NEW POST! A Mixture of Photos and Art.

Hello world. 

Finally, a new blog post. Sorry for the ridiculous delay. I had two illnesses, the second one came right after the first. I'm still having treatment for the second. This is the 17th week of  this illness, but I'm SO much better.

On with my October blog post. It's a varied mix of photo manipulation, photography, and one experimental photograph. The experimental one is a taster for some more of these in my next blog post. You will NOT have to wait a long time for that one, I already have it planned.

As always, if I don't feel an image needs me to say anything, then I won't!

OK, first images. Whilst I was unwell, I used the time to experiment with new ideas and learn new techniques. The last few months were quite painful but have not been wasted. One of the new ideas, (well, for me, that is) was to take some of my old photographs of buildings and try to redesign them. I created over 50 of these, the following are a small selection. The first one, is part of the stonework taken from a row of buildings called, Wainhouse Terrace. I'm very fond of this one.

Wainhouse Stonework 1

The next image was also created from one of my Wainhouse Terrace photos.

Impossible Building 1

Funhouse of Death

Fortifications

Double Trouble

Vertigo Attack

A few colour redesigned buildings now.

Control Tower

Office Blocks at Sunset

Shopping Precinct

Space Patrol Building

The last in "Redesigned Buildings", (in this post anyway) is another of my favourites.

Dyeworks

I've mentioned Gasometers and their demise in a previous post. They really are such photogenic structures. I decided to rework some of my photos of them. The triptych below, is one example.

Huddersfield Gasometer Triptych

Now for a few arty photographs:

Fishing Boat Wreak

Coastal Diptych

Beach Marks

Seaweed on Pebble

Twisted Tree 1

Sheffield Fountain 2

George - isn't he 

a handsome boy?

Two of my rock studies, both from Eve's Top quarry. Regular visitors to my blog will know that I've had a love of rocks, stone formations and boulders for many years. It comes from being brought up seeing them all around me since I was a baby. 

Eve's top quarry was the very last rockface I ever climbed. A long time ago, someone told me that he liked climbing. I asked if  he did Freestyle climbing, also called Free soloing, he said he did. Free soloing, is what it says, one climber on their own, without the aid of ropes or climbing equipment. I took him down to Eve's Top Quarry. It was about 8 minuets walk from where I lived. It's weathered Millstone Grit and 70 feet high, (a little over 21 m). The top of the quarry is very chossy. (A rock climbing term which describes a route or problem as dangerous, because of loose rock.) I chose the route and led the climb. At about 30 feet up (9 m) a rather nervous voice floated up. He was stuck, not only that, I could hear the rising edge in his voice. This is the start of what climbers call, "being gripped up", that is, so scared that you can't let go of the rock, or move at all. That's potentially very serious, as you realise. I told him how to get balanced and comfortable and NOT to look up or down, just breath slowly. After about five minutes of me "talking him down" (calming him) he was ready to get to the top. He never spoke of it again, neither did I. Obviously, even though I'd explained there would be no ropes, he didn't seem to understand. I didn't realise that at the time. There is a lesson to be learned here; ALWAYS be sure that the person with you, knows exactly what they are in for. You don't want to be ringing for an Air Ambulance.

After that primer, two photos of Eve's Top Quarry.

A small section of Eve's Top Quarry

Eve's Top study 1

Three final images. 

Very Old Tree Stump

Sea Holly

This last one, is just in time for Halloween.

Evil in the Church

Happy Halloween everybody. Stay safe and watch out for Goblins.

Gordon.

A mixture of photos, photo manipulations and digital art.

 Hi everyone

 I have, what I think is a nice mix of images in this post. I'm sure I've said the following before on this blog, however... If you take an object, for example, a functional one, or part of a ruined building, out of context, viewing it for it's shape and colour alone it can be seen as a work of art. Displaying unusual, or curious objects as ART, dates back to at least the 16th century. In the 1900s, artists began to include found objects into their own work, as an artistic statement. Nowadays, objects, or products with a non-art function, incorporated into art, are termed "readymades". 

Try this, look at, (say) an old door with badly peeled paint. Or a noticeboard with several layers of old posters showing on top of each other. Flick the little switch in your brain and imagine it with a frame around it, or perhaps on show in an art gallery. Do it a few times as you walk about, when shopping, or out for a stroll. You will find that part of your awareness of "things" has expanded.

The first image is dedicated to my friend Claire. Hi Claire, I hope you like it. It's the latest of my digital Op Art pieces.

Eastern Promise

I may as well stay with digital art for the moment. A couple of months ago, I was studying the De Stijl art movement, (Dutch for "The Style"). Ultimately, The Style became known as the Mondrian Style. I decided to try creating art in a similar manner. For those readers of my blog who may not be familiar with De Stijl, there is a nice introduction to it on Wikipedia at:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Stijl

One of the people involved in the movement, was an English woman called Marlow Moss. She was quite close to Mondrian, (one of the founders of De Stijl) and was probably the nearest thing to a friend he had. She was an interesting person and artist, helping to take De Stijl to the next level. She influenced the direction I took with my De Stijl work. For those interested in her, I strongly recommend the following book, available from eBay and Amazon. It's cheap, nice, pocket sized book. The eBay link is below, copy and paste into your browser.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/133681134006?epid=24034103247&hash=item1f200439b6:g:DF8AAOSwIa9gWU6d

The next three images are part of a set of twenty that I made. Sixteen of them are below in three groups, to avoid showing them all as separate images. My thanks to my friend Peter for suggesting it.

Six Linear Form Pieces

The next in this series is composed of three separate works. I started with the one on the left. Once finished, I decided to see if I could use the existing one, keeping all the elements of form and colour, evolving them into a new image. Once I'd completed the second one, I thought it would be nice to create a third, still based on the original image. When I was almost finished, I felt I should show some of the other colours used in later De Stijl work. I added sections in orange and green. Having gone this far, I saw that they should be combined as a triptych. I was very pleased with the result. Interestingly, a couple of people who have seen this one said it reminded them of Native American Indian Art. I can see why.

Triptych made from three Linear Form Pieces

The final ones in the De Stijl trio, were all inspired by Marlow Moss. Separately, each on them has it's own name. I decided to call the collection as shown below, by a single name, "Playground." The name was triggered by me having studied a selection of modern architectural designs for children's playgrounds.

Playground

Now to one of a series I'm working on called "Land Art". It's a bit of an arbitrary title, as the term already applies to the huge sculptures by artists like Henry Moore, Anthony Caro and others. In the way I'm using it, it really means objects I've come across as I'm out on photoshoots. They can be anything, from man-made retaining walls holding hillsides up, to objects abandoned or discarded by people. I created the image below, almost by accident. I came across a very long and high steel retaining wall by a roadside. I loved it straightaway, it reminded me of the sculptures by one of my favourite sculptors, Sir Anthony Caro. Once I uploaded the photos to my computer, I realised there was a set of images to be taken from them. I reworked them very subtly, keeping to their original appearance as close as possible. I chose the best and made them into a quadtych.

Four Variations on a Caro Form

A few more of my Land Art examples follow.

The first is one panel of an old door on Northgate, Halifax. There are several panels, all have become distressed by age. I'm going to go back to photograph some of the others. This one looked like a nice, textured, abstract painting to me.

Found Art Painting

The next is another Found Art painting. Again, I came across in Halifax. It was the bottom panel of an outside door, in an disused building. It looks like an abstract painting which has been left behind.

Ready Made Artwork

The next example of Land Art, is outside a small Tesco supermarket. I'd been looking at it for about 12 months, waiting for a sunny day, when there were no shoppers or cars about. Virtually all boxes like this - for electricity or telephone

connections - are dark green. The choice of this shade of blue, against the red brick was either a subconscious one by somebody, or a happy accident. I love this for what it is. I think it's an ignored, undervalued object, in just the right place. 

Blue Box

When the walls of old buildings start to sag, one way to give them structural reinforcement, is to use anchor plates. There are various names for these. Because they will be visible on the outside of a wall, many of them are quite decorative. A common one is a circular steel plate, in the UK these are known as "pattress plates". A few days ago, walking around the old parts of Halifax, I found two different pattress plates a few footsteps away from each other. One was simply a blank steel disk, the other is illustrated below. Having seen these two and also a cross shaped one, a star shaped one and a very ornate "S" shaped one in Norfolk, I decided I was going to see how many types I can find in my local area. I think I'm in danger of becoming an anorak. Oh no!

A pattress plate

Carrying on with Found Art, very near the place I came across the image above, I stumbled on the construction below. It was yet another, "I HAVE to photograph that" moment. It reminds me of the sort of work produced by the Bauhaus school. Simplicity. functionality and clean lines are just a few of the concepts behind their creations. The way the service pipes, cables, waste pipe, disused wooden plank and buttress on the right, are all set out, is to me, text book Bauhaus.

Bauhaus Lines

Now for two images taken from one of my Urban Exploration, or Urbex, trips. The first is very much a still life.

Bramble Sculpture

The second is a more dramatic Urbex image.

Neglect

Next is a selection of my recent works.They're a mixture of abstract, digital and photographic work. Some of the photos are montage, others, photo manipulation. Most of the following will not have any comments about them.

Geometric Fail

Liminal Gate

Green Demon

I spent a long time trying to get the next image to look like I wanted it to. I had one or two conversations about it with my good friend Roger. It was almost right, when I realised that the gates should look red hot at the edges of the mesh. It was the  final touch, a bit like the icing on a cake.

The Guardian of Hell

Crystalline Tree

The next one is a tribute to the abstract painter, Hans Hofmann.

Tone Poem For Hans Hofmann

Remember 1969?

Modern Architecture 1

The closing few images are all bright, or cheerful images.

Colour World Lilies

Carnation

Snow on Fall Spring Woods

She Tripped on the Pavement

A freaky one to finish with.

Windmill Stripes

And that's it for the moment. I have already decided on the content of my next post in a few weeks time. It will be all, or perhaps almost entirely all, photographs I've taken this year.

Stay safe everyone.

Gordon.

Abstract Art, Ubex, Urban Exploration, Photo montage, Photo manipulation.

 Hello world, here I am late with my blog post. I'm sorry to say that the continual messing about with the Covid regulations, by our idiot, half witted, prime minister, with his the repeated doubling back on, "His word" (HA!) has confused and depressed a LOT of people in England, including me. The public are confused as to what they are supposed to be doing. He's really good at saying, "This is what is going to happen next", only to announce a complete reversal of it, sometimes just a few hours later. The draconian laws he has put the country under, were supposed to be over, or significantly lessened, by mid April, (well, more or less). We are now informed that all this restriction of our isolation, misery, movements and freedom will carry on for yet another six months, when it will be reviewed, (every six months). I have a strong feeling that he would like to carry this on for a long, long time. Some of the new laws are turning England into a police surveillance state.  He never even got elected in the first place, what a situation! However, I've struggled with bouts of reactive depression of the, "What is the point of doing anything? I can't be bothered" sort. I keep fighting it off . Later, it sneaks up on me from behind. That's why I didn't post sooner. Anyway. I am trying to distance myself from it all and doing very well at it so far.  

So, my rant being over, I'll get on to the images in this post. This is going to be a mixed set of pictures. Having said I felt I couldn't be bothered doing anything, in my "clear" periods, I've been working out my frustrations in my art. I've created a great deal of it in the last three months, using digital techniques, photography and painting in oils and acrylics, (the latter are my all time favorite paint medium). Comments on individual pieces will be provided where needed.

I tend to feel that opening with a bold show of colour is alway good, especially in these strange times. The image below, "Moormires" is named after a place about half a mile from me (0.8 km). I often go for a walk down a place called Carr Hall Lane, then through Robber Dodge, which is a beech tree wood. Recently, I found a sign pointing the way to Moor Mires farm, I love the name. so I used it as it is on the signpost, not  in the way the farm is named. This walk is so lovely, except in very wet conditions, when it is incredibly muddy. It always uplifts me, so I decided to create an image which describes how it makes me feel - bright, happy and peaceful. This is it. 

Moormires

Colour Flow

Desert Threads

Emerging

Luminous Lizard

Excalibur Rising

Lyrical Dance

For those people who do not know, Ra was the name of the Egyptian sun God.  I was out on the moors one day, climbing a long, steep hill, in a remote place. I saw a track going off to the right. Following it, I discovered a small, stone building. The  area I was in, is a water collecting ground, feeding reservoirs. The building was constructed in an Egyptian style, probably late Victorian. There were no windows, just a small door. (Seen on the right). The shape like a door or window on the left side, had been sealed up a long time ago, judging by the style of the stonework. It was obviously a water board building. I couldn't hear any sound of pumping engines, so it didn't seem to be a pumping station. I couldn't hear running water either. I've no idea what it is for, or why they went to the trouble and expense of building it in this manner. It would have been a lot more costly than using the standard, utilitarian form the Victorians used. I decided it needed some dignity and created the picture below.

The Temple of Ra

I'm going to change the mood now, for a short while. I wanted to work out my dark moods and also, the mood of so many people around the world at the moment. The three following images are my response to Covid. The first relates to the sadness, isolation and deep uncertainty that many are feeling. The two that follow it, are my artistic impression of the virus itself.

How Dark Is My Life

The Plague Years

The Plague Years (Mutation)

Now for a few Urbex, (Urban Exploration) images. These were made using either photo montage, or computer manipulation. I injected some humour  into them with the titles.

After The Party

Ours Is A Nice House

The next one is a new technique for me, I've done two in this style. I'll show the second one in a later post. It was fiddly and time consuming to do and does not work with all photographs. Still, it was very rewarding for me.

Flyover

Urbex 1

The following three pictures are digital litho prints. By that, I mean pseudo lithography prints. I used some of my photos and manipulated them to get the look and feel of litho works. I used to do photochromic lithography in a studio and ultraviolet photolithography to make experimental silicon devices, as part of my job in Solid State physics. I've had a lot of experience with it, one way or another. I'm quite pleased with the result of these pseudo-litho images. "Ovenden Moor" (below) is my place of refuge. I go up there when the world becomes too big for me to cope with. I've said before in this blog, that there is a huge difference between loneliness and solitude. I love the solitude and peace I get from being up there on my own, even in rough, wet weather. I always come back home like a new man. The image below, is one of the peat bogs as it looked some weeks ago, when I was there. It was wet, with large areas of flooded ground. There was a strong, cold wind, blowing snow in my face. Wonderful rich, brown, deep, peat mud, sucked at my boots. It was as wild, bleak and somber as any good Yorkshireman could ask for. Oh, and I was the only person on the moor that day. It was Heaven!

Ovenden Moor

Blackley Hill, (below) can be seen down the valley, from the end of our street. I was pleased that this image did the hill justice, at least, as far as I'm concerned.

Blackley Hill

The piece titled, "River Bank" is from a photo of mine, of the River Calder, one mile (1.6km) down the valley from me.

River Bank

Now for some more experimental ones, on my part that is.

Candle in the Wind

Telescopic Tunnel

Over the last two months, I've been studying the art movement, "De Stijl". It was started in Holland by Theo Van Doesburg, Mondrian and several other artists. I've done a couple paintings in that style, which I call, "The Mondrian Style". I also produced quite a few computer generated ones in the style. In my next blog post, I shall show these. The image below is a photo manipulation of one of my "Mondrian" paintings and a photo I took on the Calder and Hebble canal, about a mile (1.6km) from me.

The Mondrian Stone

Recently, I bought a wonderful book of the painter Richard Mayhew's landscape paintings, titled "Transcendence". After looking through it twice, I was inspired to attempt a piece in his style. The image below is one of my results.

 

Autumn on the Canal

The last two pictures are the outcome of me using Richard Mayhew's work as a springboard for a new technique. I created the technique as I made the works. I've done it before, it's a sort of, "What would happen if I did such and such at this moment?" way of working. It's fun, but can result in some spectacular failures. I was lucky, I got some very nice results.

Under Alien Skies

Another picture using one of my photos of the Calder and Hebble canal. It's an endless source of  photographs and joy for me. 

Night on the Canal

Well, that's my first post on the blog this year completed. Tut, tut! I have most of the images for the next blog post ready. It shouldn't take too much work to get the stuff online. (Famous last words). *Smile*

Stay safe and look after each other.

Gordon.