Another Dip Into the Past...

Returning to the stone circle as subject matter, and another painting, after the recent 'Castlerigg' example, based on historical sketches and a particular photograph taken on location during a snowstorm.

The circle is not, like Castlerigg, an ancient monument, but, rather, a more modern structure, erected in the 1960s on the top field in Flint, North Wales, to commemorate the staging of the 'Eisteddfod' cultural festival - a feast movable all over Wales - in the town, and is composed of twelve standing stones arranged in circular form with a further collection of stone laid in the centre, in the style of a plinth with irregular 'steps' on all four sides. The tallest of the standing stones (probably the slightly most distant one as represented, at the left-hand edge of the plinth) is perhaps 6 feet in height.

Growing up there, and in the top end of town, it's something - a thing, an object, composed of objects, a static arrangement like a still life in the landscape - that I encountered on very many occasions, indeed daily over a period of years, more often in passing, sometimes to stop and contemplate. At various points, I photographed and drew the circle, and it is these records as they exist that inform this particular painted image, which thus embodies both specific and more general memories.

'Spectral Stone Circle #1: Snowstorm'

oil on canvas/16" x 20"/June 2019

The size of the painting is rather smaller on this occasion, a deliberate attempt at experimentation with questions of scale, and, whilst retaining evidence of its brush-marked, hand-made nature, has less thickly physical a surface than the larger Castlerigg predecessor, not least in an attempt to communicate something of a 'spectral' nature which is an idea that I'm considering exploring as a theme from an interest in the nebulous concept of 'hauntology', something introduced into my frame of reference via music and related artwork (primarily the wonders of the Moon Wiring Club and the Blank Workshop) about ten years ago and which continues to exercise a particular fascination.

Back at the Easel...

Presenting today the early stages of the current work-in-progress, another 4′ x 2′ ‘widescreen’ canvas upon which has been sketched the early stages of a second woodscape composition closely related to its predecessor and of which there is as yet not a great deal else to say.

The work was carried out over the course of Saturday afternoon, this activity to the accompaniment of a selection of the new release from the Moon Wiring Club, celebrating in generously expansive style the 10th anniversary of & comprising, musically, an LP (entitled ‘Exit Pantomime Control’) and triple CD set (‘When a New Trick Comes Out, I Do an Old One’), some of the artwork of which is pictured below (there’s also an A2-sized double-sided poster folded within the CD package, detailing its contents and featuring more of the inimitable illustrations of the sort on show), and a book too (also ‘When a New Trick…’) – a veritable cornucopia of sound and visuals as, indeed, each of the issues from the Blank Workshop and fictional town of Clinkskell are, what have come to be a much-anticipated annual treat after the clocks have gone back and the seasonal gloaming descends and envelops.

As ever, the music is both familiar and strange (more so than usual this time, with remixes and re-imaginings from the substantial archives), accents recur but are subjected to tweaks and new treatments, ghosts rematerialising in fresh guises, moods benign, contemplative and unsettling shift within the continuum – it’s rich fare upon initial encounter that frequent revisiting will reward as we move inexorably from this year into next.

Now – given the seasonal crimp on available painting opportunity (fundamentally, an insistence upon natural light conditions) – when’s the next chance to paint and listen?

White Pears #18

Today the opposite of tomato is Crumbling the Antiseptic Beauty

(Re)presenting the very latest in the series of paintings taking a selection of the whitewashed model pears as subject/object-matter, the final all-over surface being the result of a single two-hour painting session yesterday afternoon, the textures again being layered upon each other as the process progressed to a point of conclusion, as observation prompts constant revision until something of a representation of the thingness of things in space, Braque's tactile space, is achieved, producing another palpably physical thing, its surface described by light as are the models' & their immediate environment.

'White Pears #18'

oil and acrylic on canvas/10" x 14"/December 2015

(detail)

(detail)

(detail)

 

 

In Other Matters

It's delightful to be able to report that once again it's Moon Wiring Club season, with, on this particular occasion, a veritable cornucopia of three simultaneous releases, comprising the vinyl LP 'Why Does My House Make Creaking Noises?', the CD 'Playclothes From Faraway Places' & the glossy brochure 'The Lovely Day', the latter expanding upon the music's accompanying 'explanatory' artwork (which of course only serves to deepen the overarching (non)sense of the curious and uncanny goings-on in Clinkskell) which is, as ever, such an integral part of the whole.

 

The artwork is of course ravishing, whilst the music contained within, in both its analogue & digital forms, marks a development from the signature sound - although the familiar elements are there, the de-/re-contextualized, disembodied, clipped terribly English found voices, etc - into something noticeably more 80s' electronic, more synthesised sounding, more danceable dare one opine (albeit as a non-dancer), the drum machine beat-driven 'tunes' alternating with more atmospheric, beat-free pieces where one can feel the ghostly mists coiling: it's wonderful stuff, comfortably unsettling in the best possible way, utterly compelling. Nice one, again, Mr Hodgson (& the cast of characters).





Seasonal Sounds

It being now but a few short hours to Hallowe'en, this seems an opportune occasion to tell of an intriguing discovery indeed, courtesy of the good offices of the sagacious Mr Simon Reynolds, whose divine Blissblog maintains its position at the coolest point of the cultural zeitgeist: come with me, if you please, on a journey through time & cyber space, to the remote northern English village of Clinksell, isolated upon the misty moors, & where one may find the Blank Workshop & the strange but wondrous goings-on therein.

Populated by an eccentric cast of stylish, sophisticated & somewhat arch personages, amongst the productions emanating from the workshop is the latest CD of the Moon Wiring Club’s music, ‘Shoes Off and Chairs Away’, very recently purchased & much recommended, not least as a pleasing object in itself, the disc being accompanied by a handsome booklet introducing one to various other aspects of the whole ‘Blank’ aesthetic, of which the front cover & reverse of the casing provide a tantalising glimpse:

One gets the picture: nostalgia is in the air, the retro stylings of the graphic design also serving as a visual analogue to the collaged method of the music where, to mostly languid, trip-hoppy beats overlaid with sometimes brooding basslines (& an occasional bossa nova) & recurring electronic melodic motifs (classic Minimalism as an element within the Cubist framework), fragments of disembodied voices (clipped, plummy, sometimes hammy, enunciated English ones of the type heard upon the BBC Home Service or 'Afternoon Plays' on the Light Programme of the past) manifest themselves, unsettling, eldritch, before echoing into the mysterious ether of the atmosphere generated.

The air is that of the soundtrack to psychological parlour games, played upon the unwitting victim by those of superior, sophisticated wit, characterised by sly humour & simmering menace, or of being lost in woods patrolled by eerie, wooden-masked figures, an overall spookiness, otherness, of the supernatural: one is reminded of Tales of the Unexpected (& the visual aesthetic recalls such a period, of the 60s - 70s as influenced by earlier styles, a very English mix of, e.g. Art Deco & the Victorian-Edwardian), of Hammer Horror in its milder manifestations, &, more recently, certain aspects of the Royston Vasey of The League of Gentlemen. All in all, visually & sonically, its such a beautifully realised conceptual whole, a fabulous conceit, complex & rewarding.

One's first thought upon listening may suggest early Boards of Canada as a general point of reference or departure, but (& an interesting coincidence occurs here, given my recent mention of them), Cabaret Voltaire lurk significantly in the background too, with their similar 'Radiophonic Workshop' aesthetic, their sampling of found voices - especially 'proper' English ones - & the uncanny sounds that create an atmosphere of unsettling mystery, of the inexplicable, of something or things 'out there': Moon Wiring Club seem almost to exist in a space - & a place all of their own (i.e. Clinksell, of course!) - between the Cabs & the Boards, but ultimately the effect is a singular one.
I was also put in mind of DJ Shadow's mighty 'Entroducing', its magic enduring, employing perhaps a similar sonic aesthetic of an electronic cut-&-paste technique & vocabulary of samples, loops & minimalist motifs, although the idiom is of course completely different: his sound is unmistakably American, urban, & the Moon Wiring Club/Blank Workshop's is quintessentially English & provincial-rural, if of a highly refined & sophisticated, 'knowing' nature.

But why not avail yourself of & be seduced by the 'little night music' so generously offered as a taster, of both 'Shoes Off and Chairs Away' & the equally intriguing preceding album 'Art Deco Eyes'.

Aside from the music, further examples of the Blank aesthetic include a periodical, book design & even a range of tempting Scrumptytons sweets, again perfectly, delightfully referencing the history of design & redolent of a lost, disappeared time in English socio-cultural life.

The Ideal Tiger contributes a wide-ranging post on the subject of Moon Wiring Club & the Blank Workshop, eloquently stated, introducing a number of fascinating theoretical cultural issues, not least the concept of 'hauntology' (via the always excellent k-punk), & goes on to term MWC most wittily & succinctly as 'haunted house music' (hence its particular topicality).

Something else I happened to notice, by way of strange, perhaps spooky coincidence, is the presence of a cat - that weird creature - lurking amongst the visuals accompanying both the Moon Wiring Club CD & 'Entroducing'...

Happy Hallowe'en!