For after all the best thing one can do when
it is raining, is to let it rain.
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Showing posts with label rain. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rain. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Sunday, October 16, 2011
There Will Come a Time ....
There will come a time, you’ll see with no more tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.
– Mumford & Sons, After the Storm
YouTube Link to this Song - It is AMAZING! = Click Here
About this image: I am always captivated by leaves that have fallen and come to rest somewhere else. And what better place to rest but in the Pine Needles.
About the quote: I've been listening to Mumford and Sons for several months and admit that many times I am moved to tears with their music. If you aren't familiar with them, please check them out. You will be soooo glad you did!
Robin with Wet Berries
For after all the best thing one can do when
it is raining, is to let it rain.
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
About this Image: Though not as sharp as I would have liked, it's still one of my faves. Berries after the rain and a Robin ready to feast ..... it just says "Autumn" to me :)
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Singing in the Rain
Taken thru the window looking out into my front yard.This little guy was singing his heart out in the rain on Monday morning. Beautiful music!
Truly to sing, that is a different breath. ~Rainer Maria Rilke
Saturday, October 16, 2010
WATER GALLERY
http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2010/08/airspace-and-phantoms.html
Water is a major issue here in Australia, and indeed all over the world. In Australia, newspapers are currently covering the release of proposals to reduce allocations and supply of water to farmers in the Murray Darling food bowl. Farmers are not happy and local communities are worried that reduced allocations will mean loss of jobs and social instability.
As regular readers of my BLOG know, I have long held a fascination for water, how it used, allocated, and costed. I am a farmer's daughter and also lived, for 18 years of my adult life, in Goondiwindi, a small rural town on the border of New South Wales and Queensland. As a child I watched my father stare at cloudless blue skies, and also despair when flooding rains ripped way top soil and spoiled bumper crops. Goondiwindi was the same with farmers staring at the sky, but it was slightly different, because irrigation played a significant part of the rural experience with cotton being a substantial crop grown in northern NSW and SW Qld.
Water is also an issue with the surge in coal mining, particularly coal seam gas extraction [CSG]. Water, is a 'byproduct' of the extraction process, but under legislation this water does not come under the control of Water Resources. So, there are a number of issues now confronting communities at large as well as those immediately affected eg: Dalby [where I grew up] and district. These issues are various, from the potential to reduce underground aquifer levels, to how to deal with the salt water byproduct, to broader issues of adequate infrastructures of all kinds. The major risk, as I see it, is that lack of foresight...lack of stringent risk analysis...will lead to diminished soil viability, and thus the reduction of food growing capacity. I have written about risk http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2010/09/risk.html
I have written previously about all of the things I have mentioned above. But, with water being such a current [I like to play on the word 'current' http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/06/currency-of-water.html ] I thought I'd make an online 'gallery' of some of my water paintings. This is certainly not all of them, plus I have ideas for more. I will be exhibiting some of the newer ones in my solo exhibition 'Vortex' next year 22 Feb- 6 March. After all... water disappears down the drain pipe in a vortex! But, metaphorically the turmoil, stress and strain fraught by water and its various issues, are akin to what I imagine is the frantic whirling of the outer vortex. I have already written about some of my 'vortex' ideas, but will be writing more as the exhibition evolves.
I would like to make a comment though about farmers. Droughts are devastating, but one outcome is that along with the unlucky, the inefficient farmer is also 'weeded' out. After nearly a decade of drought conditions in rural Australia [following on from sporadic conditions since the late 1960s], those farmers left to produce food and exports, which benefit all of us and our nation, are the most efficient and savvy farmers. They use sophisticated farming techniques based on science and experience, and they understand the financial as well as the environmental benefits of looking after their land. They love the land and know it intimately. I just hope that authorities ask the farmers for advice too...and that they listen.
Enjoy my 'gallery'.....................................and look for the small $ signs and quotes from newspapers. The far and close distance perspectives are important reminders that we must always look and also see!
Blue Gold Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm
Cyclical Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm
Truth Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm
Water Harvesting Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm
Great Artesian Basin Gouache on paper 30 x42 cm
Risk Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm
Phantom Water Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm
Royalties Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm
Tendering Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm
Salination Gouache on paper 21 x 30 cm
Salt Eternal gouache on paper 21 x 30cm
Hope In The Distance Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm
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Thank Goodness [It's Raining] Oil on linen 90 x 207 cm
Earth For Sale Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm
Lifeblood Oil on linen 90 x 207 cm
Seeping Into The Intimate Vastness Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm
B Aware Exhibition
B Aware exhibition closes Thursday 21 October, so there are 5 days left for you to see it. St. John's Cathdral, 272 Ann St, brisbane 9.30-4.30 daily. The exhibition is themed on the Millenium Goals. I have 5 works selected for the exhibition.
VORTEX
Keep 22 Feb to 6 March 2011 free! My next solo exhibition 'VORTEX' is on at Graydon Gallery, Merthyr Rd, New Farm, Brisbane.
Here's an image of one of the paintings in the show:
Finding the Light Oil on linen 100 x 70
Monday, March 8, 2010
HOPE IN THE DISTANCE
Hope In The Distance Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm 2010 SOLDThis painting is the one I wrote about in a recent post. I was still working on the painting at the time, but I shared my inspiration, which travelled from rain in the distance, to hope, to literal and metaphoric horizons. Here's what I wrote:
I am working on a painting at the moment and my ideas have revolved around issues of water and rain, plus what they represent at emotional and even spiritual levels. Regular readers will know that water is of great interest to me and that it has been a sub theme within my broader interests in perspective, distance and the space between the micro/local and macro/global. Overarching all of this is my compulsion to explore the potential of archetypes to perhaps reveal universal connections that mean something to us in the 21st century.This new painting which I am currently working on, is essentially about hope. I am calling it 'Hope In The Distance' because it is, at first glance, a painting of strips of rain on the horizon.
When I lived in Western Queensland, strips of rain would appear on distant horizons, often cruelly tantalising us with the potential for much needed rain. But, horizons, as metaphors for our lives cascade into so much possibility, because as I have written before, horizons can be both close and far. Our eyes, of eye ball and pupil, see horizons as existing in the far distance, but our eyes trick us, because we are essentially always present upon horizons which exist at all universal and nano distances around us. Our mind's eye can 'see' these multitudinous horizons so much clearer than our eye of eye ball and pupil, especially if we discard one dimensional and simple notions of distance and perspective.
I am reminded of a quote I used in my artist's statement for my show 'Distance' in London in 2002. The quote is from Walter Benjamin's Illuminations where he describes aura as, the unique phenomenon of a distance, however close it may be. The word 'aura' has new age connotations, but I think, whether we know it or not, we are all searching for an experience and an understanding of aura. Maybe this is the unviversal search and that at each era, the agelessness of archetypal symbols offer clues to a discovery or a depended understanding of aura. We just have to keep investigating their potential. I think the investigation may require us to rely more on our mind's eye rather than always relying on our eye of eye ball and pupil...the two need to work together questioning everything.
My thoughts about multitudinous horizons have given me glimpses of the phenomenon of aura! These glimpses slip away as I try to grasp an understanding, but my hope is that as I discard old ways of 'seeing' I might come to a fuller experience of aura. Indeed, as we live locally in an increasingly globalised world, we are all actually forced to collapse notions of distant horizons, as we experience contemporary life. I suppose the hope is that the experience is understood as being potentially transforming in a positive way for all humanity.
MORE
'Hope In The Distance' Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm
The tree-of-life creates a land formation which seems like a mountain or a hill in the foreground. The branches of the tree suggest underground systems of water, minerals, roots, animal burrows etc. The five strips of rain fall from a potent sky of red and blue. These strips of rain represent hope, hope of sustenance. As an aside, the current floods 'out west' will provide deep subsoil sustenance and replenishment of underground aquifers for some time, but the devastation of homes, infrastucture and livestock is brutal.
Yet, this painting got me thinking about things beyond rain, drought and floods. It got me thinking about connections. The strips of rain are like conduits connecting earth and sky, body and soul, mind and God. The tree-of-life transcends the material, by imposing its true potential, which is the fullness of life...of humanity. In this way the immediate suggested horizon vanishes, because humanity encompasses past, present and future. All three of these time phases are horizons in a sense, but when experienced simultaneously horizons disappear, perspective evaporates and distance has no meaning.
TO REMEMBER
FRISSON Solo exhibition
Graydon Gallery, 29 Merthry Rd, New Farm, Brisbane
EXHIBITION DATES: 16-28 March [***From 1pm-6pm Tuesday 16]
OPENING NIGHT: Thursday 18 March 5.30-8 pm
Gallery is open daily 10 am -6pm ***
SOME NEWS
I went to the inaugural TEDx Brisbane on Saturday 6 March http://www.tedxbrisbane.com/ It was really great and certainly generated some ideas worth spreading.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
WATER
Some of the images below have been posted to my BLOG previously, but a few conversations over the last couple of weeks have prompted me to reload them as a group. These conversations have been about that age-old and very important topic of water. When weather conditions are perfect water is not necessarily a topic of conversation, but when there is not enough or too much water, then anxieties, hopes and frustrations are expressed in conversation. Currently , in my part of the world ie: SE Queensland we are experiencing a severe lack of rain. Whilst there were good falls earlier in the year they have not continued. Gardens are dry, farmers look imploringly at the sky, bush fires are raging in the dry conditions, dust storms have recently enveloped us and so on. Not surprisingly people are talking about water and rain.
Lifeblood Oil on linen 90 x 200 cm 2008/9
Answer To A Prayer Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2009
Cyclical Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2009
Here is the previous post I wrote about 'Cyclical' . Quite interesting if I say so myself!
http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/06/cyclical.html
Fertile Sky Gouache on linen 30 x 42 cm unframed 2009
Some other 'Water' posts:
Seeping Into The Intimate Vastness Oil on linen 80 x 100 cm 2008 http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/06/seeping-into-intimate-vastness.html
Lifeblood Oil on linen 90 x 200 cm 2008/9Lifeblood above, is a large painting where I have painted the strips of rain in small $ signs. The underground water and surrounding soil are also painted with $ signs. The red ribbon like vein in the sky is painted with $ signs. From a distance the viewer does not recognise that this painting contans any $ signs, but when up close they are revealed. Readers of my BLOG know that I am intensely interested in the viewer's experience of close and far distance and the impact this may have on developing flexible skills in perspective. The viewer's experience is a metaphor for how we need to 'see' the globalised world in which we live locally. We need to be able to see another person's point of view, understand another's culture, put ourselves in another person's shoes in order to have compassion for ourselves and others.
Here is the link to my previous post about "Lifeblood' http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/05/lifeblood.html
Thank Goodness [It's Raining]! Oil on linen 92 x 207 cm 2007 This painting above was inspired by those exclamations farmers make when it does rain. 'Thank God', 'Thank Goodness' and 'About bloody time!' These sorts of exclamations are really expressions of gratitude with all the emotions gratitude contains. I have used my much loved, tree-of-life motif as a visual conduit which could represent underground systems, mountains, a strata of the earth as if cut in cross section. The 'rain' falls from a dark blue sky, but the rain is red. I often paint rain in red because this colour represents fertility and a sense of vascular life forces. Rain and water are like the blood of the earth.
Here is the link to my previous post for 'Thank Goodness [It's Raining]!http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2007/07/thank-goodness.html
It Looks Hopeful Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2009
The sense of hope which farmers must have is like a faith. I wrote about faith in my last BLOG post and I have to say that as a farmer's daughter I have witnessed incredible expressions of faith from my father and other farmers. I also saw this when I lived in the small rural Queensland but highly diversified town of Goondiwindi for 18 years. Faith is a kind of 'knowing' which seems inexplicable but is felt at deep core levels of our being. Faith and hope are two of the most important characteristics farmers or anyone living in rural communities must have.
Now I am going to write something which may seem odd, but artists are like farmers! We must have faith in processes which we may or may not understand. We must get to a point where needing to understand is not paramount, because we recognise that creative forces are never ending. We must have faith that we can tap into these forces, and that when we have impasses where things do not seem to flow, we 'know' to walk away to 'let' the congestion unravel. We 'plant' after we have made all the necessary and technical preparations and then as we work we 'manage' complex creative and technical processes simultaneously. Our medium becomes an extension of ourselves, just as a good farmer after making all the necessary technical applicatons and seeking appropriate informaton can 'know' at his/her core if something resonates as the right thing to do.
Water Harvesting Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2009
I have written previously about this painting 'Water Harvesting'
http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/06/water-harvesting.html
Answer To A Prayer Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2009Being grateful for rain!
Cyclical Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2009 Here is the previous post I wrote about 'Cyclical' . Quite interesting if I say so myself!
http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/06/cyclical.html
Fertile Sky Gouache on linen 30 x 42 cm unframed 2009Some other 'Water' posts:
http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/02/water.html
http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/06/currency-of-water.html
http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/06/currency-of-water.html
I am still working on my latest large painting which I am going to call 'Halo'. It is 90 x 200 cm and I am spending hours working away and going through the inevitable ups and downs of the creative process.
Cheers,
Kathryn
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
LIFEBLOOD
Click on the painting and you will see $ signs! In a previous post 'Currency' I have written about my interest in the uses of this word with regards to money and water. http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2009/03/currency.html
I have called this painting 'Lifeblood' because water is the Earth's 'blood'. Rivers, oceans, streams, underground aquafers, rain, melting ice are all parts of the visceral and vascular system which assists in keeping our planet and us alive. Yet, water has become a commodity to be bought and sold, borrowed, harvested, allocated and litigated about. There is a monetry value to water and its flow which, if monitored appropriately, will ensure appropriate use of water for all people. However, can we be sure that this will happen?
So...in this painting I have created a vein of red $ signs in the sky. From this vein rain falls in two strips. This rain is also painted with $ signs. I have painted the rain in strips because when I lived in western Queensland I was always intrigued by the appearance of rain in the distance. Driving west from Toowoomba to Goondiwindi I often witnessed strips of rain on the far horizon and hoped the rain was falling on Goondiwindi! This kind of hope is deeply felt by country people.
I have also painted the dammed and underground water and the surrounding soil in $ signs. This is commenting on the 'value', use and diminishment of underground water. The depletion of underground aquafers causes salination and thus the loss of soil richness, subsequently causing land degradation and loss of income as well as sustainability.
Whilst this painting comments on water and its 'value' it also contibutes to my interest in perspective. Like many of my recent paintings this painting, when viewed from a distance, does not reveal its details. It looks like some sort of ambiguous but vast landscape. However, up close
the viewer can see the details of the $ signs and starts to question the 'big picture'. In a way the movement back and forth to view the painting [mirroring how an artist works] is a metaphor for contemporary life living locally in an increasingly globalised world.
the viewer can see the details of the $ signs and starts to question the 'big picture'. In a way the movement back and forth to view the painting [mirroring how an artist works] is a metaphor for contemporary life living locally in an increasingly globalised world.
I have previously uploaded this painting, but since then I have worked on it a bit more.
Lifeblood Oil on linen 90 x 200 cm 2008/09.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
ANSWERS
I have been very busy lately. Apart from feeling like a yo yo Mother I have been exploring the possibilities of widgets, Twitter and other online distractions. I have loaded a Widget called FEEDJIT onto my BLOG and it detects visitors to my BLOG. I have revamped my TWITTER http://twitter.com/brimblecombe with a background of one of my paintings. I am also on FACEBOOK which embarrasses my children as I am too 'old' for these sorts of things. Well, apparently we 'oldies' have taken over FACEBOOK as well as the TWILIGHT series of books. If you have not heard of this series...well ask any 11 year old girl and she will tell you about them! Actually ask any woman on the street and she will also be able to tell you ...probably!
But, I have also been painting. I am working on the large oil which I talked about in my BLOG post 'SOAKED'. The painting is progressing and I am completely absorbed with it when I am with it! Hours pass by and I am looking forward to, but also anxious about, seeing it finished. Painting is also an bit of a yo yo experience. One minute everything is going well....the paint glides off the brush, my arm stays steady, the colours meld well and then...all of a sudden....I realise I've put too many lines, or I've been thinking without looking, or the paint does not behave as I would like it, or I get up to move away from the painting to see it from a distance and I realise it is not quite right. The process is a constant movement from contentment to...sometimes the extreme of hopelessness.
Yet, I love it. The positive and negative aspects of creating a painting stimulate a movement which feels right to me. The problem solving stretches from practical issues to conceptual concerns. On the one hand the paint might not have the right consistency, but when I look at the painting does is actually 'say' what I want it to? Both the practical and conceptual fuel each other.
I know I must love what I do because when I have a problem it does not get me down. I don't become stressed in a way which makes me wake in the middle of the night to ruminate and catastrophise. In a way I enjoy the problems as they stretch my intellect and imagination. I remember my Mother telling me something a doctor once told her. That is, if a job or activity causes the kind of stress which leads to sleepless nights then it is unhealthy. But, if a job or activity causes the kind of stress which fuels your energy at all levels then it is a healthy place to be. It has taken me awhile to sort out what jobs and activities are really suited to me, as sometimes parts of a job or activity do satisfy, but how one copes with problems is the litmus test I think.
The gouache on paper painting above is called 'Answer To A Prayer'. it is from my "Water" series. But like most of my work it says a lot more than its obvious intention which is about being grateful for rain.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
RAIN DROPS
Since my last post I have finished the work on paper above and started on the large oil painting I wrote about in the last post. This work on paper continues my interest in water. I was watching the rain fall only a few days ago and fell into wondering about the smallness of the rain drops, yet the impact a deluge of them can have. This impact can be devastating or truly remarkable and wanted.
I have read that the human body is made of around %70 water. This makes me think of a number of important details. One is, that by looking after our planet's water supply we are honouring our bodies as well. Another thought is that water, from one drop to a mass, can be absolutely beautiful. This beauty then must have potential within us too.
Water has the capacity to seek out and seep into places thought to be impenetrable. By doing this it strokes the landscape's intimate parts where any kind of distance or space is unknown or difficult to imagine.
Image: Rain Drops Gouache on paper 55 x 115 cm unframed 2009
Sunday, March 29, 2009
WONDER
After a couple of weeks not painting I am now back into it. I was distracted by the preparation for two presentations which both went well. I have to say, though, I prefer being in my studio on my own. Venturing into the public arena is always fun, but I need to recharge my batteries with some alone time in my studio. The recharging is under way.
The good thing about a break is that it can cause a departure from previous work. Others may not pick up on the departure, but I am aware of it. I used to fight it, but now I welcome it knowing that any departure is a result of new experiences, rethinking and reflection...even if it has only happened in a couple of weeks.
In my presentation for the Qld Academy of Arts and Sciences at the Queensland University of Technology Art Museum I spoke to the topic 'A Critical Space: The Art/Science Nexus'. One of my suggestions was that both artists and scientists have insightful powers of observation. This might happen to a greater or lesser extent in individuals, but generally speaking acute observation is a capacity which is shared by both scientists and artists. Both may observe their physical surroundings but they will also observe their reactions to and thoughts about these observations. It is one thing to observe with your seeing eye, but to observe those things which sight might trigger in the imagination where the capacity for wonder exists is another level of observation.
Artists and scientists will make internal critical judgements about their wonderings. This is where there is possibly a departure in manner because the desired outcomes are different. And, it is a good thing there is a difference, because I believe art must avoid the trap of thinking it can provide answers when it has the power to prompt questions. However, science is driven to find answers albeit knowing that any answer must be refutable. Questions keep science honest, but only to the extent of the quality of the questions. Art is one of science's partners pushing for questions based on wonder and imagination.
The power of observation ranging from observing the external to then observing the internal paths of imagination and wonder is a dance of close and far distance. The artist and the scientist employ powers of perspective to view their physical world and also their own internal worlds. Interestingly I have written the plural for internal 'worlds'. This poses interesting questions about the space or distance which is inside each of us.
The painting above is called 'Rain Brings Hope', gouache on paper, 30 x 42 cm [unframed]. It is from my 'Water' series of works on paper.
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