what was new 2004

OK, after this date I wrote nothing further in 2005. This was because of all the trials and tribulations I was experiencing. Namely, the death of my best friend, Matthew, the death of my Auntie Joyce and the death of Jack, my niece's unborn son. These combined with some health problems I was experiencing made me withdraw into myself. I had little enthusiasm or inclination to work on the website.

Besides those personal problems I was having more trouble with my web hosting company. They had morphed into a new company and all my access codes were changed and I was unable to actually log-in to my site to update pages anyway. As, I didn't have to will to sort matters out has meant that the site has stagnated. I apologise to anyone who was a regular viewer.

There were a couple of good points in terms of my artwork in 2005 though. I completed quite a few new abstract paintings at my "new" studio. These are mostly brightly coloured and use even more buttons and beads, as well as bangles and braceletes and lots of glitter. Strangely, these somewhat gaudy paintings seem to be in opposition to how I was feeling at the time. I really should have been painting black and heavy works!

Also, I absolutely adore my new digital camera which has given my a lot of inspiration and joy. The fruits of which will be put on-line in one form and another soon.

I also had an open studio exhibition which was successful in as much as there was a lot of positive reaction to the work and I sold two works! A small drawing and a computer print - both figurative. Not much money was exchanged but heck, it gave me a boost because it meant that people really do appreciate what I do.

Anyway, as I write this in early January 2006, I can say that I feel as though I have been put through the mill and have come out the other side in one piece. I am feeling more positive and I really hope 2006 will be a better year.

Thanks for listening.

28th June 2005
Another day. Another funeral. Jack was an innocent. He was just too fragile to live in this crazy, competitive, cruel world. It was decided, maybe he decided, that his life was to be short, so short that he didn't even get to see the outside world. He almost made it. Which made his passing even more difficult to cope with. Jack's coffin was tiny and white and his family and friends all threw a rose onto it in the grave. The vicar said that Jack was with God - like the baby Jesus. She read a story about big Jesus and how he dug kids while his disciples said "why?". There was a song by Céline Dion which was so appropriate - she certainly can soar. Anyhows, where his body is resting now is really beautiful. Jack, I never met you mate, but I know the effect you have had on my family. We will remember you.

After saying hello and goodbye to Jack I went to studio.

Yesterday, I moved, with my mate Andrew, my desk and computer and bits and books from home to the studio. Today, I reordered all the paintings and moved them about and set the desk and computer up. Whilst I have one less wall, I actually have made more space to work (paint) in and I now also have the mac set up too - in the studio!! It's brilliant. A positive move indeedy. In fact, I'm writing this entry in the studio now. I will post it later coz I don't have internet access here. It will have to set up my powerbook with my internet service provider. But, I'm going to leave them because I will get broadband at home and there are other providers out there that are doing broadband for the same price as I pay for dial-up.

25th June 2005

SUMMER SOLSTICE AND WEIRD BIG FULL MOON

MOVIN' ON

So it's been baking hot and then it poured. Glastonbury festival is a washout.

I am bubbling on, as one does. Trying to focus and move on. I'm in the process of moving my desk and computer to my studio and also some other stuff like the printer and scanner and books and mags. I don't want to have all this stuff in my room. I want my room to be my bedroom - not a room where I work (like on this website and other things), and use it as a space where I crash too. I need more space in my room and while there is hardly any spare at the studio, I'd prefer the studio to be cluttered and stuffed and not my room at home. At the moment my room is hardly conducive to bringing the ladies back. I want more space!! As I now have my laptop working. Hurray! I can use that at home and do all the scanning and printing work at the studio which I have felt a bit inhibited here (at home) coz it's too small really. It is going to be a good move. It makes sense to have a computer at the studio anyway seeing as it is an integral part of my work as an artist. I am taking part in the Open studios at Copperfield Road in november and I want to show some work on computer, because I will only have a small area to actually exhibit paintings. I'll probably show quicktime films of some work that I don't have room to display coz there in just no more room to spare coz I've filled it all!

So this weekend is shifting stuff time.

Bought this. On vinyl, of course. 4 records. WOW!!

The Godfathers of modern music

20th June 2005
I dunno if their is a god, or God even. I don't think (believe) there is. Why he, if this deity is indeed male, should allow such innocent suffering to people, good people, without seemingly to care, is incredible. Call it Nature, God, woteva, humans are powerless to its sheer disregard (disrespect) for our feelings. From the mind boggling destruction of tsunami to a still baby born at the end of term, the loss is often unspeakable, literally.

We have no power over the force of Nature, we all die, sooner, later or maybe tomorrow. A human being who decides, rationally, they believe, to take their own life, is having power over nature, I guess. Cocking the snook.

Yea, talking bollocks. SORRY!!

I am trying NOT to feeling sorry for myself - and for my friends and family, of course, but it's hard and I cry. Being positive, I fixed the flat roof at home. Well, I patched it and did a pretty good job I must say! I still have to paint another coat of waterproof paint, but the main bit's done, Before I had tarpaulin laid flat over the flat roof and weighted done with bricks and wood, but it still leaked. I had to wait until the hot weather to fix it properly. This weekend has been HOT. Hottest June since '76.

Planet Earth is getting mighty warm. Australia has got the worst drought in living memory. All, it seems, because, of the way we live, or aspire to live like. More countries wish to live the Capitalist way of life. Why shouldn't China want to life like The USA or Europe. No-one can stop that anyway. I just hope that the clean technology (which has been invented and is here and now), comes along sooner, rather than too late. Because, if we all want to live life now that a privilaged few do, (having a car, travelling by air, using many electrical devices), then we are surely dooming life on planet Earth as we know it. Gotta get those carbon air emissions down. Nuclear power gives off no co2, but it SUX big time and countries use them to make bombs - whatever they say. So, wind, wave, sun, earth, woteva is they way to go - if we wish to save ourselves and Earth.

I don't drive. Learned, but failed my test, and never tried again. So I've never had a car. London, these days, is so crowded with vehicles it's insane. Bicycle is the way to go. I see more and more cyclists. Good stuff.

I need a holiday. Where shall I fly to...?

13th June 2005
If my spelling is shit it is because I'm pissed. I'm drunk because I have just had more bad news and I needed to get skwiffy coz I can't take on board such stuff all at once. Life really does suck sometimes. human beings are so frail.

MONEY
MONEY
MONEY

12th June 2005
I had decided to make money and get rich. No longer am I going to be the poor struggling artist. From now I adopt a ruthless business approach to my art and website(s). It is promote, exhibit and sell, sell, sell. So I want you lot to buy, buy, buy my work.

This means that I am finally adding a new Painting of the Week. This painting is the first I am putting a price on and hoping to sell through my site. I have at last gotten around to getting something uploaded. This painting is much smaller than "Deeper Blue" - the previous Painting of the Week. It is called Pondlife and I painted it last year. You will need Paypal and a credit card to purchase it. I have made it so you can pay in pound sterling, US dollars, Canadian dollars, Japanese Yen, €uro and Australian dollars, but if you are interested in buying a painting using these currencies please email me first. Like the previous "Painting of the Week" this one may not actually be a week - although I do intend to change it much more often, especially as I now have made all the template pages and I just have to drop a differnet pic and info in. I had actually sorted all this out a couple of months back, but what with loads of stuff going on in this year of change, I never got around to it. However, after the trauma of late, I decided that I must be pro-active and actually try to achieve some of the goals I am always setting myself.

Also today, I added Google adsense ads to about 10 more pages (mainly intro pages). I am going to be rolling in it!

11th June 2005
SHIT HAPPENS

My best friend has just commited suicide a couple of weeks back. I'm not going to say anymore about it here, suffice to say, it has been, and still is, a very hard thing to deal with. Big B I love then and now and tomorrow and I'm really, really gonna miss you mate.

So, onto other matters.

I have added an experiment in Flash animation that I created a few months back. It is a kind of a personal artwork that I was not really sure I wanted to exhibit on the website. It is a weird joke. After what has just happened I thought "What the fuck".

YOU ARE MY MIND SLAVE

I have slightly modified the home page and changed the animation for a stripey one.

22nd May 2005
Added some links. I have bought a digital camera. Hope to have some shots up soon. Still working on the new content. Have been busy. I now have new work where I sit in front of a computer screen all day, so the last thing I wanna do is do more work on a computer when I get home - so I have been slow sorting out this new stuff.

13th April 2005
I have been working hard getting new content on the site - I just haven't uploaded it yet!! Watch this space.

21st March 2005
Added some links including one to a friend of mine, Belle, an artist who has just set up her uwn website with a little technical help from Dave, her husband. Belle paints London cityscapes, still lives and portraits.

Also added a link to http://www.artanddesignonline.com. They emailed me and I've put 4 pics up on their website - it's foc.

Got the new computer working after a day of trials and tribs sorting it out. HURRAY!!

Now I can really start to work on updating the website again, because I have space on the new harddrive to do stuffamd save files with no scratch disc problems. Yeah! AND I can now get Paypal again, which stopped working using IE5 and OS8.6. I am now using Netscape 7, which I'm gradually getting used to. but I like a lot although it has frozen a couple of times, and OS9.2.2. This means that I can now buy stuff on Ebay again at home without having to use an internet caff or using cheques. I can also now sell work off this website, which I have been meaning to do for ages and ages.

7th March 2005
Okay, I collected the new computer today, but I haven't set it up yet, so this one is still in use.

Started a journey again with steps 201 - 210. The last entry in this project was July 2003, so the traveller has had quite a rest. It is an ongoing journey that will be added to. A log, in other words.

1st March 2005
Today may well be the last entry written on this present computer.
I have put down a deposit on a used one of these:

gggggg

an Apple mac G4 466mhz, cd writer, 30gig hd. A shop in Essex Road, Islington in selling them at 225 nicker each. However, I'm getting two because my mate wants one too, so he's doing them at £210 each. I think they must be a job lot from some office or studios (they're not nicked, if that's what your thinking!). I'm getting the shop to fit a scsi card on mine because my slide scanner is scsi. He said he'd do one f.o.c. Which is nice of him. He says they will be tested. Just have to wait and see if they are okay. They have the last version of OS9 on them, but I may put panther on. Can't wait. Not sure what I will do with this old one I'm writing these very words in Dreamweaver on. The cd doesn't work, but it could be a loose connection. I may keep it as a back-up.


28th February 2005
I've added some more of these Google adsense ad banners to more pages - Angels, Photography and Links I like. See how they go. I have now made 57 cents since I started on the 17th of feb. I figured if I had more ads more people would press them. I prefer these to the ads I had on the site about 2 years ago, when I was doing those affialliated schemes, because they are targeted and also, if there are no ads available the put a public service (charity) ad instead. It makes the reluctant capitalist in me (putting commercial ads on my website) feel good. I will have to work out if they are worth it. I guess once they are up I don't need to do anything - just let the bucks flood in. :)

21st February 2005
Updated "This is Planet Earth intro". Added a fantastic new huge animation of big earth with stars rushing by. Added a few more globes and words. Also added about 9 more globes to THIS IS PLANET EARTH, some of them quite big. I put google adsense on THIS IS PLANET EARTH too. What I like about it is that it does public service ads as well as commercial ones. These are in keeping with I how kinda feel THIS IS PLANET EARTH is about. The caring for nature and each other. These usually appear as a big banner. The commercial ones are divided in four. They are usually about on-line stores selling globes or links to animated gif sites. The ones on the homepage seem mostly links to other artists. All these links are fine by me, I have no objection to them and I think the public service (charity) ads are excellent - I had no idea they were part of the scheme - I thought it was all commercial. I guess it is to do with how much traffic goes through a website. Since putting up adsense (a few days back) I have made 20 cents!! This vast commercial gain is a by product really of why I decided to to put adsense on. It's to do with getting links and google works a lot by number of links and also I think if I'm using their product I am more likely to get nearer the top of the listings, thereby attracting more people to my site.

When you view the earth as a small spinning disc like an astronaut would see it from space it makes you realise how just fragile it seems. We could quite easily spoil this amazing planet we share with its other lifeforms. We are told that if we don't start changing the way we are right now it seems that future generations will be living on a world devoid of much of flora and fauna we experience now. Millions of years of evolution changed in a 100 years because of man's impact on nature and the causation of global warming. Some might say that this is evolution, this destruction of our environment; it is a natural progression. We are a clever, destructive, ego-driven species. Our obsession with ourselves is unhealthy. We have started changing ourselves as well as our environment. More and more people use plastic surgery to change the way they look. Maybe once nanotechnology comes about, people will change themselves that way too. Robotics is another way humans like to recreate themselves. Homo Sapiens will become post-human sooner or later.

17th February 2005
Where did Jan and most of Feb go? I have appeared to have been in a coma for the last few weeks. I cannot recall anything from recent times. Treadmill world creates amnesia. Work, eat, sleep, round and around. Winter blues. Got to get back on track.

Actually, I have been at the studio a fair bit. I have made a few abstracts using glass beads which look good - very smooth. Some of these paintings have stamps in them too.

I am also working on a large painting using small canvas sheets similar to:


"Free stripes and you're out"

This actual painting has now changed since this slide was taken and put on-line. I have added some blobs and buttons to it, but I haven't updated the image yet. However it isn't that much different from this earlier version. I just wanted to use it as an illustration of the style the new big painting will be. Not sure when it will be finished, if ever.

I'm onto the 27th Cameo now. I am very pleased with the last one. At first I wasn't happy - I thought it was finished, but I came back to it and did some more work on it and now I think it looks great.

Sooner or later, I wiil get some pics up online of the recent work. This is only going to happen once I get my new computer going, coz this present one only has about 50mbs left and I'm unable to add anything more. I need a BIG harddrive!

Put a new animation on the homepage.

I have added Google adsense to the homepage and to This is Planet Earth intro. I will earn millions!!!

1st January 2005
Happy New Year!
This New Year is obviously tinged with great sadness for those people who's lives have been lost or destroyed by the earthquake / tsunami disaster in South East Asia. Like most people, I find it difficult to comprehend the unfolding tragic situation that is emerging from that part of the world. The pictures that I see on the television are shocking and heart-rending and it makes one feel helpless and impotent. However, the world's response is unparalleled in human history, with nations, aid agencies and individuals all contributing and helping these desperate people and countries affected. This link is for those people in the U.K. who wish to donate money towards the aid effort.
https://www.donate.bt.com/bt_form_dec.htm

Or call 0870 60 60 900 to make a telephone donation

On a lighter note, I wish to thank all those people who visit my site and get some enjoyment from it. Last year, I had a few personal problems which, although they may not be resolved, are not as all consuming as they once were. This meant that I wasn't able to devote as much time or input to the site as in previous years. Hopefully this new year will be better for me personally. I have new plans for the website. Basically an overhaul is required on the individual painting and photo pages. I want to make larger versions of the images available, especially as now many people have broadband, so the wait in downloading a bigger image is not as prohibitive. I also intend to sell the work online. I know, I've been wanting to do this for some time, but I now have the will to get this together. Also, some of the pages that don't work, I'll scrap or update, so keep tuned. Thanks once again, and I hope that you have a wonderful 2005.