The Sound of Drawing

We just finished a week long project where we had to translate a music score and the sound of the music into a graphic representation. We had to show every single note.
My group got Beethoven's 'Moonlight Sonata' - the 1st movement.



Listening to it i didn't feel any particular emotion, other than i just wanted to lie there and carry on listening. It reminded me of watching Space Odyssey 2001 or one of the old Windows screensavers of a starfield - not much goes on but you go into a trance and can't tear your gaze away.

So above is one of my sketchbook pages - where i realised that the dynamics and visuals of constellations and the universe are very similar to musical notation. I used the below passage to organise the different notes by pitch and length - by translating the cosmic vocabulary into musical vocabulary.



This is a sketch from above of a downward spiral of all the bass clef staff notes. I chose mountain shapes because if you listen only to the bassline the notes carry through the whole bar usually and you are lead along - it's like letting your eyes wander over a mountain range - you don't jump from peak to peak, you follow all the conoturs in a long sweep. This is how the bass notes present themselves to the listener.
Where one mountain is shown to be inside another represents chords. The white solid mountains represent sharp notes.

I chose a spiral because for a few reasons:
1.it's continuing repetitive shape, and the piece of music is a continuing repetitive sound.
2. it encourages a trance-like gazing reaction from viewers.
3. it's a common feature within the cosmos, in arrangements of stars and galaxies and is a recogniseable shot in many space films.


In the workshop on the final day of the project we grouped together and my group made an installation. I assigned a colour to each note of the bass line and made every single one into a paper mountain. We used a blue/grey space colour scheme overall.

Waiting for photos...

La Ley De Derechos de La Madre Tierra

This is Barbie;
As a mass-produced, plastic (from crude oil), hyperreal, pop-culture, material product, she epitomises our modern capitalist society;
only concerned with currency gain and exchange, full of excess and materialist products that are manufactured to try and temporarily alleviate the boredom, repetion and stress of our money directed routine lives that is so out of touch with the natural environment it exploits. She's a symbol of evil!!!









Which is why she's been crucified on a tree.




This is Pachamama - The earth deity of indigenous Andean spiritual beliefs. She is a living entity that represents and 'is' the environment and is placed at the centre of all life. It is from this resurgence of this belief that Bolivia's new social and legal law springs: 'La Ley De Derechos de La Madre Tierra' - which gives nature and the environment equal rights to humans

http://www.pvpulse.com/en/news/world-news/bolivia-set-to-pass-historic-law-of-mother-earth-which-will-grant-nature-equal-rights-to-humans#.TmfIuc4Pp7j.facebook










And this is a quote from Elizabeth Oakes Smith in an address to 'Women's Rights' in 1852, calling for more rights for women to be legalized.
And this basically sums up what Bolivian president (an indigenous ex cocoa farmer) Evo Morales is saying - he's overhauling Bolivia's legal system and social construct, and hoping to be an example for the rest of the world to follow.






And this is a monument to mother nature sheltering you - lending you her home for your stay on earth:



A monument to naure's ultimate significance over humans at it's higher cosmic temporal position - humans have invented a numeric time perception system which is uninformed by the cosmos. Everything is minutes, hours, dates of a month. Months are named after Romans. This show's why human's live at such a fast pace, stressing themselves out and always counting down.
The Native American Indians named their 'months' by the physical manifestations and results of the seasons; The Month of the Strong Cold is January, for example.



A monument to mother nature's oxygen breathing gifts! - the birth and life of everything and everyone.









Dom and I made this - a hazel hurdle. An old man we bumped into near Abergavenny taught us how :)

O Superman - Laurie Anderson

Why money is smelly and green is swell and everyone should go outdoors

- grow lotsa veggies and don't shop at superstores.
- eat your roadkill (actually that's illegal, you can only eat someone else's. plus you shouldn't drive you should use public transport)
- wash in rainwater
- music is gooooood
- live under canvas - no tax no bills no rent

Natural Pigments

Branches & muslin coloured with paint I made from flour, water, sugar & paprika/talcum powder.

Gnarly Mama Nature and her Lover/Son

Bury my heart at Wounded Knee

A 21st Birthday present for my oldest friend. I decided she needed something spesh as i've never known her to be as old as 21 before, in all the years i've known her!

Nakey me becomes un-nakey and a dress is drawn :)

Bright town