Category Archives: Art
No Summer Exhibition for me…
The Royal Academy sent out a note inviting me to enter this years Summer Exhibition.
I have entered a paintings every year for the last 4 years and have decided to pass this year.
I have not painted anything new since we moved house and I have little faith in my previous works as the ones that were entered were rejected.
This isn't to say that I am put off entering again. I simply need to find time to sort out room in the house for my material and to get the inspiration and time to paint once again.
You can find out more about the Summer Exhibition here.
You can view some of my paintings on the Saatchi website.
Why doesn’t it rain on me..?
I visited the Rain Room installation with friends tonight as London's Barbican Centre.
Oddly it's a room where is constantly rains, inside. When you walk into the rain you don't get wet!
Paul enjoying himself in the Rain Room
It's a fascinating experience. Friends can be a meter away and it's raining heavy between you and yet you're both dry.
A must see if you are in London at the moment.
Lego as art
I find what people/artists are doing with Lego to be interesting and fun. This film takes three such artists and explores what the medium means to them an dhow they engage the viewer with just the standard plastic bricks.
I have to say though I find a couple of the artists to be a little bit creepy!
All New People
Last night we went to the Duke of York theatre in the West End to see Zach Braffs play All New People.
The play is written and starring the
Scrubs star and has a limited run in London.
It’s a play about four people whose circumstances bring them together. It’s a single set, single scene piece with no intermission (it’s not long at 90 minutes).
The reviews haw been either very good or very bad and I can see why.
The play is interesting and uses a good mix of media to tell the stories of the four characters and there are places we’re you really laugh out loud.
Sadly this isn’t enough to keep the momentum going and the play stumbles in sections. There are points where you wonder if the play should simply have been a 30 minute TV play as it does tend to be over before it’s begun. It feels like they made it longer to accommodate the audience.
The cast are very good and the inclusion of the woman from Torchwood is interesting as she has a complex character to play and pulls it off.
Braff seems to have stereotypes himself into the role of Jewish bumbling male but let’s face it that’s what he was good at in Scrubs.
It’s a fun play and has some interesting twists but it could have tried a little harder. The theatre was packed but I guess that was all the women who wanted to see Braff (who does stage door appearances after every performance!).
Not bad. Could try harder. 7/10
The French Cat
Shouldn’t that read “chat”?
What a gorgeous book. This would look lovely on our coffee table 
Restful day
It would seem the rest of the world has woken up and things are getting busier. At least we have the unseasonably milder and dry weather to help us out when not stuck in the office.
I have done my best (as I always do), to try to have a brief walk at lunch and this weekend Richard and I saved a day to get out and about.
Having managed to put all our appointments and chores into Saturday we ensured today has been left for us to both relax and have a quiet day. Although not as warm as it has been it was sunny so we got in the car and took the short drive over to Audley End.
We spent the best part of the morning exploring the grounds and enjoying the fact that there were only a handful of people there. It felt in some parts that we had the whole estate to ourselves and we had a great opportunity to explore.
Of course following our walk around the extensive grounds we stopped for a hot beverage and lunch before heading back home.
I have promised myself that I will keep up my 366 project this year (previous years haven’t been that successful) and have so far (I think), managed to upload an interesting photo each day this year. I know it’s only early days but I am already quite proud of my collection of snaps…
My photo’s already include ex prime ministers, the ever-changing London sky line, protest lines of demonstrators and dramatic neo-classical follies. Go on have a look!
I’ve decided to have another stab at the Royal Academies Summer Exhibition and have paid for my application. I am taking a gamble this year as I am not sure I will have time to create anything new therefore I will probably submit an existing work… I must be mad!
2011 as recorded on Instagram (id:trunkguy)
Our new home
Our new home Essex/Suffolk
Brandy "adjusting" to her new feeding times!
English Countryside
A year enjoyed with good friends
Saying goodbye to good friends (they moved to Australia)
Another year, another year older
Gorgeous seaside sunsets in Essex
My baby looking as handsome as ever on his birthday
Janet Jackson at the Royal Albert Hall
Experiencing new views of London
Sunny breaks in Spain (popular photo this one!)
A year of literature...
... and culture (The Most Incredible Thing, Ballet at Sadlers Wells)
Christmas as captured on Instagram!
Our Anniversary Weekend
It’s been a nice weekend and I would like to start by thanking those who remembered and sent congratulations and celebratory messages to Richard and I for our anniversary. It is madness to think that it has been five years since we tied the knot. I honestly don’t know where the time has gone!
Me with my iPhone 4s (and Siri)
I was toying with the idea and for a while agonised whether I would keep my iPhone 4 as I didn’t see there to be any problem with it. I decided in the end that I have worked so damn hard lately that I should and could treat myself – so I did.
I was originally intending on leaving Orange (crap signal at the new house and on the commute) and moving to 02. Sadly I have encountered a couple of surly 02 staff this week when asked if they had an iPhone 4S’s in stock. Richard suggested Vodafone (whom I originally dismissed as there handset price was slightly more) and I gave them a go.
The Vodafone store in Colchester could not have been more helpful and to top it off they had the 32Gb white model which I was coveting.
Now you may have seen some of Siri’s responses online but I wanted to share just this one with you as it made me chuckle. There are loads online to view though so I suggest you Google it. That or get an iPhone 4S – especially to ask Siri what to do when you need to dump a body!
Apple has come up trumps again and the Siri interface is as straightforward as you would expect from Apple, the memory bump really makes the phone and lot quicker, the signal is always on (and I don’t just think that’s cause I dumped Orange and the camera etc are brilliant.). Regardless of all the comments about me being an Apple fan boy this is one clever little device.
During Friday I managed to use some will power and not head home immediately. Instead I stuck with my plan and headed to Firstsite.
Firstsite is a fantastic new arts centre which is part of the regeneration of Colchester and is a world class gallery. It partners with the Tate galleries which means it’s full of works from Al Wei Wei, Andy Warhol etc that wouldn’t normally make it to provincial exhibitions.
I was lucky enough to obtain a Golden Ticket to the launch but couldn’t attend as we were in Plymouth at the time.
The light and airy interior of Firstsite
Of course there has been some local noise about such a thing and the typical over budget costs but this was born of a time when the country had money and if the likes of Liverpool, Hull and St Ives can have world class art venues then why not Essex or Colchester?
Of course I am a tiny bit biased as I now have two world class art galleries on my door step – Tate Modern across the road from the office and Firstsite at home
After a browse around Firstsite and a shopping trip to Sainsburys I headed home, sorted the house and cooked an anniversary meal for Richard and I. I cooked what has become an anniversary staple for us and we both throughly enjoyed the meal. In fact we turned in early as we were both absolutely stuffed!
Saturday actually followed a very similar routine to Friday. Principally (I believe), because Richard knew I didn’t feel that rested on Friday!
We went into town early and after some further deliberation Richard bit the bullet and went to Vodafone and signed up for an iPhone 4S – Saturday afternoon was spent with multiple conversations with Siri!
As I had recommended Firstsite we took a stroll over to the gallery in the morning where we enjoyed a coffee and a cake in Musa, the restaurant/cafe at Firstsite. It is as airy and as bright as the rest of the gallery and an excellent spot to take a load off and enjoy the panoramic view of Colchester.
On the walk back through town I took a number of snaps for Colchester24 – a public experiment to capture the town over a period of 24 hours. This is a document that already exists with the last one taking place in 1986 – it’d be great to know that one of my photographs may be included in their historical archive.
We chilled for a while in the afternoon with the help of Love Film before heading out our front door and on a country walk from the Meadow opposite the house. I switched on my GPS tracker and in 50 minutes we had managed approximately 3 miles of open countryside and public footpaths before ending up back at the house. It really is lovely to have this on our doorstep and with the October weather being so nice it’s great to be able to take advantage of it while we can.
Charter Wood opposite our house
So I think you will agree it’s been a nice relaxing weekend so far and as I write we still have the rest of Sunday to go
Once again… thanks!
Once again thank you to all of you who supported me in my endeavour to get my portrait of Richard in this years Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy in Piccadilly.
The Royal Academy had over 11,000 entries this year and unfortunately I was not accepted on this occasion.
I am a little disappointed obviously but I currently have much bigger things to worry about (more on that in a day or so I hope!).
Thanks to all of you who voted and helped me pick this piece to submit. Sadly our eyes are not the same as those of the Academies Judging Panel.
There is always next year and who knows it may be a case of third time lucky…
You can read about the voting and my journey to this years submission here.
