Soaking off Grim Island

Caption: Top image: 'final image', second image 'halfway through post work', bottom image: 'pure render image w ithout post work'

Okay, sorry to be away so long: Ugh.

Without further ado I'd like to state that my real reason for being away from my blog is:

a) I fell overboard (port side)  from my yacht 'Reginaldus Rogerina.III" and was eaten by a baby Blue Ringed Humpback whale who mistook me for a giant cooked prawn (I was sunburnt). I was only released after eight non stop hours of  singing Barry Manilow songs at the top of my voice.

b) I've been holding my breath taking part in the World Breath Holding Championships off Tahiti and came second with a time of eight hours, seven minutes and twelve point 2 seconds. Part of my prize was to act as a human bean bag at the following week's Sudoku wrestling championships.

c) I had my finger stuck in the tap and couldn't get it out till the local green grocer got in a supply of Aldo Moro Cold Pressed First Virgin Olive Oil from Mt Ararat..

d) I was kidnapped by some sardine eating Tasmanian terrorists wearing black pantyhose on their heads (the kind with the sexy zipper seam at the back of the leg). 

e) I have been making a book that I actually finished.

f) I was mistaken for Barak Obama and locked away on a desert island by a bunch of  deprived and depraved echidnas looking for a fun time and the answer to the riddle of the Spinx: ("What goes on four legs in the morning, on two legs at noon, and on three legs in the evening?")

g) I was arrested for misspelling both 'handkerchief and 'miscellaneous'  in one sentence. (The old fat man sat on the small thin boy to make sure that he couldn't escape with the pale green handkerchief and the other miscellaneous frippery.)

h) all of the above.

Sorry, that's enough miscellaneous frippery for one post.....

 To be honest I was lucky enough to be included in an Artists's Book Exhibition which opens on 11th June here in Newcastle. You can see part of my work here. It's about Fairy Tales in the modern world with specific emphasis on feminine stuff that I don't understand ....

Just kidding. To quote from the official site: 

An exhibition of artists’ books at the John Paynter Gallery, Friday 10th – Sunday 26th June 2011, and Artspace Mackay, Friday 22nd July- Friday 28th October 2011, curated by Caelli Jo Booker and Helen Hopcroft.

The exhibition is conceived as an interdisciplinary collaboration between artists, writers and craftspeople invited to work together to create handmade books which explore female narratives within the fairytale genre.

While the classic fairytale ending ‘happily ever after’ envisages a single, finite destiny, the contemporary feminine experience encompasses a multiplicity of roles, expectations, endings, beginnings and relationships. Thus the exhibition theme is probably best conceptualised as a celebration of diversity within destiny, with the fairytale genre used as the narrative vehicle to explore this idea. 

I started work on the book two months ago. It's an accordion folding book. And it's now longer than my living room (about twenty metres plus). I've also adapted it for the Blurb format  and it's come out at 74 pages...... I never know when to stop.

But one of the items in the show is to illustrate a specific scene in a book named Cape Grimm.

So the top image illustrates a moment where the "Holocaust Preacher is Taken by Giant Squid."

I made it this morning in between scrubbing the kitchen and ironing my shirt for work - so it needs some fine tuning especially round the thighs/legs where they are vanishing into the darkness.

The other scattered images are part of the finished work. With thanks to some of my friends. You know who you are! :)

Thanks again for looking at my work and your patience with me.