Tuesday 19 March 2024

Has The Cycling Industry Lost Its Way? [trans_scribe]

 


Photo-Manipulation: March 2024


[Adjusted Video Transcription]:

Elite professional cyclists are often held up on a metaphorical and literal pedestal as an example of what all cyclists should do basically if the pros do it so should you however I'm gonna go counter that flow and give you three reasons why you shouldn't do what the pros do why are you tearing the bike community apart why and to be clear this isn't a knock against pro-cyclists or people that light that kind of writing I'm just simply staying that one particular style of writing shouldn't be the default lens through which we look at all of cycling the first reason you shouldn't do what a pro-cyclist does is they basically have different goals theirs is to compete in when races and bring home a pay cheque and make their sponsors happy and if that isn't your goal then you should probably take what they do with a grain of salt if your goal is to drop your kids off at school pick up some groceries go on a long and lazy meandering tour then it goes without saying you don't need to emulate what they're doing you don't need a carbon fibre bike you don't need to wear some crazy arrow helmet or a skin suit a lot of that is an unnecessary expense that's not going to benefit most cyclists and if anything it just acts as a barrier furthermore advice in training videos that information is great if you want to race and want to participate in that kind of writing but it shouldn't be the received wisdom for all people on the bike if your goal is to just ride around riding a bike shouldn't be like school where you work your way up to some kind of vague ideal and you graduate to a real cyclist and they give you an arrow helmet and clipless pedals just like how everyone who drives a car doesn't aspire to be an F1 racer to be a real driver some people just drive to get around to move their kids to do daily tasks this dovetails into another reason why you shouldn't do what the pros do in particular using the same equipment pro cyclists are train athletes that way like next to nothing they’re super flexible and what suits them so they can accomplish their goals doesn't make sense for a lot of people so don't feel that pressure to slam that stem right on super narrow high pressure tires unfortunately today you know most road bikes are actually road racing bikes or pretend racing bikes again to use the car analogy a lot of people are looking for an event or that affordable you know bare bones pickup truck to do tasks but most bike shops when you walk in there they're basically selling you know the equivalent of Formula One cars or Formula One car light give me a bike with a comfortable ride with tyres that aren't optimised just to go around a closed circuit track and whatever the bike equivalent of cupholders is that might be brazen for adventure nipples more cup holders and more better and the last reason why you shouldn't do what the pros do is because it's their job and it's not yours you don't want to turn something fun into a job do you just like any job cycling has a uniform and tools to accomplish that very specific task aero clothing and funny hats make sense in that context but if it's not your job and your pay cheque doesn't rely on your your cycling performance then don't worry about it again not knocking anyone that does this kind of writing or enjoys this kind of writing or wants to do this kind of writing but there is a big wide world of people that ride their bikes or want to get into cycling that are just kind of put-off and intimidated by this constant messaging it's a way we're able to keep the lights on quite literally you know we're not sponsored by any big cycling brands if you appreciate this independent voice.




Original Images: West Leicester, March 2024








Monday 11 March 2024

Completed Painting: 'space_time_07 [wave function]'

 


'space_time_07 [Wave Function]', Acrylics, Paper Collage, Ball Point Pen & Paint Pen on Panel,
300 mm x 300 mm, 2024


Here's the latest of my 'space_time' panels. As is often the case, anyone needing an explanation may find certain clues below...



"Conceptually, the Schrödinger equation is the quantum counterpart of Newton's second law in classical mechanics. Given a set of known initial conditions, Newton's second law makes a mathematical prediction as to what path a given physical system will take over time. The Schrödinger equation gives the evolution over time of a wave function, the quantum-mechanical characterization of an isolated physical system. The equation was postulated by Schrödinger based on a postulate of Louis de Broglie that all matter has an associated matter wave. The equation predicted bound states of the atom in agreement with experimental observations" [1.].



"Schrödinger himself suggested in 1952 that the different terms of a superposition evolving under the Schrödinger equation are 'not alternatives but all really happen simultaneously'. This has been interpreted as an early version of Everett's many-worlds interpretationThis interpretation, formulated independently in 1956, holds that all the possibilities described by quantum theory simultaneously occur in a multiverse composed of mostly independent parallel universes" [2.].




“In order to give an account of these practices [of everyday life], I have resorted to the category of ‘trajectory’. It was intended to suggest a temporal movement through space, that is, the unity of a diachronic succession of points through which it passes, and not the figure that these points form on a space that is supposed to be synchronic or achronic. Indeed, this ‘representation’ is insufficient, precisely because a trajectory is drawn, and time and movement are thus reduced to a line that can be seized as a whole by the eye and read in a single moment, as one projects onto a map the path taken by someone walking through a city. However useful this ‘flattening out’ may be, it transforms the temporal articulation of places into a spatial sequence of points. A graph takes the place of an operation. A reversible sign (one that can be read in both directions, once it is projected onto a map) is substituted for a practice indissociable from particular moments and ‘opportunities’, and thus irreversible (one cannot cannot go backwards in time, or have another chance at missed opportunities). It is thus a mark in place of acts, a relic in place of performances: it is only their remainder, the sign of their erasure. Such a projection postulates that it is possible to take the one (the mark) for the other (operations articulated on occasions). This is a quid pro quo typical of the reductions which a functionalist administration of space must make in order to be effective [3.].


West Leicester, January 2024



[1.] & [2.]: Wikipedia, 'Shrodinger Equation'.

[3.]: Michel de Certeau, 'The Practice of Everyday Life', Berkeley/L.A./London, University of California Press, 1984/1988.



Sunday 25 February 2024

Completed Paintings: 'space_time_05 [Undertaking]' & 'space_time_06 [Green Light]'

 


'space_time_05 [Undertaking]', Acrylics, Paper Collage, Paint Pen, Ballpoint Pen, Ink
& French Polish on Panel, 300 mm x 300 mm, 2024


Here are the latest of my 'space_time' panels, along with a few relatively facile clues. It doesn't feel like too much further explanation is necessary at this point. A few further insights into this little run of small-scale works can be found here, and here.














'space_time_06 [Green Light]', Acrylics, Paper Collage, Paint Pen, Ballpoint Pen, & Ink
on Panel, 300 mm x 300 mm, 2024













"Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter—to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther.... And one fine morning..." [1.]





Inner Ring Road, Leicester, February 2024


Inner Ring Road, Leicester, January 2024



[1.]:  F. Scott Fitzgerald, 'The Great Gatsby' London & Dublin, Penguin, 2000/1925



Saturday 20 January 2024

Completed Paintings: 'space_time_03 [Perdu]' & 'space_time_04 [Memento]'

 


'space_time_03 [Perdu]', Acrylics, Paper Collage, Screen Print Fragments, Paint Pen,
Ball-Point Pen, Ink & French Polish on Panel, 300 mm x 300 mm, 2024


My creative energies mostly turned towards painting as 2023 turned the corner into 2034, and these little panels have been appearing relatively rapidly (by my standards). As a body, they seem to be serving as a kind of test-bed for various motifs, which will (I hope/assume) continue to evolve and mutate as more such pieces appear. Those layered motifs (and texts) themselves represent the numerous theoretical and emotional responses which emerge, along with subsequent (possibly quite arbitrary or capricious) associations, as I repeatedly haunt the same relatively overlooked corner of inner Leicester.






So far, so customary. This is essentially the same modus operandi that I've adopted for many years now. It is clearly what I do. And, as cartography continues to play an active role just now, any amateur sleuth with access to Google maps can easily detect that the territory under examination is still that portion of West Leicester traditionally known as St Augustines/Blackfriars. Bordered by the River Soar to the west, and the inner gyratory road to the east - and with Great Central Street and the ghost of a long decommissioned rail route running through its heart, this little zone is one to which I have been drawn repeatedly for longer than I can remember. Indeed, numerous posts on here can attest to that.










I suppose this might lead one to  suspect that things have all just become a bit stuck - or even that I'm (literally) raking over the same old ground with diminishing returns. And yet, these little panels (along with the slightly larger associated works from last year) actually feel surprisingly fresh to me, just as my own responses to the terrain continue to provoke and delight me. I think this is for two key reasons.


'space_time_04 [Memento]',  Acrylics, Paper Collage, Screen Print Fragments, Ball-Point Pen,
Paint Pen, Ink, Spray Enamel & French Polish on Panel, 300 mm x 300 mm, 2024




Firstly, the neighbourhood itself has undergone such massive transformation and redevelopment over recent years (and continues to do so), that it hardly resembles the same landscape I traversed just five or ten years ago. As a result, the possible narratives and emotional responses it may have one engendered are themselves continually refreshed. The strata of history buried beneath newly-laid tarmac and paving may prevail, but the present (and future) are up for grabs in ways that could not have been predicted when I first began to perambulate there. As the titling of these panels attests, space and time are inextricably entangled, and past/present/future all remain nested within each other in a multi-dimensional exchange.

The very processes of transformation, along with their associated memories (real, imagined and constantly emerging), are the real 'subject' of the work, as much as anything more specifically defined. The lines of the street plan may remain (relatively) stable, but the spaces and flows between them are where the real drama lies.




The second point worth making relates to that idea of continual flux - and in particular to the manner in which my emotional responses and thought-processes may be activated during/following any given journey along well-trodden routes. As work from a decade ago demonstrates, the key process remains relatively unchanged. Back then however, the use of found texts was often enough to elicit a kind of ambiguous frisson, with any further shoe-horned associations being perhaps a little 'route one' (in my mind at least).

Since then, my readings into such relatively pop philosophical ideas as Hauntology and Psychogeography have themselves led to the somewhat more elevated ideas around Situationism or the even more deliciously abstruse writings of Deleuze & Guattari et al. If much of the stuff at the apparent Philosophical 'top-end' remains pretty obscure to me, it has, I believe, started to liberate the nature in which my own thought processes flow around those cartographical delineations. Key to this are the ideas of trajectory and the 'line of flight', as well as the notion of rhizomes as the preferred model for explaining experience and knowledge to ourselves.

If the Situationist notions of the 'drift' and the city as an intellectual/emotional playground essentially validate my own humble activities, then it is perhaps D&G who point to more organic, less 'organised' ways of freeing the mind once immersed within it. Any point at which one's feet/wheels/lens/attention come to rest is essentially just a taking-off point for ideas and associations which may fly-off in a million different directions at any given time. These may themselves entangle with each other in a potentially endless complex of shifting nodes and new combinations. Coincidence, chance, tangentiallity, transverse shifts and apparent arbitrariness are all grist to this mill. Essentially there is only one map, and any pathway (be it neural or geographic) might ultimately connect to another - as we move around it in a perpetual state of becoming. In this context, perhaps one might traverse the entire globe, or simply the same small patch (through time), to much the same effect - providing one remains openly engaged.








Or something like that...





Thursday 4 January 2024

Derelict Mirror (Happy-ish New Year)

 

All Images: Central Leicester, New Year's Day, 2024


The festivities are behind us, and it's time to peer trepidatiously into the future. I can't claim this was the most uplifting of Christmas/New Year periods, being largely characterised by yet more school-borne illness and a seemingly endless procession of Atlantic storms. Thankfully, the virus has departed, but each subsequent extreme weather event served to both lower the mood and raise the water levels - to the point where my own neighbourhood here in Leicester was subject to a full-on flood alert for a couple of days. I can only hope the immediate emergency is abated, and that we dodged a bullet here (others have not been so lucky) - not least as moving valuables upstairs and taking midnight walks to gauge nearby river levels is hardly a relaxing or creative way to spend one's precious leisure time.








Nevertheless, the creative life is about adapting to events as they present themselves, not as we would idealise them. Even between seemingly interminable downpours, there have been brief windows of photographic opportunity, and the chance to grab a bit of much-needed two-wheeled exercise. If life gives you economic/political gloom, environmental collapse, climatic catastrophe, illness and despondency - then find an attractively waterlogged bit of waste ground to symbolise the mood - that's my motto. I've passed by this portion of nondescript, derelict vacancy many times, but this time the standing water and briefly atmospheric illumination transformed it into something actually worth documenting.

To be sure, it's the kind of bleak subject-matter to which I'm often drawn, and perhaps captures the exhausted and demoralised mood of this particular nation, in several ways. Nevertheless, there's no denying its obscure beauty and wealth of visual texture. To simply observe and document is at least to engage, and creative endeavour is ultimately its own reward. To extract stimulation from the least promising circumstances is a generator of hope - and thus a political act in its own right.

Who knows? 2024 might even see a (marginally) less dysfunctional government replace the current criminal regime. That's if we can avoid a slide into full-on populist fascism, of course, but for now - let's look on the bright side...








Thursday 28 December 2023

Completed Paintings: 'space_time_01 [Le Temps]' & 'space_time_02 [Wood Gate]'

 

'space_time_01 [Le Temps]', Acrylics, Paint Pen, Paper Collage, Screen Print Fragments,
Ink, Ball-Point Pen & French Polish on Panel, 300 mm x 300 mm, 2023


Demands on my time and attention (from various directions), along with repeated bouts of minor ill-health, both intensified and multiplied towards the end of this year - making a degree of conscious time-management increasingly necessary. My choice has been largely to prioritise the continued production of new work over such distractions as social media and the like, with what spare time/energy remain. While the imperative to tell the world about my every move may have dwindled to the point where I currently experience regular impertinent/impatient elbow jogs from Instagram, there's some satisfaction in maintaining the generation of what I still regard as the real (i.e. physical) 'content'. 

Anyway, the festive period, and accompanying educational pause for breath, allow for a little end-of-year catch-up. 2023 ends with a clutch of modestly sized, multi-media panels in play, with the two shown here being the first to reach resolution.









These pieces originate in the same small zone of Leicester that has inspired a slowly-expanding body of work over the last couple of years. The general desire to connect specific, mapped territory, through time, with numerous layers of possible meaning and narrative has long been a constant in my work. It's also fair to say that some of the motifs, as well as the general collaged mixed-media approach adopted here, are hardly unfamiliar either. What does feel like an advancement is the increasingly oblique, intuitive, or simply impetuous, manner in which  mental/emotional/associative lines of flight are triggered by my repeated passage through certain points on the map. The intention is to allow this particular rhizome to continue to entangle itself through these little panels as 2023 turns the corner into 2024.


'space_time_02' [Wood Gate]', Acrylics, Paint Pen, Paper Collage, Screen Print Fragments, 
Ink, Ball-Point Pen & French Polish on Panel, 300 mm x 300 mm, 2023













Monday 27 November 2023

Completed Painting: 'Untitled (From The New School ) 17'


'Untitled (From The New School) 17', Acrylics & Adhesive Stars on Panel, 
300 mm x 300 mm x 106 mm, 2023


Here’s another recently completed ‘From The New School’ painting. The overall rationale behind this series was explained long ago and can be read elsewhere.  Suffice it to say, each one is intended to reflect some specific aspect of, or set of assumptions about, institutionalised education in visual/stylistic terms. In some cases, the focus has been relatively specific. In others, the themes are possibly a little more more generalised (or just based on my own intuitive responses to another day spent earning a crust on the school premises). Clearly, each one also acts as an opportunity to consciously try my hand at a different aesthetic trope or method of application (even if most revert to some form of hard-edged formalism by default).




 


In this case, the intention was to cheerfully embrace a form of kitsch, 1960s-style Pop naivety, possibly reminiscent of ‘Yellow Submarine’ or George Harrison’s clumsily-painted ‘Rocky’ guitar. Competing colours were juxtaposed on a whim, and masking of straight edges deliberately avoided. Brushwork showed little regard for surface refinement, and the general attitude was one of ‘if in doubt – stick something else in’ (including fluorescents, pearlescents and sparkly stars).





Harder rock sounds and Glam stomping had long since replaced lysergic nursery rhymes in the charts by the time I began my own secondary school career in the mid '70s . However, It's fair to say that some wistful memory of the psychedelic late 60’s (including a degree of vestigial utopianism) still lingered on in diluted form. That all seems a very long time ago, but even now, I  sometimes detect a whiff of incense and peppermints in some of the New-Agey ‘wellness’ agendas that have appeared in education of late, as a constrained attempt at strategic stress-relief. I’m also regularly surprised just how persistently a quaint, untutored primary-school sensibility lingers amongst many of our teenage charges - even as our harassed teachers struggle to instil the principles of colour-theory, composition and ‘The Formal Elements of Art’ in the limited time available to them.





 

Groovy (man)!