In This Moment

Making : up my mind as to what to do first, well trying to anyway!
Cooking : nothing yet, contemplating baking some pear and sultana muffins
Drinking : 3rd cup of plunger coffee
Reading: Subject zine
Wanting: to apply for a job at IKEA
Looking: Onwards and Upwards
Playing: with Felix and his toy fish
Wasting: time as always!
Sewing:
Wishing: that I was going on a road trip to the beach this week
Enjoying: House Cleaning Monday
Waiting: to see if the Postie delivers anything nice to my letter box today
Liking: pretty illustrations
Wondering: what time Mum and Dad will leave Merimbula
Loving: listening to Claude while he plays on his perches
Hoping: that Mum and Dad have a safe trip home today
Marvelling: at where the morning went??
Needing: to hang out my freshly washed laundry
Smelling: the house - it needs a good mopping, followed by some fresh flowers I thinks
Wearing: "Real genuine velour, Baby!"
Following: my instincts
Noticing: that Claude seems to love AFI as much as I do
Knowing: that that laundry sure isn't going to hang itself out
Thinking: about what to make for Dee's and Jizzy's Birthday presents
Feeling: excited about catching up with Jody tomorrow!
Bookmarking: Suzie's lovely blog
Opening: the front door to check the mail
Giggling: at the invite Stabby and I wrote for Claude Fest last night
Feeling: sorta lazy even though I've been fairly productive for a Monday

Further investigation into 'Practical Abstraction'; Camouflage

Last Tuesday afternoon, I spent a good few hours searching through the library's online catalog for books with references to facade, camouflage, design, Melbourne Buildings, exhibitions about the architecture of Melbourne and art about architecture etc etc.... By Wednesday I carried home an armload of books on topics ranging from architectural landmarks in Melbourne, the buildings and art of RMIT University, a radical history of buildings across the city, a book about disfigurement therapy and skin camouflage from 1977 (horrendously outdated and awful in it's use of language, however proving to be an interesting read, may have to post a review in the coming days.), all the way through to essays on How To Read Desperate Housewives.

Also following the suggestions of both Fran and Louise during a recent tutorial, I sought out books on Disruptive Pattern, or practical applications of abstract painting as a means of concealment. In a historical context, as with Project Facade (see earlier blog post) and the advancement of re constructive/plastic surgery, the application of geometric patterns as camouflage during WW1, was necessary due the significant increase range and sophistication of weaponry.

I'm particularly enjoying reading up on the history of "Dazzle" ships, the avant-garde artists who may have influenced them, and those who were in turn influenced by them. The idea of the Dazzle patterns painted on British war ships, was to do just that; dazzle, or mis-inform the enemy (namely German U-Boat Captains), as to the shape, size or direction of the ship, thus making it almost impossible to target. Anyway, the idea of this blog was not to give lectures on history (or to rip off the research of others!), however, if you're interested in the subject, I'm currently reading;

• Aurandt. D, McElroy. G, (2008) Razzle Dazzle: The Uses of Abstraction , The Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Ontario, Canada
• Hartcup. G, (1980) Camouflage: A History of Concealment and Deception in War, Charles Schribner's Sons, New York, United Stated of America

Subsequent Google Image searches on artists featured in both of the above mentioned texts including; Ray Mead, Jock Macdonald, and Edward Wadsworth, (whom is one of the artists most frequently associated with Dazzle, [McElroy. G, (2008)].) led me to a particularly interesting blog-site Coleg Menai, which is more or less an image catalog of avant-garde Modern Art movements.

Anyhoo, next on the artistic agenda, will be many more colour studies, getting through the books I've borrowed and returning them on time, and during the week I've planned another day of photography around the city - maybe I'll follow one of the walking tour guide books?

Oh, the image above is the Edward Wadsworth painting, Dazzle-Ships in Drydock at Liverpool (1919), National Gallery of Canada, and I sourced it from FFFFOUND! who in turn, quoted Oobject as their image source.

Photographs of Photographs, and other work

Photography Project

Todays post is based on the Photography Project, aimed at supporting each individual Work Proposal as part of our Studio Painting Program. At this point, these images remain unedited, and this is only a selection of the 60 images I took this morning. Sarah Wootton, kindly reminded me that Brunswick Street Gallery are accepting entries for their upcoming Photography Exhibition - but only until this Friday!

Oh! Also ending this Friday afternoon, 4pm SHARP to be exact, is The RMIT Painting Silent Auction. This is an amazing opportunity to purchase artworks by Rhett D'Costa, Robin Kingston, Phil Edwards, Louise Weaver, Wayne Conduit, along with 3rd Year Painting Students, with all funds raised, going towards their Graduate Exhibition and catalogue expenses.

Magic Dirt mourn the passing of a founding band member

Yesterday, Adalita, front woman of Magic Dirt, released an official statement on the bands' website, confirming the passing of bassist, Dean Turner, age 37.

"Magic Dirt’s beloved Dean Turner passed away on Friday August 21st, 2009. For nine years, Dean battled an extremely rare form of soft tissue cancer called dermatofibrosarcoma protuberans (DFSP). This cancer became life threatening after it began to metastasize and cause various fatal tumours..."

"...The surviving Magic Dirt members, Adalita, Raul and Adam are absolutely
devastated at their loss and cannot fathom a future without him. Above
all else they will remember Dean as their beautiful and precious friend.
Kind, gentle, very funny and witty, had impeccable taste, a joy to be
around, a great storyteller, extremely trustworthy, honest, direct, a
diamond mind. They are so very proud of Dean’s brave fight and will do
everything in their power to ensure that Dean’s legacy of integrity and
spirit lives on.
The band has postponed their upcoming tour until further notice.
Magic Dirt’s love and thoughts go out to Dean’s family and to his wife
Linda and two children."

"A memorial service for Turner will be held at the Main Hall, Northcote Town Hall, 198 High Street, Northcote on Friday (August 28), 11.30am. In lieu of flowers donations may be made to the Charlie and Evie Turner Trust," (steveplusone, via Magic Dirt official web forum).

As the band have postponed all up-coming tour dates, Sydney's Annandale Hotel,

"...will be putting a show together in memorium of Dean with local and high profile artists, with all proceeds going to Deans Family."

The line-up for the Annandale show is as yet unannounced.
The Tribute show will also take place this Friday August 28th, from 8pm.


(Image Source: Annandale Hotel, Event Details)

Fast Times and Friday Night High(light)s

What do you get when four art students in Hawthorn hold an open invite 21stBirthday House Party? Well basically the front door stays open all night, the kitchen ends up as packed full with people as any bar might, and everyone gets drunk while dancing the night away. This is the sort of household which throws the sort of parties you only expect to see in movies, you know the ones, when everyone ends up moshing and jumping around the kitchen and the cops rock up at 3 to tell em to turn the music off.

Anyways, point being that after a certain point I figured it would be best to put the camera away, before I left it somewhere and it got trodden on, hence the limited photos from Friday night. All I can say is that I remember queuing for the toilet at some point, discussing Miyazake's films with Lauren, and when the door finally opened, some chick came out wearing a towel after having taken a bath (said bath tub was left filled with bath water too).

The Stabbs and I spent a good deal of the night dancing to the Yeah Yeah Yeah's and falling all over the lounge room, Amanda became obsessed with the idea of creating an ill-fated "Wool Piece" in the kitchen mid-party, and all in all I'd say it was a pretty damn good night. I even made it home in one piece and woke up on our horrendous couch at 9am Saturday morning.

Yep, the Hawthorn House has yet again lived up to the party goer's expectations for a good night in!

Tit for Tat! Blog Lovin' for Lovely Blogs

Woohoo for RMIT Union [ARTS], not only do you guys organize the best excursions I've been on since primary school (at damn good subsidized prices too I might add!!) through the Linking Up program, offer free lunch time cinema on Wednesday's at the Kaleide Theatre, let your friends in on the most up-to-date art-scene goss through your ARTS MAGNET newsletters, but by god the opening night parties you throw at FIRST SITE GALLERY are just so much fun! Of course, there are many, many more advantages for those who befriend the Union [ARTS] crew, including funding for your arts projects or collectives, RMIT Student Film Awards, dance programs, they provide the opportunity for those with a 1/2 decent set o' lungs to get up and belt out a tune for RMIT Idol, and even offer the inexperienced the chance to perform on stage in the upcoming Melbourne FRINGE Festival!!

On a side note, the Melbourne FRINGE Festival are currently looking for volunteers to help the festival run smoothly (just something I thought you might like to know!), they're offering full training, including R.S.A., full supervision on shift, your very own souvenir T-Shirt and you'll get to rub shoulders with all those important industry types while gaining insight into how an arts festival is run.

Anyways, back to returning the love! Having spotted the pics and "review" of Hayley Scilini and Amanda Airs Exhibition Opening I posted earlier in the week, the Union ARTS super cats, have linked to my "review" in their much better worded review of this wonderful show. And I would just like to say I love 'em for it, and that that they are indeed friends worth making.

Oh and just for the record, I concur that Reading Room Fashion Critiques should most definitely become an ongoing fixture at First Site Opening Nights, perhaps we could feature interviews with some of the stars? However, I digress.

If by chance you're unsure of where to find these wonderful people, here are some of the best places to start;

Their page on the RMIT Student Union's LAUNCH website
You can befriend them on Face Book
Check out there Blog
Visit them in in person by dropping into their office between 10 and 5, Monday to Friday at RMIT city campus, 360 Swanston St. Building 8, Level 2Melbourne, Australia, 3000
Calling them on (03) 9925 1945
Stalking them at First Site Openings
And if all else fails, you could try waiting around Organarchy at lunchtimes when VeganEyes Boy dishes them up some super scrumptious lunch time treats.

SEVENTH Gallery is accepting Exhibition Proposals for 2010

NEXT ROUND OF PROPOSALS ARE DUE 5PM FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 11

SEVENTH welcomes proposals from established and emerging artists from a variety of disciplines, as well as proposals from curators and collaborative groups. We are also keen to support off-site or one-off events that can be promoted as part of our exhibition calendar.

APPLICATION DOWNLOAD
PDF Format



_______________________________________________________________________________________

We are now taking applications for the following spaces:

GALLERY ONE:

A large naturally lit shop front space, with fluorescent or spot-lighting, this generous open space is easily viewed from the street and is ideal for large scale or group exhibitions.

Dimensions: [Approx.] 4.5m by 6.5m
Operating Hours: 12pm – 6pm , Tuesday to Saturday
Price: $700 for 3-week exhibition period

GALLERY TWO:

A more intimate, controlled lighting space, allowing a versatile range of projects and catering well for multi-media or sound work.

Dimensions: [Approx.] 3.3m by 4.2m
Operating Hours: 12pm – 6pm , Tuesday to Saturday
Price: $450 for 3-week exhibition period

THE NIGHT SCREEN:

This is an after hours projection space (6pm – midnight, Tuesday - Saturday) which is comprised of a pull-down rear-projection screen. This unique night only screen is visible from the street and occupies the entire front window space of SEVENTH.

Dimensions: [Approx.] Width: 2500mm x Height: 1500mm
Operating Hours: 6pm – midnight, Tuesday to Saturday
Price: $350 for 3 week period, includes use of projector and dvd player
Please Note: The Night Screen does not include a sound component

EXHIBITION FEE INCLUDES:

• Three-week exhibition period. For Gallery 1 and 2 artists these hours are Tuesday – Saturday 12 – 6, for Night Screen Artists these hours are Tuesday - Saturday 6 – 12

• Inclusion in the Seventh Calendar and hard copy promotional material

• Email invitation to Seventh Subscribers

• Promotion and documentation of the exhibition on the Seventh Website

• Hosting of the exhibition opening event

www.seventhgallery.org

Researching facades

I accidentally stumbled across this site by googling the word 'facade' for my studio research project. Given that the initial concept behind my project was to investigate the role of the facade in contemporary Australian culture; in terms of form and structural design, as well as in relation to the transparency of personalities, Project Facade seems interesting.

Part historical research, part artistic interpretation, Project Facade investigates the role of WW1 as a catalyst for British surgeon, Sir Harold Gillies to develop re-constructive plastic surgery.

"Since 2004, Artist and Project Façade Leader Paddy Hartley has researched, responded to and interpreted the personal and surgical stories of some of the servicemen who underwent this pioneering surgical reconstruction under Sir Harold Gillies."

Hartley responds "...to the patient records of The Gillies Archive and later life experiences of First World War Servicemen who underwent facial reconstructive surgery at the hand of New Zealander Sir Harold Delf Gillies and his surgical team."

The project acts as a recognition of, "the surgical techniques pioneered by Gillies and his team to repair the horrific facial injuries inflicted upon Servicemen formed the foundation of modern-day facial reconstruction from which many tens of thousands of people have benefited."

Images sourced from Project Facade.

MHS CPO CATS

Features & Specs:

• All makes and models
• Standard 4-paw drive
• Standard FREE microchip
• 100,000 purr warranty
• Made in Michigan
• Better than new!

Multi-point Inspection:

• Spay/neuter surgery
• Age-appropriate vaccinations
• Medical check-up
• Behavioral evaluation
• General grooming
• Nail trim

Yep, you read correctly, the Michigan Humane Society are giving their abandoned kitty's away to new, loving homes for free. The MHS is trying to get as many cats adopted as possible during the US summer months, traditionally the time when shelters get overwhelmed with unwanted kittens (and, sadly, have to put the majority of them down).

Original Source: http://www.bust.com/blog/2009/08/18/next-up-cats-for-clunkers.html

I can say that adopting Felix the Guard Tiger through the Victorian RSPCA has been one of the most rewarding decisions I've ever made. He was already six months old when I adopted him, and he fits in with our household 'purrrrrfectly', sorry I had to say it!

In the mean time, if you're a cat owner, HAVE YOUR PETS DE-SEXED TO PREVENT THIS HAPPENING IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!!

What I'm Listening To Right Now

Okay, so by now I'm hoping you've seen, or at least heard how epic the line up for SOUNDWAVE 2010 is going to be. To be honest with you, Adsy (my heterosexual life partner) and I nearly wet our pants with excitement when we discovered it!!! As such, I've been flogging the newest ALEXISONFIRE album Old Crows / Young Cardinals non-stop today, just to get myself super pumped for Early Bird Tickets which go on sale next Friday.

Also, just in case you've not yet seen it, here's the Line Up (so far!!!) FAITH NO MORE • MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE
JANES ADDICTION • AFI • PARAMORE
HIM •ALEXISONFIRE • TAKING BACK SUNDAY • TRIVIUM
SUNNY DAY REAL ESTATE • EAGLES OF DEATH METAL
THE GET UP KIDS • REEL BIG FISH • MESHUGGAH • ALL TIME LOW
A DAY TO REMEMBER • IT DIES TODAY • ESCAPE THE FATE • CLUTCH
ANTI FLAG • ISIS • GALLOWS • A WILHELM SCREAM • THE WEAKERTHANS
EMAROSA • ANVIL • THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA• COMEBACK KID • THE ALMOST
DANCE GAVIN DANCE • FOUR YEAR STRONG • YOU ME AT SIX • WHITECHAPEL
THE AQUABATS • ROLO TOMASSI • BARONESS • RX BANDITS
MAXIMUM THE HORMONE • THE CREEPSHOW

VENUES AND DATES

FEBRUARY/MARCH 2010

SATURDAY 20 BRISBANE, RNA SHOWGROUNDS
SUNDAY 21 SYDNEY, EASTERN CREEK RACEWAY
FRIDAY 26 MELBOURNE, SHOWGROUNDS
SATURDAY 27 ADELAIDE, BONYTHON PARK
MONDAY 1 PERTH, STEEL BLUE OVAL

If you plan on going along, my tip is to get in early, tickets are sure to sell out quickly! The best way to get your hands on 'em is to join the Soundwave Community that way you can sign up for the latest updates, and get access to discounted Early Bird tickets!

Also, while I was scouting about online, I happened across the AOF tour blog '...on tour forever', well worth checking out if you ask me, for now adieu, I'm off to continue flogging the crap outta my CD collection, maybe I'll put some old school AFI on next....

Heartless Bitches International; sounds like my kinda group

Ways To Swing A Cat

Jade Plitz, Hayley Scilini, Erin Carew, Amanda Airs, Raphael Buttonshaw, Jordan Hoffman, Sheree Hardcastle, Jean-Jacques Lale-Demoz and Bettina Garnier
8–18 September

'The artists in this exhibition intend to explore through extended painting practices, certain relationships with time, space and the gallery. Issues of location, pop, colour abstraction and a dissolve of formal and historical relationships in art will be explored.'

Opening night: Wednesday 9 September, 5–7pm
George Paton Gallery
Second Floor Union House, University of Melbourne, VIC 3010
Open: 11am-5pm, Monday to Friday

Amanda Airs and Hayley Scilini; Familiar Worlds Opening Night

'Familiar Worlds is a collaborative exhibition in which everyday materials are used to create an installation that references arhitecture and human shelters. Notions of familiarity with man-made structures are explored through geometric, linear and spatial compositions. Individual works merge and intertwine, simultaneously drawing into and pulling away from each other, creating a work that is reminiscent of architectural structures and at the same time, presents itself as fragile and impermanent.'


Show opened this evening in Gallery One at RMIT Union [ARTS] First Site and runs until August 29th. If you missed out on the opening night party, then you'd better take the time to get in there to see a fantastic exhibition by these two RMIT Fine Art students. If you're so freakin' lazy that you happen to miss this show (seriously, it runs for a fortnight!!!) then you'd better get your tight lil buns into gear for Ways To Swing A Cat, which opens at George Paton Gallery in two weeks time, to redeem yourselves!