Sunday, November 30, 2008


















'It elevated folk art and custom to something noble, and argued for a "natural" epistemology of human activities as conditioned by nature in the form of language, custom and usage.'


The little home studio of Millet where i visited in Barbizon.




Old and musty and packed with relics like mouldy clogs and old palettes the colours of the forest.





















'' The first man who, having fenced in a piece of land, said "This is mine," and found people naive enough to believe him, that man was the true founder of civil society. From how many crimes, wars, and murders, from how many horrors and misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind, by pulling up the stakes, or filling up the ditch, and crying to his fellows: Beware of listening to this imposter; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itself to nobody. ''




— Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 1754

















The forests of Barbizon/Fountainebleu were enchanting for me, the zero degree frenshness of the air and christmas scents of pines. I Dont know weather i was touched by the fresh historical importance of the forest like those hundreds of years, or weather i was perfectly happy to be out of the big cities, the masses.
This trip really is major city to major city and taking a walk through the forest was like a mentos for a smokers mouth. The air pure and the light diffused like fog hanging between trees, deer scattering, mushrooms underfoot, and grand old trees umderwhere artists have sat for hundreds of years. This has had more personal importance for me than galleries because a forest is a place easily experienced personally, as opposed to the masses in the galleries.
The town of barbizon is small and suitably deserted for the timne we were there, not a tourist to be seen, just chimneysmoke and singing garderners. I stood in the studio of millet in the light of mouldy windows and the air of dustyrelics. Splendid day!




Monday, November 24, 2008

SNOWY PARIS
not quite like this painting
but we imagined so!











Yesterday it snowed! how wonderful paris is in a winter wonderland!
It was a very indoor type day though, super cold and wet and drizzly and the face feels red raw.
I wandered around deserted streets of saint michelle looking for the musee dòrsay by myself, the quiet sunday streets where i imagine everyone especially the french sayed indoors by the heaters. The family had freids for lunch and i left whilst the home filled with the smells of a cooking tart and the notes of little Elvira's flute practice.
I arrived finally at the museum, to find hundreds of people, mostly english speaking tourists and solemn travellers coming all the way to wait in line for 40 minutes.
once inside, i only had 2 hours, and wasted half of it in the first room, the gift store, marvelling at great big books of photos of paris last century. I roamed and saw a chalkpastels show which was comlpetely inspiring to one who never felt the love to chalkypastels. Some of them Degas and segatini and dhurmer and prouve.
I love when the impressionists and seccesionists left the old school of history painting, the romantics and the old school, to capture and be amongst nature, this slow progression where art lef the country and the standard and became natural and personalized. You can see the love and longing in Corot's country paintings, Millet and Rosseau. Capturing and recognizing the natural man and land bond, finally after so many years of cloisters and schools, the artists go back to nature!




lovely men



Saturday, November 22, 2008



The men, they smoke cigarettes elegantly like a woman taking a bite of a croissant. They seem classically elegant compared with australians, refined and full of old features like a face that has existed for centuries. There are wonderful faces to watch here, beautiful manners to observe. Their accent becomes hypnotic and their culture more mysterious by the day. The women, and their classical grace, full hair and olive skin, natural pouts and loving gazes. Even after almost 2 weeks it is as though france will never become familer or understood for me, i prefer to watch it all as if in a movie.
Last night we slaved over the pokey kitchen, navigating our way around the maze of utensils and strange ingredients. People came over with their wild children who played around the downstairs in french giggles and squeels, the imaginitive and contained maddness of apartment reared children.  They started us on oysters, salty nostalgia of clareville at lowtide. Then wine and the feast we made, grilled sweet pear salad with crispy pancetta and pine nuts, with warm risotto of parmesan, lemon and leek. After the feast, Pascalle and her daughter sang theatrical french songs on the piano while all the children danced an sung along. We watched from the door of the kitchen where we cleaned the plates after chesses and rhubarb tarts, then coffee and chocolate.   such an indulgent and rich night. 
xx




 
 

Friday, November 21, 2008

THE MAD JEFF KOONS AT THE MAD VERSAILLES!!



the louvre has many sweet madonnas 
just like the streets of paris
the louvre has many colours
unlike the streets of paris
paris in winter is grey and cream
and silver
like barnacles.

i am staying with small parisian family
with sweet children 
who we catch watching us from doorways
like the cat who spies on us and creeps around our things.
the children did a musical performance for us
polite with classical flute and piano
and then they served us chevres
goats cheese
on pikelets.


we saw the cold city of rotten stone
pere lechaise cemetary
wet loss covered statues
and leaveless trees like that painting of that cloister
on the narcisuss and goldmund cover.
the least grandiose being jimmy morrison
whose grave was watery with black roses
an american manwolf in paris
a rockstar amongst grand families. 
oscar wildes grave was covered in lipstickisses
and love hearts.

we sleep in an old smokeysmell room
overlooking montmarte
where maybe picasso hungout
its nice to hangout here
overlooking the city of barnacles
with the sky that glows pinkyorange
and flourogreen trees like a fauves painting
like a van gogh.

and i was touched by the louvre and the people init
the mona lisa the only one relaxed amonsgt the photoflashes
medusas raft rocking on the sea of eyes
and delacroix's liberty leading the people through isles of history.


back to paris and its sweet breadsmells xx



Wednesday, November 12, 2008



Today..
I bought a banana on Portobello road and ate it curbside whilst watching beard clad gentlemen ride bicycles with leather knapsacks.
I strolled through notting hill and took photos of english rose gardens in the morning light.
I walked through the shades of histories minds, being chased down by the cheekiest squirrels in Hyde park, under falling wintry leaves, down winding bankside paths in bruegelesque tones.
The light, dramatic through looming dark clouds, and the wind rocking white dinghys in the choppy slate couloured lake. Fat geese and swans paraded like i was there to see them.
I was in a pisarro painting all afternoon as i walked down orange and yellow leafed trees and found buckingham palace, sketched the luminous gates, lay in green park with the squirrels and we snacked on raisins.

I ended my last day in london with a glimpse at the old tower on tower hill, a meander down piccadilly, popping into the national portrait gallery catching an annie leibovitz retrospective, and a squiz at the royal academy of arts ( all shows - byzantium and giacometti - were £12, beyond my budget, although i got a free catalogue :-). All in all, london has overwhelmed me in pace and size, but also touched me in colour and culture. xx

Tuesday, November 11, 2008









Arriving in a new city, body clock distorted, hazy from those transit moments in a saudi arabian airport in the Am, is when one needs a dose of solace.
Where does solace come for backpackers? When hostels are buzzing with festive fever and kareoke nights, when the city you have arrived in is extensive and bustling with busy people. When you want to receive some retail therapy or even catch a flick, but it costs the price of jetstar flight to brisbane. Galleries have been my haven from the mad world of the hostel. The tate modern on saturday took me aback with its lines, £4 coffee and swarming tour groups of 30+. The artwork seemed like simple objects, floating amongst the masses, some unable to stand out over the energy of exitable humans. Saturday is not a day for solace.
I went to meet with a camp hawian fashion student from the hostel and got lost in the Lord Mayors parade, Fur lined velvet clad gentlemen and flashbacks of aristoracy, military tanks and relics rolling down the pedestrian filled rainy streets of central london.
We went shopping in the vintage warehouses of brick lane, before spending the night drinking fishbowls of long island ice teas and using london for what its saturday night had to offer.



Monday the tate brittain. I walked along the thames in the rain, the soft drizzle and the white skies so typical of london, big ben towering like a post card, double decker busses the the lot. The Tate was peaceful and serene, like a playground for the weary artist. I rested in the francis bacon room and watched a documentary on his debauchery, illicit romance and the emotional language of his painting. I played the interactive games in the turner drawing room, playing with light and pencils and hand made watercolours. I sat and drew the neo classical sculptures amonsgt other young art students on a feild day. I mosied through the Victorian room, the 16th century brittish portraits room, the Romantic landscape room, the turner prize and the Francis Bacon collection. It was now getting dark, as it does around 4 o clock, and went for a wine&sushitrain feed in mayfair with an old friend from sydney.

Today, all the stimulation of london and being here for a few days, i've settled in to the pace of things a little more. I think i will find hyde park and nestle up to a tree with my sketchpad, then find the royal academy of arts, see the globe theatre, scope st pauls cathedral, buy gumboots, and get ready for my last day here tomorrow.