2015 Work roundup

       

Some of my favourite images I made this year including Betty, Votes for Women, Go Set a Watchman, Reykjavik, Madrid & Vote Libraries. . .

  

 

Isle of Skye Map, embroidered book bags & book stack linoprints. . .

2015 photo diary

  

Snowy fields, trees & cats. . .

 

Boats in Wakefield, on the canal & Liverpool. . .

   

Glasshouses, Palmtrees & reflections. . .

   

Octagonal ceilings, domes & Old type. . .

Podcast Love 2015

Here's a few of my fave podcasts I've been listening to lately:

     

The Voyager | A New Life in Europe: The Dhnie family | Lore

The Voyager is a city travel podcast featuring independent businesses, sights and culture in less traveled cities around the globe by Monocle magazine; If you want to try and understand a refugees journey from Syria to Germany this account of a family's journey is harrowing yet hopeful and Lore tells stories of folklore, ghouls, murders and unexplainable goings on.

      

The Tennis Podcast | Betty in the Sky with a Suitcase | Criminal

A must for a tennis fan to keep up to date with all in the tennis calendar with fun polls & interviews; A flight attendant's funny stories from collegaues & pilots and her own solo travels around the world (I created the image above as I love it so much- see here) and Criminal looking at interesting crime stories.

      

Mystery Show | Magic Lessons | Serial

The Mystery Show solves mostly small, stupid mysteries that don't need to be solved but you're glad they have been; Motivating creativity lessons with Elizabeth Gilbert and Serial's back for a second season, will it be any good? 

See my 2014 podcast love post most of which are still on my listening list.

What podcasts are you loving?

Betty in the Sky with a Suitcase Podcast

I love podcasts, I mainly listen to them while I'm walking places, working or tidying. So when I find a great new (to me at least, she's been doing it for ten years!) podcast that's endearing, shows humanity in many weird forms and makes me laugh, I want to shout about it!

Betty in the Sky with a Suitcase is that rare podcast full of laughter, fun, spontaneity, weirdness and surprises; filled with stories from Betty's job as a flight attendant and her love for solo travelling, animals, snorkeling, getting to know the locals and adventure.

Along with her own flight attendant stories she collects them from pilots, other flight attendants & people she meets on her travels. She's experienced so many amazing places including seeing lemurs in Madagascar, swimming with pigs & jellyfish, Easter Island, Tarsiers in Sulawesi, Indonesia and mud-larking in London to name a few; listening to the podcast it feels like I've been on an around the world trip myself!

I made this illustration because I love Betty & her podcast so much; it's Betty with her recorder surrounded by a few of her stories including lemurs, bees, a turtle enjoying the view, the beverage cart, naked passengers and sanitizing vodka.

Thanks Betty for letting us travel the world together with you & here's to the next ten years of podcasting!

Go here to Betty's website to listen & subscribe.

VOTES FOR WOMEN Print

 

 After seeing the Suffragette film last week, I was inspired to create an illustration which then turned into a linocut print in homage to the amazing women who fought & campaigned for so long for women's right to vote in Great Britain which wasn't achieved for all women (over the age of 21) until 1928.

   

My print includes chains for when they chained themselves to railings in protest, bombs/matches for when they set off postbox bombs & bombed a ministers house in protest, sashes and a miniature of their hero and 'leader' Emmeline Pankhurst along with flowers and medals which they received after their stint in prison and on hunger strike and a dove for the freedom and peace they were out to acheive for all women and the fight for equality which still continues to this day.



It is now available to buy in my etsy shop

Autumn Art Seen

 

Art can transcend, take you to new places and new ways of thinking through looking, experiencing and being present. Here's a few exhibitions I've seen this autumn that have made me look & think again:-

Agnes Martin is one of my favourite artists ever since I found her at Uni, so I couldn't miss this retrospective at Tate Modern. It was quite simply mind affirming. So meditative and zen yet so powerful and determined, so true and authentic while mysterious and overwhelming. It was one of the most amazing exhibitions I've ever been to. It's so hard to tell from pictures what they are like, their presence is so great and their silence so loud. I really love her works on paper as well, I'm always drawn to paper works as they are so familiar, so relate-able, free and spontaneous.

 

My paintings are not about what is seen. They are about what is known forever in the mind.' - Agnes Martin -

 

I didn't have much time on my short day trip to London but while heading for the train at Euston I popped into the Wellcome Collection to see Alice Anderson : Memory Movement Memory Objects

Which consisted of everday objects from a car to a guitar wrapped in copper thread mostly in blacked out spaces. This was strangely affecting and seeing how some objects had morphed and broken by the pressure of thread was beautiful, such power in such fragility.

I also saw Jackson Pollack: Blind Spots on at Tate Liverpool which was a bit small & mainly large black & white works. I loved his experiments on Japanese Paper and his melancholic energy.

While I was there I also saw the small Geta Bratescu exhibition full of sewn & paper collages, performance and drawing which allow her 'dedication to the drawn line' to dominate. I loved this quote of hers talking about drawing with her eyes closed: "without the 'freedom of the eye' the hand can better explore 'the freedom of its muscles"

I also managed to see the M + Sigg Chinese Art Collection...

and Cornelia Parker's Magna Carta Wikipedia Embroidery at the Whitworth Art Gallery, 

 

and the Beyond Limits Sculpture exhibition in the gardens of Chatsworth House. Including this Gormley sculpture placed in the most perfect rockery and geometric garden location for it. (Full post on this exhibition to come...)

What have you seen this autumn?

Madrid for Show Us Your Type

Here's my Madrid poster I did for Show Us Your Type all made out of tapas! Lots of little plates of yummy Spanish food; mussels, olives, langoustines, chorizo, calamares and scallops. Delicioso!

The next city is Marrakesh; go here to contribute.

See all my other city posters I've done for Show Us Your Type here.

Isle of Skye North End Map for They Draw & Travel

 

I love exploring the Isle of Skye and have spent quite a bit of time on the North end of the Island, so created this map for They Draw & Travel featuring a few of my favourite places to visit.

Skye has some of the most spectacular scenery in the world, with dramatic coastlines, coral beaches and rugged mountains. There's always whales, seals and an abundance of birds to spot and as it's known as the Misty Isle, you have to be patient and may get wet, which is all part of the fun!

Friday Illustration: Silesia Woman

 

From a National Geographic (May 2011) photograph of a Silesia Woman which was German Prussia now Poland

Friday Illustration: TV watching

Tv watching is getting out of control; so many good box sets & series to watch. Here's a few I've been enjoying lately: Episodes, Doll & Em, Pretty Little Liars, Orange is the New Black, Grace & Frankie, Life in Squares, Ruth & Erica. What are you watching?

Friday Illustration: Palmhouse

 

Palmhouse; artificial dreams of tropical climes caged in from the outside world creating their own reality.

Friday Illustration: Blue Shadows

Shadows are inspiring me lately, I like the fact that they're real while being unreal, they exist just while the light is right, ephemeral moments of a solid life, a surreal moment in time in lightness & shadow...