Ides of Inktober. Can you help me rescue a "painting"?
Upon this Inktober ides eve, clocks tick at double pace
Late as I with all bandwagons, chamber on void of grace,
I'm known for not completing tasks or bowing out half way,
If I'll partake another day, sincerely I can't say,
It's not for lack of will or wish, not amotivation,
Intentions refuse to transmute, to that of causation,
I gave myself a simple task, a single minute thing,
With pen in hand I scrawled enthused, abet sharpie to bring,
But simple no longer applies, nothing achievable,
Scrawl, write or stitch once brought solace, now inconceivable.
The clock ticks on hours turned days, add to the list of fails,
Reminder of encumbrance, confined by that which ailes.
I've been working on another piece.
A large canvas.
I had intended to do a painting, but my hands are too unsteady, and I've never been much of a painter.
So as it happens, unaware of inktober, I went back to my trusty pens.
I fear I have created a monstrosity that can't be salvaged. But I thought I might give it a wash of colour.
I used this clock as an experiment of sorts, and gave it an ink wash.
Today's Inktober theme is clock.
I set mine at 3.
Three o'clock is not my friend. AM or PM. I hate 3 o'clock.
It was also a therapeutic process. I included a lot of the themes I had contained and restrained in the other piece.
That is driving me crazy!
Steemit. Can you help me pull this one together?
Any suggestions? Is there hope left in this?
The green way.
The idea sprung from a piece of old rail track that has been reopened with a light rail system.
It also serves as a nature corridor through inner urban Sydney and connects two waterways. Along the rail there has been rezoning and high rise developments and redevelopment of old mills and factories into cool exclusive apartments.
It is known as "The Greenway."
It seeks to sell both urban living and nature preservation.
In the middle of this urban landscape they have discovered a number of long nosed bandicoots. A rare and vulnerable native animal.
I am working with that idea of juxtaposition. that challenges if that is even possible. It is a desirable gentrified marketing notion. But is it possible to coexist? To have high rise and roadways, and indeed railway tracks share common space with a nature corridor?
The whole piece is a map of sorts. At the top is the iron cove (off Sydney harbour) the corridor runs down the middle, to the cooks river.
The lines that crisscross it represent the main arterial roads.
Any advice on how to rescue my poor bandicoot drawing and see it through to completion is most welcome.
I am also in need of suggestions for the focal point in the eye circle. That mess is currently a pencil scribble.
Are you kidding me it is not a monstrosity I absolutely love it!
P.S Picasso would be proud!
@tygertyger,
Tyger, I totally agree. I don't know much about visual art but I find it very compelling.
Quill
Well, this was only half finished when the date rolled round. The short listing date came and went for this piece too last week. I didn't really expect to be short listed, it was only half finished after all, and by that time I felt pretty OK about it. The contest got me creating. I never feel like I have achieved a finished piece. Anyway, when I realised that it had not been accepted I decided to go ahead and paint it. It needed some colour.
Last night I got a call from the gallery. They said, Your piece was shortlisted but you haven't dropped it off yet. Can you have it here tomorrow? 😂 😂
I did laugh. I was among half a dozen people who for some reason didn't receive the email. I told her about my situation.
I only entered for a distraction from life and that I paint for the sake of sanity only, and I'm not really an artist, but thanks for the call. Don't feel obliged to choose it, it is different from the original image.
She said painting for sanity is what all artists do. Can you have it here by 1030am tomorrow? 😂 😂 😂 😂 💃💃
So last night I scrambled to finish the half paint job, it was at an acceptable finished black and white stage when entered but the painting process is another story.
I've had a few hours sleep, and am actually due for a short stay admission at midday for a minor over night hospital thing. It's 5am, my son fell out of bed at 430 (perfect alarm clock), now I am up and waiting for my hands to work so I can go back over some sharpie lines before I drop it off on my way to a less pleasant work up. 😂
I came back to this thread, because the three of you know me. I don't need to write the whole background of this thing in order to convey the meaning. And I can thank the three of you for being here and each being a significant enriching element of my life. The colour in my black and white shattered map of where I dwell and used to live.
I am only colouring sections. I want to leave the majority black and white. And yes that is a proud rainbow of colour I have chosen quill. I thought about our slightly heated debate when I chose the rainbow. It represents the diverse constituent demographic of inner Sydney. Our local crossing in my neighbour that is usually black and white zebra crossing was decorated in chalk by local school kids in rainbow colours, they didn't call it pride, they called it diversity and inclusiveness. The council later painted it. Yes I wrote that to bait you quill. To bait you in a conversation with tyge no less.
But seriously. Thanks for your support and for believing in me. ❤
@girlbeforemirror,
Marg, a lot of life is about perspective. And marketing. Since this seems to happen a lot ... adapt ... and make it look like you're doing it on purpose. Like you've had a friggin' insight.
You start a new art genre called, "Pieces Half-Finished."
Everybody with a paint palette will be kicking themselves, "Shit ... how come I didn't think of that!? Instantly, 50% more efficient."
Marg, for the record, I'm not "anti-LGBT." I'm "anti-unsupported arguments" masquerading as "logic" and "fantasies" masquerading as "facts." A "hypothesis" is not a "theory" and an "opinion" is not "the truth." I attack ideology wherever I see it and with equal vigor. Here on Steemit, I've done the same respecting the ideological claims of "anarchists," including those who are Whales and Witnesses. I've done the same with respect to the claims of conspiracy theorists.
Moreover, I don't have a problem with LGBT having a rainbow flag. I do have a problems with their combining it, through defacement, with the American or Canadian or Australian National flags. I don't deface the National Flag for the cause of Alzheimer's research, you don't deface it for the cause of EDS research ... so why should they get to deface it for LGBT causes? They shouldn't.
BTW, I have several gay and lesbian friends who are similarly horrified by the antics they see at LGBT Pride Parades. If you look and act like a circus clown, don't be surprised when people treat you like a circus clown.
If you want me to take you seriously as a human being, walking around dressed like an idiot and carrying a placard saying, SODOMIZE ME! (It's Legal!) is not the way to do it. This does not make me anti-gay ... it makes me anti-idiot.
Quill
Hi
I don't think I need to explain to you my darling how frustrating it feels to have creativity trapped inside and a body that will not cooperate.
Yesterday was the deadline for this. I scratched it out with a sharpie lying down, and then forwarded the entry 6 minutes shy of the cut off.
I left it black and white... It couldn't do it... And I bundled in some what.
It wasn't about the damn painting, but it represents a lot. It is everything, I fail at everything, and we still haven't accustomed to this person I am. We are still looking to fix things, I am yet to adopt a mindset that this is me. But I can't do things, and pain is getting the best of me. If I take my son round the block or outside for half an hour, I pay for a week. Sometimes I think I got away with something, or I forget I can't do things, then my head turns it around and I question if I should try harder like some say I should. Rather than enjoy the window of a moment of function or less pain, I tell myself I should be like this all the time. Or the echo of judgement (my own projected through the words of others) grow in power and decibels. Then it all returns and I feel stupid. For not using the time when OK to be appreciative and for thinking it was gone because I covered it with medication to get up.
That is what the damn drawing represents.
So I fashioned a broken mirror to the face of the bandicoot. I pasted it over the community, the map of the community that I used to be a part of. 😂 I actually did. In my summary I wrote. This is a map of roads I know well. But I don't run on them anymore. Now I live on line. The broken mirror represents the person I am now and name I took from one of my favourite Picasso works Girl before a mirror.
This painting challenges a sense of existing / coexisting on several levels, and the notion of community and belonging. The fact it is incomplete perhaps speaks truths. It has a couple of indigenous symbols (which I included with careful thought as I'm not Koori ). I haven't ever used them, because it is like theft of culture and language, but I wanted the history of this place to be more than bandicoots and old mills. People have lived here over 60,000 years.
There are 29 nations in the Sydney area alone, they are sometimes referred to as The Eora nation, Eora meaning, From this place.
They are still here...
I know the feeling. Let me tell you that I loved both of your works as they were layered. The second spoke more to me. Even before I read your explanation for it, I saw it like a broken glass/mirror or a puzzle - a sort of reminder of a distant memory of a life that is now missed.
<3
Cool clock- I still need to start mine for today - but where to find the time!
Hello @girlbeforemirror, thank you for sharing this creative work! We just stopped by to say that you've been upvoted by the @creativecrypto magazine. The Creative Crypto is all about art on the blockchain and learning from creatives like you. Looking forward to crossing paths again soon. Steem on!