C'est pas mon truc . . .

It's not my thing.

One of the more 'bof' - Gallic shrug - reactions to my exposition of paintings. I also had a comment yesterday that they should be more colourful. This is odd as most people have walked in and started back at the colourfulness of everything. Maybe it was time to get an eye test? or perhaps he shared the vision of the average dog - a rather grey spectrum according to the last research I read about this subject.

                                                              two not very colourful paintings

The vernissage (private view) went very well; lots of people, masterly improv music from Mark and Jérôme, wine from NOZ - I have blogged about Noz before - bizarre shop full of everything from dog chews to pants to baked beans to . . . wine, and often amazingly good wine; and since all my work is about recycling materials it seemed fitting to buy abandoned wine. And I sold enough paintings to make the whole event worthwhile. 

                                 Another fairly colourless painting underway in the gallery

Jérôme and Mark

So, two more days of sitting in that marvellous space wondering if the next person will be non-plussed or delighted by the work. I've had some fascinating visitors and some in depth conversations about environmental issues, recycled everything, my personal art process, and many questions about how long a painting takes - always challenging to answer.

I'd like to say thanks here to several people who made the event happen and happen in such a great way.

Mark - my partner in life and art, and jointly useless person at selling anything. He's been brilliant in all ways, and without him I certainly wouldn't have the art book we made before the expo.

Pierre, Hazel and Louise who were so generous with their time, and muscles, moving quantities of furniture and paintings into the space. we couldn't have done it without you!

And thanks to the Mairie of Saumur for letting us use this beautiful old chapel. What a space!

Essential viewing/listening

I think this is one of Nate's finest.

Please listen to this calm and helpful analysis of where we are now at this complicated time, and what we can all do moving forward, even if the steps are small. Please share too.

Being gripped 2

Following post a little while ago showing the start of the painting below. On waking after a rather complex and mainly worrying dream I became 'gripped' to illustrate some of the features of it. It has two names: 'We could have taken the second curve' after a book by Charles Handy (The Second Curve) in which he suggests that an intelligent and correctly functioning society would look at a point where a certain affluence and knowledge had been realised and would act on that in a sensible way - i.e let's plan for the next curve now we have enough; let's build resources and safety for the next generation. I'm obviously paraphrasing as I read the book some years ago and I'm not the best human for retaining all factual detail, but you'll probably get the notion.

The other name is 'Eat, Shop, Relax' following a post I wrote many years ago while sitting in a Ryanair waiting area and gawping at the info screen telling me to do just that. I think I drank some water, bought nothing, and felt extremely tense.

Hmm, very tricky to photograph as it's a tad long. Details below.

Being gripped

In my case by a want to create more art, and writing - a good thing! I think it's been a fallow period while I was concentrating on trying to get our B and B operational. It's almost there, and since we are having biblical amounts of rain currently, I can't venture out to try and redo (bodge) the window frames and shutters that our future guests will be sitting next to - when we've done the terrace area . . . another job. So, apart from dog duty, in tray garbage sorting, house work and all the usual life stuff I have found more time to write and paint.

With an exhibition booked in August - a good continual prod forward, and a desire to complete my third-in-the-series of Londonia so I can get it out to any potential agents/film people I'm busy, and yes, gripped!

Here's an outline sketch of my latest painting  - canvass courtesy of our local recycling emporium for two euros - a rather more apocalyptic work, but with positivity included . . .

Writers' process

We all have different approaches. I know one writer who plasters their sitting room wall with an A4 timeline featuring every chapter from one to however many have been planned, and then proceeds to write out everything that is going to occur in each chapter. I'm sort of in awe of this system, but also, not. It's a bit like playing chess. I'm hopeless at the game, being able to plan a couple of moves in advance before wondering how bats decided to hang upside down to sleep, why the mould in Roquefort cheese tastes delicious and not vile as you'd imagine it would, or how electricity really does arrive in a light switch, etc. Give me a game of Pictionary or anything that involves spontaneous action including drawing and laughing a lot, I'm yer dame.

I'm 10,000 words into the new book and although I thought this time I'd really plan stuff out . . . nope, not happening. The main character has stayed fairly consistant to what I had imagined at the outset but the secondary personage has completely morphed into a different sort of psychology, and actually, I like the way it's going. I once read an interview with Stephen King about his writing process, and it was gratifying to realise that he works in a similar way - the minor role housekeeper in one of his novels becoming a lead player which he seemed incapable of changing, for example. 

It can be a bit frustrating when trying to imagine the whole universe of a book but then perhaps it's interesting to get distracted by details along the way, and draw subconsciously on the internal library of visual and audible memories one stores away. Inevitably in the second draft, small and major things change and by then the useful framework is set, allowing a feeling of a certain sort of safe place to play around in, knowing the bulk of the serious work is done, the scenes set and the characters corralled . . . mostly. 

A small section from my latest  novel, and the third in the Londonia series.

                                                                        Kalistre O

The lock is glitchy again. I faff with the key remembering how easy it was before when with a finger touch the door would glide open. This hastily added slab of wood sits uncomfortably within the frame which in turn looks bizarre rammed into the pale grey plastic walls of my allotted room. That was during the last rounds of lec-fails. 

A whistling wood-o had done the rounds of all the sliding doors on this level and had hacked them out, mad max style and replaced them with oddly elegant, dark wood doors. I’d asked him where they had come from. He’d winked: ‘Some old manor house cross the line – they’d all been liminated.’ ‘From what?’ I’d asked. ‘UI generated pox, folks say. Or coudabeen bandits.’

I cross the corridor, weaving between blank-faced pairs of serfs heading towards the assembly hall, and knock on Sassy’s door. She must have sensed me as it opens immediately and her large serene eyes are staring at me in as a doe might have in a wood, when there were such things. I don’t say anything for a few ticks. The deer image is so strong I can smell it.

‘Yos ‘magining again,’ she goads, ‘y, blondy dictichary.’

‘Dictionary.’ I say. ‘Can’t stop it. It’s just the way my mind is. . .don’t you?’

‘What?’

‘Think about stuff outside of here? Trees, clouds, birds . . .what wind would feel like.’

                                                      https://kateahardy.com/

Mona Lisa revisited

 During a quest for old crockery to use at our Londonia book launch back in 2020, I discovered one of my top ten favourite charity shop finds - a Mona Lisa plate handprinted by someone who had obviously taken much time to emulate a favourite image, but, some elements were a little . . . odd, which of course made it so appealing. Said artist had also created a plate featuring the equally famous 'Arnolfini portrait' by Jan Van Eyck. Suppressing a whoop of delighted laughter I scooped them up, paid for them and the rest of the china and left to continue setting up the book launch.

After the event, I returned all the china and glasses etc to the Oxfam shop but kept the two plates, wrapping them with great care for my journey home. They then graced two kitchens and for a while a third and current kitchen until Madame Mona sadly met the tiled floor in many pieces after a nail gave way. We were both weirdly devastated, the plate being as unique as the great work itself. "No," I said, "There must be a way to save her!" Too many bits to piece back but I kept two pieces, found an old picture frame, added a load of grout when we were doing floor tiling and stuffed the bits into it. Mark shook his head at this weird grey mess and suggested the bin, but I could still imagine a future for the work of art.

More grout later, plus beads, ecclesiastical blue paint, bits of old postcards, gold paint ring/necklace etc and I think Leonardo would have been mildly impressed, or perhaps utterly horrified, or collapsed with laughter. 

New space, new projects

When looking around our new house, we had observed the small dusty room next to the bathroom and had thought - storage. But with a much needed new velux, and a better amount of light coming in it started to say - studio, or rather, small garret studio, which is what I like to create stuff in - a cocoon of a place full of collected, inspirational stones/postcards/books etc.

After unearthing completed paintings and works in progress I've amassed it all - or most of it as there's still stuff lurking in the garage - in the space and it's probably the best room I've had to work it - beats our bedroom at the last house . . .

Projects: I'm just finishing a commissioned painting, as ever laid on top of a recycling emporium picture, using recycled paints - I found a fantastic box full of acrylics at our local Emmaus; perfect timing as my last lot were fast reducing down to various non-inspiring browns and greens.

An idea for a novel is also stomping about in my head - the first threads of a prequel to Londonia, so I'll what it's like writing in there too. Think it'll work, especially with rain pattering on the window. Might have to install a mini wood burner to really get the feel, or perhaps just a kettle and tea apparatus.

https://kateahardy.com/

Paris wanderings

As is the case in most areas of France seemingly, we can't find a dentist . . . anywhere. I tried 25 in the bigger towns last time we had a semi-emergency - nothing. So, Paris it was. And how efficient the result was and is. We get the train to Montparnasse, cross over the windswept and rather desolate Montparnasse sq (which is apparently due for a 're-looking') and enter the centre de soins dentaire. This time was no exception in the efficiency line of things; carte vital noted, time for a pee and into the chair of terror - I am completely dentist phobic . . . Luckily for me, all was good, not so great for Mark who will have to return next week - bad, as in, work to be done, eek! but good as in he gets another day looking at art and architecture, and eating wonderful Indian food in the Gare du Nord sector.

It is an expense, the travel there and back, but as a cultural, and cheapish experience - if you go easy on the eateries - scarily expensive on the whole apart from our afore-mentioned favourite curry establishments, and the 'Bouillons' scattered around the city (once soup kitchens, and still very reasonable) - it's a trip we would so rarely make otherwise, and, as a pair of artists, it is vitally enriching. Mud, garden, wood fires, dog walks and own work is all great but broken up with city vistas, art and music, well, it's inspiration that nurtures ideas and furthers our various art forms.

                                                              Daftest eatery sign of the trip

We had the incredible luck this time of staying in an apartment a few meters from the Arc du Triomph rather than a scraggy Air B and B somewhere many metro stops out. A delightful couple who stayed in our own B and B during the summer extended hands of super generosity and invited us to stay for a weekend or a week! if we liked. We do like! But time away from the rambling house/garden/animals is complicated, so a weekend it was. 

our view . . .

I couldn't recall how many decades it was since I went in the Louvre so Mark bought online tickets and we duly queued after the dentist RDV. Some interesting conversations to be filed away such as from a large American family behind us:

Kid of about ten: "Mom . . . how long d'we have to be here? Can we get back to the hotel soon?"

Mom: "Look we're just gonna do the Mona Lisa, OK? then straight back!"

It must have cost them about 60 bucks for the experience of seeing a small enigmatic-looking woman gazing back at them from behind glass and through a forest of iPhones. Still . . . if you are doing the checklist I suppose that's one of the highlights along with the big, pointy metal construction and the church-on-hill experience. 

                                                          Best 16th century dog portrait

We spent a couple of hours staring at much sumptuous paintwork, mostly Northern European of the C16 and then I was ready to move on. Mark has the capacity to wander like an elegant grey and black attired crane through as many rooms as time will allow, stooping to inspect, or gazing at the bigger works. An hour, and I've had it. I usually fixate on one or two paintings and study them in detail - especially if there are dogs in them - marvelling at the techniques, and just appreciating the mere fact that these extraordinary works have survived for so long, and are hung in a gallery for us to marvel at. It's just too big and busy - the Louvre, for me. I prefer smaller galleries, even really small ones if there is an intriguing exhibition happening. And I like wandering around probably more than any other city experience - see many previous posts on the subject.

                                                                           Worst art

This trip's wanderings were mostly to the North East of Paris - a voyage to Nanterre - which our hosts, quite understandably, didn't understand when there is the whole of the glorious capital to explore. The reason for the derive was to visit the Tours Aillaud, or cloud towers. Constructed in the 70s by architect, Emille Aillaud, or rather, conceived by him, they are well worth visiting. Extraordinary, towering curved forms, eighteen of them, with landscaped areas and a giant mosaic serpent. The site I looked at before we went said - 'be very wary, it's a dangerous area', or similar fear-inducing words. Possibly at two in the morning if you turn up in a Maserati and slope about dripping in Dior, but it was quiet, peaceful and several locals asked if we were lost as we must have been looking suitably stunned, turning slowly around and staring upwards.

biggest mosaic serpent of the trip

We then walked towards the city centre via La Defence, soulless, yes, but some interesting buildings, fountains and views; then onto the gallery, fondation Louis Vuitton, situated on the edge of magnificent park/woodlands. This is a building to just spend a lot of time gawping at - the sheer madness and brilliance of such a structure; the amount of iron, steel, wood and glass, and the numbers of people who must have been involved in its construction. The pop art expo was good but my joints were suggesting a nice lie down might be a good idea, so we hiked back to our our flat and did just that, followed by an apéro dinatoire (drinks with biggish snacks) with our lovely hosts and a testing of the local Indian restaurant - excellent!

I got a fair bit of sketching done: Seven in the drizzly morning, standing in a bus shelter as the traffic thrummed around the arc du Triomphe, various metros - line 6 is especially great as it passes many landmarks, and the return to home journey as the Pais suburbs zipped passed my TGV window.

dampest sketch of the trip

  

Just

Such a hopeful and sometimes overoptimistic word . . . I'll just knock that wall down there and then we're going to put a pool in where the terrace is . . . the sort of thing our friend Alvin would say - and he'd somehow do it, successfully.

With my new website, we were just going to slide the new site over to the domain name, twiddle a few settings and it would all work. Nope. Two weeks of emails, phone calls and enlisting of much help from kind people - thank you Glynn . . . it finally has taken up residence on or in the net. Yes, I am a non spring chicken semi-luddite, and that's OK.

A few images from the site made, by Nick Lockett and myself, and a link below.

My extraordinary polymath musician husband, Mark Lockett, built the site.

https://kateahardy.com/

Phone separation and useful consequences

While trying to ensure that I didn't wake Mark at some crazy-early hour this morning, I insomniac-ly snuck out of bed, felt about for my phone on the bookshelf and  . . . no phone. Rather than putting on a light and thus really waking him, I went downstairs . . . without . . . the phone. As someone who likes a good rant about everyone being stuck to their screens it was a sobering moment to realise that I am fairly, or greatly- possibly, addicted too. I made tea and ignored the urge to go back upstairs and hunt about for it, instead, sat down with mug and a book I had scanned through off and on but had always been distracted by, not just the phone, but jobs and life generally. 

Book in question is a marvellous compendium of David Sedaris's diaries. Marvellous in that it's his work, but also the putting together of it with intriguing diary pages inserted into the main book. Three-quarters of an hour of inspiring reading and observation which has already had an influence, no -hate that word - a resonance in/within/around me and my ensuing work; rather than said amount of time used in staring at weird phishing emails, and gawping at someone working out with a chicken/singing dog/ferret in barbi outfit, etc on procrastination-o-gram. Thank you Nick for buying me the book and lugging it all the way from the UK - big tome!

Absorbing the past

My current series of paintings are all based on sketches done from train windows on London train journeys. I've been using the timed sketch idea for some years but decided to restrict the journeys to London as it's my main inspiration place for current and future writing ideas. As well as journeys the sketches can be from a static place - café windows a favourite, or a brief standing/crouching sketch if I have been captivated on a walk by a particular cluster of buildings, trees, etc.

As I mentioned before on this blog, I stopped painting for some time as I felt disturbed at having to purchase plastic (acrylic) paint in plastic tubes, and buying wood specifically to then cover it in paint. Having now decided to only buy 'second hand' paint from online sites such as gumtree/Vinted et al, and only using found wood or old pictures bought in recycling emporiums, I feel this to be ok, or as near as ok as possible until I perhaps make a sortie into using earth pigments and fallen trees.

The picture below is an extraordinary example of 50s/60s factory paintings (I assume); where someone has been trained to dab and smear, creating a homogenised version of a landscape, in this case one I find extremely eerie. It cost four euro in the many-times-on-this-blog-mentioned Emmaus, so someone rid themselves of something rather worrying, Emmaus made a bit, and I get a large and cheap canvas to work on - with some unready interesting textures which will work well with my next sketch - that of Greenwich and the dome structure, the two minute's limitation making some interesting swoops and lines.

I hope the previous painter - or their ghost won't mind be borrowing the surface; I find it interesting to absorb someone's forgotten brushstrokes into a new image. Would they have had a cooling mug of tea on their work station as I will no doubt have? and similar worries, fantasies, music or blankness running through their mind as they had worked.

Putting it all in one place

My stuff - years of it - manuscripts, drawings, finished books, short stories, back-burner ideas and paintings. My lovely brother had made me a website some years ago but I'd never really got to grips with how to update it so it did rather just sit there gathering internet webs and receiving the odd dubious comment. Thanks to a PR guy who I talked to as the audiobook was nearing completion I realised I had to make a functioning space where all my work could be viewed, and the site updated regularly.

Gripped with I'm sure I could do a site confidence, Mark did - with a lot of frustration and learning on the way. I'm super impressed with what he has created, along with some excellent portraiture and stills done by his cousin, Nick Lockett - ace photographer.

It's been a useful exercise for me too - trawling through boxes of pen and ink sketches, writing texts to accompany each page, and throwing out a lot of previously held-onto-for-no-real-reason stuff, and contacting people about use of audio clips, etc. One highlight of this being that we were given the right to use the recording of Anton Lesser reading my short story, The Hundred and Fifty-Eighth Book, which is just . . . delicious. Click here to listen to the marvellous Mr Lesser, and here for a preview of the site.

the 51st celebratory event of calf's head tasting

There's many things I love about living in France; one being the amount of local village 'fetes' that highlight a local product or foraged item such the 'cepe' mushroom, pumpkins, truffles, wine - bien sur!) giant croissants (less interesting - and there is a previous post about this somewhere), carrots, oysters, etc, etc, but . . . there are certain fetes I would definitely not wish to attend. 

I don't particularly like the idea of eating baby cow, especially having seen certain reportages on how most of them live before being terminated - actually not so much around here - there are plenty of meadows where cows munch lazily while their offspring amble over for a quick milk top-up or laze about in the grass. But baby cow's head . . . nope, not happening. It might be a vestige of a childhood memory where I came from school and found Mum attempting to cook half a calf's head in not-quite-big-enough aluminium casserole; or it might just be that it's rather a vile idea, let alone making a celebration out of it. However there must be many other folk who find the idea wonderful judging by the poster. 50 years of it! The famous fete of baby cow head.

Think I'll stick to the celebration of the humble carrot or tomato.

Don't suppose they will be serving it like this however . . . calf's head 'en tortue' - tortoise shape, I think.

Painting revisited

Recently, two visitors kindly remarked on a few of my languishing works of art dotted around the house; kindly, and with genuine interest on subject. technique etc. I felt the faint awakening of interest in paint applied to canvass - or rather wood in my case. I had partly stopped painting as writing had taken over, but also as I felt unsettled about using so much plastic - in the form of acrylic - the paint, plastic tubes et al. I'd vaguely thought about using earth, naturally made colour - onion skin, beetroot etc but writing was my key interest leaving little other time for paint experimentation. I've kept sketching, mainly when in cities - especially London, so have a good backlog of stuff to work from. 

So, thought I'd leap in between narrating the Londonia audiobook (nearly finished...) and running our B and B. This time I'm using only old board - mainly abandoned pictures found in our local recycling place, and 'second hand' paint - from online old stuff selling sites, or paint donated to said recycling place; stuff that would end up dried out and heading towards landfill. My pictures might too one day but I'd like to have a chance at selling a few. It's all tied in with the Londonia project so who knows . . . audiobook, art expo, film deal . . . :0)

  work in progress - train window London sketch

London sketch from 2011

From a sketch done in 2023 - Muswell Hill (Mossy Well)