Saturday, 24 October 2015

100 Lines in Space

Rachelle's 100 lines (64/100)
The room was already full when I rushed in, ready to take my place in a drawing workshop alongside a group of young architect students in central London.

The instructions at the top of our introduction sheets were simple and clear. It read : "Take 100 pieces of paper and make a line by whatever means on each one". Sounded easy enough, but most things that do, aren't. With that, I began my odyssey into the world of drawing from the architect's-point-of-view.

Escher-fitti
Over the next few hours I watched as a bunch of scrawled signatures morphed into three dimensional Escher-like creatures, floating in space. In another part of the room carefully drawn pencil lines created magnetic white holes which drew the viewer deep inside the paper space.

There were drawn lines which spoke of longings, missed holidays and sexual innuendo. My favorite was an ingenious composition which consisted of a series of lines drawn across piles of paper, meticulously arranged on top of the worktable. To me, it resembled a huge paper mobile of a building, lying dormant on the table. 

Unite & Divide

As for my own drawings, I was quite surprised when one of the young architects described them as "Three dimemsional lines in space"! Although this was my first creative encounter with architects I felt it was a successful one. Their work resonated with me and I felt they understood mine. Hopefully there'll be more creative collaborations in the future.

A great big thank you to workshop leader Sean Griffiths and the Architectural Association for a enlightening evening and a great time.

Sunday, 4 October 2015

KU Space of Art

Deconstructing Space: KU  (#6)                 R Allen-Sherwood 2015

"Space is the breath of art".   Frank Lloyd Wright  

Saturday, 26 September 2015

Deconstructing Space


"Deconstructing Space:  Ku"        Sumi ink, watercolour on paper  2015
I've been practicing with the Japanese word 'KU' (space) over the past 2 years, using ink and calligraphy brushes but never really comfortable with any of the results -not even when they were perceived as "good" by others....  I always wanted to find a way to express KU in  my own original voice. A way of expression that is truer to who/what I am.. Well, I think I'm finally getting close. (It's only taken a decade.).

This is a work-in-progress, part of a series I've just started to develop. If you are interested in seeing more, please check out my facebook artist page where I will post works as they evolve.

As always, thank you for visiting & see you next time!.

Thursday, 10 September 2015

Vertical Space Dance



     "There is no up or down. just space and substance".  
Wanda Moretti  Il Posto founder & Choreographer

Il Posto is a vertical dancing troupe from Italy who are all about creating fluid flowing bodily movements whilst dangling several hundred feet in space.

In a recent interview,  Il Posto founder and choreographer Wanda Moretti talks about the beauty of emptiness and how important it is to her dancers. She described it as: "The suspension in the few seconds of a leap, a moment of freedom in which the legs also become the arms".
 
The surreal visual imagery is mesmerising, if slightly disorienting. Makes me wonder whether the phrase 'wall legs' should be added to existing 'sea & land legs' in the English language? You decide, I'm too dizzy.

Wednesday, 26 August 2015

Serra-isms

Visual note taking (not art)        R Allen-Sherwood 2015
I recently saw an interview with the artist/sculptor Richard Serra where he talked about my two favourite topics - drawing and space.

The interview was done a few years ago, on the eve of a retrospective showing of Serra's drawings spanning over 20 years. Serra described his drawings as "space articulations". But he made a clear distinction between what he called his "visual notations" and drawings that were done to work through something in his mind. For Serra, only the latter could be called art.

Richard Serra Drawing 1*
I enjoyed the interview and many of his words resonated with me. Probably because I too, am dealing with the issue of expressing space in my own work even though I cam not a sculptor.. Perhaps it's a more ambiguous issue in my case.

Richard Serra Drawing 2*

One of my favorite moments from the interview came when, asked for the hundredth time as to whether his drawings were inspired by figuration or objects in real life,  a visibly annoyed Serra snapped back:

"I draw space, not image!" 

Hooray! My kind of guy.


(*Drawing 1  courtesy of J. Padgett Washington University)
(*Drawing 2    http://amesadeluz.blogspot.co.uk)

Saturday, 1 August 2015

On-Off-On


"Appearing & Disapprearing"                R Allen-Sherwood 2015

My Zen teacher, the late Master Gudo Nishijima used to talk about the Instantaneousness of this Universe as a way to explain the true nature of reality...

What has stayed with me was his description of how every passing moment of our lives speeds by, flickering On-Off-On-Off-On-Off.....

It's taken many years to reach a point where I think I can now understand the meaning of his words.

Then again, I could be wrong..

I'm just glad the universe happened to still be "On" when I snapped the camera shutter yesterday.. Only just.

Monday, 6 July 2015

Top 10 Most Popular Posts

FF Crispin and Roy admiring my pop-up installation at Mirfield Monastery (2012)
After last week's post about my Zen Garden article being in the top ten over at Glow Magazine, I became curious about which posts were your favourites on this blog. And so I took a look.... and found last week's post about being in GLOW's top ten in my own top ten! (Thanks everyone for your continuing visits, likes and shares.)

Here's the TOP 10 list of your favourites! Click on titles to see posts :