Hong Kong between the storms

A short break in Hong Kong before Australia and whilst the weather is warmer it is certainly familiar. Rain, rain and more rain and lots of it.Still at least its not freezing. I am staying in the Tin Lau area of the Island (east of Causeway bay. Tin Lau is goddess of the sea and very important to Hong Kong people. I wonder if she is also invoking the rain? Below are a few images of the local temple and the night scene just outside my room.

On first full day I did the touristy thing and took a tram ride up to the Peak and then joined all the Chinese keep fit and dog walkers on the long walk down. Th
e sun actually brook through for a while and allowed a lovely viewing of the botanical garden and  Battery Point on the way down. I even managed to continue through the longest escalator route to central. Using the steps as the escalator routes uphill. Then took the Star Ferry to Kowloon and then back to Wan Chai. Walked along region of Causeway taking in some noodles before a welcome return to bed.

Sparrows after my sweet bun

Peak view tram and view

Sketch Kowloon Park

Kowloon near the harbour Hong Kong and me reflected in the buildings 

Buildings Causeway Bay

On second day took a small bus to Stanley and the market. I have to say, I was drawn more to the walks and the Military Cemetery rather than the market. Most of the day dodging the storms. They have their own Tin Hau Temple, with a festival and dragon dancing on the day.

Tin Hau at Stanley

Offering at Pak Tai Shrine (God of the North and special and special to fishermen)

It is still pouring with rain..which is why I am taking some time to update my b log..but need to go out to get some noodles or rice and dumplings.

Entering Autumn,Leaving 'Spring'

Well, the solstice has passed and we are officially in 'Spring' though it is more like Winter. More confusing, I leave shortly for Australia via Hong Kong so will enter Autumn bit will feel more like Summer. Will need clothes for four seasons (isn't there a pop group in there somewhere?)

I will update this blog with sketches and images as and when I can. Meanwhile, I leave my other half (Derek) doing a 'Spring Clean'. He is a very handy guy so we will be putting stairs into our loft to make better storage and access and further down the line, kitting out our old shed as an outdoor room/studio.

Before leaving, I am reminded of a the winter trees, Witch Hazel and cold weather behind:

Witch Hazel 15x15cm

Witch Hazel 

 

 

 A sketch of pots at West Dean pottery studio and photographs from the windows of my house

Winter Tree and Bowl 15x15cm

To 'Doo' Different Norfolk and workshops.

I have just spent a few days back in Norfolk with family and running workshops with Anglia Leisure Learning at Belsey Bridge. One of my favourite Norfolk sayings is 'To Doo Different' with a long 'o'. It was great to catch up with family and take in the cold sparsity of the landscape and trees.

There is a lot of Dutch influence in the East Anglia as these houses in Beccles reflect. Much of the wealth was founded on the wool trade and the later digging of dykes and waterways in the countryside.


Many of the churches and houses are built with local flint. This wall has bottles inserted into the brickwork to bring light into the interior..I think?

And, for those who may sometimes wonder what I am saying..as I 'doo'...you  may find a clue here; www.norfolkdialect.com

 I stitched a quick sketch:

and like the back (top) better than the bottom (below)



The student focus was on using seams, edges and pattern to create personal narratives. Thanks for permission to share on this blog:

 Lace and isolation of part of image by Karin Bourne (above)
Use of clothing and needlework references (left) by Claire Thirkell

 Anne Davies using more illustrative processes..would work well in a children's book

 Detail of edges and layers by Sheilagh Frankland

Flying Crane by teacher specialising in design textiles  Tracey Xu

Traces

Festival near Amritsar

Sometimes, I reflect back. Six years ago I visited India. I have Romany ancestry and wanted to 'trace' connections and links  to the North West regions of India  where it is believed the 'Romani'  first migrated.. The colours of the temple, coverings for the horses and the decorated trucks certainly resonated with the those I remember seeing on the Vardos or caravans my grandparents owned.

 

     Monkey Mountain Jaipur                                               Waiting at the Station, Delhi

I made photographs and drawings recording what I saw and experienced and gradually, as the experience began to sit with me more, the colours and marks found they way into my work.

Rooftop Delhi

I was interested in the day to day, the interaction between the landscape and the people and the marks made as part of that interaction.

Sketchbook Collage

Small Stitch-sketch canvas' of local scenes.

 

One of my pieces, 'Remnants from Not So Ordinary Lives' (above) is in the collection of a teacher decided to show  the work to her students: 

'I have to tell you that your piece hanging in my classroom today drew the kids in.  I could hear oohs and ahhs as they can into the room.  And the neatest thing was watching them get up close to see all the wonderful stitching/printing/collaging, etc.  And then asking permission to touch.  They just really needed to touch your piece as I did several times today.  It looks so transparent and is so lightweight, not what we are used to producing here.  It's a very magical piece.' 

 (Teacher at Whitney High School in Cerritos, California)

This is a reminder of the value of the original research in terms of its place and development in my work and more relevant, how the artworks can inform and inspire the next generation to ask questions about its function and purpose. As always, this research will be returned to sometime as a reflection of my cycle of interests.

Traces installation at Rochester Cathedral in 2007/8 (supported by Medway Council)

Flat lands and high waters

60 years ago on the eve of January 31st and morning hours of 1st February severe weather conditions and the high Spring tide caused a storm surge. Water level exceeded 5.6 metres (18.4 ft) above mean sea level in some locations. The flood and waves overwhelmed sea defences and caused extensive flooding The Netherlands, particularly Zeeland. recorded 1,836 deaths. In Eastern England, 307 people were killed with my native Norfolk heavily effected. Lets remember them.We should always remember the great power of the world around us and how relatively insignificant we are on the scale of things. I constantly return to the echoes of my landscape and seek the connections and resonance to those I visit. 

Zeeland Stitch sketches

Happisburg, Norfolk..gradually falling in the Sea

Groyne or otherwise know as breakwater posts.

Sketches of Norfolk Reeds

Waterland  by Graham Swift describes this landscape

We lived in a lock-keeper's cottage by the River Leem, which flows out of Norfolk into the Great Ouse. And no one needs telling that the land in that part of the worid is flat. Flat, with an unrelieved and monotonous flatness, enough of itself, some might say, to drive a man to unquiet and sleep-defeating thoughts. From the raised banks of the Leem, it stretched away to the horizon, its uniform colour, peat-black, varied only by the crops that grew upon it - grey-green potato leaves, blue-green beet leaves, yellow-green wheat; its uniform levelness broken only by the furrowed and dead-straight lines of ditches and drains, which, depending on the state of the sky and the angle of the sun, ran like silver, copper or golden wires across the fields and which, when you stood and looked at them, made you shut one eye and fall prey to fruitless meditations on the laws of perspective.
And yet this land, so regular, so prostrate, so tamed and cultivated, would transform itself, in my five- or six-year-old mind, into an empty wilderness. On those nights when my mother would be forced to tell me stories, it would seem that in our lock-keeper's cottage we were in the middle of nowhere; and the noise of the trains passing on the lines to King's Lynn, Gildsey and Ely was like the baying of a monster closing in on us in our isolation.
A fairy-tale land, after all.

snow and more snow and yellow

Could not resist going out early and seeing how the small bonsai and Witch Hazel looked and capturing shots from above in my garden. Also had footprints of small furry visitors in places. Will make some sketches in the next few days..here's hoping.

Reflections on Water

A few pictures and a sketch of reflections in water. Norfolk and Kent. My observations are made in the sketchbook at the bottom of this image, directly, whilst at the scene. My top sketchbook is used to explore ideas.

Observation and recording. I move around several sketchbooks at once. The top one is for experimenting with ideas and techniques but never acts as a 'formal' design for work. Records ideas and work in progress.

Dark profiles of  trees into high contrast on the water.

These photographs were taken at West Dean where I regularly work. Photographs support my sketches but I like to sit and observe.

5 minutes pen sketch. Try it yourself...but don't take the pen off the page..and just do..don't think. It is only pen and paper and you have nothing to lose.