To Quote Glen...'Make Art'

When I heard that Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova won an Oscar for Best Song last night & Daniel Day-Lewis for Best Actor (an honorary Irishman), I felt immensely proud to be Irish & homesick both at the same time! My sister Rachel gave me a present of the soundtrack for the film Once & it is nearly warn out, as I've had it on non-stop for the last few months. Every song is beautiful...but the Oscar goes to... Falling Slowly

If you haven't checked out Once it's a must, I watched it back in Dublin over Christmas and had to rewind it again & again to listen to the music. It is about a Dublin busker (Glen Hansard), who ekes out a living playing guitar and repairing vacuum cleaners for his dad's shop, meets a young Czech immigrant (Marketa Irglova) who sells roses on the same street. She likes his song, and what's more…she has a broken vacuum cleaner! They soon find themselves playing music together in a nearby music shop (since she can't afford a piano, the owner lets her play his floor models). Over the course of a week, they form a musical rapport and, newly inspired, decide to record an album. It is lovely, inspiring, hopeful & sad all intertwined!

Make art, Make art....love it!

Boo!

I'm still here, just quite busy at the moment...deadlines, work, life & all that! I hope to get a chance to post properly next week. Have a good weekend x

::ownership::

When I'm asked what I do for a living, I normally say that I'm a student. Which means that I generally dodge the title of 'artist'. That is, until R pipes up & says, 'she's an artist', I then usually give him a look which translates as 'I can't believe you just said that'...then turn to the person who asked & kind of shrug my shoulders in an apologetic way. It's a matter of ownership & confidence...both of which are things you decide to step into & which I obviously still haven't fully.
So, this all said...[a long winded way of getting to the point] I went to view a studio space yesterday with a friend from Uni & we have decided to take the space! It feels both nerve wracking & exciting in equal measures. It is a fantastic bright, large space in an old paper making factory, which is now used as artists studios. I brought my camera along, but alas, forgot to take any photos...too much excitement! I still have another couple of months until I have to be out of the studio space in college, but studio spaces aren't easy to come across in South London & it seemed like an opportunity not to be missed. The long & short of it is I now have some more direction as to what will happen after my degree, which has given me a bit more piece of mind [no more sleepless nights, tossing & turning wondering what next] I think I'm beginning to feel like a proper, grown up artist!

These days It's all about tea!

I was invited to a Tea Party this afternoon, for my friend Lora's Birthday. It was all very civilized...we ate delicious cakes & treats made by Lora's fair hands, drank tea out of delicate cups & saucers and listened to Billie Holidays records. A perfect way to spend a glorious sunny Sunday. It does the soul good to drink a nice cup of tea & eat cake with friends !

*chairs a plenty*

This made me gasp when I saw it!
In 2003, for the Istanbul Biennial, Salcedo made an installation on an unremarkable street comprising 1,600 wooden chairs stacked precariously in the space between two buildings, creating 'an act of memory' in order to re-inhabit this space of forgetting.


You can see more of Doris Salcedo's work here & she is currently showing at the Tate Modern