert on print restoration. One of the major figurative paintings which needed its wood base removed was found to have an under-base of blue below the flesh tones of the surface to give them depth ... so I started with a blue colour for the flesh. (I have been unable to find that painting, but google being the serendipitous adventure it can be, it led me to discover the blog of Antonella Colaninno)

[clicking on any image provides a gallery of all images, press return to get back to the blog]

By the time I took that photo [click to enlarge] I had added story — I planned a yowie figure watching over her, with her thoughts streaming, her arm ambiguously seeking connection or fending off, also (we had begun discussing symbols in paintings) an echidna in the corner: singleminded, prickly, not easily picked up. 

At the end of the first day I had applied some skin tone and was so appalled by its state I turned it to the wall to hide its nakedness and clumsiness overnight.

I had no idea overnight if I would go on or paint it out and start again....

I did go on. Then late in the morning my female protagonist died and it became a tale of mourning. No photo of that state. Then I remembered I had been wondering what I might paint for the 2012 exhibition sponsored by the Shoalhaven Mental Health Fellowship, for which the subject was to be 'out of the darkness and into the light'. And so the idea dawned and the painting became "The Dream of Sunshine in the Morning". As it also remained for me to place a light cloth over herself. We shall see if it is finished... entries to be submitted 1 May.

I recognise this, having painted it, as in my style. I do not command my style. Do I like my style? Hard question. It happens.

I remain a story teller, the story evolved beyond my command, the painting changed a lot. The story it tells now is in my 'artist's statement' below. [click on images to enlarge]

THE DREAM OF SUNSHINE IN THE MORNING

In long-term invisible illness, 

you remain sentient, head full of ideas, 

and you remain sensual, heart needing love, flesh needing flesh. 

You reach out ... to touch or fend off? 

You turn away in loneliness.

Your totem becomes the echidna: small, prickly, determined, defensive, hard to grasp.

Your carer, your lover, tries to see but it's not visible; 

tries to embrace your elusive mind.

[mood change]

Oh, and!  We were given 30cm x 30cm (one foot square) ply, on which to multimedia experiment, with collage, paint, whatever. Exhausted by the major work, I produced a work which caused a primary school principal in the room to say she wondered seriously about the workings of my mind. I said I did that too.

Here is "Hey Babe"...

in the beginning was the line

I am pleased that, concerned to get my soul back into painting after a nasty period of illness ... and thus, hopefully, into the novel, I went to a weekend art workshop by Tracy Verdugo, an effervescent painter in the Jervis Bay area, a style of workshop Tracy will also conduct in the US (see Tracy's blog at link).

in the beginning was the line

Click on any image to see a gallery of all images, enlarged. 

Click return to get back to the blog.

The weekend was excellent... I was lone male among 13 women, though that inauspicious-sounding ratio was much the same as I experienced as an arts student in the early 1960s. And as I remarked at the end of the weekend, to have been painting a female nude in such company was a little daunting... though it might have been more daunting in a male group.

It was a supportive group. Painting is a lonely business even in company, there are moments when your work is something you want to turn to the wall, out of sight: as I did at the end of day one with mine (separate blog entry follows).

There was some evident influence from Tracy's style

— but being urged to work and work 

on one large canvas over two days

individuality emerged...

Tracy's technique for building a collaborative workshop was excellent. I don't plan to reveal her technique here. Some participants were experience painters and painting teachers, some had never touched a brush to paper. We were encouraged to begin with confidence just to build lines on canvas, interacting happily with each other's 'lines'. Fundamental to success was Tracy's positive energy and constant empathy and encouragement. Without which nothing. I heard someone speaking of being in an art class where the teacher constantly urged people to do something different, to get out of where they were. Well, this was pretty much the opposite, with constant encouragement to delve deeper in what we were, what we saw, what we felt, what we wanted.

The workshop was in the small stables at Worrowing.

Mood is lifted as you arrive 

by the jaunty security honchos at the gate, from Ironbark Security

The stables protective from weather, small enough but large enough

and lots of indirect light from huge doors and windows

There were moments in my work where going fishing seemed a better option

and these bipeds of the horse paddock watching me clean brushes 

seemed to say in a lazy way:

"Hey, get over it, just enjoy, the grass is green, come snooze!"

It was a wet weekend 

but we had good interludes to help work dry in the sun

(everyone seemed to put their work through half a dozen evolutions)

and see things in a different light

SIDEBAR- I am reminded of this excellent advice:

"We must be as courteous to a man as we are to a picture,

which we are willing to give the advantage of a good light." 

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

We did several smaller tasks and minor works for diverse experience... especially experience in chucking paint and other media around. Also in framing and trimming down elements of larger work:

At the end of the weekend we got to speak of our experiences and show what we had done. Here are some images that speak for themselves... lots of desire to "put it in the garage" to which Tracy's reply:

"No, hang it where you can reflect on it, don't tell visitors whose work it is, wait for their comments."

And note that a lot of the following remain works-in-progress, with determination to work on.

And so much variety...

new directions in strategic policy?

With the appointment of Bob Carr as Australian Foreign Minister, we have an intellectual in that post, as well as a formidable political force added to the parliament.

More serious papers are pointing to the overriding issue of the imbalances and uncertainties in relations with the United States and China.

Here are some of my comments:

[1] in commenting on former ambassador to China Geoff Raby's views as reported in the Financial Review

I found the decision to locate US forces on Australian soil as part of a containment of China disturbingly contrary to national interest as well as puzzlingly at odds with past Labor Government attitudes to unilateral US force presence or action in Australia from Whitlam forward.

Perhaps three things were in play:

-Rudd's essentially 20th century conservative-activist diplomatist approach

-Rudd's capacity to smother the cabinet in words, the absence of alternative critical faculty on foreign affairs within the Labor Party (mirroring the coalition), and

-concern to leave no room for the coalition to get round the Labor Government on the right on foreign policy (much as since Hawke),

Carr brings reflective and family multicultural image to foreign policy and will not be easily trampled by pressures from wherever. A major asset in relations with the US has been our reliability privately and effectively to present a different and sane view to bolster the arguments of sensible people in Washington when American leaders get strange ideas of what to do. This was evident when Reagan was taking office and wanted to adopt aggressive China policy. See the archives.

In 1980 Fraser's Cabinet decided that we should actively pursue a broad-based relationship of value to any future Chinese government, in its own right. Howard didn't get the sense of the whole relationship, mind basically on the money. We haven't got back from there - but must, swiftly.

·  [Reply]

Dennis Argall

formerly ambassador to China

Mar 6, 2012, 11:38AM

 [2] Letter to editor of Financial Review, regarding this editorial

I was puzzled by this reference in your 14 March editorial "Caution needed on US/China":

"But Australia should not be overconfident about being able to be an honest broker between two such large powers and should be careful to also nurture relations with other Asian countries so it can work in concert with them to ease whatever US-China tensions do arise."

Both those options seem too complicated and a bit away from how it's done. 

We have in the past had a history of being valued in Washington by people wanting reinforcement for sensible argument when an American Administration goes weird on China, as seems to happen. As also in the past we have had a reputation with China of refusing to speak 'for China' but to speak for ourselves. One of the great values in our relationship with both, when well served, has been capacity to resolve issues without resort to a lot of noise. Senior Chinese officials in the 1980s spoke warmly of this to me: "You always fight hard for your own interests, but you don't make it so public like the Americans. Thank you."

In recent years there seems to have been a shift to noisiness in our China policy. I stay with the wisdom of the 1980 Fraser cabinet decision to build a broad and mutually beneficial bilateral relationship valued by any future Chinese regime. A perspective lost in the Howard years - focussed on the money -  and muddied by the silly (but sadly serious) militaristic cant of more recent times. This amazing statement in the 2009 Defence White Paper has to be pulled down:

"The United States will remain the most powerful and influential strategic actor over the period to 2030 - politically, economically and militarily. Its strategic primacy will assist in the maintenance of a stable global strategic environment."

http://www.defence.gov.au/whitepaper/docs/defence_white_paper_2009.pdf [para 4.14 accessed 14 Mar 2012]

Strategic planners in defence have no greater prescience than those in financial markets. It's wishful thinking, not just at a political level but at a force structure level where having special toys depends on being in a deeply integrated defence relationship with the United States. 

I agree with your editorial that this is an important challenge for Carr. But the answer is not in trying to put all the eggs on the scales at once, it is to measure and deal with the issues with a concern to build all the best aspects of relations with rising Asia and sustain all the best aspects of relations with the relatively declining West. 

I hope Senator Carr takes home a copy of the venerable and valuable Satow's Guide, cherishing especially his remark...

"These then are the qualities of a good diplomatist. Truth, accuracy, calm, patience, good temper, modesty, loyalty."

Sir E. Satow, A Guide to Diplomatic Practice  (Longmans, Green & Co. London & New York, 1917) p. 451 http://books.google.com.au/books?id=KWAUAAAAIAAJ&q=truth#search_anchor accessed 24 February 2012.

which needs to be the cornerstone of our foreign dealings.

Dennis Argall

formerly Ambassador to China. 

[3]  Letter to Editor (limited to 200 words) of The Age, regarding this article by Dick Woolcott

Dick Woolcott's "How a US Ally can be Friends with China" makes the case. 

 I don't know how we improve general public attitudes towards and conduct when in Asia in an age of universal travel, but government must be more conscious of how ordinary Australians shape our image. 

Key to our official relations with both China and the US, when well served, has been capacity to resolve issues without resort to a lot of noise. Senior Chinese officials in the 1980s spoke warmly of this to me: "You always fight hard for your own interests, but you don't make it so public like the Americans. Thank you."

We'’ve become noisy.

In 1980 the Fraser cabinet decided to build a broad and mutually beneficial bilateral relationship valued by any future Chinese regime. We lost the broad view in the 90s. 

This fantasy statement in the 2009 Defence White Paper has to be pulled down: 

“"The United States will remain the most powerful and influential strategic actor over the period to 2030 - politically, economically and militarily.”"

We can build the best aspects of relations with rising Asia and sustain those with the declining West. 

Dennis Argall, formerly Ambassador to China.

and back, sadly, to strategy

I despair of the direction of western strategic thinking, not least of the difficulty in democratic systems, of being honest about war. The news this week of US marines in Afghanistan pissing on those they had killed was sad, but it was the simple-minded indignation of political comment that is tragic. I offered this comment on a story by Robert Fisk in The Independent.

Dennis ArgallCollapse: found the greatest horror in listening to the sanctimonious secretary of state mouthing her horror of how contrary this was to the principles these boys are supposed to have. (Thank you Andy Williams for stating the problem clearly.)
Surely some humility and some insight into the soul destruction of the implementation of strategic policy to achieve ego sustenance by righteous violence would be constructive. 
It's not what you say, Madame Secretary, it's what you do. Basil Liddell-Hart (greatest British strategic thinker of the twentieth century) in his last book attributed the horrors of the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) to the way the peninsular war with Napoleon (a mere six years, to 1814, wherein the word guerrilla entered the language of war) was conducted; he also ( in 1970) attributed the resurgence then of Middle East terrorism to Laurence of Arabia. 
For how long into the future will the planet's life be poisoned by the 'what you do' of such moral leadership as we in the 'enlightened and principled' world now have?

It's a bit odd, adding to discussion on the web, it is greatly disappointing to find so many people using pseudonyms. Change only comes when people use their own names in commenting on the serious, not just in the twitteration of life. Why are the young not out, in their own names?

from foreign policy back to the chooks

I have put up this page on how to manage a small number of chooks (Australian English generic and gender free term to cover roosters, hens, chickens, chicks) in a suburban environment, relatively disease free and withou also raising hoards of sparrows, pigeons and less mentionable birds.


I have placed our place near Bodalla on the market, info here ... too hard to get there these days, sob.


I have been inhibited writing because of problems with my right arm, have now acquired some speech recognition software, hopefully will return to the writing, but perhaps via painting first... meanwhile, it is a very busy time with a food garden gone mad in this season of alternating rain and heat. Here some photos from back garden. 

CLICK ON PICS TO ENLARGE.

First, this is the view north from my office window, 
this damp frog-rattly morning 22 December 2011. 

'Lawn' of chamomile and parsley, bush basil and rocket in seed, 

bangalow palm growing;

rose climbing below and peach leafing over window

- all this was grass and concrete path to clothes line three years ago.
Yesterday a blue wren sat for some time on that tall post (cypress, not yet sculpted) 
behind the young palm,
bouncing, as wrens do, landing to face 90º away each time,
a slightly apprehensive rotating lord of all he surveyed.

... looking northeast down the path from veranda, across the previous view:

rose, peach, banana, fig, rosemary, potatoes, more... 

tamarillo tree with huge crop developing, droopy leaves right side...

in a permaculture garden you seek to develop  mulch from what grows

and you take more interest in harvest from the cubic metre 

than from the heavily fed individual plant.

In time, the objective is to close the system, minimising inputs from outside, 

collecting seeds and cuttings, roof water; kitchen scraps and fresh pick for the chooks, 

chook poo back to the compost and garden.

Compost, youngberries, mosaic - always combine art and nature!

Always expect a photo to include limbs of parsley gone to see!

floral and food-al; 

two callistemon (bottle brush) bushes in company with sweet potato, pumpkin, mandarin;

marjoram and lotus leaves poking their heads into the bottom left of picture.

Here lived chooks before

— the well manured run now planted densely to asparagus, dill, strawberries, yacón, marjoram, mint, comfrey and more, including two white cedar trees

 (two white cedars being allowed to grow, many suckers being pulled up!)

I look around and see so many suburban gardens 

where the owners seem to try to impose a permanent look from the beginning, 

a recipe for mowing, snipping and reflecting a need to control nature. 

But nature evolves, ecologies change and they offer us opportunities to marvel at them.

This northern and eastern back garden in pictures above 

 has growing palms and deciduous trees 

It will turn into a great shade area in time, in summer, more open for light in the winter.

Already the eastern garden (below), around the corner of the house, 

which had two large established deciduous trees when I arrived ini 2008,

is heavily shaded in summer, open in winter. 

Work continues, to make this a rainforest room, with earthy women, 

ponds and a stile to enter and exit the bedroom. 

Source of cool breezes through the house later in the summer day; 

leaves off and warm early sun in the window in winter.

Where on earth do we think we are going in strategic policy?

You can find here text of 1500 words I wrote today on the Australian-American alliance. I have offered it to a media outlet, but there is such a deluge of royal visit euphoria with the excellent President Obama here. We can see that both the United States and Australian strategic policies are being pulled by the tail of military options and military interests.

It used not to be thus as my text at link narrates.

The rot begun, or made terminal, by the invasion of Iraq, see my comments at the time here, has sadly set in brainlessness-droughted mud now we have what ought to be more thoughtful and more radical governments in Canberra and Washington.

I am now at a point where I have to say the next generations must look after themselves, if they'd bloody well come out of their creepy comforts and sullen retreats and address the issues.

Nick's wedding

I wrote in August about uses of the web and devices of. I have just put up some photos I took last weekend at my son Nick's wedding. Easier, more permanent too, to have them within my own html designed pages.

You can take a look here.

whither the blog

I guess as time passes the act of blogging diminishes in significance. It was useful when we travelled to Italy in 2010 and 2011 to have the blogs unmese (one month) and duemesi (Italian for two months) - valuable for keeping in touch with family and friends at the time, also of great value in supporting later recollection.

I had earlier 'blogged' before there were resources on the web for doing it easily, this remains my best record from those earlier times.

I had begun recording life via the web when it was important in 2000-2001 to keep people informed of my wife Margaret's wellbeing when she was being overwhelmed by a brain tumour. That experience led on to my hosting site 'aplaceof.info' hosting this collection of brain tumour resources I wrote several years ago.

I have used that hosting site, located at www.ipower.com, for a variety of other community projects some far away. I have also used subfolders of aplaceof.info to express some views, such as these. And it remains useful to build web pages for particular needs.

Along the way, it became clear that a web presence for community needed several vectors:

1. a web site, which at best should be a static, easily encompassed calling card with background information. Web sites are not simple to conceive and design, and it becomes very mucky when you change them a lot. They are not the best means for recording news. Research has shown that people 'like' or 'dislike' web sites in fractions of a second, so in a fraction of a second you must grab the reader.
2. a blog, now so easy with this blogger technology and others, which lends itself to the writing of the record as it happens. This record becomes of accumulated value over time IF you put good labels on every substantive entry, so you can track not only the chronological record, but mention of issues, places and people over time. 
3. An email group, for private exchanges between members of a community, with email group hosts like yahoo and gmail offering huge free resources for holding files and photos, etc. This email group has been a very valuable group for hundreds, since I set it up in 2000.

Much has changed in the very recent past, however, with the emergence of Facebook and Twitter, where a whole new world of social interaction has begun and continues to evolve. I don't go there, however, as I value my privacy more than seems relevant to Facebook or Twitter, and I prefer reflective communication to brief passing utterances. I don't have time, if I am to paint, photograph and get the novel back on the rails. My apprehension is that those social media may tend to diminish individual creativity. The blog remains a different form of expression. Yes, there are trite blogs out there but it is inherent in this format that one write some substance. As it is inherent in the putting of labels on a blog entry that one gets to consider if one has said anything at all.

For the moment, I go back to the garden in spring. I must provide photos of my approach to edible landscaping, in a permaculture design.

Permaculture as a design system deals primarily with the ... need to establish plant systems for our own use on the least amount of land we can use for our existence.

My own view is that this can be done with a high degree of aesthetic concern and content, to build surroundings which are fun and uplifting, amusing and comfortable, personally reassuring. It is remarkable how, as we take a relatively small space and build within it smaller spaces, with passage from one to the next as surprise, how much larger and attractive all the space becomes... we can bring personal landscape to a scale where we can speak quietly and interact warmly with each other and our surrounds.

life drawing

One of the riddles for me about life drawing is that while there is much to be achieved in drawing the nude form, and much beauty to portray - in anyone - the hands and feet, the head and face are critically important. I find that I don't get it, don't begin to draw the person well, without coming to terms with their character as revealed in their face or the excruciating difficulty of drawing a person's hands or feet.

I have been copping out, in a way, by using conté crayons, much like charcoal but less mess on the floor, allowing you to fuzz up and erase. Last week I could not find my box of tricky drawing stuff so I went out with paper and B4 pencil and discovered that I could find lines and could show light and shade and also, I think, mood.

The model was young and appropriately apprehensive, modelling for the first time. I could not quite catch the broad softness (and underlying strength) of a young face but I did catch her mood, I think. Her eyes - deep, dark, large - were almost constantly on the move and she chewed the inside of her lip, a full lower lip with a ring in it. How to represent the restless energy and emotion of such movement?

I am also trying not just to draw known features but light and shade, to approach minimalism.

Huh! When I edit this blog entry, Google (as it does with gmail) displays ads like "How to draw eyes." I remain happily uninstructed. I am attending a life drawing group, not a class. There is a freedom in being uninstructed. I do not know how I draw what I draw. I am constantly surprised at things that appear in front of me. If the artist does not know what he is doing (as Fellini maintained and I agree) do I want someone to tell me her/his ideas of what I am or should be doing? Much of the value, for me, in drawing, is in the struggle to produce: the birthing process, as well as the surprising baby. So exciting to discover this emerging on the page...

This is one of four drawings from a 15 minute pose. 15 minutes is a huge length of time when you look for the essence... and it's a huge time if you want to muck something up, not knowing when to stop.

update

The kitchen bench was finished.

The writing remains on hold, physical problems writing/typing.

Some valuable life drawing, very meditative experience and pleased with these my first results, improving, wanting to work also on details and abstraction of light and shade after assuring myself of basic drawing skill. See below.

First, though, the kitchen bench with stove working well, bench constructed from ancient timber slab washed up by flood, also some paulownia slab, rot gaps filled with water-based putty coloured with red pigment, seven coats Estapol gloss varnish finish, some acrylic metallic colours added along the way. Painted (irises) bread maker behind.

Life drawing sketches, with conté on paper

26 May 2011

16 June 2011

9 June 2011

16 June 2011, trying especially to deal with strong shadows

the discriminatory attitudes of the mighty who stand in judgement

There is a matter before the state parliament now as to whether it will ratify a decision by the judicial tribunal to sack a magistrate because of what would seem to be the risk that if he failed to take his medication for his bipolar disease, he might make an ass of himself.

One suspects that some mighty judges would think this magistrate had already made an ass of himself by his plain language and common decency in this advice to a young (and as it turned out, undeserving, as the gutter bottom of the Murdoch press hastened to crow) offender.


What is it that leads strong men to fear for their own manhood or whatever, when someone close to them has a mental illness. Hard to fathom, except in the simplest way in which societies now as then, engage in witch hunts and strike down those who remove certainty from their global self-importance.


The magistrates in their decency as more common folk, are up in arms.


The Anti-Discrimination Commissioner is concerned. That link reveals to me that there are two magistrates in trouble, something I did not realise when I wrote on 1 June 2011 to the Premier and others, also revealing something of myself.


Here tis:




Dear Premier Farrell and Attorney General Smith

I am writing with concern about the proposed removal of Magistrate Maloney, which I understand to be before the parliament now. 

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/mps-to-rule-on-sacking-of-mentally-ill-magistrate/story-e6frg6nf-1226062259731

I write as a person who in the 1980s was dealt with somewhat in the same high-handed 'tip him overboard' manner while in a very senior position in the foreign service, as ambassador to China, because of illness at the time. I became significantly more sick as a result of the chuck-out, hostility towards disability (and simple fear of disability) resulting in further problems over years. Spurned as if possessed. I remind you that the last person burned at the stake in England for being strange was deemed fit for burning because he was a Baptist (Edward Wightman 1612).

I was, years later, pleased by the passage of the federal Disability Discrimination Act in 1992. My treatment in 1985 would have been illegal had it occurred after passage of the DDA; there would have been greater benefit to my employer and less cost to the public purse were I properly treated and supported in work.

However superior the NSW court and parliament may feel it is to this federal law, however in some manner it is deemed that magistrates are not human or should not demonstrate human depths, I remain of the view that the removal of Magistrate Maloney on the grounds reported is not only an uncouth and antediluvian proposal from the court, but also contrary to the DDA, by the simplest test of the meaning of Section 5. Don't say that this section says if you'd sack him for what he did if he had no illness, so you can sack him. That's to miss the point of the illness and its correct-ability. If the brakes had failed on his car (through no fault or failure to perform on the part of the driver) and had caused an accident, what would the situation be then? 

If the case against the magistrate is no more than as reported in The Australian (and if it is something else then deal publicly with that) then you have a splendid opportunity to make clear to the courts that they are not above the principles of law (however some state law may seem to stand on the matter) and that even - even - a magistrate is deserving of decent treatment by his employers. In doing so with coherent and positive explanation you would enhance the standing of the parliament, perhaps also eventually of the courts and certainly of people coping with disability, in the general public eye. The distance between justice and compassion should not be astronomical.

For ease of reference, here is section 5 of the DDA.

I have copied this to members of the parliament in my region who know me: The Speaker, Acting Speaker Ward, Mr Green, Mr Park.

Hoping for sensible action, I am

Dennis Argall