Going Slow

Today being a rather blah day in general, with the rain and all and despite my never really caring how the weather goes one way or another, I thought that I would take a little time and look at this and that around the house and in the studio.  But it seems as if nothing was quite good enough, so I decided to detour back into some recent photographs- in particular, a set from a nearby garden which I go visit every now and then.  Quite surprisingly, instead of being kicked out (to be replaced by some monstrosity of a condo), the garden has actually been able to expand, and this I only realized after walking inside of it.  Sometimes, I wander in there, often because I cannot stand the neighborhood and the noise and people who are now surrounding it, and in doing so, I get a few moments when I feel that the city cannot swallow me up.

When I re-emerge, I feel that I can go on, and fight anew.  That is, until I finally decide to leave the environs of the city for good.  But,when will that be, if ever?

No Place Like Home

I've been more than usually lazy recently due to a mixture of things that aren't really worth talking about, but I thought that I'd just mention it for mentioning's sake. Thus, the significant lack of posts recently which I will hopefully be able to remedy.

Last night, I finally got a chance to watch The Makioka Sisters on film- I had a very bad quality version of it on VHS many years ago, but did not watch it thinking that the color did not do it justice.  I am glad in many ways that I waited, in particular because the visual quality of the film is one of the main draws.  As for the way that the film was made, there were flaws aplenty that were evident- not least of which were the many cardboard actors playing the many parts.  Perhaps it is also my fault that I have spoiled myself by watching the great films of Tarkovsky, Bresson and Ozu.

Something I was able to take away from the film, or perhaps have evoked in my own latent sensibility, is the notion of "home,"  As the film's lateral concern was the onslaught of time and in essence the fall of a traditional family, the major move by the family head from their "home" in Osaka to the far away land (then, and now) of Tokyo is a major change, and one which was taken with much compromise, sacrifice and betrayal.

Over the years, as I myself have questioned the notion of what "home" is, and realizing that I have none, seeing someone else (even a fictional character) leave theirs is utterly heartbreaking.

the film, set in Showa 13, which is (was) 1938.

Revival Furniture

There are many people for whom moving is not a big deal at all, but I surely am not one of that number.  Always having a place that I called "home" since I was born, despite the fact that I do not live there (but could, should I chose to), has always been a kind of privilege and also a burden (the burden being that of time and memory).  Over the years, I have lived in only a few other places, mostly during my school days, which are a far distant and utterly forgettable chain of memories.  And, of course, the place where I have hung my hat over the past eight years is less than a stone's throw away from my real "home," so there has never been a sense that I have moved anywhere, really.

A friend of mine recently moved, and it was with the help of myself and Other Half taking two full days and nights of helping out that allowed him to get everything sorted, furniture and things arranged, items displayed, et cetera. With the usual procrastination and excuses of daily life, most likely all the boxes would be overwhelming and put off until a later date. But, as both myself and Other Half are not the kind to leave boxes hanging around like dread eyesores, we unpacked and sorted through the entire apartment until it was up to par.  And up to par, it indeed was.  As for how it will turn out later...

One of the best things about helping my friend move was to be able to convince him of keeping some of the furniture that was in his former apartment (which belonged to his late grandmother).  Having visited that place on many an occasion, it was cluttered with the garbage of daily life and with things that were not his (many of which were, as well), so it was difficult to see the furniture in its glory.  But, taking a good hunch, we felt it could be very useful and lovely for the new place- and, if it were not, then to contemplate buying new furniture instead.

It turns out that we were indeed right- the furniture was just waiting for its turn in the spotlight, after being obscured for years.  (One disclaimer, though- that clunky, fat, lazy looking sofa set is something I would have advocated chucking out)

A Perfect Place and My Own Search

The past two weeks have been a bit busy and chock full of entertainment and encounters, as well as the usual accumulation of things (mostly books and a small pile of comic books when I lost sense and decided to buy a batch of nonsense), so I have not been able to devote much time (or any time, really) to the Proust which I had begun a little while back.  It is with pride and also with a competitive sadness that Other Half is already on the second book, while I have been stuck in time in the first, although in the coming days I fully intend to remedy that.

Just a quick post today, really.  I was walking around and taking in some of the autumn foliage which had descended onto ground, and thought that what I really needed was a place where silence could reign.  Once again, I must give kudos to Other Half for finding a great place in which to read Proust- in the living room, with our brand new Bauhaus inspired reading lamp.

As for me, I've yet to find the best place.  Perhaps anywhere I decide to, that's it.

Other Half's Spot, with Swann's Way.

Market Ghosts

There is a set of three buildings on Essex Street which, despite years of being here, I have only been into one of (the market which is still operational daily).  Another was used for the briefest period of time (maybe a month, maybe a few months, I cannot remember exactly, as this was over ten years ago), while the third I have never known to be open to the public.  Just exactly why the city owned property has not been used to any benefit (including their own monetary gain, the end all of government dreams) is not entirely clear.

The other night, I was walking by the building and saw that something was going on.  It turned out that the space was being used for a public art project of sorts, and it was closing night.  Well, I haven't anything to say about most of the "work" inside, but I was more than pleased to be able to see the interior.

As expected, it showed the decay of time. The only evidence of its earlier existence was the ghostly remnant of a sign indicating what was being sold- evidently, the meat market.

Perhaps it will rise again, this market- or, more than likely, with the developer's mind (after lining government pockets) and the usual who cares attitude of the general public, they will demolish it for yet another eyesore building.

Seth, the grand Canadian artist.

An idler such as myself has many interests- probably too many to count, really, but all are sorted within their own compartments in my mind, and sometimes juggled quite flippantly as the mood takes me.  While it is true that I am interested in comic books (not graphic novels), I also realize on the flip side that they are for the most part escapist and nonsensical- hardly worth spending any time over.  But, very clearly I understand my own nostalgic interest in them, and also that my own preference has always been for works that are aesthetic rather than for the juvenile (or non-existent) story-lines.  This, I have known quite well for years...

Now, something which has also followed me for years, well over a decade, really, has been my interest in the Canadian artist Seth.  I have to preface with where he is from not to define him, but to indicate my respect for his many works which feature Canada as real or imagined in some way, shape or form.  It was his comic Palooka-Ville which first grabbed my attention, and in the years since then, he has come out with lengthier works in a similar and also a different style to reflect his vision.  Without fail, I have picked them up, with the exception of one (George Sprott), mainly because it is large sized and I often wonder where to place it on my bookshelf- although I did read it in its entirety already when it first came out.

Well, the other day, Other Half asked me whether I was going to the Seth signing at a local bookstore, and I said, yeah, maybe, but in the back of my mind, I was not quite sure, because I always thought going as a fan reeks of the Comic Book Fanboy, so have always missed out on his few signings here in the city over the years.  Anyway, I decided that this time, maybe I would go see him...

After deciding on it, I went into my usual staple bookstore to pick up the George Sprott book, and surprise surprise, there he was in his splendor- the artist Seth himself, looking through the graphic novel section.  I pointed out his newest book and said, "That book is very good, I heard" and he responded, "No, it's not very good," and we had a quick exchange of words, and said I looked forward to seeing him the following day.  Pretty happy was I, that I walked around for a few hours more, random places as usual, and then at the end of the night I popped into another bookstore to see if the latest issue of a magazine (Monocle) had come out, which it hadn't, but instead, there was Seth again, looking at the non-fiction book display- and, again, I  spoke with him.

Two times in one day, that's pretty good.

The next day, I went to his talk (which he held with Daniel Clowes of Ghost World fame), and afterwards, had him sign and make some quick sketches in six of my books of his, as well as in my own recently unused and unloved sketchbook.

my small collection of Seth books- winners one and all.

as he was sketching in the George Sprott book

sketch inside the brilliant book he worked on with his father. 

a sketch inside my own sketchbook, which depicts the artist (on request)

A moment

Time has surely slipped away quickly since the last post, but not without me being conscious every day and night of its passing. But, having been caught up in several things that required absolute commitment to time, there was no way that I wanted to write anything even if I wanted to at the end of each very tiring day.  I do have to say, though, that in the back of my mind, I have always realized that I was indeed thinking of writing as soon as possible, as I have accumulated rather a number of things that I could go on about in some small detail, and that jumble of thoughts will make up the posts that follow.

Tonight, though, I will just offer that I was quite overwhelmed by the convention that I have just attended over four days, being there for almost every minute that it was open- with the exception of the third day, when I left four hours earlier- I just didn't want to deal with it much longer, and it was not due to lack of interest.  I had just reached a saturation point, I felt, although this did not manifest itself when I returned back home, when I immersed myself in even more research for the following day.

There was little time in which to actually breathe, to think about things.  True that I was entirely in the now, so to speak, but that being so present was not really the kind of mind state that is ideal.

What follows is the image I took when I stepped out to take a breather, and it was breathtaking- five minutes of silence before I plunged back into the craziness.

Rainbow Room

While at the Tommy Nutter show (the subject of the previous post), there was a small side room which looked a bit like a boardroom- and is probably used that way when so needed.  But on the day that I was there, nobody was around and there was an exhibition of 1960s-1970s era photographs of some photographer or other.  I gave it a quick go through and was thrilled to find beyond the recognizable shots of David Bowie as Ziggy amongst others some lovely portraits of Twiggy in her heyday.  For some reason, her allure as an icon has attracted me like no other former model (of any generation, and especially not of the contemporary one)- and one photograph in specific (of her, seated alone, in the Rainbow Room of the Biba store) drew me in, awestruck and starstruck, into her world (and that world) for a brief and very shining moment.  Before leaving the museum, though, I picked up a book on Biba written by the woman herself- and it promises to be full of the times when her store (or empire) was the place to be for young and forward looking young girls.

Nutter

The European trip from last month becoming ever more of a memory and an almost unreal thing, I thought that I would finally settle the matter and finish up on the postings related to it- so as not to be bogged down by the past.  Hopefully, in doing so, this will open up a new range of possibilities and thoughts, in addition to presenting myself with more places in which to visit or to hopefully re-visit.

Now, one of the names that often pops up in my interest in sartorial things is that of Tommy Nutter, who is quite obviously a crazy genius of sorts and was instrumental in redefining Savile Row- at least, for the time that he was alive.  His work with Edward Sexton (no longer on the Row, but on Beauchamp Place, near Harrod's) and the other masters Chittleborough and Morgan (who still work on the Row), when seen up close and personal, strikes one as so outrageous and so courageous that it really would take only the most trendy fool (at the time) or someone who was so proof positive of one's own style to wear.

Tom Ford has, of course, revealed his "inspiration" from the work of Nutter's, which is obvious in the lapels- but, really, if one is talking about lapels, Nutter's are absolutely brilliant- higher than the sky, they point heavenwards to its absolute Mount Rushmore of a peak.

This small show at the Fashion and Textile Museum in London was particularly good, in that I had never seen even one of the Tommy Nutter suits in real life, and here was a veritable load of them, as worn by cultural icons of rock when they were still rocking- as compared to being camp dinosaur icons.  There were many represented from the collection of a Prince of some Indian country or other, but, alas, I could not find any photos of the fellow who decided to outfit himself oh so flamboyantly.

Even better was the spirit of Tommy himself, smiling throughout, knowing that even years later, nobody had really taken away his energy or his luster.

Haggis and Irn Bru at Mackintosh's

Maintaining the enthusiasm for Charles Rennie Mackintosh in Glasgow after a visit to the School of Art, I found myself in the reconstructed version of his Willow Tea Rooms in nearby Sauchiehall Street for some architectural snooping as well as a place to have a pleasant lunch before rushing back to London and its many splendors and horrors. Needless to say, after finding my new love and appreciation for haggis (and neeps and tatties, that was indeed what I had ordered- and I also inquired as to what Irn Bru was amongst the refreshments, and ordered it after the waitress's recommendation (she liked it)- which turned out to be an old fashioned sort of orange colored but not orange flavored fizzy drink of the sort which used to be popular (I found out from Better Half's mother) in the olden days in Japan.  Of an American equivalent, I can think of none at the moment.

Back to the Willow Tea Rooms itself- it was in a multi leveled space, the second and third floor of which is the tea rooms proper.  The ground level was for a jeweler, quite random thing really with their assortment of baubles- and the upper levels served a kind of hidden purpose of which I was unable to ascertain (despite snooping up there, while on a visit to the loo).  

Alas, tea and Irn Bru being had, and quite delighted at Glasgow in general and specific- despite the cold rain, which was still on and off, the map of Mackintosh related buildings beckoned me further- one or two more points, and, weather and time be damned, that was next.

The rain of another day.

This rain this rain and the dreariest and tiredness of moods that shift and swing between this that and the other in no predictable fashion cry out for a shot of the hard stuff that I have been avoiding for the better part of a few months now, and a curious daydreaming sent me back to the driving cold rain of glasgow- the near frozen (but not quite) that tore down in a dreadful pitter patter when I arrived in that fair (not foul) city.  Armed with increasingly rained upon map (and no sense of direction in general, as is usually the case), I somehow made my way to the Glasgow School of Art- the one true purpose of my going to Glasgow- and to see whether my imaginings over the years of the work of Charles Rennie Mackintosh could hold up to seeing it in the light of reality.

Not many photos- as none could be snuck in on the guided tour that I was part of, led by a fabulous young student (Fran).  All the better, as there was more time to be captivated by the sights and the sounds.  If anything, it made me want to stay in Scotland longer, to take in the few other Mackintosh buildings that were still around- but, alas, time was most definitely pressing, and only two others could be viewed.  As for the school building itself, that was definitely a marvel.  Mackintosh must have had plenty of good ideas of how a school should be run, and how it must be intimately involved with aesthetics (or, pure beauty, really), and it was not hard to imagine how a student could fall in love with the idea of art just by being there day in and day out.

Although, I was told that there was a curfew of when students had to be out of the building- something, given the artist's stereotypical hours, makes absolutely no sense.