Ragz

Bonjour, oh how it is so beautiful here at the moment. The sun has constantly been out and made me feel so much warmer, especially when I go cycling. A good distraction from when you're doing work indoors, still I shouldn't be complaining that much as I haven't really been doing that much work to the dismay of my teachers. Ho-hum what ya gonna doo?

So in appreciation of the beautiful weather my mumma and I took a trip down to Birmingham on Tuesday to go to the rag market to find exciting things for tres cheap! I went a little crazy and ended up buying fifteen rolls of tassels and trimmings, along with six individual tassels... What can I say? It was for work though! I'll be puttin' these tassels to good use for my Textiles, well for the research part anyway I don't know what I'll do with them after that. Probably weave them together into a massive woven shug-rug thing ooh that would be amazing!

To top this all off I have been listening to Cosmia by Joanna Newsom on a loop for the past twenty four hours, it's just amazing. Despite it being fourteen minutes long you feel more like your going on a journey with Miss Newsom as it just goes through so many different phases and mah! I love it. Enjoy your day everyone, I leave you in Joanna's capable hands.

Adulthood

Holy crap guys! Guess what happened yesterday. No wrong, guess again... Still wrong! You guys suck at this game. Just kid, but yesterday I turned 18, I know what a shocker I am now an adult. It was such an amazing birthday this year, I really feel like I have achieved something? Or at least crossed over to the dark side. These past three days have just been one big celebration and I have loved every moment of it. I am so lucky to have such hilarious and thoughtful friends, they are massive goofballs, but we have fun and yesterday was just fab. I don't really have much else to say just that I can't believe I am an adult (eep), and I have just had such a glorious weekend and some of the cards and presents I have received from my friends and family have actually made me well up to the point where I needed a second (heh).

What was also so lovely about my birthday was that I got to celebrate along with my rad bro Isaac as we share the same day'o'birth, and with Louis whose birthday is tomorrow, woohoo, we're all pubbin' it from now on.

Memories

So today I went on an art trip down to King's Road and Trafalgar Square to visit the Saatchi and National gallery. I find I am much more of a modern art person - however not going to far as conceptual, I need that shit explained! I still appreciate the tremendous dedication and skill it took hundreds of years ago to make such emotional and thought provoking pieces, as they are so glorious and the actual collections in the National Gallery are beautiful, with some of my favourite paintings.

When going to the Saatchi we had a small tour around some of the exhibitions they had revolving around the theme of 'body language' - Ooh I do love the Saatchi. Anyway there was one artist who just absolutely inspired me and just spoke to me in such a personal way that I went a bit crazy in the shop and now have an almost shrine dedicated to her work.

(my shrine)

Makiko Kudo is a contemporary Japanese artist whose oil paintings inhabit nostalgia and delicacy, each one emitting this dream world in which I found myself becoming lost in. With a stimulus of a place, a plant a sound she creates these huge pieces which encompass childhood memories. What I loved when having the talk was that she apparently never got rid of the initial marks she makes on the canvas, instead they very much become a part of the piece, building up vividness as her memories become stronger. I just can't get over that room and her art, both so pure and beautiful.

(mini freak out, but so beautiful and serine)

(aah, look at these amazing marks!)

*

Oh and my friend and I did blind contour drawing on the bus ride home and they actually turned out hilariously good:

*All paintings belong to Makiko Kudo 

Ukiyo-e

Oh wow, I am tired. I finally handed in my art coursework yesterday and it was just such a relief, I have not slept so well in quite a few weeks. I absolutely adored my coursework unit and am sad to finally be saying goodbye to it, still getting our exam today was exciting and I am looking forward to exploring all the tingz.

For our coursework we were allowed to chose what topic we wanted to focus on and I chose Japanese art and the history of their culture. Long story short I drew in everything I could think of about Japanese art, the prints, the garments the calligraphy and I just made one big ass (well it was only a metre tall) KIMONO:

Oh yus, I constructed this bad boy out of handmade paper, some of which I made some of which I bought, and just went crazy yo, I put mountains and flowers and water just all over this shiyat. I know I'm not explaining anything very well but I am so arted out right now that I can't even begin to talk about the symbolism and whatnot behind this. So here y'all can just take it in for the aesthetics. 

Bodz

Hey butts, I hope your weekend was satisfactory, mine had a weird beginning a tough middle and is resulting in a pleasant end, a lot of different emotions can be felt in 48 hours! I thought I'd just post a few photos of what my final Textiles product looked like, I am very pleased with it and the fact that I have given in all of my Textiles coursework on Friday is just weight lifting! I still have a chunk of my art to finish, however I am determined to get that semi done for tomorrow... Hopefully the teachers will understand.