Poetry
-
A thought on Zazen and painting
Zazen Silent movement Passing through the stillness And empty form. This wee haiku is a thought on zazen and experience. After my recent studio shift, zazen and considering the looser paintings I’ve been doing, I think it’s good not to bring too much, or any at all although this can be impossible, of the bias,
-
Hill-walking up through frozen moon snow, Ben Vrackie Scotland
moon snow guided by the rolling moon heated by the february sun Glinting and sunbeams – obscured horizons Above animal tracks, boot prints, Mountain hare prints in blue-white snow – Towards the half-moon rolling down Ben Vrackie’sWhite hill edge topped by south pointing iceSnow fingers from monstrous frozen rust structure,Rising from the summit’s ocean floor
-
Fragmented scultpure and installation
Over the last few months I’ve been continuing to build up new ideas about 3D work in my practice, using various techniques, props, lighting and digital photography to explore presentation and atmosphere… It’s great fun building installations and working from these in sketchbooks, such as my dynamics studies, below left, (some tighter work and looser
-
Sketchbook wordograph experiments
Here are some excerpts of word art drawings and notation, plus ink studies, reflections on last year’s trips to the Outer Hebrides… splintered half-covered green-grass wild-flowers sheep-shit tide-in tide-out rustless pink-steel-alloy sloping-hillside visitors at a distance cloudy morning passing boats skull shaped sculpture spacecraft zigzag trickle of fresh black water on grey brown
-
A fresh perspective on the north room studio door
A very talented and enthusiastic student of mine blogged her visit to my studio with the photo and creative writing below, which I really like, and kindly allowed me to re-post here. It is great to be able to see the studio through fresh eyes… “Monday 23 January 2012: What’s through the door this week?
-
Wakabayashi’s Zen Calligraphy
This is my sensei Wakabayashi’s Sho calligraphy of zen master Dogen’s poem coming to terms with reality ’empty-handed’ after returning from China – ‘The eyes are horizontal, and the nose is vertical.’ This prompted my partner to tell me the story she read of Ikkyu (Rinzai zen master, 1394-1481) who placed a curving, twisted bonsai
-
Wandering the cityscape spaces
I always find interest in the variety of cityscape spaces, especially at twilight or night when it is easier not to discriminate between shapes. Atmosphere! Winter in Glasgow is not so bad after all. The moon shot I snapped reminds me of Dogen, who often used it as a metaphor for our experience and glimpses
-
Drifting Snows, Folded Forms
End of December 3 day trip to the Trossachs National Park Central Scotland 8 and a half hours walk, crampons on at around 400m Exhilarating but tough crunching through snow and ice Carrying materials, limited time for sculpture Drifting snow along the ridge from Ben Ledi to Ben Vane Snowmelt, deer and headtorches for walk back