Monday 26 September 2016

Tupac Shakur - Violent, ODB Big Baby decks


Van Gogh styled, for this Tupac track from my favourite of his albums 1991's 2Pacalypse Now


There is little denying the prophetic and prescient message 25 years on. I get the same anger as from a lot of Bob Marley tracks like Looting and Burning. 
A little evidence marker...

2pac, cloudpine451, music

2pac





A few decks this time for big favourite ODB. I always loved this track, so rebellious with a thick slice of the ODB slang! Great skate track.





Saturday 24 September 2016

Allan Pettersson Symphonies, Stockhausen - Momente, The Czars, MGMT - Metanoia and The Notwist - Your Signs


It's great to make time for some images for favourite music.
Here are some for (numbered) Pettersson symphonies. His 16th is so amazing and jazzy I have it on a loop sometimes.


allan pettersson, cloudpine451, music











stockhausen, momente, cloudpine451, music

Karlheinz Stockhausen - Momente          I do not understand it but that is why I love it. Spaceships are in order for Stockhausen.







czars, cloudpine451, music

czars, cloudpine451, music

The Czars - (Best of) and jadewashed interior art. I'm new to the Czars, John Grant's voice cuts through you! This nautical artwork came to me while listening.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDSO3IVrFsA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypEPTYGl_KU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Szhd5UVEfs

It would be useless not to include Grant's famous Sigourney Weaver song-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6iWtIFJ-og





                         
MGMT - Metanoia (Jadewashed)  MGMT know how to keep me interested. The transformed chords of the synth at the end of Metanoia bring happy smiles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1BnEdnzLEA







 The Notwist - Your Signs from the album Shrink.  ....So jazzy, so good with a few ciders.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kv-ZT91dG8E

No art for this one, but one of the most sublime things I have heard from a trumpet! I remember watching this on telly on the night and being awestruck. Qigang was a pupil of Messiaen and it shines through here, the master would have been so proud! Bravo Alison Balsom!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYFJZKSExPU


Tuesday 20 September 2016

Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials - Ruta Skadi attacked by a Spectre (2008)

One of my drawings from 2008, scanned for the first time. This was the best drawing from the books I made. I saw the spectres as these almost transparent abstract points, there are more images in an earlier post ( just type spectres in the search box).

Witch, His Dark Materials

And here inverted.





Monday 19 September 2016

More studies for a Brutalist structure



These are the remaining sketchbook drawings. I have an idea now for the final piece. 


Elevator entrance/exit.


The highway.


Ideas for foundations.


Residents.


An art studio.


Balcony with hexagonal feature.





Saturday 3 September 2016

Studies for a huge Brutalist structure

2015 - 2016 has been a treat for fans of Brutalist architecture. With Ben Wheatley's big screen vision of JG Ballard's 'High Rise', Jonathan Meade's two part 'Bunkers, Brutalism and Bloodymindedness' (see Vimeo) and the release of Barnabas Calder's book 'Raw Concrete' there has been a solid attempt to re-appraise the style. Calder goes as far as to say-
'I have slowly come to believe that these buildings not only match the architecture of any other period, but that they can win out'
His book argues that Brutalism has been our civilizations most optimistic and confident architecture. Wheatley's marvellous film (and the Ballard book), use the building as a cypher of UK society in the 70's much more than any criticism of the Brutalist style.

I love concrete, and also crystal clusters, so I am making a large drawing of a really vast residential complex based on the shape of crystals. I want to keep the shapes of the crystals and add as little else as possible.

In making a large image of a huge, sublime structure I arranged crystal clusters in three rows which are the forms I will draw. They lie on vast man made hills. Imagine the low points of the hills as roads that run low, underneath the structure. The buildings will lurch over the road at different angles. I will scale up from the model and from photos.




Next is a sketchbook before starting the poster sized image. These are to build up a set of ideas and a mood.













Whatever angle the building is at, the floors are all level.





I love dirty concrete!




No candidates suffering vertigo need apply for residence.





I still need to complete the sketches before I know what to do with the final drawing. 

Below is the now demolished Sheffield Polytechnic Art Block C on Psalter Lane, it's Brutalist style had a big impact on me when I studied there in 1992. The internal studios were vast.



Another example of Sheffield's Brutalist Architecture now demolished. Kelvin Flats, where a friend lived in 1991, again I remember the maisonette was very large by the standards of recent housing. It had an long lounge room almost width of the block.


The recently demolished Castle Market in Sheffield.


Three survivors in the style, Sheffield University's Geography Department,


the sub-station at the bottom of the Moor.


The Magistrates court. Please send me any photos of Brutalist architecture near you!




Internationally my favorite examples are the Wotruba Church in Austria, for the randomness of the blocks.



And adding a little greenery never hurts, like here in Seattle.


Not sure where this is, but the foliage is a dream with the concrete, I will have to add to my final crystal buildings.