Maison Martin Margiela

I once used to wear black suits, back in the day before I had children when I harboured notions of managerial positions, this was my look. It is the look that seduced Emin, boy did he feel conned when I reverted to type!!

Now this is what I hanker after, in my fantasy world of lottery winnings tumbling past my ears these are the clothes that would envelop me during the cold dark days of winter.

Style Icon Lucinda Chambers

I wish there were more photographs of Vogues fashion editor out there in blog land, she is responsible for some of Vogues best fashion images, how brilliant does she look?
Photo from here

And this one from the excellent Anne Bernecker

The view from here

The field next to his aunts house, as I paint I am surrounded by a moving carpet of red beetles, yet only the ants climb into the paints, I sit on an old chair and paint so can't go too far, their is no need when it all looks this lovely though.

The village sits high up on top of a mountain, the view above is from his aunt's veranda, she spends the weekdays looking after her grandchildren and returns at the weekend, the house is big and was part of a farm, but it is sadly falling into disrepair, her husband died of cancer many years ago and she had 3 girls all of whom have flown the nest. It looks idyllic, but if this painting had sound all you would hear is the constant bickering from a neighbouring house!

This is the view from Emin's house, on the front veranda, I have used considerable artistic license and removed the junk yard that is attached to yet another smallholding lived in by a very deaf old lady, the same old lady that proclaimed she had goats in her garden prettier than me!

This is the view to the right of Emin's house, sadly the mountains have bleached out but on a clear day they rise up majestically.

Down a small lane, 10 minutes walk away is this view, they are all of the sea around here, there are places where the entire horizon is just sea, it gives the landscape a wonderful hazy glow when the sun is out.

This is a heavily reworked painting I sat in the garden of a house that has just been built on the outskirts of the village, it overlooks the valley, across to another village. During the call to prayer there is a small time delay which allows the call to echo across the valley, it is rather beautiful and something I would like to capture on tape. Emin apparently owns a scrubby patch of land down there!

Finally there is a scrubby field 5 minutes away where plants have reclaimed once ploughed land, I love the colours of all the different tress, although I never got to grips with that ethereal silvery beauty of olive trees. I would love to return at Easter one year to see the flowers too.

I painted double this but these I felt were the better ones, they are visual notes for me to paint from, rather than accurate representations, I am also conscious that I use watercolours like oil and often layer them up rather than allow the paper to create light. I half wished I had taken pastels too, but I like the way just using paint forced me to mix colours and focus on how the light changes colour almost every second of the day.

The second week was more rewarding than the first, simply because I finally warmed to the subject and got to know the colours better, I'm going back next year, but perversely will probably approach the project from another point of view using a different media.

Benim guzek Africam

I too love all things African, a fairly trite statement, I know. Not unlike proclaiming a love of all things European, or Asian. Sadly I am not educated enough to specify the origin of sculptures, textiles and jewellery I love, but on retirement when I steal from my school resources it will be the box of African artifacts that will vanish with me.
Situated on a very industrial estate, just outside of Magusa (Cyprus) is a large bakery, it sells all manner of greasy pastry and overly sweet cakes and ice cream, but it does have free wi fi, and so you can sit and watch the locals come and go whilst simultaneously deafened by a music channel, whilst downloading the latest Guardian. There are worse places to spend half and hour, and for me there was a battered dog eared Vogue from Turkey, inside was this lovely page of jewellery, the text I can't translate, the jewellery I love. This too is fabulous, although a little too theatrical for me to wear daily, I do love the concept.

Both from Anita Quansah

Was it a Merry Christmas?

Oh, the tales I have heard about Christmas, they would make last years play Seasons Greetings by Alan Aykbourn seem tame. I have heard 3 different versions of the same story from my mother, my sister and my daughter. The conclusion to my daughter's moody antics is for my mother and my sister electing to spend next Christmas in Australia. Far enough from Daisy to not feel the bitter chill of her frosty glare.

Kitty too at the opposite end of the country with the other family had to suffer, but she did so graciously in silence whilst her new baby brother was spoilt rotten.

And me? well, had the day fallen on a weekday it would be business as usual, Leyla would have gone to school and I would have painted. Instead it fell on a Sunday and so I decided we should have a jolly day out in Bellapais...Sadly rain stopped play.
We drove through torrential rain and it only stopped for a brief moment the entire day.
My uncle is a big fan of misplaced Santa's and so this one was for him.

The oranges were abundant hence scrumping, since the restaurant we planned to eat in was closed.

Is it me or is there something wrong with this picture? Clue, woolly hat + sun glasses!

But I did get to church!

and despite the grey rain soaked skies it was as beautiful as ever

Just a lot greyer.

but we did see our first double rainbow

and some blue sky on the way home.

By now we had fine dined at a Burger King! and I had endured a very expensive tantrum on the phone with Daisy. I decided it would have been cheaper to fly her out to spend Christmas with us next year, which is more likely than she thinks!

When shopping online does work

A recent post on Out of the Bag highlighted the seductive, but oh so flawed practice of Internet shopping. My fingers have been burnt so many times I have all but ceased on what was an often fruitless exercise in anything other than deflated dreams. I like to feel the weight of the fabric, I am very tactile when it comes to buying anything remotely sartorial, I often chide Leyla for walking into a shop and touching everything, only to find I do that too. One particular minefield when buying online has to be shoes. At what point can you be sure they will fit? And yet curiously I have had the most success online with shoes than most other purchases. The trick is to know your brand and stick to it like glue. I lover PF Fliers for pumps as well as Converse, the sizes stay the same making it easier to buy online.

Last summer was saved. really saved by a very basic pair of Fly Flot mules. I was not keen to move on to boots in case they were not sized the same but as luck would have it Pavers have a shop in York and so I could try them on. I then bought these online, only just the right side of orthopedic Blackpool Landlady I know, but with my feet, if the shoe fits....

They are much nicer in the flesh so to speak, they do gape a bit at the top but the shaped curve does not make it so obvious, I must be the only fatfoot who does not have cankles! But what I love is they have just a little height enough to ease the pain in my heel. They were not my first choice but I came late to this party. Not the next though, so later this year when their boots get restocked I will be more on the button.

So with spring ahead I am now tempted by these.

The perfect work shoe to wear with skirts I hope.

I am today wearing a black dress/tunic form COS, (see top piccy) purchased yesterday before meeting Lucy to see Richard II (mmm 3/5) For me it was serendipity, there was only one on the rail in my size, and it was in the sale, (as was the grey cardie I bought on impulse before the bloody sale!) an otherwise itchy combo of wool and angora it's really lovely and not at all itchy, which is more than I can say about their trousers. 5 pairs I tried on, and my normally reliable source dried up.

But back to the grey cardie, yes, I know I said no cardies, but it was lovely, what I really want now is a rich clotted cream jersey top with a scoop neck and 3 buttons down the front, I used to own some old men's flannel undies that had that and I loved them, now I can't find anything silky enough to wear under a jumper which has the desired buttons.

It is on my wish list.

The view from there to here

So yes, I have returned, we made it there, and I have come back infection free. A small miracle I think.
I have painted a lot, and I have read a lot, I have even become quite bored a lot, but that was my fault as I went as per usual woefully unprepared for the extreme dip in temperature and prolonged darkness once the sun dropped like stone from the sky.
It was 70% sunny and warm, but the other 30% was, I have to say, verging on Old Testament biblical in it's extremeness. The house sits high up on the converging points of three peaks, so the clouds scud at some considerable speed across the sky and the rain lashes down in torrents with enormous flashes of lightning. I don't know why, but Mediterranean thunder storms are quite hairy at night.
I managed to take some more photographs which I will post next week. Plus I survived a really crap head cold, which was pretty much obligatory considering how busy I was before the end of term.
But more importantly I painted, nearly every day. nothing special, but I have defiantly moved forward for my project, which somehow has morphed into a landscape project. But what landscapes. I did not have the emotional connection that I have with Scotland, but I have enjoyed the challenge so far and have come home with numerous ideas to explore. So this was the view nearly 3 weeks ago, balmy days picking flowers. My life was made very simple as Leyla went to school each day, so all I had to do was cook. The garden needed very little attention so despite lugging very heavy wellies, I did not go into the fields much.
The one down side is that because a wall is being built at Easter, the extra planting has to wait until next year, so despite assurances to the contrary we will be going back next winter...Joy!
Back home and the gales have followed, going home last night my scarf was woefully inadequate and so I dived into TKMaxx, and fell serendipitously on these Scottish lambswool gloves and the softest cashmere moss green eternity scarf.
Sometimes it is the small things that pep up my day, because I sure as hell did not want to be back at work.

I do have plenty to look forward to though as I keep on writing here, but I need to keep writing about it to convince myself that life is good.
So, I am attending lectures at the Tate Modern ..Good, but have to write 50000 words by May...Bad!
I have some great ideas for painting..Good, but teaching keeps getting in the way ...Bad!
But best of all I am going to Madrid in February, and guess what? There is a HUGE art fair on at the same time ..Good... so I have my carrot to survive, and I need it as there are 3 parents evenings in the next 5 weeks..Bad very bad...

And one more thing, I really, really miss writing. I wrote not a jot for 10 days, I thought my head would go *BANG!* with the muddled mess backing up. So in the end I wrote and wrote and wrote, all on scraps of old paper. I essentially annotated my paintings, but boy did it feel good, really good.
I should really just bite the bullet and get a computer to use, but in a way I do feel that absence from gazing at a screen forces me to evaluate and appreciate. I don't see reading blogs as wasteful at all, I have learnt so much you would not believe. But I do think I need a break occasionally, but thank you all, to any poor soul who wades through the meanderings of an increasingly old and addled brain. And especially to those who comment, into what seems like an empty vacuum. I do read them, I long to chase you up, but this effing job just keeps getting in the way. Yes, that same effing job that pays for those glorious holidays. me complain?