Finished Rainbow Warrior. Finished exhibition.

Finished - Rainbow Warrior'

47 x 37 cm.

Well...after 7 months I've finally laid down the pens on this one! i'm utterly tired of it. This of course is not unusual...after staring at it, being familiar with almost every dot, I'm ready not to see it for some time. the practise almost always bears out , that when I finish a large piece, it goes away safely where I'm not going to see it. My work over the last few years gets the same treatment..secreted away down at the side of the wardrobe. Having returned to images such as 'Three graces with two headed lamb' 'Lectern' 'Museic' 'Viscount Bubbles' I'm happy to say I'm really satisfied with them now (despite the uneasy nature of their messages)

The swifts are summer visitors here in England...they fly from north Africa each year to breed...they always return to the same nests...they always arrive in the first week of May, and fly back to Africa in August. My Dad used to point them out...he was an incredibly experienced ornithologist who who was a lover of nature. He used tell my brother and I about their journey...the fact that they never land apart from to lay their eggs and incubate them...they eat, mate and sleep in flight.

The above photo and the one below I took using my self timer on the camera. I'm at the gallery in Cromford. Below i've just finished clearing my work out...sweeping the floor and leaving the place the way I found it. I find the end of an exhibition a sad business. I've sat for a week, surrounded by work that had in many cases been the product of deeply emotive issues...if not the subject, the things of life that happened during their creation. I meet people I love...I meet strangers...I have wonderfully amazingly inspiring and encouraging conversations, not to mention the drive home through beautiful Derbyshire countryside. the gallery is with my work in is like my life...my self...the known and the hidden on display. I'm vulnerable, but I'm the master of my work...my expression.

Today I sat...in the peace and quiet, sad for it to be ended, but happy...happy with some special memories...of a very beautiful day yesterday. 

now...what next?