Careen and Cohort

The meaning of words certainly does change. Careen seems to have lost its correct meaning for many people and to be synonymous with the idea of bouncing about. The  received meaning is connected with the idea of a ship leaning to one side in a dock or whilst sailing. But the casual meaning also has a long history.

Even the distinguished American writer James Lee Burke uses the word cohort to mean a companion-or possibly a subordinate companion rather than a military grouping.Thiss can be found in his Montana set novel "Bitterroot".  As if one person and a another were fellow horts. Co-horts indeed.

What a difference a tag makes

I put this image up on Flickr. It is a small sculpture I made out of various materials a few years ago. It is usual to add tags to the image so that people can find groups of similar themes. The last tag I thought of-in my innocence-was "fetish". I thought that the work might suggest some kind of cult object. You can imagine how astonished I was to see the number of times ''anthropologists'' clicked on the image. No doubt they were disappointed..... 

Dunstanburgh from the West

Taken from  the track on the western approach to the castle which passes through the marshy ground which protects the castle for much of its inland facing aspect. I cannot help thinking that the long narrow pool is so regular in  shape that it must have been excavated on purpose. It may have been a quarry and then become available for defence.

Current Exhibitions

Much is written about Bacon, Rothko and Hirst at the moment. It is hard to take the last two very seriously. I have some respect left for Bacon and there was a time when he was worth looking at and there seemed to be some integrity left. It now seems to me that Bacon became a "method" painter. By which I mean that he found a formula and stuck to it because it was the easy thing to do-and the quickest way to manufacture work. But just as a symphony would be unendurable if the direction was to play at ffff for several movements there are problems in painting where everything is blasted out .

As for Rothko. He was always a timid painter in terms of colour combinations. The early work is dreadfully weak and clumsy and the colour field represents an easy way out.  In a way I am not surprised that Howard Hodgkin is envious of Rothko. But  then Hodkin has so little to recommend him as a colourist. His work is certainly crass in comparison to the Indian miniatures he loves. I'm not suggesting  that he should have used their palette-though Rothko might have learned something colourwise from them. A tame critic or two was certainly helpful in Rothko's case. They were  able to excite themselves over very little. But the message has been conveyed and the art-loving public has been educated into seeing the numinous aspect of Rothko - at least this appears to be the message of the article in yesterday's Observer.

From the same newspaper I learn that Peter Conrad  has had a moment of conversion: he now sees Hirst as a "thinker". Is Mr Conrad really so impoverished?

Self Portrait at Howick

What the Cyclist told me

I've got me yellow fleece

And me lycra shorts,

I have a helmet

Like a second skull,

What business is it of yours

If I ride on the pavement?

They force us !

And you say I'm a vehicle,

Well fuck you mate!  

Art and Photography

Looking at Aaron Scharf's "Art and Photography"  the other day I thought. Is that it? It seems to me that the influence of photography on art is insignificant. The influence is all the other way. Writing about the Durieu photos which Delacroix owned is just a footnote to art history.  As Sickert wisely said.The only artists who should use photographs are those who have no need of them. In other words use photographs as an aide-memoire if you wish. 

A Poor Sense of Colour

There is something distinctly old fashioned about much  landscape photography in Britain-especially that of the amateur with more equipment than he can manage. Photographers oftene seem to be lacking in any modern sense of colour. So much of what they produce relates more to a  landscapist such as J C Dahl than to Monet or Seurat.  There is considerable gloom along with occasional flashes of something more lurid. 

One of the problems is HDR. I'm not sure that it lives up to its name in providing a High Dynamic Range. I have rarely seen an HDR  colour image which wasn't weirdly lurid. Maybe Dunstanburgh and Bamburgh should be patrolled so that anyone carrying a tripod can be turned away .

The situation is made worse by the camera magazines which serve the  male concern for technical matters and a hierarchy of cameras which fit into grades such as "prosumer" (sickening isn't it ?), professional or amateur. Beginners, perhaps lacking confidence go on to repeat the latest cliches of the genre. Art students are no different and many of them never grow out of it. I am sick of  photographs which show a misty milky sea floating round some rocks. There is often a pinky/blue sky to confirm that the neophyte got up at dawn. Dunstanburgh and Bamburgh should be patrolled and anyone carrying a tripod should be turned away. As Degas might have said, "Landscape photography is not a sport". Never underestimate the herd instinct.

And another thing....that ridiculous remark to the effect that, "From today painting is dead". I could replace it with a question. There are times when I am tempted to ask,"When will photography come to life?"

Self Portrait

Variation on a theme by an old  friend- Colin Miller LRPS.

The Aln near Alnmouth

Love at the Laing

The Laing Art gallery in Newcastle is showing another of its themed exhibitions. There have been several in the series and all feature heterogenous  works , mostly from the National Gallery. This allows the organisers to throw in anything they have available. The exhibits are shown in the Laing's wretched galleries with their thoroughly unpleasant and inadequate lighting. At the National Gallery these works have better visibility: here they are drained of life.Its not a matter of conservation.

There was a time when the Laing was co-host to major exhibitions on Claude and on Cezanne drawings. Such were the days....(The  elitist days of the past-I don't think!). Now we have NewcastleGateshead peddling the unsustainable vision of a major cultural capital. Never was hype and fashion so ill founded. In this The Baltic features but it is an institution which has lost its way .Though it seems to me that it never had a way in the first place. From the fashion for foreign directors- just like Tate Modern and  just the same in not staying long- there doesn't seem  to have been much   direction or coherence.

The Sculptor's Studio

Spring Poems

It does not surprise me to learn that Chinese poets wrote "Spring detaining poems" in order to preserve the memory of a brief season of glory after a harsh winter.

By the Tod Burn

Yesterday,on the south bank of the Coquet between Pauperhaugh and Weldon Bridge and by the Tod Burn. It is definitely Spring in  Northumberland. Celandines, Speedwell and Primroses are all out. Ramsons are flowering. Heard the sound of a Woodpecker. Many new lambs in the fields.

The  intense and milky sunlight and pastel colours would have delighted  Pissarro and Sisley.

made with THE GIMP

In the Mirror

Spring at Naworth

Dunstanburgh-small acrylic on paper

Howick:the quiet shore