show and tell!
It’s been a very long time between posts, not a blog suicide or even a hiatus, just the unintentional result of not having the Internet at my new house and not being that organised with the whole living out of home thing. But there are so many pretty things to play show and tell with!
This is a shelf from this very cute store in Newcastle called Blackbird Corner, which turned out to be something of a bonanza for the matchbox project, which was in danger of petering out with the lack of tiny things in my life. But now I’ve got a waiting list of novelty items like fake moustaches, tiny tin insect badges, kewpie dolls all just waiting to be packaged and photographed and released into the world ready for someone to find. I’m actually getting ready (in my head.. nothing much has been physically done just yet) for the Matchbox project to be in a group show, a good and proper art show that the boy is curating. I’ve been toying around with the idea of show for nearly a year now, Nicky was suggesting a silent auction with mystery boxes a while back and I did meet with a few galleries, most of whom met me, saw my stuff and said things like, ‘Gee, they are very small, I don’t know how we could exhibit them…’ But December 8 is getting very close and so I think I might be having a Matchbox working bee or something, I found the cutest little track that makes me also want to make a stop motion animation about general gift giving to strangers. I’ve been wanting to hang presents from the trees in Hyde or Victoria Park at dawn for quite a while now and this might be my chance to do it and pass it off as art.
I’ve been slowly accumulating presents for sort of strangers recently, which also happened by accident. There are just some things I see or people I meet that compel me to want to give them something or contribute in some way. For example on the way to the local shopping village, there is this house in which the front yard is completely littered with garden gnomes. Big ones, little ones, ones that look like the seven dwarves, ones hugging fish, ones looking sweet and others looking bored. And in addition to this, a smaller collection of plush caterpillars, it’s really quite bizarre and lovely at the same time. So in what is I guess an Amelie-esque move I told my housemate that we should get the owners a gnome for Christmas and just leave it on their footpath with a bow around it’s neck. A contribution and thank you for entertaining us on our walks. On the way home there is this other house that is the home of five black Scottie dogs, like the one in the dog food commercial (Chum no?) that are almost always on show. The plan is to get five oversized red tartan bows with bells on them and tie them to the gate for Christmas. And then there’s the tailor that does all of the alterations for my work. This very sweet man who is always incredibly polite and punctual, he’s usually whistling and getting on with his business. Anyway the other day I noticed a cassette player in his tiny box of a workshop when I was waiting for him to express hem some pants for a customer who kept telling me he was a male model. I asked what music he listened to and he said Arabic and so I’m on the hunt for Arabic cassette tapes to add to his three tape collection.
Last week I got to hang out at a Toy Library in North Ryde as part of this combined journalistic and photographic project I’m working on. Basically I hang out with people from my old neighbourhood that have always fascinated me, ask them questions and take some photos. And in the end, it’s going to be a character and place based history of the City of Ryde, both a publication (form to be decided…) and an exhibition in February. Although the toy library interview was probably more information than anecdote based that I would have liked, it has got to be the most good looking story I’ve shot for this project so far. But then I’m a sucker for cute things and bright colours.
In the past few weeks I’ve hung out with the mysterious local cake wholesaler (yay free cake), a primary school aerobics instructor who was more than twice my age but could very nearly do the splits and a bunch of op shop ladies who were almost too accommodating with their chocolate biscuits, silly stories and tea. I think next week I’m headed to the local bar, which actually used to be called El Rancho before they changed it to the more sophisticated sounding The Ranch.
I also had my portrait painted! It was so cool! The finished painting is actually more of a sculpture and consists of a front and side view (I look angry but in reality I was stuffing my face with cheese and crackers on a particularly rainy and sleepy Sunday) that sit at a 90 degree angle from each other and protrude from the wall. Tony Curran called it ‘Sculpture’ and it’s currently nailed to a wall in one of my most favourite cafes, which makes eating there a little embarrassing but I do love it! At the end of the month it’s going to Brisbane to be in the Brisbane Powerhouse Museum and I might be going too.
And of course, there is always still baking. Between the three of us, someone manages to bake every day or so, Smartie cookies are the current obsession, healthy as they are… but honey cakes, lemon poppyseed cupcakes, carrot cakes, banana breads and rice puddings have all made their appearance.
Thanks for reading, see you soon.
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(Anonymous)
2008-11-08 05:48
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I'm pretty sure you should pay a visit to the suprisingly small and under stocked woolies on epping road.
yep, i'm a check out chick there.
oh well.
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2009-09-13 08:59
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