The Ramblings Of Linden Langdon

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Paul Zika Exhibition

Friday 29, September

If your over in Melbourne and interested in painting that is outside the box, then Paul Zika's exhibition is for you! Opening on the 25th of October and continuing until the 11th of November, the work is quite beautiful and rich. "Sicilian Arabezques II" is on show at the Stephen McLaughlan Gallery which is located at 37 Swanston Street in Melbourne.

I do believe I will be in Melbourne within those dates myself! Paul is the head of painting at the University ofTasmania School of Art.

HIP At Morning Toast

Wednesday 27, September

Coming up next Sunday (8th) is the opening of the Hunter Island Press exhibition at the Morning Toast Gallery in Glaziers Bay. This will be good to pop into as there will not only be a selection of framed and unframed work by HIP members, but also a display of artist books and especially the collaborative book project from Living Writers Week. Leonie Oakes and Toni TenBensel are running a abook making workshop on the 15th October and enquiries are welcome on 62951441. The Morning Toast Gallery is located at 156 Graces Road, Glaziers bay, which I think is about 45 minutes drive from Hobart and is on the Huon River, from what I can gather. I'll have to head down next weekend and find out! The gallery has limited opening hours, Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 10am to 4.30pm.

Testing Ground

Wednesday 27, September

My daughter Amy is about to finish her degree at Queensland university of Technology. One of her units for the semester is Performance Studies and they are having two nights of performance as a major part of their assessment. The show is comprised of four short stories which have been devised by the students from ground up, which means they have worked very hard to develop the performances completely - story, direction, costumes etc. They have also had to build a website, which is still under construction, and film the performances. So in the one unit they are bringing together all the facets of drama in modern theatre. Wish I could be there Amy! Best of luck to all students on the night, and especially Amy!

Some Shows And Comps

Wednesday 27, September

Here are a few other exhibitions and competitions that are happening about the place.

• Malcom Bywaters, 'Headspace', Design Centre, Launceston, September 15 - October 10.
• The Churchie, emerging art exhibition, $5,000 prize, run by the Anglican Church Grammar School, Brisbane. Detalis on their website.
• Peripheral Village, Cast Gallery, Hobart from September 16 to October 17. Cast is located at 27 Tasma Street.
• Linden Postcard Show 2007, this is a big event for the Linden Gallery with a wide range of works entered in the competition. Guess it rules out Linden as the name for my studio...
• McGregor Prize for Photography, entires close December 1st
• Paddington Art Prize for contemporary painting inspired by the Australian landscape. Entries close November 14. $20,000 acquisitive prize.
• Marco Luccio, 'Images of Paris and Florence', 1-28 November, Steps Gallery Carlton South. You can check out Marco's work on his website as well.

Kaye Green

Wednesday 27, September

'Seeing the Same Moon' is the title for Kaye Greens exhibition which is opening on Thursday the 5th of October at the Carnegie gallery. Her invite says the exhibition will feature prints, drawings and artist books whcih celebrate the 2006 Australia/Japan Year of Exchange. Kaye Green is a tasmanian artist and her work for the exhibition reflects the Japanese influence she has experienced. The work will be on show until Sunday november 12th and the gallery is open daily from 10am to 5pm. The Carnegie is located upstairs in the maritime Museum, 16 Argyle Street, Hobart.

Papa Mielland

Sunday 24, September

Finally I got my new camera out for a play. I also bought a sturdy tripod, which should make all the difference for photos which can be arranged. So how could I resist the superb Papa Mielland rose that had just burst into full bloom in the garden? This rose has the most sensual velvety appearance and absolutely unbeatable perfume. Hopefully my photo has a bit of that on show! I put a version in my little collection of desktop images if you like it as much as me!

Hermie Cornelisse

Sunday 24, September

If you had mentioned the name Hernie Cornelisse a couple of years ago I would have responded with a blank expression. But I can't count the number of times that her name has bounced up at me in the last year or so. It started with the short course I did to introduce the techniques used to photograph artwork. hermie was there, lining up her pots and arranging them with sentimental care. "They need to communicate with each other" she said to as I struggled to arrange my dad's pieces into something that looked fulfilling through the camera lens. So after countless conversations, articles and exhibition pamphlets later I wasn't so surprised to see she is now showing at the Bett gallery in North Hobart.

New Melissa Loughnan Website

Wednesday 20, September

The new website for Melissa Loughnan, arts manager, has just been launched. It is a creation of H4 and sticks to the white site which is very suitable for artwork. It has a random selection of images which is a great way to work with art as it is inevitable that the first one in a row gets the most clicks. Anyway, check out Loughnan Projects (Melissa is my arts manager) for a look at what is happening in the new Armadale gallery.

Burnie Print Prize

Tuesday 19, September

Entries close for the Burnie Print Prize 2007 on the third of November. That gives us plenty of time to get the entry up to scratch! It is an aquisitive award, with additional purchaes being made by the gallery to add to their growing collection dedicated to printmaking. What a great initiative! They have a gallery solely for printmaking and the works are rotated throughout the year. Information about the competition is available on the Burnie City Council website.

Print Design

Tuesday 19, September

Lately I have been plagued with working out print designs that end up being stripped down to the minimum. This may be a good thing, but it is kind of fun to work with heaps of layers at times too.

Although I'm having a small break from the print exhcanges I enjoy so much to concentrate on uni, there is one exchange that is current, but very quiet. So I have been playing about with the Sea Dragon image, a lino cut, using different treatments to test my urge to have strong colour. I kind of like the simple print above, but I really wanted to add another layer with kelp to talk about regeneration, the theme of the exchange.

So I added a kelp layer, but it just got lost in the colour. I wanted to make this a stronger kelp layer by working on the collograph more, and maybe this will be the next step for this print. The colour I used for the kelp was wrong too.

However in the meantime, I really liked the lacey kelp design, so I printed on the other half of the Sea Dragon prints I had made. This is my favourite interpretation so far! So, yet again I am brought back to the minimal - sems that I'm destined to work that way!

Tooth Extraction

Tuesday 19, September

I must admit I'm feeling a bit sorry for myself today after having a wisdom tooth plucked from my jaw. It didn't want to let go, which I think is quite reasonable really, but eventually the brute strength and determination of the dentist won the day and my tooth landed in the stainless steel dish with a bloody splodge. Just thought you may have needed to know this lovely tale of woe.

Nepal Peace Pagoda

Sunday 17, September

I just got around to scanning the photos of the Nepal Peace Pagoda. It is located in a superb splash of tropical rainforest, edged with bamboo, at Southbank, Brisbane. It was built in Nepal, then deconstructed and sent to Brisbane for the expo of 1986. The gardens have grown, the building weathered just a bit, and the atmosphere of tranquility just drifts around you. So having scanned the photos, I am uploading them to my Flickr account - slow that it is! Would have been faster to build a page for them I think! My scanner is looking a bit aged I noticed - a few scratches creeping in - but hopefully the photos will show a little of the beauty of the place.

Update...I used up my account quota for the month with half the photos, so I will upload the other half next month!

Staining

Saturday 16, September

There are quite a few ways to add a tone or colour to paper. One of my current projects requires a black background. The easy answer is to buy some black paper, but this doesn't allow me to control the depth of black or tone which may influence it. So I make black backgrounds. This is just a matter of rolling up an aluminium plate repeatedly and pressing the paper through the etching press, usually two or three times, to get a good strong colour and coverage. Paper can also be dyed or stained in various ways, most of which I haven't yet tried. I saw some superb pieces of paper that had been stained with the natural leakage of colour from native plant material. Eucalpyt leaves give a gorgeous olive green. Anyway, back to my feeble effort to date. So I wanted to have something else going on in my print between the background and the foreground, so enter the stain. This one is just a mix of charbonnel ink, plate oil and white spirit, with more white spirit to get it moving on the paper. It worked ok, but took a couple of weeks to dry! The result is worth the wait though, I think. The stain has a gloss from the oil, which should in theory catch the light at points. But then theories often make a liar of me!

Turning The Day Around

Wednesday 13, September

The good thing about working at home is that you can hide from the rest of the world when you want to! Some days everything just seems destined to turn into a big pile of mush no matter how hard you try to make it look pretty. Today was behaving just like a child in boots way too big for them - stumbling along with no sense of control. But accepting the mistakes, bizzare nature of human behaviour and the unmistakable signs of needing to take hold of the day, it was the hardware shop which shined a light at the end of the tunnel. I went there for serious stuff, really, like the funnel for the oil, which I had attempted to pour into the engine of the car and succeeded only in spilling it all over the motor and driveway in spasms and glugs. (ooops). But there it was, the twinkling tag of a camelia calling out "pick me pick me". So how could I leave it? It was a rescue mission, the poor thing was the only white one left, and with its few desperate leaves I can see why! But there it is, potted up by the studio door adding some spark to the daily routine of work.

Looking Into Pottery

Tuesday 12, September

I have my Dads pottery book on my shelf. Bernard Leach had most of the information he needed to build his knowledge, skill and interest in pottery. I don't think I have quite the scientific mind that he had, and the chemistry slides somewhere overhead. Perhaps its a time and dedication thing, because I can't say that I dedicate that much time to study. But, in contradiction as always, I ventured into the library and plucked a few books from the shelf. When I was last in Queensland mary showed me her lovely collection of pottery books and Shoji Hamada leapt out for me. He and Bernard Leach developed their work for years in unison, but with beautiful strength of individual and cultural influences. It is so inspiring to turn the pages see how the pots sing with their makers intent. Its why my Dads pots are so precious to us.

So my pottery classes start up again on the third of October and I am busy planning my project for ten weeks I have with my hands in clay. I am hoping to incorporate pottery with my printmaking, both in a physical sense of them being part of the story and mechanism of viewing work, and also in a more spiritual sense of connection with a personal history. I haven't talked to the supervisors about this yet... but it doesn't really matter what they say as I'm doing it because I want to, and in the end isn't that what art is about really? A means of expression, communication. Another way of writing a story. And no matter when you read that story, as I read my Dad's now, it still sings.

Coconut Slice

Saturday 9, September

This is always a favourite in the cake department. It's a good way to use up the second half of teh jar of jam too!

• Coconut Slice
• 100g butter
• 1/2 cup castor sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup SR flour
• 2/3 cup PL flour
• 1/2 cup jam
• Topping
• 2 eggs
• 1/3 cup castor sugar
• 2 cups coconut

Cream butter, sugar and egg until light and fluffy. Stir in the flours and you will have quite a stiff sort of dough, but add a touch of milk if it is too thick. Spread evenly over a greased and lined lamington type tin. Leave enough paper hanging over the ends to make lifting the slice out of the tin easy. Spread the jam over the base. The jam can be whatever you want really, but raspberry, blackberry, apricot and strawberry have all been ok. Strawberry being the softest flavour.

To make the topping, beat the eggs with a fork, wire whisk or in the mixer, then beat in the eggs. I usually do mine in the mixer to get a good thick beat going, but it can be done just enough to mix together. Stir in the coconut.

Spread the topping over the jam covered base and back it for about 35 minutes in a moderate oven (180 degrees celcius). I usually find it takes longer and I turn it around a couple of times to make sure the coconut gets an all over tan! Lift the slice out with the paper onto a cooling rack. Leave until cool on a rack then cut it up and lift off the paper.

Year Of The Surf Lifesaver Print

Thursday 7, September

The first print I have been working on for the Year of the Surf Lifesaver started out with several layers, but ended up with one! It always surprises me that you can have a print thoroughly worked out in theory - in the head or on paper - and it looks great! But the reality is that when you actually start printing so often the print itself determines its own outcome. Layers may be more powerful than you had imagined, colours softer or stronger to suit the print and so on. This physical part of the process is often underestimated time wise, and deadlines become a mad rush to complete. Hopefully I'm on time with the prints for the surf lifesaving. This will be a traveling exhibtion of work from several community printmaking groups. More details as they come to hand!

Finally Commitment To A Camera

Tuesday 5, September

After a few years of procrastination and debate I have finally commited to buying a camera. Or two really. It came down to really working out what I actually wanted, which can be hard sometimes when it goes agains't the flow of things. So here they are. The Canon Powershot A640, hot off the launch pad and offering 10 mega pixels and the ability to photograph all that I need from a clear and digital perspective, plus the Nikon F80D which is an SLR film camera. Why? Well because I just love being in the darkroom, and though I haven't had a lot of time there, this will help me make the time! So as tempting as it was buy a digital SLR which had all the features, it was the old film which one the day. Of course the camera has full automatic functions as well as manual, so I think it fills the needs. Also Canon have only just introduced a sensor that is the same size as the 35mm film, and thats way out of my price range, so really my photos will still have the best quality. And it cost less than a digital SLR! Thats because the market for the film cameras is falling in demand, so they are on sale with some great bargains to be had - mine was reduced $250! This purchase is the second part of my Arts Tasmania loan, so now I have to knuckle down and make it all work for me!

So now the lovely little Nikon 3100 can go and live in Steve's room, where it rightfully belongs as he lent it to me a couple of years ago! Thanks for the loan Steve, with cherries on top!

The Big Print

Tuesday 5, September

Open day was highlighted with a bold attempt by third year printmaking students to create a large print using a lawn roller! Students each had a woodblock with an outline of the shape of a curvy jar to work with however they pleased. The blocks were inked then placed in a random order before the paper was laid down. After some vigorous hand work applied to the back of the paper the roller was broughtin to finish the job. The result is a large print which really shines with the character and spirit of the IXL building and the printmakers. I have just uploaded some images to my Flickr account, so if you want to see some more from The Big Print event, just follow the link. I'm still working out how to use Flickr, any advice on how to reduce the images on my home page would be greatly appreciated!

Abi's Day

Sunday 3, September

Abi joined me at the Art School open day and we had plenty of adventures! Yesterday she printed her etching of the sugar glider possum, which is a really lovely print (originally a drawing in a book about looking after Tasmaniain marsupials). It was still drying on the kitchen table as we headed out to the art school this morning. First up we had a drawing class with Lindsay Broughton. This was a good opportunity for Abi to learn about how to think about an object that you are drawing , in terms of form and detail. Next up was the extremely popular badge making session, which was actually great fun! Then we had a guess of the number of catalogues were bundled up to form the word ART.

Now she approached this from a mathmatical perspective, counting a stack then multiplying it by the number of stacks, which gave her a pretty good estimate. She wrote down her guess and went on our way to watch the big print unfold. It was at lunch that Abi realised we had left out the human element from the calculation - the sneeky few added in here and there. So back she went to put in another guess, in my name because you only get one guess each, and hey presto she was only 4 off the actual number! We came home with a bag full of IXL jam, compliments of IXL and Suan Payne who organised the event. So it was straight to the kitchen to cook up the favourite raspberry jam and cocnut slice...yum!

Art School Open Day

Saturday 2, September

Tomorrow, Sunday the third, is open day at art school. This promises to be a day with plenty of variety for everyone. Lindsay Broughton will be giving a couple of drawing lessons, there will be prints for sale through the printmaking society stall, a stencil art display, course information and THE BIG PRINT! This is the event I will be aiming for! Milan has got together with printmaking students to create a massive print in the art school courtyard (located just at the top of the entrance sairs and to the left) using all manner of techniques to get the print happening. I hear there is a lawn rolller on the way... The Art School is open from 10am to 4pm and The Big Print is scheduled for between 11am and 2.30pm. I'll be there with my trusty camera to capture the action! The Art School is located in the old IXL building, Sullivans Cove, Hunter Street, Hobart.

Teddy Rules OK?

Friday 1, September

A few years back, well quite a few, I made a teddy bear. It was a project that my daughter was doing at high school, so I joined in and made one too. It was such good fun, and despite all efforts to keep him in a pristine condition on the shelf, he managed to creep into plenty of hugs and so now he has all the hallmarks of a much loved and cuddled bear. My daughter managed to keep hers on the shelf and he is a beautiful fluffy bear reminding me constantly of how lush my ted's fur used to be... Anyway, today I did my first test print for the Teddy etching. He is part of a large print which has a group of plates, but I think he is cute enough to have a print all of his!