Rubies in Crystal: 2017

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

Unwrapping First Copies of Fugue in Green!

direct link: Unwrapping First Copies of Fugue in Green!

The first copies of Fugue in Green arrived from Quattro Books today! Guess who helped me open the box! My little darlings! They were so sweet I had to grab my iPhone and video. As you can see, they found the box, rather than the books, of greatest interest.

The Quattro Launch is Wednesday, January 31, 2018, at The Garrison, 1197 Dundas St W, Toronto (Dundas St W, just west of Ossington Ave), 7 pm start time. I am considering doing another launch with another author later on, since the Quattro launch is for eight books and will be packed.
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Wednesday, December 06, 2017

How to Deal With A Block: Never Mind, Draw!

Everything within me has fled since my brother's death, or this is what I think. So how do you work through a block. You draw. Never mind what anybody else might think. Draw because your life depends on it. These are mostly (but not always) extremely short subway drawings, sometimes from one stop to another.

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Saturday, December 02, 2017

Photos of Bloor St in Toronto tonight

Bloor Street in Toronto tonight, and not where'd you think. They are snapshots of the same scene. These images are practically painted with the way that I do them. I'm not an abstract artist, and no desire to go that direction, but it's fun to take the realism of the photograph and push it, and push it, into an abstraction of the scene which it so faithfully rendered in the photostream. Something scantily scandalous about this.
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Wednesday, November 08, 2017

Mini Review of Lisa de Nikolits', No Fury Like That

No Fury Like That by Lisa de Nikolits
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Lisa de Nikolits novel, No Fury Like That (Inanna Publications, 2017), is an imaginative, witty, humorous romp through Purgatory, endings of lives, discoveries and recollections in the near afterlife, a redemption novel where vengeance is the redeemer. Other reviewers give synopsis' of the plot, so I won't, but I am intrigued by the architectonics of the structure she creates for her Purgatory, a 3-dimensional maze, a cubist emporium where rooms appear and disappear according to 4-hour windows, and the Viewing Room where virtual reality comes to life. There is a coffee klatch mostly of women trapped in Purgatory not quite sure of how to achieve realizations to get privileges and perhaps promoted to Heaven. There is an entangled mess of relationships on earth that those in Purgatory must work their way through. The number of characters de Nikolits creates and maintains consistency with throughout the story is quite a technical feat in itself. No Fury Like That is a bustling, busy novel that spins and grabs you in all your corners and assumptions as it focuses on the corporate life vs the family life, success in the business world vs loving relationships. The main character, Julia, gets to have her cake and eat it too - she gets a second chance to make pay backs and revitalize her life, to balance it, to find love and family and happiness as well as a solid career. This is not to say that the novel isn't a passionate explosion of pain and anger and vengeance - it moves from a kind of 'Orange is the New Black' to 'Kill Bill' in a dizzying kaleidoscope of different kinds of violence, sharings, realizations and furies. Julia responds to the brutality that she suffered with a brutality that is as fierce and takes no reprieve. And then she shifts her life. I would say that No Fury Like That is about a new era where power relations between the sexes can become more balanced, where success in the world and fulfillment of the heart are eminently possible in a way that is brand new in our world.

View all my reviews
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Sunday, October 29, 2017

A Gif of Smatterings of Galleries at My Website

Please, no intention to drive you mad with repetitive strain images! But here's a gif for my painting page at my website (which is done, except for all the captions/labels). It's a smattering of an image from different galleries. They are slooow gifs! How much can the eye take in when there are three gifs giffying together? Also, this gif has a white background to go with G+'s page colour; on my website, it's black.
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A gif of my book covers

It'll drive you mad, so don't look too long, but here is a GIF that I made for my website of my three books, a chapbook, the luminist poems (LyricalMyrical 2013), a book of poetry, Tidal Fury (Guernica Editions, 2016) and forthcoming, a novella, Fugue in Green (Quattro Books, 2017/8). I refuse to tell you that this little .gif took me most of the day to figure out (hint: after many fruitless attempts, I finally made it as a movie in Final Cut Pro and then used a gif-maker to flash the magic, over and over and over). Every cover seems to be my own art. Hmnn....

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Thursday, October 26, 2017

Day 6/7 Black and White Photography Challenge (No Humans, No Explanations). )

Day 6/7. Black and White Photography Challenge (No Humans, No Explanations). #blackandwhitephotography (not tagging anyone, but please do the challenge if you are inspired)
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Wednesday, October 25, 2017

Day 6/7. Black and White Photography Challenge

Day 6/7. Black and White Photography Challenge (No Humans, No Explanations). #blackandwhitephotography (not tagging anyone, but please do the challenge if you are inspired)
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Tuesday, October 24, 2017

Day 5/7 Black and White Photography Challenge

Day 5/7. Black and White Photography Challenge (No Humans, No Explanations). #blackandwhitephotography (not tagging anyone, but please do the challenge if you are inspired)
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Monday, October 23, 2017

Day 4/7 Black and White Photography Challenge

Day 4/7. Black and White Photography Challenge (No Humans, No Explanations). #blackandwhitephotography (please do the challenge if you are inspired)

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Sunday, October 22, 2017

Day 2/7 Black and White Photography Challenge

Day 2/7. Black and White Photography Challenge (No Humans, No Explanations). #blackandwhitephotography (please do the challenge if you are inspired)

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Saturday, October 21, 2017

Day 2/7 Black and White Photography Challenge

Day 2/7. Black and White Photography Challenge (No Humans, No Explanations). #blackandwhitephotography
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Friday, October 20, 2017

Day 1/7 Black & White Photography Challenge

7-Day Black and White Photography Challenge (No Humans, No Explanations). #blackandwhitephotography

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Thursday, October 19, 2017

Drawings in Prep for my next set of Portrait Paintings

October 19, 2017

Swirls of grief continue, sometimes an undertow, other times gliding on the surface. Managed to get into a sketch today. This took as long as 3-4 tracks from Wardruna's album, Runaljod - Ragnarok, maybe MannaR: Liv to Odal. Darkened it a bit -just blocking in at this stage, the details that make an individual an individual not creased in.

September 30, 2017

Not sure when I did this sketch earlier this summer and... I can't finish it. Since my brother passed away, I've been in such a tailspin, trying to crawl out, get back to various projects...

Luciano Iacobelli, I probably posted this already.

All these sketches are preparation for my next group of portrait paintings - though the paintings won't be the same as the sketches.

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Tuesday, September 05, 2017

My dearly loved brother, Raymond, passed away last week

My beautiful brother Raymond passed away last week, on Wednesday August 30th, unexpectedly. I remember when my mother emerged from the bush plane in Kafue National Park in Africa holding the little bundle that was my new brother. He has been the kindest, most supportive brother and I love him dearly. I can't imagine life without him. Ray, may you be pain-free and soaring with the quiet joys you gave. I love you, bro. Rest in peace. ♥️

A photo of us Christmas 2014. Ray is on the left; my brother Allan on the right. Sure gonna miss that big wonderful fella. xoxo