Here’s Nikki
Nikki is one of a series of characters, each with their own unique back story. Back stories will be published later.
Nikki
Acrylic on Canvas Board
4ocm x 50cm – 16” x 20” approx
Tag: Cardiff
Old Pals
Old Pals: Acrylic on Canvas 51cm x 40cm – 20″ x 16″
An early walk to the weir
An early walk to the weir
young gulls, learning
loving, cold, water
rushing, falling
casual crows, black, white-necked, doves
pecking, grass
ducks, basking, blissfully, bathing,
warm, bright, gold, late summer, sun
river, tumbling
endless, rushing, song
Annie’s bench
sitting, silently, thinking
days, ahead, days,
long gone.
Again
swans, duck, dive
tails, aloft
beaks, beneath, sparkling surface
young gulls, splashing
ugly dogs rushing
stationary ducks, wet mud, camouflaging
fallen, fruit
overfed crows
loping lazily, grass grazing
walking, home, day, beginning
A lazy writer?
What it is see, is that I’m a lazy writer. No, it’s true, I know that I could work much harder and craft every sentence, every paragraph, every chapter, every verse, every simile or metaphor into something that is entirely professional and rock solid. No, I could, I really could do it – every time.
Thing is, I don’t.
Why is that?
More importantly, does it matter?
And, in any case, lazy people deserve to have their voices heard too. After all, there are a lot of them about. Yeah, I know, there are a lot more people who don’t have the skills or experience to write well, whose voices are never heard, and it’s not their fault, so you could say, so what if your voice is unheard, for every one of you, lazy writers, there are a million others who will never have their voices heard and it’s not even their fault, it’s not their choice, they just don’t have the option. They may even be illiterate through no fault of their own.
But you do, you do have the choice, and the opportunities and still you produce sub-standard work simply because you’re lazy.. And don’t try and say that you have produced millions of words, published novels, short stories, poetry, articles, opinion pieces, musings and whatever else. They are lazy words. A million lazy words are less than equivalent to a thousand well-crafted.
You could say all that couldn’t you? But, what the hell, I still say that even lazy writers deserve their voices heard or at least out there in the ethers of life in the twenty-first century.
You don’t have to listen you know.
The beginning of something?
Work in progress
Acrylic on Canvas 600mm x 690mm
After a while.
Table 9
19:15-Chapter TABLE 9 It’s kinda tucked away at the side of the Café-Bar near the entrance to the Art Gallery Table 9 A place to look to assess to judge and comment There’s a woman with her daughter slurping on soup and munching on salad and drinking diet cola A family with two parental figures one presents as a man the other a woman They are at a long canteen-style table with 5 kids Aged from two to ten by the look of them (later you realise that there are three people who are presenting as parents and just 4 kids and you realise that whatever narrative you are imposing is full of your own perspective and is not a universal fact) Their table is laden with drinks, some alcoholic, and café-style plates of food They have screens with games “It’s not cheap cheese” says a young man delivering a plate to a solitary middle-aged woman who must have complained about the price I’m eating dirty vegan fries – a special order they said – and a pint of some German beer, that cost me thirteen poundsAnd thinking about the fish and chips I bought in 1964 for one shilling and three old pennies before decimalisation and before, long before, I became a vegan 30 years later but now it’s 2022 and things have changed as they do always And my friend, who works here and greeted me on my arrival 30 minutes ago told me about how he came to consciousness earlier today in the void and thought for a second that there had been a nuclear war These vegan dirty fries are difficult to eat because the melted vegan cheese sticks them together in clumps
And when you spear one with your fork it brings half a dozen of its closest friends with it to your mouth So you have to separate them with your fingers and stuff them in or eat too many at once so you look around the café-bar to make sure no-one is watching you being a messy dick and then you realise, it doesn’t matter it’s not real because there probably has been a nuclear war and you probably are in the void dreaming of what might have been
And your friend, the one who woke up in the original void has disappeared and you realise that you are a dot the size of a neutrino in a universe the size of . . . . . . the universe and it really doesn’t matter – even though it really does Message to mes This is a message to all the mes in all the parallel universes It’s me You are the light You are the love always and forever The Younger Generation I am a member of the younger generation and I always will be you are too I’ll never be old that’s what the 60’s did for me and for you Beware Beware of people who sit alone in the café-bars of arts centres drinking something like a pint, or a cup of tea and they’re writing in a notebook or a paper pad or on the touchscreen of an ipad (type thing), and they look up now and again and scan the room Beware of them They are writing about you
a few recent paintings
here’s a few recent paintings.
there’s about 50 altogether, mostly 12″ x 10″ – 30cm x 25cm – acrylic on canvas, some larger acrylic on paper. Most painted on the coffee table in the evenings over the last few months.
some may be for sale, contact me if interested
This is Petal
Anyway, here’s Petal.
Art Exhibition
Click on an image to begin
Celandine
Crocuses finished on wall
Framed and ready to roll. This painting will be on display and for sale at The Wholefood Shop in a few days. Not sure about the price yet but I like it a lot so . . . .
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Crocuses
Oils on canvas 2017
needs finishing and framing – planning to do it over the Easter weekend
It will be on display in The Wholefood Shop after that.
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Coming Out of Lockdown
Oil on canvas 15/6/2020 – 60cm x 50cm / 24″ x 20″
Painted between April and June 2020 during the Covid lockdown. On display in The Wholefood Shop Cardiff and for sale at the right price.
The painting was started as a pure abstract, in the sense that there was a blank canvas, a random selection of oil paints, brushes and spatulas and no definable objective in mind other than the need to spread some colour and create an image.
What emerged is a representation of what it felt like during lockdown and when the first signs of its easing began.
The colours are fiery, representing the fever of coronavirus. The composition is of two individuals facing away from each other as if to maintain social distancing. The shape in the middle is undefined but may be thought of as an unknowable and unspeakable thing, an awareness of the hugeness and awfulness of the virus on the psyche of those who happen to be alive during the pandemic.
Yet, at its core it is a joyous and hopeful image, with a bright and powerful energy that comes from the very heart of the universe, from the source of life and love itself.
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Croeso – Welcome
What’s it all about then?
No one’s got a clue really, but we try to do our best.
This website exists to display a bit of one person’s attempts to do their best. When I say ‘best’ I’m not sure if that’s true in the sense that everything here is perfectly crafted, because it’s not. Some of it is roughly hewn or not hewn at all, simply pointed at, but then again, maybe that’s the best I can do.
I dunno.
I reckon that less than 1 in 100 visitors to this website are actual human beings so if you’re one of them and not a bot, and have managed to read this far down the page, I hope you can find something of interest here.
Just scroll and click and search. Turn over some metaphorical stones – there’s quite a lot to uncover even if I do say so myself.
blah blah – you know the score – here’s a poem from 1999 about knowing the score
ninetyfivefive you know the score in a movie or a tv show the flaws small flaws idiosyncratic flaws twelve flaws or just one we’re allowed to be flawed it’s ok as long as in the end we’re fucking good at our job in my real life i’m an artex ceiling of cracks and fissures with some small redemption it’s kind of arse-backwards ain’t it?
More Reflections in a Bin
Here’s a short video clip set on/in a bin
Taken the same time as the photo in a previous post, i.e. March 16th, at the beginning of lockdown
The Flying Boy
I recently completed writing a new novel. The title of the book is ‘Skin and Bones’ . More news on that soon, but in the meantime here is an update on a major work-in-progress.
It’s a book with the working title of ‘The Flying Boy’. The title refers to a recurring dream I used to have when I as a boy, probably no more than eight or nine years old, possibly younger.
The dream involved me flying along the street where I lived at rooftop height. I think it influenced me a lot, in fact I am influenced a lot by the recurring dreams of my childhood. There were a lot of them.
I already wrote a book based on the one about The Three Bears and much of my other thoughts about what the universe is, how time works, reincarnation, spirituality, morality and so on, originate in my childhood dreams.
There will be more info about The Flying Boy in future I’m sure and one day the book will be published. Don’t expect a ‘normal’ novel-like thing, but it is a novel. In the meantime, here’s an extract from the work-in-progress. Continue reading “The Flying Boy”
Corona Response Team (Painting)
Started this at the beginning of lockdown – been fiddling with it since – finally finished it yesterday (April 24 2020)
Painted on a charity shop frame and mount
Branches and Sun reflected in a bin full of rainwater
cropped
Original Photo
Ramble – Podcast
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