The Ramblings Of Linden Langdon

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Abi And The Camera

Sunday 29, January

I'm always happy to let someone else take charge of something if they have the inclination - why not? Takes the pressure off me. Anyway yesterday it was Abi taking charge of the mountain photos, and she did a fantastic job under a lot of pressure to snap quickly and effectively! I think she had a bit of fun too - you never know what your going to download from a teenagers camera... Anyway, I couldn't resist putting them all up on the mountain blog at once, as they make a good group! I posted them seperately, so once they are archived past the index page you can find them as posts 'Abi Takes Charge', 'Salamanca', 'Diamond Princess Again', 'Lenah Valley Lights', 'Lenah Valley Road'.

Zucchini Pickle

Saturday 28, January

One disadvantage of not having a search function is that I can't search for my own posts to see if I have talked about something or not! So please excuse me if this is a repeat... Anyway, this recipe is a favourite in the family and has been gratefully received as gifts and sold well at markets. It is easy to make and yields well, so get plenty of jars ready! I always soak my jars in hot soapy water, give them a scrub, rinse in hot water and then dry in the oven - 150 degrees celsius for 10 minutes. This seems to sterilise them well.

• Zucchini Pickle
• 3lb (1.350kg or take it to 1.5kg) zucchini
• 1 1/2 lb (675g or take it to 700g) onions
• handful salt
• 1 1/2 pints (825ml) cider (this is the yummiest, but you can use white) vinegar
• 2lb (900g) brown sugar
• 1 dessert spoon (tbl) tumeric
• 1 dessert curry powder
• 1 dessert spoon mustard
• 1 dessert spoon mustard seed
• 1/2 teaspoon ginger
• 1 fresh chilli, 2 dry or 1 tsp powdered chilli
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 pint (250ml) vinegar (extra)

Thinly slice the zucchini and onions and sprinkle with a handful of salt. Stir gently through then leave the mix overnight, or at least a few hours. Drain the vegetables and lightly rinse. I usually use a colander and just run a bit of water through. Bring the mix to the boil with the vinegar and simmer gently for a few minutes. Add the sugar (this is the tasty soft brown sugar)and spices. Simmer this mix for about 10 - 20 minutes until it looks cooked through.

Blend the flour with the extra vinegar to a smooth paste. This needs to be added to the pickle to thicken it, but I find that it often still has lumps, so I pass it through a sieve as I add it, stirring rapidly to blend it in quickly to prevent lumps forming. Then its just a matter of allowing it to simmer for a few minutes, stirring constantly to prevent sticking, and thats it! Of course the spices can be varied to suit your taste, and usually like to add at least one fresh chilli as it adds a dash of red to the jars which is entcing!

A Hint Of Red In A Sea Of Green

Saturday 28, January

The summer season is starting to pick up in the garden with some red starting to colour up the cherry tomatoes. A much anticipated event! Its just going to be a matter of who gets to the garden first to taste the first tomato of the year! I think I've got a pretty good chance...

I just went through my archives and see that I haven't posted my Zucchini Pickle recipe yet - so I guess I'd better part up with it so that everyone who loves pickles and has an abundant supply of zucchini can make use of this vegie in a most delicious way! Even kids love it!

Mountain Revamp

Friday 27, January

The Wordpress program which runs the Mountain blog can have a new look by dressing it up with a new theme. I have been using the Kubrick theme since I first started posting the mountain photos and a change was well overdue. But, being someone who likes to play in the code a bit, I decided to alter the Kubrick syles rather than just use another 'out of the box' theme. Its amazing how little you have to do to get a totally new appearance, with colour and image replacement. Anyway, the Mountain blog seems to want to stay and keep growing, so a revamp was in order, and the intention is that I will continue to adjust the appearance and won't be so lazy with again...

Its A Four Things Meme!

Wednesday 25, January

Picking out favourite things is not such an easy task for a person who enjoys the variety of life - that is chops and changes with circumstance and experience - but there must be a few things of 'four' that stand out as solid symbolic identity markers - surely?

UPDATE - oops forgot to link to Steven who invited me into the four things meme! Sorry... hope there are some surprises here for you anyway!

• Places I Have Lived
• Buderim (and other Sunshine Coast places)
• Brisbane
• Koonya
• Hobart

• Movies I Can Remember
• Mr and Mrs Smith (cos I saw it the other night)
• Jaws (cos I saw it when I was a kid at the drive in and when the shark surged to the surface I hit my head on the glass window of the cafe)
• The Long Kiss Goodnight (its been on tv so many times I can remember most of the scenes! That makes two aggressive female dominated type movies, should I be worried?)
• Frida (see below)

• Favourite Artists - Well Four Of Them
• Sam Fullbrook
• Monet
• John Olsen
• Frida Kahlo

• Things I love To Do
• eat - especially avocado, ginger and yoghurt
• swim - surf in the ocean, oh how I miss the Sunshine Coast waves and walking on the beach
• print - the moments I have printing are rare and precious
• take photos

• Four Bloggers I'm Tagging
• Marja-Leena Rathje
• Simon from 75 Degrees South
• Angela Thomas
• Printfreak

Oh well, back to the fence for me...

Art And Issues

Wednesday 25, January

It warms my heart to see that the role of art as a means of debating, featuring or grandstanding an issue has become a topic of interest in recent magazine publications. Warming because my stuff tends to be issue driven, as my supervisor once pointed out when trying to find the issue in my suggestion. Artlink has featured artists who have an interest in highlighting issues facing our environmental catastrophies in the recent quarterly titled "ecology: everyone's business". The issue is packed with artists work approaching big issues like climate change, species extinction and architectural approaches as well as human consciousness of treading lightly on the environment.

Gregory Pryor approached an installation at PICA with a huge energy to fill an exhibition space with images of specimens from the Western Australian Herbarium to represent the 'black death' of species diversity. The installation of Ken Yonetani in 2003 involved the creation of fumie ceramic tiles representing six endangered butterfly species and formed in large numbers, laying them out in a superb display and then having people walk across the delicate forms, crushing them underfoot. Literal and effective.

The current Art Monthly Australia also looks into the addressing of issue driven work through the article 'Artsits as model workers' by Ross Woodrow. Woodrow concentrates on the Mike Parr performance "Sitting member" where he was cacooned in a box within a space that had once been an active railway workshop. One arm (stump) protruded from the box, and stayed there for the full working day without any breaks in the performance and highlighting the tenuous labour reforms that are about to sweep away the rights of workers in Australia. Perhaps then, art is regaining its position within the powers that shape our daily experiences and effect the future of life of all forms on the planet, rather than lingering in the peripheral sanctuary of the marginal. Now there's a high bar for me...

Four Stones On The Move

Monday 23, January

I had a few hours to myself today and managed to finish working on two drawings on my litho stones, which means I now have four stones set up like patient puppies looking for a pat. Each image is within a 40cm x 56cm space on the stones, so there is plenty of work involved in getting them through the printing process. Two stones had their first roll up of ink today, which I do without putting the stones through the press. This enables the design to be etched again without the ink being placed under pressure, and in theory should help the more delicate areas to maintain their form.

The uni is still a no go zone for the undergrads, so the printroom is deliciously quiet. So despite still struggling with sciatica nerve pain, I have to make use of the space as the countdown to February first when the undergrads get their golden passes to the access doors is a bit to large and looming. How long does that give me to get the four stones processed? Mmmm, busy week for me...

Its A Ramble And Websites

Sunday 22, January

The printmaking lists I am on have been more active than me in the last few days, and I have a few websites other members have parted up with saved in my favourites list which kind of reveals the amount of time I spend hanging out on the net. Apart from that I have been poked and manipulated by a bloke who declares himself a physio and says he will cure all the injury related pain stuff that was stirred up by stupidly thinking that I could sort cherries despite having had a whiplash injury (admittedly I did think it was all good) in recent history. Also on the agenda has been dealing with the lads surgery after tearing his hand open at work on a bucket handle, the dog needing TLC for a torn toe nail, a stray dog needing refuge from the recent wild storms and consequently trying to find the owner which involved phone calls and aimless walks around the streets following the dog in hope that she would lead the way home (which turned out to be up the hill not down where doggy wanted to go for a swim in the creek), the arrival of our Norwegian visitor (also being daughter's partner), my partners uni highs and lows and new job highs and lows, oh and did I mention my constant pain? The physio said we will start on some pool activity as part of the treatment - oh how I long to get into my swimsuit in front of you mr physio... Now there's a thing, whats this middle aged label I keep hearing in muted dark corners and sighing dismissal? How rude.

All the same, here are a few of the sites that have been appearing in the conversations on the Baren (check out the blog too) and SSNW which is a Yahoo group site.

• Anthony Woodward, with a healthy comic fetish
• Andrew Gott, mostly lino and woodcuts
• Daniel L. Dew
• Helen Moore from the Uk
• Washi paper, paper being a topic of conversation on the lists
• Judy Barrass
• Ellen Shipley from California
• Kevin Parratt
• M. Lee, into woodcut
• Mike Lyon's site is a good one to look around
• Annie Bissett another woodcut blogger
• Andy English is also into woodcut and blogging it
• Graham Scholes

And so with the heat soaring up to the high thirties today, the idea of drawing on my litho stone at uni seems to be slipping away like pregnant beads of sweat, so I shall retire to the bathroom for a cool shower and further the self administered beatings...(as opposed to mr physio).

Die Laughing At Entrepot

Wednesday 18, January

"You are invited to The Rat Palace, an exhibition put together by Die Laughing Collective featuring Jamin, Paicey, Empire, Homewrecker and Speck. The exhibition opens at 6pm, Friday 20th January at Entrepot Gallery." reads the invite that arrived in my email box today. If your into stencil art, which seems to be all the rage at the moment, then this is a good place to go and have a look at what its all about. Not shy of political and social comment, Jamin has built up quite a reputation with his strongly coloured and well aimed artworks. I haven't seen the other 'guys' (blokes, shiela"s person"s) work, so I guess this will be a good place for me to check it out too! The group have a website too, which features blog posts of street art about the place.

What Is RSS?

Tuesday 17, January

I was sitting in the glow of the red lamp my daughters gave me for Christmas and drifting into the shadows it cast off the shasta daisies and RSS popped into my head. What a weird inconsistant thought, bit like thinking belly button fluff when your listening to a lecture, but here I am espousing the values of RSS. Why? Well it has solved a lot of the time hungry website browsing as I have all the sites I want to keep up with (that have RSS feeds that is) on my feedreader, which means that I only visit the actual site when there is something that needs further investigation. So what are RSS, feeds and readers?

There are a couple of styles of RSS feeds that I know of, one like mine which has only a small part of the blog post, and those which have the full post in the feed. The feed is the content of the post which appears in your feedreader, and the feedreader is just a small program which stores the website adresses and periodically searches for new posts (when you have the program open that is).

So, for example, I have the Feedreader 2.90 program (which is free) and each time I find a site that has content that is posted up regularly through RSS I add it to my collection of sites by copying the url of the RSS page and pasting it into my reader using the 'add new feed' button. Another sticky point is that the RSS is called various things and can prove difficult to find on a site. I have the RSS button as part of my main navigation menu, but most sites have it as a small link in the side menu. It can also be called 'syndicate', and there are a couple of different RSS... but it is worth persevering with all the little quirks as the benefit of having the posts so easily accessible through the reader is very liberating!

Ladies Print Day

Monday 16, January

My two daughters joined me in the printroom a couple of days ago to learn how to print an etched plate! They both worked a small copper plate with a soft ground coating, which I etched for a morning while I sorted cherries in the cool store a few hundred metres away. The plates etched quite well in my absence, but of course without the cautious eye watching over them. Amy and Abi then joined me on Saturday to print their designs. They both worked hard for hours, learning all the steps from mixing the ink, inking the plate, using the tarletan, wiping the plate, preparing the paper and printing the plate. I really enjoyed playing the role of the teacher, and I think they enjoyed the printing enough that they are enthusiastic about doing more in the future... so I guess thats a success story! Personally I think their prints are masterpieces - but I may be a bit bias...

Reid Cherry Farming

Friday 13, January

The cherry business has huge potential for supplying the Japanese market in their off season, and this year being the first year for exporting commercial scale from Tasmania it is the trial run for the Reid family to come up with the goods to a standard expected by the Japanese buyer. The fruit we are currently sorting and packing is not the highly prized white flesh fruit that is the ultimate aim of the Tasmanian farming enterprise, but they are very high quality black cherries. Each fruit is carefully looked over to ensure that there are no marks or blemishes that reduces its appeal, so the amount of discarded fruit is quite high. The Japanese inspectors and buyers watch our progress, ensuring that their standards are met. The fruit is also treated to ensure that there is no insect or living creature hidden away in a desperate attempt to immigrate to Japan.

On the printmaking front, the countdown in on for the start of uni again, so my moments in the studio are all the more precious as the space becomes limited when the undergrads hit the floor. I will have to become an after hours printer to get all the projects I have planned to some sort of realisation! OK its off to work then...

Cherry Sortin'

Tuesday 10, January

Late yesterday I got a call for a cherry packing job. This may not seem like a guts and glory type job, but in the cut throat world of cherry growers its all about size and imperfections. Tasmaniain cherry growers have been wrestling for a place in the Japanese cherry market for several years, but they have to meet very strict standards and grow 'the right' sort of fruit to keep the customers happy. As a homestay host I have watched my Japanese guests on many occasions as they cautiously approach the task of selecting a piece of fruit. To us wisened Aussies, eating a cherry is just a matter of grabbing a handful and relishing the juicy fruit as it bursts in the mouth with each vigorous bite. The students, on the other hand, would go about task with ceremony. Each piece of fruit is carefully inspected until one that is sufficient in perfection is found, then rolled around for a minute or two more. The fruit then goes through a cleaning and polishing process, until its optimum potential in shine and zing is reached. Then the moment of teeth to fruit is slow and deliberate, nibbles not bites.

So when we are sorting the cherries for the Japanese market, the first shipment today for this particular crop, the quality control starts with the Japanese representatives overseeing the process, the removal of any fruit with any form of mark and imperfection and the guidance of a quarantine officer who ensured that the area was kept insect free for the whole time with the use of a double door lock system, and finishes with crates of cherries packed and swiftly flown off to foriegn shores. Its an adventure, isn't it? And this week I will be able to buy some paper for my printmaking!

Gay Hawkes Champions The Weilangta Forest

Sunday 8, January

Senator Bob Brown has called out the wrongs of Forestry Tasmania with a current court case which is debating the rights and laws which protect our endangered species. Being played out in the Federal court, the action aims to save the magnificent Weilangta Forest from destruction at the teeth of the chainsaw blade. In support for the case, Tasmanian artist Gay Hawkes has begun organising a dinner. This is no ordinary meal, as anyone who knows of Gay's past events would know, but an evening to be remembered as it starts with designing the tablecloth and finishes with a gathering of people united by cause and colour. Yes colour. She has previously organised these evenings with red, blue and white for different circumstances and each person attending must wear the appropriate colour to participate. The dinner to raise funds and the profile of the Weilangta Forest has a green theme. Today I was fortunate to be in the Dunalley area and to paint a section of the table cloth that will be the centerpiece for the dinner. People have been invited to paint leaves of their choice on the cloth, creating a virtual forest which can't be ignored. Senator Bob Brown has a website which is dedicated to the issue, and is much more informative than I can be!.

'Artless' Gallery And Working Studio

Sunday 8, January

Naomi Howard and Eve Howard have settled into the superb Sommers Bay location and dug in to the passions that drive their artwork. Both are skilled in many techniques, and have recently created a gallery space betweeen their studios to show their work. This is a beautiful way to see an artists, work, in context with their working environment, facilities that they use and inspiration they draw on. It doesn't take long to see that the crystal clear turquiose water of the bay, long established and diverse native flora and abundant wildlife provide plenty of material to work with. Eve and Naomi are both working with sculpture in ceramic form, creating lively pieces that echo the people and places they encounter in their diverse lives. Using raku clay, Eve personifies the gulls, kookaburra's and other birds into sculptures that feel as though they could wink at you at any second. Naomi also works with the raku clay but also has a wonderful collection of paintings she has been working on as she travels between outback Australia, where she has worked extensively in Aboriginal communities, and Tasmania. At present the gallery is open by appointment only, but certainly worth the visit if your in the Murdunna area.

Still Working Out The Process

Saturday 7, January

My hibiscus print (it isn't named yet) is proving to be a stubborn one for fast resolution of process to achieve the best print. After finally getting back to it yesterday. I discovered that I had made the classic printmakers boo boo of not reversing the plate position, (see below) so my etching plate was printed on the left instead of the right of the paper - so all those prints immediatly became redindant - cast aside in a fit of despair! As luck would have it, Entrepot has reopened and I was able to buy some more paper without changing out of my print clothes (imagine the t-shirts, skirts, singlets etc that you threw out 10 years ago) and pick up a few sheet of paper to trial my print process yet again. I chose a Magnani Pescia, Fabriano Rosapina and the Rives BFK.

My first testing of the process showed that the paper needed to be consistently wet for the registration to be accurate, so this time I decided to print all three layers in one swoop which would mean that the paper only needed to be wet once, reducing the strain on the paper, and the risk of damage to the print. So I set up on the big MES press in the postgrad room and lined up the inks and plates for each layer. My three pieces of paper gave me enough for six prints, the print size being 30cm x 30cm. Once it was all set up, it was just a matter staying hydrated in the steamy hot studio and keeping the process moving along with a sharp eye on the registration of the paper for each layer. The etching was first, the print then masked out by a piece of plastic, then the roll-up layer in a yellow, then the etching masked out again for the third layer which is the lino cut. It mostly went smoothly, however I still have one issue to resolve, and that is that the etching ink tends to 'bleed' a little when it comes under pressure while the paper is still wet. So, after all the test runs it looks like the etching layer will have to be allowed to dry before the two colour layers are applied.

So whats it all about? Well the hibiscus and wonderful bright colour is siginificant to my Queensland childhood, while the dark etching of the Tasmanian natives reflects the subdued tones of the Tasmanian environment. I seem to keep wandering back to the issue of integration into new environments, and the psychological effects that the environments have on the person. The hibiscus, incidently (or perhaps not) was drawn from one I had picked from my fathers garden and pressed - and wonderful way to keep the memories close.

The Office Chair

Thursday 5, January

Finishing my print has been undermined by the office chair. It has been on the back burner for a long time now, as apparently my beautiful chair with the carved leather seat and back just isn't office material. "Its just not ergonomic enough" is the repeated cry as my posture is assessed by learned offspring and studious partner. So with gift card (thanks to Craig and Averill) in hand it was off to Office Works for their 'pre school year' sale. If you've ever had to test drive office chairs you will understand the frustration of trying to find the right one - the one that nestles your body just so and has all 'the right' gadgets for manipulating the bits into the ultimate position that will prevent all obsessive computer related back, arm and hand disorders (stops short at fixing the degrading eye problem though). So eventually after springing from seat to seat, in ascending price tag order, the last one on the sale list turned out to be 'the right' one. So now I have arm rests to slouch on, a seat that does whirlies, wheels to slide about the carpet and gas lift to play with in moments of sheer frustration or boredom! Welcome to the ergonomic age Lindy... and now that I've shopped, waited for assistance ("sorry all the black ones have sold out, its burgundy, blue or grey"), queued patiently, provided beverages during assembly and broken the seat in with a blog post, then maybe now I can finish that print!

City Of Hobart Art Prize

Tuesday 3, January

The City of Hobart Art Prize changes its entry guidlines each year by shifting about the art discipline, and this year its jewellery and printmaking. This will be an interesting show as there is a large number artists working in both art forms in Tasmania. Entries for the competition close on the fouteenth of March, so there's plenty of time to work out an artwork for the exhibition. Held in the museum, the competition is also heavily backed by the Moorilla Estate, with an aquisitive prize. Check out the website for the Hobart City Council for full details.

Registration Issues

Monday 2, January

Despite all efforts by the powers that be in the admin department who constantly make errors with my access to the art school, I have managed to work there for the last couple of days and finally get to see how an etching and linocut I worked on weeks ago prints. The print consists of four plates, one etching and three lino, which come together to form a hibiscus and a collection of Tasmanian flora. A comment on my Queensland roots and Tasmanian existence. Anyway, registration became an issue, as the printing is a three part process. First I have done the etching. I always soak the paper for etching, to ensure a strong pull of the ink into the paper. Next was the roll-up layer, which will provide the colour for the negative parts of the linocut - and the registration issues! Conversation with myself (cos its only me and a phd guy most of the time in the studio, and Iona)..:

• "I can do the roll-up dry - no need to go through the soaking paper routine when its just a background roll-up."
• Three prints later..."why can't I get this to register? - oh, ok the paper has shrunk and I need to soak it - stupid.."
• next problem
• "oh no - now the wet paper is causing my plastic mask to pull the paper and ink away from the etching print!"
• first try to solve the problem - drier paper - fail
• second try - reduce pressure - fail
• third try - oil the plastic - success!

So as you can see, it isn't always as straight forward as simply running a bunch of prints off! Out of the twelve or so prints I started with, I'm down to half for the final print layer - the linocut - so my ambition for the whole project is to get one decent print! At least it will resolve a few issues so that next time I line up to do the print it should be smoother sailing!

And the admin issue? Well someone up high in the halls of uni fame made an executive decision, forgetting the pressure and stress that many postgrad students are under at this time of year as they battle every hour of the day to finalise their work, to cancel all access cards to the art school! Great move mr clever guy.

Remembering Dad

Sunday 1, January

It seems appropriate and timely to find in my garden a cactus in full bloom - a rare event in the colder climate of Tasmania, but frequent in Queensland where my Dad had a range of cactus with a myriad of colour. Timely, as it is the first day of a year without my Dad, saying hello, planning our next meeting, talking about the garden - yes its the small conversations that seem to echo resoundly about my head. Appropiate then, to find the flower in full bloom, on a cold day which made its flowering even more improbable, reminding me that though he isn't here anymore, his presence always is. Timely also was an email from my uncle, whom I have never heard from or met before, arriving today as the cactus bloomed and Dad is remembered. Miss you.