Eastern Suburbs Art Group

 In Melbourne recently I saw this social media ad and considered the idea too strange, especially for Sydney, where I live. In the end the experience was a bit disappointing but just the train trip was worthwhile. The displays were often interesting but not really what was promised. The museum is in a small street off a main drag. What impressed me about Collingwood is the lack of eateries. The suburb is relatively close to the city centre but I didn't even see a hamburger shop, though there was a kind of pub or hotel. Perhaps it was a bar. In contrast the city centre in Melbourne is crowded with restaurants and places to buy food, ice cream parlours and the like. What this means is anyone's guess, however it is clear that if you live in Collingwood and you want a kebab you have to go into town.

 When I waas down in Melbourne in January I saw this show, which sort of bookends the 'Dangerously Modern' show in Sydney at the same time. One show specifically about women photographers, but with a global perspective. The other show about women in Europe in the 1st Half of last century.  Writing about the Sydney show I said it was comprehensive, actually it was enormous. The guard knew how many works were on the walls. Aat the NGV I tried the same trick but the guard was not able to tell me. At the NGV there were many different subjects, as they were in the Sydney show. The photographs were sometimes portraits, urban landscapes, photos of children. A range of different things. The diversity of subjects was proof of the intensity with which the artists worked. And they were aware they were making art. The NGV show is still running if you want to see the works. When I was there it was sunny and warm and I stopped at a food van outside to get lunch. There was a fashion show on ...

These wall sculptures are evocative of space, they sort of create space but of course they are just sitting on a wall so they also do not. But the intent is there I think. At least this is what seemed to me to be going on. At one point in our discussion the artist referred furthermore (Ihadn't mentioned anything rleated at the time) to negative space. Mainly when I think of this phrase I think of a particular Romantic poet whose intent has never been fully understood even by most of the Elites. Also in this regard I think of Chinese painting, and because Pollard's work is mainly black (and since the gallery walls - most interior walls actually, these days - are white) my mind raced to pictures in ink of, say, carp or perhaps a wren on a slung branch. One day I will be in a position to revisit this misunderstood phrase alongside the artist, we both belong to the Tree Veneration Society. In the gallery I stayed talking for a while, probably most of an hour. THis is a good way to ...

 These luminous organic abstract works play with colour and texture. Colleen says the impasto ground goes on first, making shapes of texture suggestive of geological formations. Bright red or vivid green the canvases string colour along a wall. They are like Christmas decorations, unchallenging and intuitively interesting. I haven't worked out what it is about colour, but it is central to who we are. Humans live in a wold of colour, we use colour to communicate, to survive. Frances uses colour to entertain and this is perhaps the most rewarding use of colour there is.

Organised or at least publicised through a community art society I belong to, this show was only up for a few days. I dropped off the work on Thursday and the main event was the Friday, then I picked up the work on the Saturday. There was a talk in the church about Van Gogh's religiosity (his father was a Protestant pastor) which was very interesting because most of contemporary commentary on such painters is rigidly secular. The truth is that Van Gogh was alive 150 years ago. It's so amusing how we can easily give credence to the outdated ideas of Marx and Engels but willfully ignore the completely comprehensible ideas of people living even later than them. It only takes a few seconds to see the reason in this view. Marx was publishing in the 1850s and Van Gogh was painting in the 1880s but somehow Marx is more contemporary than Van Gogh. The absurdity is astonishing. But unfortunately this is the commonplace we worship these days. I was incredibly lucky to bump into two frien...

Being in the southern capital for a week I made time to see this show. Attendance was hardly exceptional, I queued up at morning with the doors opening. Not surprisingly I fixed on the colour, such as (below) Lydia Wegner. I also really liked (below) Cassandra bird's work. Again colour features strongly in these works. Alex Walker's (below) photoprints also strongly use colour. The out of focus really drew my eyes. From New Zealand Christian Dimick (below) reminded me of a Sydney artist and I mentioned this to the gallery staffer on the booth. We chatted for a minute or two. First nations artist Janet Koongotema (below) offered some more strong colour. Keturah Zimran is another First nations artist (below) and she uses the famous Basquiat crown in her compositions, which have a sort of pop sensibility which I liked. Once again coilour is strong. Another artist I liked was Henry Lewis (below) who sort of uses the same patch effect as me in my paramontages, or at least some of th...

An impressive show with over 200 works, so curators have basically hoovered up a majority perhaps of what is available in this category of art made in Europe by women at end of 19th and beginning of 20th centuries. These works are of high quality and there are some names I never learned before, which is a testament to how necessary this show is. I was struck by the variety of subject matter, though the Impresionists in the 1870s and around that time had also focused on domesitc scenes, for examples paintings of children. In the 'Dangerously Modern' show this necessary preoccupation is repeated. But there are other more traditionally masculine themes such as the nude or war, for example the painting (above) by Iso Rae, whose name I had not know previously. She was born in 1860 the label tells me, in Melbourne. A very improtant show; I thought the curators did a great job putting together such a large number of works from so many painters in this class.

This was my second solo show this year. We had a nice number of very friendly people including Edmund Thommen who did me the favour of taking some photos (see below). Christopher Michaels who also came on the day made a remark about the work to my left in the above photo. The work is Polyp 2, and contains a poem. I have known Christopher for years and we sometimes discuss philosophy, which I never read. So on the opening day he said something like You don't like philosophy but this poem sounds like it. Maybe it is time to write more. There were three series of works, all started since November last year when I was in Newcastle for the Rising Tide event. The polyp works (only one in this show due to size) use collage cutouts scanned and placed using software. I made the entire series of works only using two shapes.  There was also the ambiguity series which are photos with words layered over them, in fact the subject lines of the sorts of emails that men often get from (apparently) ...

This show at Hazlehurst Art Centre in Gymea. The opening was last week. I am in this show with a photomontage of photos taken during a road trip in 2008. Penny Simons held the talk (above photo) and a fairly good crowd attended on the day. It was a fun event and i found I was talking people through the work I made for the show, not once but several times. This an interesting exercise because I hadn't really discussed the work with anyone prior to the event. The Tree Veneration Society is mainly comprised of artists. The goal of the organisation is to celebrate trees, to go with the name. The range of works on display was quite surprising, even to me who had spent the month prior organising social media content for the show. I got to meet some people in the group I nhad not spoken to before, which was appealing. The show runs til next week.

I partly went to Melbourne to see this show and it did not disappoint. I was not really prepared for the contents of the show however, much of which is pretty boring stuff like silver ingots. I mean if you've seen one ingot you've seem them all, they are sort of like steel fingers in shape and size. Above photo shows some of the ingots, there is a ton of them. All nearly identical. But there are other items as well, including crafed containers. See photo below. This containers had in it a whole ot of other things, some glass some metal.  Each item was wrapped in cloth. I mean each item in the above container. Although most of the cloth had disintegrated as the container was like 1000 years old or something. But traces of cloth remained. Galloway is on the Ireland side of southwest Scotland, though the name actually sounds Irish. But it's not. The museum has a crafted sign showing silver trade routes, which was sort of cool. But not a whole ton of information.  There were ot...

The turnoff for the Foundation is large and has been especially constructed for the purpose of feeding traffic safely into the parking area, which is large. The gallery is located about three and a half hours' drive from Melbourne. NCEA has a spacious reception area that spills into a cafe. The tables are magenta and bottle green, which is very colourful and striking. The entry fee is small, or at least it was for the prize show I saw. The show didn’t really have a theme. A lot of the works in the prize exhibition are figurative, such as Jesse Wallace's 'Peekaboo' (above) which shows a fur seal, a species endemic to Australia. The show spaces are large and evidently suited not only to showing works but to accommodating events. I mean there is plenty of space for people to mingle and talk in comfort (see above photo). The facility is well organised and has a cafe as already mentioned, important when you have to go so far just to get to the gallery. The gallery is situate...

This little gallery is in a regional town about 3 hours' drive from Melboure. IT is a pretty part of the world and getting round Victoria is anyway pleasant becasue the landscape is so uniform. I apologise for not posting while away I just got back this morning, had a car wash to get the mud off the car, picked up mail, picked up framing, got some information from the art supply shop, and did other errands that needed doing. Gresham's tapestries are quite small but they are magnificent, full of colour and poise. For some reason they reminded me of banknotes, possibly the ndetail, which is astonishing. The gallery has several rooms but the Gresham show is nearest the front counter. The gallery does not sell works but staff can put you in touch with the artist if required.

The show was set up about a month ago and will come down next week. At the moment we are meeting people there by appointment only, so if you want to see the show please get in touch, I met friends there today and another man, whom I met at Rozelle Markets, also popped in briefly this morning. My friends have always been supportive of my practice. Each time at least they buy a book, one time a book of prose one time a book of poetry. At the markets I also sold paintings and a book each time. That is two weekends in a row. If anyone wants to see the Drummoyne show please get in touch and we can organise a time and date.