Facebook, foxes, inspiration and owls.

Many people criticize Facebook. It has its problems, doesn't always work as it should, reminds me always that I have a fat belly ( thanks for that facebook! every time I look at my wall! with it's specially chosen facebook adds). At the end of the day it is free.

And I have found that from facebook I have been able to connect with other people who are sometimes like minded, sometimes not. I have been able to make a closer link with my peers. I have found a supportive community of people and there have been times when I have been inspired by facebook, for example when Kathryn Evan's son Archie said that while he believed in faeries he didn't believe in foxes because he had never seen one! The result was the painting of The Strawberry fox.

 

Sometimes I feel challenged by the opinions of some people, often I find links to beautiful things, always I find that my time becomes tangled in the world of others and very often I find inspiration, so, my thanks to both Jane Hill and Richard Mabey. Jane posted a response to something I had written.

"from Richard Mabey's 'Nature Cure'. The book I was reading this morning, a description of seeing a barn owl at dusk: " it was winnowing the grass, threshing it for food. i could see the last light from the west shining through its wings, marking out the dense primaries from the almost translucent trailing feathers. it seemed at that moment to have four wings, two in the day and two in the night...."

 It reminded my that walking and watching and sometimes standing still and watching is good for the soul, and has drawn me back to the depiction of owls.

 

Other things I have done with facebook:

bought books recommended by others,

sold books,

sold paintings,

met people,

cemented friendships,

learnt things, 

wasted time,

talked nonsense,

argued,

invited people to events and exhibitions,

seen things of beauty.

Playing

 In between illustrations, playing with older ideas. I have always thought of The Owl and the Pussycat as a love story.

Owls

Sunday

In between being asleep and being struck down again with pain in the teeth I did manage to push some coloured water around to try and pull heart faced hushwings out of paper. Meanwhile my boy Tom was winning the race at Solva with Porthgain Longboat crew. And those lovely ladies won too.

The owls are for Art in Action as I want something that I can work on easily at least on one day, so I will be gilding them there. Hoping to do some painting and also maybe a big drawing while I am there. Always difficult when used to solitude, to work in such a public way.
To see last year's Art in Action have a look here.

2 lists

Clearing desk and cutting work of drawing boards and packing things to post I discovered a list of things to do. To my amazement I had stretched that paper, drawn the cuckoo, not only drawn but also painted hare, hart and unicorn. I had looked up the worshipful company of tailors and been sidetracked by frock coats, stratched even more paper ( enthusiasm for that task had led me to list it twice) emailed more than one ceramacist and written the panda story, although it still needs to be written onto computer. Wow.

So, time for a new list.

1. Clean house ( parents arriving Thursday for short visit, will not be impressed by level of filth)

2. Draw owls and prepare a board for Art in Action. ( This will allow me to spend one day gilding which looks sort of impressive but I can do that and talk at the same time.

3. Send off proposal for something to someone. Courage in hand, Just do it.

4. Walk to the hilltop high with thoughts of Tom, the piper's son and the only tune that he could play and visit the moonjar in twilight when the swallows give way to bats and butterflies hand over the sky to moths.

5. Partridge. Pear. Gold leaf. Christmas card.

6. Post MBF card.

7.Draw and paint at least one more spread for Nursery Rhymes, perhaps Baa Baa Black Sheep.

8.Do rough for 4 and 20 tailors went to catch a snail ( tailors in frock coats).

9. Leave room for unexpected happenings.

10. Try and find out about the birds that sang so loud in the night that they woke me up. Were they nightjars or grasshopper warblers?

Above, the skull of a barn owl. A few years ago I saw a barn owl by the side of the road. I didn't want to leave this beautiful creature by the roadside, to be hit again and again by cars and crushed into the dirt so I stopped my car and picked up the body and drove to the garage where I had booked my car in for an  mot. The mechanic did not seem disturbed by the dead bird. 

I took the beautiful barn owl home. Its feathers were golden and soft and i kept a few of the wing feathers for a while. Their edges are slightly barbed to allow the bird to ghost through the night. Hushwing. This is what they used to be called. I put it into a pot, a large terracotta pot and planted some bulbs over the top and then left it for about 4 years. Then I dug it up. What astonished me most was how small and delicate a creature this was. When you see one in flight it seems to fill the mind, the sky, and to silence the world.