Tag: create

Perhaps it’s about feeling?

Post author By julesprichards
Post date June 5, 2020

Along with thousands of others, over the isolation period, we took a weekly dose of Grayson Perry’s Art Club on Channel 4. Thanks, Grayson and Philipa, it’s been a very welcome tonic. It was a little bit silly, it was a little bit odd… It was the last episode this week.

Art is about mixing it up!

Punctuating the episodes Grayson highlights some of the reasons why creating Art can be so important and relevant to people.

Mixing it up…

To find some truths about who we really are…
We have to be prepared to become vulnerable…
Art involves a relationship between the artist and the subject…
Art in whatever form you can snatch it… is a wonderful thing…
A place to find comfort, refuge and control…
You look with only your eyes… looking out through yourself…
Everyone has their own way of looking at the world…
Stop and notice the beautiful things…

It’s about feeling. It’s about projecting our thoughts/feelings onto or into an object or image. Making an image or form via our thoughts and feelings.

As a student, I recall reading Don McCullin ‘If you can’t feel what you’re looking at, then you’re never going to get others to feel anything when they look at your pictures.’

As a student, when stuck creatively, we were taught to “Scamper”

But as mentioned before; ‘theory, formula, and process might help move things along, but nothing will replace the passion and drive, the wanting, the desire, the searching, the angst, the belief, the love…’ of a person.

Perhaps, despite what we are told by realist deconstructivists et al, perhaps it’s about feeling after all!

Listen to the noisy silence.

Tags Art, create, Creative, feeling

print Uncategorized

Sleep Note

Post author By julesprichards
Post date January 14, 2018

Sleep Note

This one has been sitting in my mind for a few weeks after my daughter left me a small card on my pillow at Christmas with this written on the envelope.

Kids can have such a fresh outlook on life and I’m aware that we’re privileged to share our lives with growing, inquisitive, vibrant young people.

Regarding the image above – This is what I do. Some people draw, some paint, some watch football, some like gardening. I make images. Often this is in the form of digital photo collages.

I was listening to BBC Radio 4’s Thinking Allowed recently, and they were talking about sensory landscapes. As ever, Laurie Taylor’s guests go off on one and get a little academic and wordy. But it’s true, we live in our selective sensory worlds. Each of us selects different elements from our environment. The programme talks about ‘scenes’ and ‘lifestyle bubbles’. They also talk about ‘-scapes’ and how we are always enveloped by sounds, as well as smells, mannerisms and culture. People’s practices mark people’s experiences. Monica Degen says“People sense in very different ways…”. Our selected practices, our selected perspectives, affect our selected views and experiences of things.

I love the phenomena of dreaming and dreams. I’m a great one for cheese before bed, though I doubt it affects one’s dream-life. One’s imagination resonating outside of the input from the sources we are daily surrounded by should be celebrated and enjoyed. This includes daydreams.

Children are often dreaming outside of the material they are presented with, and long may they be encouraged to think outside of the material we present them with. Edward De Bono says in his interesting book ‘Children Solve Problems‘, “A Child … enjoys the use of his mind just as he enjoys the use of his body as he slides down a helter-skelter or bounces on a trampoline”.

Back to ‘Sleep Note’, I hope we can all remember to enjoy the use of our minds, just as we might remember the exhilarating experience of bouncing on a trampoline. I love the idea of growing and inquisitively opening the envelope when our sensory world is cut of! Open the envelope when you go to sleep folks, vibrantly! x

Tags create, dream, logo, print, sleep

Uncategorized

Abundant Life

I was grateful, to be asked in April, to think about the potential for an artwork to contribute to wall-space in a local church’s community space.

In Leicestershire, Birstall village’s Methodist Church buildings are used by many different groups, making them a valuable community space that sees all ages and a variety of activities. A foundation to the many activities and different lives that pass through the space, is an idea of Christian faith. The Christian faith can be multifaceted, the understandings within it can be diverse, but certain ideas are perhaps universal if we look past specific doctrines, ritual, and habits.

the value of community
the wonder of growth
the potential of interactions
the nurture of seeds
the beauty of all differing ages
the blooming of fruit
the essence of water
the strength of the cedar
the core value of parent and child,
the strength of light and dark
the power of colour and sensation

I worked on this artwork throughout May. Over that time it grew out of initial ideas, it changed, it needed reconsideration and significant reworking until the current final form was reached.

I came to Leicestershire in 1996. I initially found myself living in Birstall and indeed socialised on the fringe of the Birstall Methodist Church community. Over 20 years I moved in to Leicester and back out to Syston. I still recognise and I’m grateful for the part that Birstall and Birstall people have played in my life.

I find the sense of ‘the natural’ is strong in Birstall. Although Birstall sits on the edge of Leicester’s urban creep, it has its roots in the countryside surrounding it. The Grand Union Canal runs along the edge of the village with Watermead Country Park and lakes. The symbol of Birstall is a Cedar tree – a remarkable 350-year-old cedar tree, standing 100ft tall, can be found in Roman Road which was originally in the grounds of the now demolished Birstall Hall. Incidentally, the Cedar of Lebanon was an important foundational building and lifestyle material in many ancient communities. I notice that the central streets in Birstall are named Beechfiled, Firfield, Oakfield, Elmfield. We also have Poplar, Walnut, and Orchard. These names, and various cultures in Birstall as well as many other English villages and towns, help to remind us of our essential natural roots in this world.

notebook My artwork started with the idea that we are called to share in the ‘abundant life’ available to us. The piece attempts to celebrate the natural ‘way’ in and around us, as well as reflect on the idea of interaction within the world around us. Many people are seeking their place and a way forward amidst life’s confusions. The wisdom of age and the potential of youth, and all the stages in between are essential to making life work. Life comes alive when we commune in community with others. The natural growth from darkness to light is empowering. The journey from our past through hope to a fruitful future and recognition of the gift of ‘abundant life’, is what I hope we wish and pray for all.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

The artwork is complete, and I hope for it to be delivered at some point in July.

‘Abundant Life’ Jules Richards, May 2016
Mixed digital composition.
Print reproduction, 906 x 1189mm, (2.9 x 3.9feet)

LifeInAllItsFullnessFLATequalised600

Tags agape, Art, create, faith, nature, print

Uncategorized

I dreamed a dream…

Post author By julesprichards
Post date May 25, 2013

Just watched the film Les Misérables DVD, hummm… Great performances and some great songs…

I then watched 15mins of a David Bowie documentary, hummm…. that’s more like it… buzzzzzzzzzzz.

Maybe it was due to the small screen, perhaps it was one of those films designed for the cinema experience? The start of the film hooked me in but by halfway through it lost me.
Romantic claptrap. I wanted more… having not read the Victor Hugo novel I felt that this was possibly a merry dance on what truly is a much bigger creation. As a stand alone work I found it seemed like spicy popcorn and cheap wine. Nice but no cigar.

In contrast, the brief glimpse of some David Bowie interviews got me buzzing.

I have recently wondered if my current medication is affecting my perception, reaction, or emotional reception to stimuli? I used to shed a tear at the least little thing on tv – drama, film and even pop tv might hook me in. But now I think of it, I can’t recall the last time a film got me going, either identifying with pleasure or sorrow.

Is my suspension of disbelief being affected? My experience of Disney Paris was not affected, but that’s sensory overload, you can’t fight the mighty saccharin Americana Mouse and friends.

Am I in the grip of the old academic ‘paralysis of analysis’ chestnut? I don’t think so – more recently I feel under-analysis and the failure to engage is a more likely.

So back to what’s changed… neurones… brain activity… hummmm….

Finally, Bowie, fantastic, creativity…. Reminded me of Matt, Simon and I experimenting with audience/performer relationships in Cheshire… Experimental sound, speech, movement, oh… to experiment and create again….
It seems ‘life’ can kill the dreams you might dream…

“Those who do not weep, do not see”
“To love another person is to see the face of God.”
“It is ourselves we have to fear. Prejudice is the real robber, and vice the real murderer.”
“Often when we think we are knotting one thread, we are tying quite another.”
― Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

Tags Art, create, Dreams, emotion, les miserables, Victor Hugo