Less of the Wibbly

Got a phone call today after college offering me some life modelling. Not a huge payment, or very many hours, but its work and the first step on the road to being independant of the NHS paycheck. Feeling a little less worried about money now. And yes i know it will all work itself out, but I can still worry occasionally. It's my party!

Had a fairly good day at college, started putting stuff in the sketchbook and ran 2 monoprints off, to work on on Friday. I think the idea for the growth project will actually work well. Collage and mixed media on canvas, with a bit of stitch too. Can't do anything without a but of stitching!

by the way the flames are to remind me of the fire in my belly and the ambition that lives and burns inside of me for success as an artist. Either that or I die tragically just as I'm startring to get recognised and Josh can live off the profits of my art after my death. The price always goes up when the artist pegs it.

Been reading lots of depressing stuff about slums in Mumbai, but also a lot of very positive stuff about community, recycling and small scale farming in the slums. Who says that the slums are all bad? Not that I would expect anyone to live there if they had somewhere better to go, but I want to make a positive statement about the people who have to live there, for whatever reason.

Had fish and chips for tea and watched rubbish on tv. Too tired to think of homework. Going to town tomorrow morning to draw public buildings and sky scrapers for the project. I want to look at the patterns of the buildings, the windows and the shapes of them to be able to reproduce them for the big picture for my project. Hopefully no-one will think I'm a spy or a terrorist and fetch the police on me. There will be scans of the results sometime over the next couple of days.

Looks like olympus are steadfastly ignoring me now. Need to send another email to them to see if I can at least get a replacement card. Only 2 weeks to go before the next wedding to photograph and I haven't got a reliable memory card. Bugger, more expense.

Going to spend tomorrow working on Claire and Sonia's photos, cos I really don't think I'm going to get any more off that memory card. Very bitterly disappointed about the whole thing. Learned a valuable lesson though. 2 memory cards and split the pics through the day. Formal on one and informal and candid on the other. Hmmmm, why didn't I think of that before? Idiot woman! Never mind. Will make the best of what I have and make a lovely album for Claire and Sonn.

Right off to feed the snake and go to bed ready for the busy day tomorrow.

Countdown to unemployment

I've had loads of support from folks all around wishing me well in the new job choices, but now I'm starting to feel a bit wibbly. It's silly really because I know I will get loads of work, last time I was temping I had more offers than I could cope with! But still, big move and panic may set in some time at the back end of next week.

On a lighter note, there are actually people who want to come to my leaving do, so that will be loads of fun. Big nosh-up and a boozy bimble up west street.

Homework is starting to come together, I've made my sketchbook, finally and done loads of research on different artists and urban geography. I feel I'm starting to move towards a clear vision now, probably to do with Mumbai being the fastest growing city and the slums that occupy every spare inch of the city. I spent about 3 hours yesterday looking at Google Earth and photos of the slums and felt quite depressed afterwards. It seems loads of people have ideas about what to do with the slums, but none of them actually provide minimum standard housing for all the slum dwellers displaced by the clearances. How do you house that many people in adequate housing? I don't have any kind of an answer, especially when you consider the slums are responsible for the vast bulk of the recycling of waste in Mumbai and without that there would be a massive waste problem that could only be solved by land fill rather than recycling. I shall ponder. And never come up with an adequate solution.

Anyway back to the homework, I'm looking at collage and mixed media, although I've been playing with encaustic today, and I want to be able to include maps and town plans in with the collage. Loads to fit in, not sure how I'll do it. Looking at Robert Rauschenberg and Lee Krasner at the moment. Different approaches to collage, but fantastic results with both of them, such power and energy in both of their works. i have to say I've not really done much collage, but I'm looking forward to the experiments. Have to produce a finished board or canvas at the end of the project. Looking forward to that. Should be fun. I may even manage to get some stitch and textile in there too! Pics will be posted in progress.

It's now way past bedtime, so off I go.