HOW TO BE TOP DOG

REQUIREMENTS FOR BEING PRIME MINISTER, PRESIDENT, TOP DOG, BIG CHEESE, GANG LEADER:

1. Know how to lie confidently, fluently, boldly, shamelessly.

2. Lie about lying, as above.

3. Be a role model: let them learn how to win via all the above.

4. Be a boor, a bore, a buffoon, a bastard, a betrayer. They will call it charisma.

BODY REBUILDING

Here's me back from the gym, feeling virtuously achy. They have state of the art equipment, acres of it, full of people in various states of uber-fitness, uber-decay and simple normal what-the-hellness. All good.

ITALIAN THINKING

My old friend from Rome, Gaetano Trusso, architect-poet-translator of Persian poetry but not fitting any pigeonholes, as is the case with all my close friends and family, was here last week and of course we spoke Italian, with the odd French or English phrase inserted now and then.

I noticed that my ongoing inner monologue changes languages whenever I spend time with someone whose native tongue is different from mine, if I happen to know that tongue. I start to think in Italian, for instance, and my thinking takes on an Italianate character. I don't mean pasta adverts and lots of hand gestures but another range of thoughts, other vibrations, other colours. Finding links between apparently disparate things, a collage kind of thinking, more like flying than driving.

Dear Christine exhibition opens in Newcastle

I've never been to Newcastle. Newcastle is amazing. Those up and down streets, wonderful buildings, the river, the bridges, one of them glowing rainbowly at night, and the people, the people! Unbelievably friendly, all of them, at least the five ot six I accosted in the street to ask for directions. They instantly stopped what they were doing, talking on their phones or whatever, and accompanied me on my search. Where else would you find such friendliness? Eventually I got to the Vane, somewhat late at the Private View. 

I intended to take photos of everything and everyone but forgot that communicating with people and taking pictures at the same time doesn't really work. I did manage a few shots and no doubt lots more photos will be posted by others. There is an excellent hardback catalogue, fully illustrated.
 

I'm so glad I was there, the launching of the Dear Christine exhibition, and Fionn Wilson deserves more than one standing ovation for the persistence, dedication, attention and affection she has poured into this project since she conceived it. Christine Keeler would surely have been moved by this reframing and reclaiming of herself as an individual rather than a mere player in the he tragi-comedy that was the Profumo Affair.

NEW PORTRAIT FINISHED

Among the insanely nerve-wracking things that we humans choose to do, painting a portrait ranks up there with walking a tightrope between skyscrapers. If that seems wildly exaggerated then you have never sat in front of a live person, brush and palette in hand, staring at them while they stare back, your mind and senses on a roller coaster between order and chaos, confidence and despair. Never mind that you've been through this process innumerable times in your artist life and that, in principle, you know what you're doing. Because every single time it's different and every single time that tightrope is wobbling and there's no safety net and you are about to fall. Yep, that's how it is.

Here's the finished portrait, carried away today, and allelulia, my subject loves it. He asked me not to give his name as the painting is a surprise gift for someone, to be presented on a special occasion. It's been about 6 weeks since I started this commission, he sat for me twice, I also took some photos.
Now to continue another portrait which is in progress. That one is entirely from photos, of necessity.

Portrait of (temporarily)Anonymous.  NdA 2019. Oil on canvas 50 x 60 cms

TOO LITTLE TIME

Busy painting two portrait commissions. And the Christine Keeler exhibition, Dear Christine, opens at The Vane in Newcastle very soon: Private View 31 May (am going of course), public opening 1st June.

Why is time speedng up so much? What can be done to slow it down? Come on, some gadget is just waiting to be invented.

Just to prove I haven't disappeared:

WHERE IS COMPASSION?

Why aren't huge crowds marching in the streets about this?
Why isn't it headline news in all the press?
How is 'urgency' decided?

And Donald Trump is officially invited on a state visit over here in the UK!

Please share widely.

RESURRECTION TIME

Plant life dies and resurrects on a regular basis with a minimum of fuss. Why don't we? The winters of our discontent more often lead to disillusion and dissolution rather than spring-like resurrection.
Speaking metaphorically of course.

The weight of the past, personally or historically, chains us to the ground, pulls us gradually deeper into immobility. Physically there's only so much we can do to regain flexibility but mentally and supra-mentally, can we resurrect every Spring, like a tree does?

I look around the room where I'm sitting. Almost every object I see is a reminder of something I need to do or have done before. Where is the explosion of flowers? The new growth on my old branches? H'm. Gotta think about this and try to resurrect tomorrow.

Happy Easter, Passover, Springtime, resurrection-time my dear friends everywhere, flowers to you all.

Resurrection. Ink drawing by NdA from Scenes from the Life Of Jesus. Old Stile Press 2011

NOTRE DAME BURNS

It will be rebuilt but something is gone forever.
Je pleure pour toi, Notre Dame. et pour nous tous.

Yes yes yes. the Big Money should have been there immediately for Grenfell Tower survivors and yes it should be there for all the other urgent needs and crucial causes everywhere, yes yes YES! But that doesn't mean we can't also mourn this loss. It's not 'just' a buildimg, not 'only' a historical artefact. Feelings don't have to be rationed, doled out parsimoniously as if there won't be enough to go round.

LAST PHOTO OF AWARD WINNERS

Okay one last plug for this event: the group photo on Sunday 31 March at Free Word Cenre. You can always tell which one is me because I'm the shortest person.