“I’m a great believer in luck and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it.” – Thomas Jefferson
Today could be your lucky day! Mairead.
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Down memory lane with buttons….
(A Sony Walkman picture – can’t find mine – too small…)
Yesterday we went to the market in Dun Laoghaire. It’s held in the People’s Park and there’s food, books, music (live and recorded), vegetables, meat (cooked and raw), crafts, coffee and cake. We bought almond slices and Americanos (they offered to add whiskey for free if we wanted!) and sat on a picnic bench watching the world go by. I forgot to bring my camera so you’ll just have to imagine the scene.
(In case you don’t know – this is a cassette tape)
Then I remembered an assignment I had and we started talking about when I was twenty-one and Denis bought me the latest gadget (I think he had to take out a loan to buy it…) It was the Sony Walkman, a cassette tape player with head phones (not earphones) that worked on AA battery power and could fit in your hand (almost). We thought it was amazing. Before the Walkman the smallest cassette player was a chunky black plastic device needing mains power or huge batteries. The Walkman was shiny with cute buttons.
(In the process of making ceramic buttons – will be shiny)
Of course now we’re older and more mature we don’t fall for the latest gadgets, we don’t need to own the latest smallest thing that will make listening to music easier. We don’t get excited by cute buttons and shiny covers……
Maybe we haven’t changed all that much…. Mairead.
Why does this keep happening to me?
“Insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results.” – Albert Einstein
If you want a different result, then stop doing what you’re doing and start imagining something new you could do instead…… Mairead.
Watch La Luna by Pixar!
(Butterfly on lavender at Powerscourt Estate)
I watched a beautiful short movie on Sunday… here’s the blurb about it. There’s a little boy, his father and his grandfather and they are out in their boat. In the beginning of the movie the father gives his son a hat, the same kind of hat as the father’s, the same kind of hat as the grandfather’s. The father places this hat on the son, in a particular way – just like his own hat is placed on his head. The grandfather huffs and puffs, grabs the hat and then places it on his grandson’s head in a different particular way – just like his own hat is placed on his head.
(Gothic doorway)
There’s a bit of a scuffle and the father’s way of placing the hat on the little boy’s head finally wins and the story continues.
(Raindrops on flowers… requested by Grahame…..;-/)
By the end of the story the little boy places his hat in a completely different particular way on his own head as he teaches his father and grandfather something new. Our children learn all they can from us and then there comes a time for us to learn from our children. Probably sooner than we think…..
What’s the lesson for today? Mairead.
How are you today?
“People who say … they’re perfectly fine [are] more insane than the rest of us.” – Ruby Wax
We’re all crazy, Mairead.
Friday Quote – The secret of a happy life?
(Beauty from Mount Stewart’s Gardens)
“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” – Winston Churchill
Are your difficulties fraught with opportunities? Mairead.
Art Works – David Hockney
This is Bigger Trees Near Warter Winter Version by David Hockney.
Besides drawing, painting, printing and ceramics my course includes an art history module where I will learn to write essays about works of art, artists and the art period in which they worked. In order to write about the paintings I will need to learn the language of art and so far although I seem to have the words I don’t have the ability to put the words together. So… I was thinking that I could get some practice here on the blog and…. with your help I might learn faster. So for the first painting I picked Bigger Trees near Warter by David Hockney.
(The artist with another of his pictures – that’s how big they are)
First, let me tell you about the words I have learned. The words are called Art Elements and you use them to describe any painting…. Point, as in dot or dots; Line, as in the shortest distance between two points but in art elements lines don’t have to be straight, they can be wavy; Shape, as in square, triangular, etc; Form, a 3D shape; Tone, I think this is lighting and shading; Colour, shouldn’t be a problem here; Texture, as in you get a sense of what it might feel like to touch; Pattern, as in there’s a pattern; Symmetry, as in there’s balance between one side and the other; Content, as in what’s it a painting of?
(The trees were cut down before Hockney had finished his painting….)
To describe this painting I want to say – I really, really love this! But that’s not using any art elements. So instead… In this picture the artist definitely includes lines, in the trees, some straight and some wavy. There are also lines for the lanes and the house. He uses colour to show the grass on the side of the lanes and of the trees. The grass definitely looks like it is nicer to touch than the prickly trees so he must be using texture? He is using pattern in the trees repeating on into the distance. I suppose you could say there’s symmetry with the little house on the left and the little hedges on the right. Finally the content, this is a picture of huge trees in winter (without leaves) in the countryside, located between two small country roads with a line of hedges in the right foreground and a house in the left background.
Any help gratefully received, Mairead.
Friday Quote – Choose your own Way.
(Path in the Wilderness)
“Everything can be taken from a man or a woman but one thing: the last of human freedoms to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” – Viktor E. Frankl
It’s your choice, Mairead.
Paper Sizes….. The Real Story…
(A5 notebook on top of A4 sketch pad on top of A3 hardback sketchbook)
Turns out I didn’t completely understand paper sizes (Personal Notebook)….. but thanks to some smart people I think I’ve got it now. My sister Moira told me there’s a size A0. Then Damien (you might remember Damien from the Dublin Flamenco Festival last year?) sent me the following….
“….I’m going to be a bit geeky and correct you on the paper sizes. This is only on my mind because Nathalie and I have spent a lot of time designing posters for this year’s flamenco festival. Hard to believe it’s starting on Friday!!!! Where did the year go?
Anyway, I digress 🙂
In the A series of paper sizes, A0 is the largest. Each increment divides the paper size in half. So, A1 is half the size of A0, A2 is half the size of A1, A3 is half the size of A2, A4 is half the size of A3, and so on.
All this halving gives us a nice little binary system. The number of the paper size ends up being the power of 2 of the number of sheets that fit into an A0, e.g.
A0 = 2 ^ 0 = 1 (1 sheet)A1 = 2 ^ 1 = 2 (2 sheets of A1 in A0)A2 = 2 ^ 2 = 4 (4 sheets of A2 in A0)etc etc etc
Ok, geeking over :)…….”
(This is Damien)
Thank you Damien! Thank you also to Susanna who took the time to explain it like this…
“...or you could express it mathematically
A5 X 2 = A4
A4 X 2 = A3
A3 X 2 = A2
A2 x 2 = A1″
Now that I understand the paper sizes… I was wondering if anyone could help me with my drawing homework? Anyone? Mairead.
Travel stories 