Getting back in the swing

It all seems so sweetly natural...to have the internet back, to be able to blog again, to read and reply to emails. And yet I've waited almost two whole tedious months for this.

Its dragged, and yet, it's gone quickly too. As is the way with the passing of time.....

Only two months left of the year and its been such a massive year for me, the B I G G E S T and most challenging ever. Sorting out my life, saying goodbye to the past and moving on, to the future. A future that may be partly uncertain, but hopefully full of all sorts of interesting mentally and physically stimulating things, and fascinating people and new experiences, too.

It is a future with good friendships from the past, some old, some newer. There is a strength within those friendships that feeds various facets of my persona. Some vanilla, some less so. The Guild of Erotic Artists continues to be a good base for me, and I value the help and support I get from the members. It has been with deep regret that I have been unable to exhibit at Erotica at Olympia this year, partly through constraints of time, partly through my personal circumstances, partly because I need to fully concentrate on doing it and can't at the moment, and partly due to the large financial outlay it involves. But, as in all things, maybe when one door can't be opened, another opens in its place, and I am always happy to peek through other doorways to see where they might lead me.

Infact, I did just that, on Thursday.

It was a new doorway, a big one, one full of promises of exciting things to an Erotic Artist........

...and through that doorway I met someone...... a woman...... a beautiful dark haired woman.....who inspires me to want to paint again. She may even be my next muse. But we need to talk further about that subject, and I don't know if our paths will cross again, but it they do, I shall draw her, with the greatest of pleasure........

I'm Back!!!

I'm back on line, how good is that!!!!!

YAY!!!!

Autumn light and life in shadows

I went for a walk around my new village yesterday. I've done it a few times, but not with a camera, and thought that in the twenty minutes that the gentle walk normally takes, I'd find a few interesting things to capture.

But, I was well out with my assumptions.

It took two hours! Two wonderful hours of being enthralled with light. Crisp clear light, with the golden glow of Autumn. But, added to that, was the joy of shadows and light working together and creating their magic. That, gives the land a whole new look. It adds contours and interest to create new interest in the picture. I know that going out with a camera when the light is flat and grey, is really a waste of time, as the whole image will only be of mid tones - and how can you get excited with sullen greys and sage greens, sad yellows, and dismal browns. I certainly can't! But when the light is crisp and bright, the sun is shining, and the Autumn leaves are bright with shining gold, Indian yellows, burnt siennas, dramatic scarlets, rich purple shadows on cream paths, the shadows come alive and become a thing of beauty in themselves, the way they create patterns on the stone walls, the paths and the warm red brick walls of old cottages. Even the colour white takes on a new life of its own - and becomes a shimmering brightness, or descends to a rich cobalt blue in deep shadow.

The place I was most fascinated with, though, was the church. Its old, and very solid, but pretty, small but full of character. I don't know how old it is, but without searching hard I found a gravestone with the year 1728 on it, but there were far older gravestones, with faded lettering worn with weathering and mossy decay. The sunlight and shadows on the stonework of the church filled me with delight, and the vertical graves themselves added extra interest with the low sun on them, creating more shadows and sharp relief against the damp sap green grass.

I shall be pleased to get the internet back. I've not had it at the new house, and I've been there seven weeks. So, I can't show you the images, I can only describe them at the moment. But, they are so inspirational. I want to paint them. And I will. Soon. I want others to see what I saw, to accompany me on that wonderful walk full of bright wonder and stunning light.........

Snippets

I had two very enjoyable days over last weekend. But the character of each day differed greatly from the other.

On the Saturday the snippets of conversation were "Oh, that's a good picture, Jackie" ..."This is fun, making these prints, isn't it!"........."I love your use of floral shapes"........."I'm covered in black ink, but I think it'll wash off".....

But, on Sunday, the subject matter was a little, well, different...............

"Of course you have to be careful about having paintings hanging at sex clubs, incase the play gets a bit....boisterous"

"We're swingers, and stayed with other swingers last night"

"I've got a load of body casting gunge in me bits, and I'm going to need a tweezer to get it all out!"

"And these three girls wrestle semi-naked in baby oil, and cover each other in whipped ceam"
To which a male member of the assembled group called out "I'll lick it off!" and his wife agreed "and ME!"

Mmm.... now, which day did I prefer........................???

Cut off from the world

Frustrations seem to add up, once they get started!

Since I've moved into my new house - six weeks ago - I've been trying (very hard!) to get a phone line installed, and the internet set up. I am a patient person, and understand that these things "take time" and am happy to wait whilst cogs whirl away behind the scenes with telecommunication companies.

So - to sum up,  so far  - I have rung one telecom company (a colour!) who said they couldn't set up the internet for me, as they couldn't take over the line so I had to contact another telecom company who I could rent the line from, on a monthly basis, and when I had done that, the other company would take it over...

I did that, and had to wait 10 working days for that to be set up.

Then, when it SHOULD have been set up, there was a problem on the line, and I had to wait for an engineer to come out, to sort it out. This took six days. It seemed to work at that point.....

Then, I rang the new telecomunications company (not the first one, as I want fibre optic internet, as its the only way to get a decent internet connection at this address). They took my details and told me that it would be another ten days (on top of the original ten days wait) to set it up.

The date was arranged. For yesterday.

I waited in for the five hours alloted for the internet engineer to arrive. He didn't come. I rang the company to find out WHY he hadn't come, when they had sent the equipment he was to install two days beforehand. This took a whole HOUR on the fucking phone, and three people, to tell me that the order had been cancelled. Oh, Really? WHO BY????!!!!! (not by me, and not by the telephone company!). How can it be that a third party can cancel my internet connection? I don't get this!!!!

To set it up again, will take, wait for it, SEVENTEEN more fucking days!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And, they're looking into it. Too bloody right, they are!!!!

And, just to add to the frustrations of the saga. The phone only works to ring OUT, and will only ring ONCE on incoming calls so if I don't answer in one frantic lunge on the first ring, it gets cut off! So, no one can leave a message on the answer phone.

And just whilst I'm having a whinge on this subject, the mobile signal is intermittent at the house, so I have to be on the upper floors to make and receive calls - not on the ground floor at all. So, when I rang the telecom company today to report the fault on the line, I had to explain ALL of the above first, so that they understood my problems. Her response was for me to take a screwdriver, remove the cover on the phone socket and check if the various phones within the house work there. Ok, but in doing it, the whole part of the phone socket came away in various pieces, and part of it is now buckled. (and I am a practical person who is used to using screwdrivers!)  So, now an engineer has to come out to check what the problem is - and if the fault is within the house, then I've got to pay £129 for it to be rectified!!!! Including, mending the broken phone socket - BUT IT ONLY GOT BROKEN BECAUSE I DID WHAT YOU TOLD ME TO DO !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fucking frustation!!!!!!!!!!!

(Count to ten. Count again.)

So, to sum up:

After six weeks of being in the house, I have half a mobile signal, a broken phone that rings out, and only in on one ring for anyone ringing me, no internet, various bits of equipment that don't work, and a huge feeling of being cut off from the world!!!! I can only use the internet at other peoples houses......

There's a lot to be said for carrier pigeons.........................

Finding love

Buying a new house means a lot of blank walls suddenly open themselves up to new possibilities.

But, that all has to wait until the fundamental stuff has been done. Things like putting saucepans and crockery in kitchen cupboards, toothpaste and soaps in the bathroom, hanging clothes in wardrobes, placing books on book shelves (particularly when my collection of books includes general non fiction, fiction, cookery books, gardening books, art books, travel books, and of course an extensive collection of erotic books!).

As well as filling cupboards and draws, I've had to go out and buy a lot of cupboards and draws!  So that in itself takes time. Infact Ikea rang me this week to see what the problem was, their shares had suddenly slumped because I hadn't paid them a visit (and when I say "pay them a visit", I don't think I've managed to made any of my visits last less then four hours!).

So, it all takes time.

And in the background are phone calls to the phone company (don't get me started on that one! Another soap opera in the making!), the service providers for electricity, gas, water, insurance, council tax, etc etc.

And of course, the walls in the rooms of the house remain blank whilst this is going on.

That's ok, I don't mind.

But, its odd for me too. Because I'm used to pictures being on walls. 

So, now that all the other stuff has been done, I can do the job that is so natural to me.
Placing pictures.

I'm fortuante, in that the new house doesn't need decorating. And I LIKE decorating. I know most people don't. But I do!

All the walls are a pretty, pale, welcoming cream. Innocuous pale cream. Pale, warm, invitingly open to being dressed in pictures.
My pictures.

I've looked at those walls for the last five weeks. Blank walls.

But last night, I put some pictures up.


And  I could see the whole importance of pictures. Because, when you look at blank walls, you see ....nothing. But, when you look at a picture hanging on the wall, you look INTO it - into the depths of it, and get lost within the image. And it doesn't matter if the image is of a still life, animals, of a landscape, of a person or people, whether it's erotic or not, you put yourself within that frame, and something within that frame should connect with you. You should feeeeel something of the image, and it should have an emotion within it that makes you feeeeeel good. It might be because it's of someone you love, an animal you love, or a place you love, or a view you love, or an erotic image that gives you fantasies you love, or a surreal selection of images that puts a lot of things together that you love, or camouflage art that hides something that you love, or something humourous that you love, or just the colours you love, but one way or another, it should make you very happy.

That's what art should do.
And that's what YOUR collection of art should do.

So this morning, when I awoke, and looked at the couple of pictures I had hung in the bedroom last night, I smiled. They are very suited to the bedroom. Well, certainly, my bedroom. They are subtle in their eroticness and they make me very happy.

Anything you like

My good friend from across the seas rang me yesterday - a delightful suprise to hear his voice, and satisfying for us both  to have our usual interesting chat together He could hear how upbeat I was about setting up my new house, and getting my studio up and running, and we talked of  my art, as we always do. I made the comment that I just lurvvvve painting, no matter what the subject. He laughed in agreement and said jokingly "You'd even enjoy painting my computer, wouldn't you Jackie!" and I laughed back in amusement.

And then I realised a truth.

That I would actually really enjoy painting it - even if it was something as "unexciting" as a computer. I'd enjoy drawing it out, choosing the colours, painting it, getting the lighting and compostion right, and looking at the finished picture, knowing that I had painted it and got as good a match to the original as I could.

Having said that, I'm sure you could think of far more interesting subjects for me to paint.....................

Re-connecting

I'm still waiting patiently for my internet to be set up at the new house, so am having to blog where I can, on other computers. Not an ideal situation, but one I can work around, until I'm set up. At least I've got a landline now, althought that was a farce in the background to set that up! Having spent 26 minutes on the phone last week trying to get through to someone (well, three "someones" actually!) to be told that my details were wrong, and they wouldn't speak to me unless I gave them my reference number (which I hadn't got on me, as I wasn't at home, and hadn't expected to speak to them on that day, else I'd have taken the reference number with me!). Only to be told, when I'd given them my name, address, date of birth and new phone number, that the details I had given them were wrong. "No they're not". "Yes, you've got the birth date wrong".  Sigh. "No I haven't". "Well, its not what we've got written down here". "Well you've got it wrong, not me". "Well, you can't give us the date written down here, so we won't speak to you". "BUT, YOU'VE GOT IT WRONG, NOT ME!!!! Like you got my title wrong, my address incomplete, and now my date of birth you've got wrong, too!!!!" "Well. we still won't speak to you....." I put the phone down in complete and utter frustrated anger. Idiots!!!!!!!!!!!

So,the next day, when the phone engineer arrived on the doorstep to set up the landline, he was a very welcome sight! I told him about the conversation I'd had with the service provider and he said he couldn't understand why it takes ten working days for anything to happen regarding changing lines, putting lines in, putting the internet in, or setting up the internet, and his summing up of it was "admin!" - so due to even more "admin" I'm having to wait another fortnight for internet connection...............

But, all of that waiting for phone lines being installed was over shadowed by a conversation I had yesterday with a painter and decorator. He was doing some decorating work at a house I was visiting, where my artwork was hanging on the wall. He knew that I had painted it, and he raved over it - the colours, the light, the subject matter. I thanked him, and had a big cheesy grin on my face as we talked, and I got more and more animated as I descibed other artwork I'd done - of portraits of  much beloved and much missed people for grieving families, soulful pets, special scenes, erotic art (to which he responded, "If any man tells you he's not interested in erotic art, he's lying!" which brought a bigger grin to my face!), the fantasy fannies, abstracts, surreal art, camouflage art with hidden messages, and erotic landscapes. His eyes widened with every description, and he said he'd look at my website with great interest. And as I got all fired up with the telling of what I'd achieved, I realised how much I've missed it this last year, whilst I've been sorting out my life, and finding somewhere new to live, and setting up my new house and studio. I can't wait to fire my passions up again, and find new artworks to paint, new commissions to enliven peoples lives with, new galleries to hang my work, new places to sell my pictures.

And more people to tell, about what I do, and what I can do for them.

Watching and learning through good taste

I happened to catch a programme on the telly the other night - MasterChef. It's not something I've ever watched before, but it caught my eye and I watched it with rising interest. I like cooking, and nice food, so it was something that piqued my gourmet tastebuds. The young men were all vying to show their expertise in the kitchen and during the episode they were shown a pile of luscious food piled up, all market fresh and of the highest possible quality. They were instructed to go and pick whatever they wanted from the pile, an array of venision, lobster, beef, crevettes, lamb, guinea fowl, vegetables and fruit, and from their choice had to produce three dishes from scratch, which were then judged by the master chef, the foody television presenter and three food critics.

I watched as they made their choices, chopped and prepared, sauteed, stirred, mixed and seasoned, roasted and boiled, then then arranged artistically on a plate. Ready to be judged. They all had had the same pile of fresh food to choose from, but some had chosen beef, others went for the guinea fowl, or lobster, some  picked carrots, others lentils, cabbage or peas. At the end of the session all six had produced through their knowledge and practical expertise some unique and fabulously flavoursome  dishes - some I wouldn't have personally chosen to eat, but certainly all looked delicious and were creative masterpieces, both visually and epicurally (if that's a word?!).

The next day, I was still thinking about it. And thought how much I admired what they had created from scratch. Each picking different items from the same pile, and making something magical with it.

And then it dawned on me.

That's what I do.

And, that's how other people react, when they see what I've painted. Starting from scratch.
And I understood fully that that's why people like to watch creative people at work. To see what they make from thin air, based on their talents and knowledge.

Of course, people also like to watch men dig holes in the ground too.......... LOL