Border Crossing Artwork in Progress - Stage Two

Wendy Grace Allen overworking Helen Stacey's painting.

Helen Stacey overworking Wendy Grace Allen's painting.

Apichart Pholprasert overworking Wendy Grace Allen's painting.

The Earth's waters are both boundaries and pathways for peoples, objects and ideas.

Fumio Nanjo

Quotes about Art etc

 

Strange Abstract by Wendy Grace Allen

I'm going to keep adding to this post with quotes I want to share with you. Which ones do you like? I have a whole book of quotes I've collected but they're packed up in NZ somewhere...

• Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life. Pablo Picasso
• Art is the desire of a man to express himself, to record the reactions of his personality to the world he lives in. Amy Lowell
• Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known. Oscar Wilde
• Art is the only way to run away without leaving home. Twyla Tharp
• Art is the proper task of life. Friedrich Nietzsche
• Art is the right hand of Nature. The latter has only given us being, the former has made us men. Friedrich Schiller
• Art is the stored honey of the human soul, gathered on wings of misery and travail. Theodore Dreiser
• Art produces ugly things which frequently become more beautiful with time. Fashion, on the other hand, produces beautiful things which always become ugly with time. Jean Cocteau
• Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos. Stephen Sondheim
• Art, like morality, consists in drawing the line somewhere. Gilbert K. Chesterton
• Artists don't make objects. Artists make mythologies. Anish Kapoor
• Artists who seek perfection in everything are those who cannot attain it in anything. Gustave Flaubert
• Beauty in art is often nothing but ugliness subdued. Jean Rostand By the work one knows the workman. Jean de La Fontaine
• Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep. Scott Adams
• Culture is the arts elevated to a set of beliefs. Tom Wolfe
• Drawing is like making an expressive gesture with the advantage of permanence. Henri Matisse
  
• Drawing is the honesty of the art. There is no possibility of cheating. It is either good or bad. Salvador Dali
• Even a true artist does not always produce art. Carroll O'Connor
• Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures. Henry Ward Beecher

The above quotes are courtesy of http://www.aakrititalkart.com/.

The Earth's waters are both boundaries and pathways for peoples, objects and ideas.

Fumio Nanjo

Contemporary Art from Myanmar

I went to this exhibition opening in Bangkok the night before we moved from Thailand to Penang, Malaysia. Not all the slides are wonderfully clear because of reflections on the glass and the angle of the photos, but the slideshow will give you an idea about the art work and the performances. The accompanying soundtrack is by William Orbit entitled Dark Eyed Kid. There is also a link to a new art space in Myanmar called New Zero Art Space and Thavibu Gallery. Enjoy!

The Earth's waters are both boundaries and pathways for peoples, objects and ideas.

Fumio Nanjo

Mould Making for Lost Wax Bronze Casting in Bangkok, Thailand

 

I've just returned from Bangkok, Thailand where I was making a video documenting the process of mould making for lost wax bronze casting.

Frenchman Pierre Cerviotti, mould maker demonstrated the process by making a mould of Blake's latest sculpture. Pierre, has 19 years experience as a mould maker and continues to use moulding techniques that date back to ancient Greece. Basic mould making is taught at art schools around the world but not as comprehensively, or with the precision that Pierre employs. Canadian born Blake, has been working with Pierre for many years and his sculptures are found in galleries in Europe and the Americas. Of particular interest, is Blake's devotion to raising money to clear land mines. To date he has raised $200,000 USD from the sale of his Fragments sculpture series. It was in a chance meeting at Thavibu Gallery in Bangkok, that I first met Blake in February 2009.

A few days ago we met with bronze foundry manager Thai Parinya Senadisai, whom we were introduced to by Ajarn Sanya Wong-Aram from Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. In the photo (from left to right) is Pierre Cerviotti, Blake Ward, Parinya Senadisai and Wendy Grace Allen

Below are some links about lost wax casting, and Blake's sculpture:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost-wax_casting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blake_(sculptor)
http://www.blakefragments.com/
http://www.blakesculpture.com/flash_site/index-flash.html.

The Earth's waters are both boundaries and pathways for peoples, objects and ideas.

Fumio Nanjo