The new prompt on Colour Me Positive is announced on Friday mornings here in the UK but as I went to the Surreal exhibition that day I didn't see it till I returned home and to my dismay it was: Celebration.The art challenge was to write what we are grateful for today. I must admit to feeling more like a wake than a celebration but after some thought I realized that there is always much in life that can be celebrated regardless of politics and the like, such as beauty, friendship, love, art and flowers. So I decided to use one piece hanging in the Surreal exhibition as my inspiration.
This piece called Collage by Eduardo Paolozzi (from the Gallery's own collection) was made back in the fifties and contains things as entry tickets, cuttings from papers etc. as well as much glorious mark making.
So I too started by collaging on my pages using the receipts for my entrance (and discovered that the ink on them is not permanent!), my entrance ticket itself, pieces of a paper bag with a red heart on it, a label send to me by a friend, pieces from a French encyclopaedia, an Italian phrase from a magazine, some scrapbooking paper with black dots and a vintage music sheet, as well as bits from my underpaper, including a piece on which I had tried out a face stamp. I also added pages from this year's Flow magazine calendar.
The next step was add a flower stamp in various places and to add colour by painting. Then I did my own mark making using the smaller stencils from our June Stencilgirl Club. And the tear shaped image seemed specially appropriate.
I wanted the page to be about my own feelings as it should be in an art journal so although I celebrated the marvellous (as per Andre Breton, see my precious post here) I also wanted it to be about the date that will now go down in history as the day the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union. That is why I included the French and Italian text and why I also decided to enter the day (24/6) on the pages using the numbers on one of the December 2015 Club stencils. It was also stamped on my entrace ticket.
I wonder how I will look back on this spread and the day that it commemorates in the future. At the moment the after shocks are battering the country and that will continue for quite some time to come I'm guessing. What the future will bring remains a mystery.
However the pages will also remind me that there is much to be grateful for and to celebrate.
1 comment:
Hello Frieda,
This is lovely work, full of expression. You worked well even though celebration was not what you were feeling. I admire your commitment to art! Sometimes it is harder to feel the joy when sad events are happening around the world.
Hugs,
Terri
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