Minor Events 2 (Unbidden)

All Images: Former Cattle Market Site, Nottingham, April 2017

Reclaim one frustrated hour in the ghost market…

(Gritted wind angling across repurposed cement meadows, where furtive Wagtails make neurotic darts.  An archaeology of slaughter - stockaded in the Magpies’ overlook, and a monument to the spectral herd.  The Union flags over the Government’s surplus.  England fades on a grimy pane.  A neglected display of the unwanted.

Hunker over subsiding cartons.  Itemise a catalogue of Auctioneer’s residuum.  A fellow despondent scavenger assessing storage solutions alongside.  Record a valise in brown vinyl – lost en route to an archipelago of discarded plastics.  Silvered splinters; Hidden Treasures; broken Love.  Tables are occasionally overturned.  Vacancy framed in the empty hearth.

The orphaned carriage shifts almost imperceptibly, on fully-functional wheels.  Derelict Minors, corroding nostalgic ‘round the back.  Primery and good in parts.  A static convoy of white Transit – Luton-boxed and chilled.  Alpha-Beta removes to the head of the directory.  The coffee chair awaits.  A bold sales pitch and cold storage.  Threefold refrigeration, overall.

Gaze through an aperture in concrete fascia.  Beyond: locked van doors - assailed with cold chisel and lump hammer; the enthusiasm of herpetologists, peering conspiratorially into trestled tubs.)

…Exit through a carnal gate - emerging into the world between the Incinerator and the Iremonger.

Mail Shots 7

Sneinton, Nottingham, January 2017

It's time for the mail-slot slot again.  These never really go anywhere, other than to top-up my prevailing love of formal geometry  and Modernist frontally.  Nevertheless, they're always there, in the background of nearly every urban photoshoot I conduct - and so my collection slowly grows.  These were captured over recent  months - mostly in Nottingham, (supplemented by one from my own Leicester back yard).

Central Nottingham, September 2016

They form a kind of, largely unexploited, notional sub-theme, at this stage.  Doubtless, one could construct a thesis around their symbolism as conduits of faltering, analogue communication, or as organs of admittance.  Somewhat simplistically, it's difficult not to read them as oral simulacra.  I'm also aware of an implied dialogue between notions of impassive closure and gaping vacuity.  That, in turn, seems to trigger a slew of related fantasies about the status of whatever spaces lie beyond.  Either way, I'm equally attracted to the smartly-painted-green-chequer-plate, and the rotted-plank-and-wire-basket iterations.  

Former Cattle Market Site, Nottingham, April 2017

The pretension and allusive prolixity of all this is deliberate and unashamed.  It is, however, equally valid to suggest that these images represent little more than some periodic recourse to a visual comfort zone.

West Leicester, April 2017

It also occurs to me that, in time, they might also come to form a surprisingly comprehensive catalogue of physical urban texture, revealed via the medium of building materials, and construction techniques.

Former Cattle Market Site, Nottingham, April 2017

Love In The Underpass (Trip Switch My Heart))

North West Leicester, April 2017

This is the first urban heart to feature here for quite a while.  Appropriately enough, I found it, earlier today, in my favourite subway/underpass system - beneath one of Leicester's main arteries.

Completed Painting: 'Untitled (From The New School) 5'

'Untitled (From The New School) 5', Acrylic & Paper Collage On Panel,
30 cm X 30 cm X 106 mm, 2017

Here's the fifth in the 'Untitled (From The New School' series of small panels.  There's nothing particularly new to say about the motivations behind the series as a whole, so I'll refer anyone wanting to catch up here, here, here and here.

I'm rather enjoying this deliberate, highly synthetic mode of painting.  It's the antithesis of any heroic painterly 'struggle' (which suits me fine), and certainly allows me to produce them fairly quickly.  Any occasional insecurities I might feel about it all being too easy, or a bit too much of a production line, are dispelled by remembering that it's the series as a whole that will really constitute any final statement, and that each of these little paintings is as much a component of a composite entity, as anything overly profound in its own right.

As far as this particular iteration goes, the main thing to say is that it was just plenty of fun to paint.  It occurs to me that 'fun' is some thing artists (or painters, at least), often neglect to talk about.  We're much more used to hearing about artistic quandaries, existential despair, or just the frustrations of wrestling an image into some form of resolution (then deciding it's no good after all).  Is that to stave off any risk of this stuff seeming too frivolous or facile, I wonder?

But, really, what's so wrong about admitting the simple pleasures to be found in simply balancing a composition or laying-down colours, or in discovering that an educated guess or happy accident create something that just 'works'?  My hunch is that, if the underlying idea is strong enough, or the artist is sincere enough in their motivations, admitting to some joy in the physical realisation might signify a healthy creative process, at least as much as all that traditional angst [1.].

So I'm not going to pretend I didn't enjoy harnessing those areas of random collage or painterly gesture, in a deliberately 'knowing' manner.  The magic 'reveal' of peeling away masking tape never gets old, and  laying down that flat field of cadmium red - well, that was an unalloyed, sensual delight.  Sue me...



[1.]:  In this context, I'm reminded of songwriter/comedian, Tim Minchin, and his song, 'Dark Side'.  Minchin is a man who seems perfectly happy to balance the profound with the mechanics of showbiz (and clearly sees no conflict in producing quality work whilst drawing a salary from the Disney Corp.).  The intro. to this performance of 'Dark Side'/ underlines that this stuff is all just artifice anyway.