The story in a drawing

Moleskine notebook.

I did this poem drawing in October 2012. At the time, I decided not to type out the words. Frankly, I'm tired of seeing my poetry elsewhere on the NET. Bits of it, a line here or there, a title, or the substance of what I've written reworked. Perhaps I should take it as a compliment that I am somewhat influential, but truly I find it insulting to discover my verbal images being used by other writers, or the style of my work being copied. So I've stopped posting poems and prose poems here in my blog. But I do like to keep an archive, and Google has an incredible search engine for blogs, meaning I can find a poem if I remember only a phrase. So I am encrypting my writing, and have no intention of passing on the password either. Sorry, just tired of being seen as 'raw material' for other writers and not being given credit where credit is due.

Of course, you can read the prose poem in the image. I'm just not making it easy to copy.

And I'll let you know what's going on with publishing - some good things in the works. And, no, I will never self-publish.

encrypted text

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The Charter for Compassion, a TED talk by Karen Armstrong

I was given hope tonight watching this. I read her massive study, A History of God, in 3 world religions no less, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, 16 years ago and she changed my thinking. She's an amazing woman with not just compassion, love, insight, but facts at her fingertips the rest of us only dream about. I am so glad to have found her on TED Talks, and to be, once again, deeply inspired by her. I truly believe the way of compassion, the way of conscience, is the only way this crazy globe is going to survive the massive challenges of the future.


direct link: Karen Armstrong makes her TED prize wish: the Charter for Compassion

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Illuminata

Some photographs today of 'Illuminata,' an illustration for my prose poem of the same name with some lines from the poem written into the ink painting. I have used little bits of filters to elicit certain effects because rain white cloudy daylight can be very bland when it comes to gold leaf. :)

Illuminata, 2013, Brenda Clews, 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, India ink, copper, silver and gold leaf in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.

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Mirrorless Self-Portrait, Sketch 1 final

Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, sketch 1, final, 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, watercolour pencils, Cretacolor aquastics, copper leaf in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.

I wonder if hanging a monopod over the drawing lit with daylight bulbs in clamp lamps softened with white paper towels clipped on with clothes pegs (homemade lightboxes) produces a more true-to-life image?

That copper is quite dark, or quite glittery, depending on the angle of the light glancing on it.

Ok, so first, it was that my 'imagined' self-portrait wasn't realistic enough - I look younger, so I tried to correct it and simply made myself look sadder. Then it was that it was an attempt at an actual representation, so, therefore, too realistic. Sheez. Give me a break. I did this using my memory of myself, that's all. Then my daughter phones and says the eyes look so sad she can't bear it, that the sadness upsets her. So now we are in the emotive representation of the self, at last.

Yes, this sadness, determination, stick-to-it-ness is what I see in the mirror when I look at myself without any of the patinas I present to others. Sorry. It's real. My mother died 4 1/2 months ago, my kids mostly moved out (my daughter not fully but she works part-time in another city now), and I was sick with chills and a raging fever when I drew it. So what if it's sad. That's how I was feeling. 

Whether it's an accurate self-portrait, vis-a-vis anatomy and so on, I don't know. No-one who knows me has commented on this aspect. It does resemble me, yes, my daughter said. It's recognizable. But so sad! The unbearable weight of sadness.

The sadness that overwhelms, or is the core of a life's expression. My Dad had it too, that sadness. When I see the eyes here, I see my Dad's eyes.

Yet we persist.

It's a sad world in many ways. What can you do.

Maybe the next Mirrorless Self-Portrait will reveal another side, who knows.

I continue with the exercise.

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To find out what this series is about, and the constraints I set, check out the very first post.

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Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, Sketch #1 con't...

Where this Mirrorless Self-Portrait is now. It is better to take a photograph in daylight for clarity of focus and the colours, and this is with daylight bulbs. I think it's coming along... that copper leaf is very hard to work with, but makes nice effects.

Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, sketch 1c, 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, watercolour pencils, Cretacolor aquastics, copper leaf in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.

This one was taken with more sunlight than the first one. It is hard to photograph copper leaf! I'm thinking some copper grasses lower left.

A dear friend thought I made myself look younger, or at least remarked that this is how we appear in our memory of our physical self. I need to say I am not a camera; I cannot reproduce what my mind's eye 'sees'; I struggle to draw something I can live with, that's all. So of course I went back and tried to age the face, but still with the constraint of not looking in a mirror. And actually, I do recognize myself in this image, even if it's not 'perfect.' There's definitely something of the feeling of what I see when I look into a mirror, the sadness in the eyes, and an intensity.

To find out more about this series and the particular constraints I have set myself, read the first post.

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Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, Sketch #1

I have an idea for an art series: The Mirrorless Self-Portrait. Recently I listened to an interesting podcast on CBC radio's Ideas program called, "Silver and Exact", an hour long show in which "Karen Virag explores the history and cultural significance of the mirror."

In the show, a woman described her experience of living a whole year without looking into a mirror. She described intense loneliness. Of becoming obsessed with her shadow to know she existed. It changed her; she undertook the odyssey because she wanted to look outwards more than inwards. I was fascinated.

My idea for this series is to draw or paint a portrait of myself without looking in a mirror or at a photograph.

I bought a new Moleskine A3 Sketchbook with a gift certificate my dear brother gave me. So today I began...







A sketch in the first of my 'Mirrorless Self-Portraits' Series. Not sure where I'll take it next.

... this, without looking into a mirror or at a photo. I'm intrigued by the idea of what will emerge in such a 'self-portrait.' I reminded myself, 'you wash this face every day, apply moisturizers, sometimes eyeliner, lip colour, surely you can remember the contours of your own face...' But I found myself feeling my face as I drew the way a sculptor might. It was odd, that. I tried to get the wrinkles in, I did.

Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, sketch 1 (and detail), 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, watercolour pencils, Cretacolor aquastics, copper leaf in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.
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Ice-Gripping Tread Covers

I wore ice-gripping tread covers on my boots into the subway. It was like wearing tap dancing shoes with the embedded metal studs, noisy but with a rhythm. However, the cleats slipped this way and that, turning the stone floors into sheets of slippery ice. Clinging to railings on the stairs got me to the station platform. On the train I pulled them off the soles of my boots. Other passengers, unsure what I was doing, trying not to appear to be looking, watched them flop, beached fish from a hole in a frozen lake as I threw them wet and salty with slush onto newspaper.



Image: 'STABILicers Lite Cleat Traction Device' pulled over mustard boots.
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*They're new; I bought them for dog walks to help prevent falls.
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