Art for Dummies

Words fail me at the moment, so I’ve been doing a bit of postcard colouring instead, using the output as birthday and thank you cards.

Quite smudgy in places, but life is not lived by colouring between the lines.

Opposites

Ugg Boot Face-off

To find oneself, at 50-something, studying astrobiology (under duress) as a subject in a Bachelor of Arts (Linguistics) degree is a little discombobulating, to say the least. Particularly if your last contact with the fields of chemistry, mathematics and physics was some 30-odd years ago (and geology, never). But the university at which I’m studying crawling through my degree has a rule (which only came into effect after I started) that every undergraduate student must complete a Planet unit and a People unit outside of their stream in order to complete said degree.

So, every week this semester just past, a very grumpy band of Arts students, including me, would huddle together in the prac room, muttering furiously over concepts such as chirality; and biomarker composition; and whether the lump of rock before us was sedimentary, metamorphic or igneous; and whether another lump of rock before us was a stony, iron, or stony-iron, meteorite; and whether the earth was oxic or anoxic when another lump of rock before us was formed.

On the opposite side of the room, sat a bunch of engaged, aspiring astrobiologists, scientists and geologists, who spoke in a language even the polyglot Arts student doesn’t care much for. We were strange bedfellows; almost different species. 😀

What a discomfiting experience.

But, it blew my mind!

I learnt so much. About how far (and not) scientific knowledge has come since I was at school; why the exploration of our solar system (so what’s the big deal about a bunch of dead rocks and gassy balls in the sky?) is deeply interesting; the mysteries of the vast and strange universe that we find ourselves in; and, most fascinating of all, the extent of the microbial and extremophile world around, beneath, on, and in us. I even had a bit of fun with the Design-a-Lander-for-Titan assignment (the tutors mentioned that they were looking forward to the Arts students’ designs. Yeah, I thought, some comic relief).

There is much value in seeking out our opposites and differences in knowledge, beliefs, philosophies and interests.

What have you learnt recently that has broadened your mind?

Curve

I’ve had the good fortune to travel to Shanghai twice in the last 6 months for work. On my most recent trip there, I was lucky enough to be shown around by wonderful hosts, and so I got to see the some of the incredible architecture in the Pudong area for the first time.

This is the interior of the Shanghai Grand Hyatt hotel from the top floor, a view not for the fainthearted.

Evocation of Art

‘Anti-mimesis is a philosophical position that holds the direct opposite of mimesis. Its most notable proponent is Oscar Wilde, who opined in his 1889 essay The Decay of Lying that, “Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life”. In the essay, written as a Platonic dialogue, Wilde holds that anti-mimesis “results not merely from Life’s imitative instinct, but from the fact that the self-conscious aim of Life is to find expression, and that Art offers it certain beautiful forms through which it may realise that energy.”.

What is found in life and nature is not what is really there, but is that which artists have taught people to find there, through art. As in an example posited by Wilde, although there has been fog in London for centuries, one notices the beauty and wonder of the fog because “poets and painters have taught the loveliness of such effects…They did not exist till Art had invented them.” ‘                                 Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_imitating_art

 

Nature creates art in the Dr Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, Vancouver

I don’t agree with Mr Wilde; surely the fact that artists painted the fog is because they saw its beauty in life, and thus art imitated life in this case (chicken vs egg). But I concede that art provides us ways of seeing and appreciating life from a number of different perspectives which we may not otherwise notice.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Red. Orange. Yellow. Green. Blue. Indigo. Violet.

Robot Restaurant Floor Show

For more entries to last week’s WPC, see The Daily Post.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Symmetry

Sydney Opera House

For more entries to last week’s WPC, see The Daily Post.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Texture

Fairy Bower Tidal Pool

For more entries to this week’s WPC, see The Daily Post.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Zigzag

Exquisite Botanical Art – Ho Chi Minh Square

I missed last week’s photo challenge…
..and my 4th blog anniversary.

And because of M-R’s powers of suggestion, I got only as far as selecting three instead of the usual five photos for my list of favourites on the WPC theme.

Just as well I’m not OCD. 🙄

For more entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post.

 Five Three standouts from this week

tea and paper

2812 Photography

Margaret-Rose Stringer

Weekly Photo Challenge: Room (to express oneself)

Ladies of the Wurst Kind

Weekend wine walkabout
lures the alter egos out

For more entries to this week’s WPC, see The Daily Post.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Infinity

When riding the Domain Car Park’s travelator late last Thursday evening, I felt as if I was moving toward some secret portal from which I’d be puffed out into the deepest ocean, or some faraway galaxy. Add to this a lone skateboarder on the travelator hurtling towards us at great speed, giant snails in the park, and dirty laundry hanging in the streets and I began to think we’d fallen down the wormhole of infinite surrealism.

For more entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post.

Blurb blurble bloop… Help! One-Sentence Biography Competition

I’m trying to get my first poetry book completed and self-published on Blurb. One of the elements I’m still missing is a short blurb/biography about me in relation to poetry – I don’t want to write this myself, and if I asked anyone in my family or non-blogging circle of friends, I’d get something along the lines of:

“‘x‘ is my ‘insert relation type here‘ – she writes poetry, but I’ve got no idea what she’s on about.“

So I’m looking for some help from you—the esteemed Blogging community (how’m I doing on the sycophantic flattery front?) for something short, and not necessarily serious, and thus am holding a one-sentence biography competition: 

Post your entries in the comments section of this post.

I will include the kindest best ones on the front flap and may include any snide irreverent blooper blurbs on the back, all attributed of course.

Payment?!

Don’t be silly! We all know poetry books don’t sell!

The winner will, however, receive a mystery prize. 😉

Weekly Photo Challenge: Masterpiece

At Moo Burgers, kids are encouraged to give expression to their inner Moonet.

I’d give Tony, aged 4, first prize for his moomorous, Aussie-themed moosterpiece.

The world seen through the eyes of children can open ours – see Launch Pad for children’s unique insights.

For more entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post – my top five for the week:

• Hamburg Und Mee(h)r
• A Meditative Journey with Saldage
• Ileana Partenie
• Solaner
• Ese’s Voice

Weekly Photo Challenge: Forward

What emotion does this sculpture – Three Businessmen Who Brought Their Own Lunch: Batman, Swanston And Hoddle – by Alison Weaver evoke in you? Do you think Batman, Swanston and Hoddle feel that they have anything to look forward to?

My favourite entry of the week was this one from Gilly.

For more entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Love

“Old and rare books!”, we gasped in reverent unison,

as we swerved off course, making a bee-line for the shop window.

“Don’t open ’til ten”, a chap behind us on the pavement drawled, the smoke from his early morning cigarette curling around his smile. He’d obviously seen our type before.

My niece and I were in Melbourne, relishing some girl-time. The day before we had spent a wonderful day at the Melbourne Museum, where we immersed ourselves in a shared love of all things scientific –

the wild,

the weird,

OK then, the weird…

..and the seriously mind-boggling.

This day we would spend the morning traversing Melbourne’s laneways, indulging our love of shopping, architecture and art,

and the afternoon marvelling at the mysterious workings of commercial harbours (Melbourne’s has quite a colourful history but I doubt that any internet resource can provide an as wry and amusing and account as our ferry driver did  :lol:).

But about that bookshop – we made a mad dash back before closing time
and what a treasure trove it is – an extraordinary collection of enthralling books,

watched over

by the largest collection of owls I’ve ever seen –

they are everywhere, roosting in glass cases,

on pelmets, in windows and on bookshelves,

and have been mysteriously multiplying for the 47 years that Kay Craddock, the bookshop’s owner, has been in business.

But Old and Rare Books was nearing closing time and we were fading fast – a love of chocolate chocolate addiction is in our genes and we hadn’t had our Koko Black fix for the day,

so, after a quick purchase for the love of my life, we exited this wonderful place.

My niece and her husband were with us for three weeks over the 2012/2013 Festive Season: a wonderful and extremely precious time. We don’t know when we’ll see each other again; we live on different continents. But a myriad of shared interests and the deepest bonds of love keep us connected.

😀 😀 😀

More about Melbourne

Food recommendations from our trip:

Koko Black (of course!)

City Wine Shop (don’t let the name fool you – this establishment is not all about wine: their food is quite delicious – and their desserts are sublime!)

Longrain – the duck salad (which we shared) was superb, as was the banana and lime sorbet- yum, yum.

And for excellent photos of Melbourne, head over to Leanne Cole’s blog – mine can never do Melbourne justice the way that Leanne’s most certainly do.

For more entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post.

HooHoooo (or, as they say in French, Hou Hou) – for Gabrielle Bryden and Bénédicte Delachanal

A poem for friends Gabrielle Bryden (sublime poet and lover of owls), who is currently fighting the dreaded winter lurgy,
and Bénédicte Delachanal (fabulous artist), who crafted these wonderfully funky owl paintings.

 The Comfort of Owls

From tsunami dreams
We bolt upright
And heart and breath
Race to the death
To drown out silence
Of dead hours
And throw us wide-eyed
To the night.

Then, faint, through darkness
Comes strange calm
To tension-wired
Synapse and bone,
The ebb and flow
Of delta waves,
Like a mother’s kiss,
Floats softly down
In owl’s low call,
Primal and deep,
Submersing us
In tides of sleep.

xx

For more things owl, check out Owls on WordPress and YouTube.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Friendship

When you peer

through the looking-glass

of the artefacts of friendship,

do you know yourself?

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See the Daily Post for more entries to the Weekly Photo Challenge: Friendship

The Best Medicine

Happy Cat – Image via http://www.sxc.hu

If you need some cheering up, head over to Gabrielle Bryden’s Fortnight of Funnies

for cartoons, comedic verse, lewd limericks and much more to come.

*****************

😀 😀 😀

Liquid art

We descend
from the incinerating heat above
through the cool water,
speckled with sunlight,
and then drift
weighted, but weightless
in the silence…
inhale…exhale…inhale…exhale…

Sculptures of ancient rock conceal
and reveal
an extraordinary profusion of life—
I move closer…a pair of feelers
shrinks back into a dark crevice,
a clownfish nibbles
on a strand of my sunlit hair, the shadow
of a stingray passing overhead…
inhale…exhale…

Suspended in a living art gallery
of creatures, bizarre and magical,
we breathe in a vaudevillean kaleidoscope
of parrotfish, chocolate dips,
Picasso triggerfish, coral trout, pineapple fish,
swarming shoals of baitfish—the exhibition is endless…
inhale….exhale…inhale…exhale…

Life’s tensions
are expelled through the bubbles
of the deep,
slow
pace of breathing;
my senses are heightened,
but I am completely
calm.

Above the brain
coral, a horseshoe leatherjacket
on its side in a cleaning station, enjoys the nibbling
of the cleaner wrasse
in its mouth and gills…
inhale…exhale…

A cuttlefish sashays past,
eyeing me coyly,
displaying its fabulous
Mardi gras costume as I wave
my hand in its direction.

A saucy, painted red-lipped
morwong flicks past,
while a dugong smilingly lopes along—
an underwater burlesque
and Carnivale all rolled into one.
I marvel
at the phantasmagoria of the deep…
inhale…exhale…

The enormous,
gregarious Maori wrasse engages,
while the Neanderthal of the sea—
the prehistoric stonefish—sits unseen
and deadly on the bottom,
camouflaged as a rock.

The dark side is right here—
Look but don’t touch!
Don’t peer too closely into the nooks and crannies!
Don’t dive too long or stay too deep!
And always there,
on the fringes
of my consciousness, lurk
the sharks. Thrilling!
Inhale, exhale,
perhaps a little faster.

Low on air,
time to go, but we will be back
to explore the endless
beauty
and search for the elusive
weedy sea dragon.

Look up,
inhale
exhale
inhale,
and exhale,
surface slowly…
from my favourite place.