The Ramblings Of Linden Langdon

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Shop Front Trail

Wednesday 29, August

Today I had a walk about North Hobart to see some of the artwork on show in the shop front trail.

There are still plenty more out there, and the more you look the more you see as there are some which aren't very noticable. It is handy to have the guide with you when you take a walk, that's for sure!

Eclipse Of The Moon

Wednesday 29, August

Last night was an eclipse of the moon. Here are a couple of pictures which of course can only give a visual idea without much atmosphere.

Museum Visit

Wednesday 29, August

On the weekend we visited the museum. The current display gives us a glimpse of the wonderful and threatened wildlife of Antarctica. The seals and albatross displays are so well done they are quite active. Well worth a look if your in the area.

Indelible Exhibition

Saturday 25, August

The HIP exhibitions opened on Thursday night. It was a good night with plenty of people interested in the huge range of work in the Indelible exhibition at the Long Gallery as well as the Mini Print which is next door in the Sidespace Gallery. Check the HIP website for more information about who is in the exhibition. My work is a dress and print. The dress is called "Were you there on the day?" in reference to the question most people asked following the Port Arthur Massacre. The print behind the dress, "Bullet (passed by)" is a reminder of the violence. This print is aimed at capturing a sense of the sound of a passing bullet within the body.

You can check out both exhibitions at the Salamanca Arts Centre. The Mini Print runs until September 2nd and the Indelible show until September 16th.

Is Spontaneity The Sauce Of Life?

Saturday 25, August

It seems that everyday is made up of carefully considered decisions with expected outcomes, committments and responsibilities. Could it be then that the spontaneous decision is the saucy bit in a conservative society? The moment you decide that sitting in the sun for a while is a better choice than washing the dishes, or that you really like that silk top - beer - handbag - puppy etc. Or perhaps it is talking to someone outside the click, remembering past friendships eating yummy food that isn't on the 'if you want to live forever only eat this' list. Knowledge, it seems, can be a huge wet blanket if taken on board in total.

Raku Day

Wednesday 22, August

Today was the last day of my pottery classes for the term and we had a raku firing day - which was great fun! I didn't have much to go into the kiln, so I just enjoyed watching the process and snapping photos mostly.

As the raku kiln takes the pots to 1000 degrees only, they ar not suitable to use as vessels for food, so sculptural pieces are better to work with. The size of the kiln is also a very restricting factor, but the effects that can be achieved are quite interesting and next time I will definately have some work ready for the kiln!

Indelible And Mini Print

Monday 20, August

The annual Mini Print sale is on at Sidespace Gallery this week. As part of the Living Artist Week the Hunter Island Press printmakers will fill the space with prints that are 21cm x 21cm and priced at a small $20 which is a bargain! The Sidespace has doors that open into the long Gallery which is where the Indelible exhibition is being held. This is also the HIP printmakers and promises to be an interesting collection of works from a wide and varied group of artists. Opening night for the events is Thursday 23rd at 6pm at the Salamanca Arts Centre, 77 Salamanca Place, Hobart. The Mini Print finishes on the 2nd of September and Indelible continues until September 16th.

Living Artist Week

Sunday 19, August

Living Artist Week is warming up with work appearing in 'right' spots all next week. There will be the extremely popular gallery crawl on Friday night, with buses running from gallery to gallery all night to keep the drinkers out cars and add a festive air to the event. Some of the shows I hope to catch include the botanical art at the Botanical Gardens - a good excuse to have a walk in the gardens - the Artless exhibtion at Murdunna - I hear they are going to have chocolate cake on offer - the shop front trail through North Hobart - which has all sorts of wonderful shops and cafes to browse - the local connections exhibition at the Rosny Schoolhouse Gallery and I definately intend going to the Euan Macleod art forum at the school of art.

If your interested in seeing my work I have a print from the Precipice series at Chrome Cafe in Elizabeth street as part of the shop front trail, along with photographer Lily Amorous, and as I am a member of Hunter Island Press I have work in the Sidespace Gallery at the Salamanca Arts Centre which is where the mini print exhibition is being run this year, and also in the long Gallery at Salamanca in the Indelible exhibition. This is where the dress will be. So take the opportunity if your in Tasmania to have a look at some of the art work that is being produced in this wonderful little island state! Living Artist Week runs from the 24th of August to the 2nd of September.

A Dress

Sunday 19, August

Today I am putting the final touches to a dress. If that is an appropriate description. It has been quite a big project, as always bigger than I imagined, and it was constantly growing as it progressed with the inclusion of extra details and new ideas. I guess that is really what its all about though, allowing things to grow and develop. Hopefully not into the over cooked basket! Also it is interesting to sit back in the final stages and think about how differently the next project would be, should I choose to do this again! I probably will - I just love working with the silk fabric - it is a sponge for the ink in some ways, but is also very challenging to get the image working as I usually choose to work on a translucent silk. So, anyway, here are a few photos of the process of sewing the panels of the dress skirt together. Each seam is a French seam (my favourite) with the addition of a hand sewn running stitch as a top stitch in red.

My little working space is a room off the garage, so the garage is fast becoming a working space too! Thanks to Craig who helped me clean it out and paint it. The concrete dust made it very uncomfortable to work in there previously. So first the panels were laid out and placed in order of sewing, then the sewing began. My little machine has been around for so many years now - must be about 18 I guess - but it is still doing the job. It sits on top of my old treadle machine, which I love and used for quite a few years when I lived without power. Yes you can live without power! Anyway, the seams then had the hand sewn row of running stitch added. The dress will be installed at the Long Gallery tomorrow, I think, so then I will be able to see the final result - and take a photo of course!

More Amy Reviews

Friday 17, August

Six Women Standing in Front of a White Wall continues to bring in the crowds at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The Herald has done an excellent review and also the Guardian. Also the team have won the Herald Angels award, given out each week to the act which the journalists choose as deserving an award. Congrats to you Amy, and your team mates and director!

Snowy Mountain

Monday 13, August

Yesterday we went for an excursion up Mount Wellington. It was quite a big adventure for me - being someone who avoids snow - but I was totally won over by the beauty of the snow covered landscape. It was just beautiful, and so wonderfully quiet, despite the hundred plus other people there. Snow is such an amazing big sponge for sound. Anyway, taking photos was my obsession, so I have put a few up on my mountain blog.

The Edinburgh Fringe Festival

Sunday 12, August

I mentioned yesterday that my daughter Amy is performing in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. As fate would have it this morning there was an email with 2 reviews they have received for the show- both 5 out of 5 which is quite an achievment! To add to that they are being filmed and interviewed by the BBC! Here is the review that appeared in the Scotsman...

"Six Women Standing in Front of a White Wall. There are some things in life which unite us all - and the need for touch is one of them. A warm hug, the gentle clasp of a hand or stroke of the hair - gestures which take seconds to perform but can stay with us forever. Touch, and our psychological need for it, lies at the centre of this life-affirming show. Already a hit in their native Australia, Little Dove Theatre Art blend Japanese Butoh with performance art. The show's title, while factually correct, is only half the story.

Six women do indeed stand in front of a white wall, tucked away in a disused basement in C soco. In these humble surroundings, the performers line up behind a sign saying "Please Do Touch". Dressed in pretty pink frocks, with wild hair and make-up, they are the epitome of vulnerability and longing. The more time that passes, the more angst-ridden the women become. Until finally, somebody in the audience plucks up the courage to comply with the signage. At the merest stroke of her hand the first woman lights up, and her posture transforms as if a lifeforce has passed through her. Slowly, other members of the audience venture forth, until all six women are in receipt of hugs, strokes and caresses. Such a display of contact between strangers is incredibly moving, and more than one member of the audience (myself included) leaves the theatre wiping away tears.

Makers of performance art often forget when to stop, dragging out their work until you've lost the will to live. At 30 minutes, Six Women Standing In Front Of A White Wall is the perfect length. We are given just enough time to engage with the characters, before the lights go down, maximising the effect. The underlying message of the show is that in the age of texting and e-mail, human touch is often neglected. This beautiful show reminds us that we must not let that happen."

The performances continue until August 27, twice a day. There's another achievment! The second review is available on the Three Weeks website. I hear there may be some photos coming through any day now...

Young Archies

Saturday 11, August

The Young Archies is on display at the University of Tasmania again. There is such a huge range of work and terrific to see such a broad use of mediums as well.

You can visit the School of Art and browse the portraits that line the atrium and hallways.

Tasmanian Sites

Saturday 11, August

I'm still playing with the blogroll - I just added a background image to the links that are Tasmanian. It was a reminder of how long it has been since I did a bit of CSS and it took me the best part of the day to get it working, when it was really a 2 minute job! Anyway, it is kind of fun adding some interest elements to the blog. I'll keep searching through for more Tasmanian artists - surely there are a few more who have websites! Oh and the image is a slice from a painting my daughter Amy did on a fundraiser table cloth - a beautiful curled up bracken fern leaf! She is currently performing at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival with Little Dove, a Brisbane based theatre group.

Artless

Thursday 9, August

With the Living Artist Week coming up from the 24th of August to the 2nd of September, there are an amazing number of exhibitions and art happenings going on. My good friends at Artless Studio and Gallery in Murdunna are having a show of recent work at their beautiful studio nestled in the coastal bush. Naomi has just returned from a working trip to central Australia and has a bundle of wonderful outback paintings as testimony to her journey. Along with Eve creating ceramic pieces and the absolutely superb ceramic work by Sally Curry, this will be a good place to head to for an excursion during the exhibition week. The Artless Studio and Gallery have a new and very informative website which has all the details you need to find the studio.

Slideshow

Thursday 9, August

Yesterday I put up a slideshow of my recent print series Precipice 1. I need to go back and take some photos of the prints again in a controlled envoronment - not snapped on the studio wall - so it will be updated in the not too distant future, but generally the prints are almost completed. I have posted the slideshow in the multimedia section of my website. Each print is 60cm x 60cm with an extra 10cm of paper at the bottom. There are 9 prints in the series, and this is the first of a number of series yet to be decided! I have started on another 2 though.

I wrote a statement about the work when I first started... "A precipice, the point at which a person can experience a barrier which prevents a perceived normal reaction. Here it is represented in the natural world, using the elements of nature to accentuate the vortex, the wall, the barrier that is conjured in the mind through interpretation of the natural forces or elements such as a mist, nightfall or patterns in nature. This work aims to provoke the viewer to experience the pressure of trauma.". I guess that the experience of looking at a print on the internet as opposed to real life mostly negates the final part of that statement, but hopefully it clarifies the motivation for the work!

The Blogroll Thing

Monday 6, August

I can't remember the last time I mucked about with the blogroll, so I just scanned through my horrendous favourites file to pick a few out. There may be more to come when the right mood strikes...

Belinda Fox

Saturday 4, August

Yesterday I went to the forum at uni and listened to Belinda Fox. She is quite an inspiring success story in the realm of recent artists graduating and skyrocketing to great heights on a few years. Drawing on her travels through several countries she has a careful and deep eye for picking detail that she then uses in her work. "Take it back" was the 2007 Burnie Print Prize winner. She has a terrific website with plenty of great browsing! Belinda has uploaded a number of PDF's of her writing for various articles and catalogues.