behindthestonedoor*

2009-08-28T17:33:00.005+10:00

Ha! Just goes to show that if you stamp your foot hard enough someone usually responds. I have a new website + blog. Designed and built by Mr Matthew O'Shannessy. Thank you, thank you!
You can check it out here: http://www.britafrost.com/ and the blog here: http://www.britafrost.com/blog/

I'll keep this blog up for a little while but I won't be posting stuff here anymore.

2009-08-17T16:39:00.005+10:00

For ages now I have been trying unsuccessfully to build a new website with a blog attached. I still haven't done it. The blog bit is fine, the website a disaster. One day I will fix it. Until then I will just continue to post things here.

I am in a new studio. I come here to write and it seems to be working out ok. Except on a Monday. I hardly ever get anything done on a Monday.

So anyhow. Some things that I love (because I do seem to love a lot of things):

I have read this transcript of a talk given by David Foster Wallace about four times now.

At the film festival I saw, among other things, the new Agnes Varda film

And the new Clair Denis film

which was breathtakingly beautiful...

Some gorgeous girls:

I have been reading the Bruno Munari book Design as Art. He writes about the Bauhaus:
"This first school of design did tend to make a new kind of artist, an artist useful to society because he helps society to recover its balance, and not to lurch between a false world to live one's material life in and an ideal world to take moral refuge in.

When the objects we use every day and the surroundings we live in have become in themselves a work of art, then we shall be able to say that we have achieved a balanced life."

It seems to fit so beautifully with the David Foster Wallace talk.

And more:

Last week I was lucky enough to meet and interview Rick Poynor. He also gave a fascinating talk about "design thinking" and critical design. I will write some more about what he said later.

A great interview with Agnes Varda here.
A great interview with Haruki Murakami here.

Oh and last night we saw the new Michael Mann, Public Enemies. I know the enthusiastic tone of this post makes me sound indiscriminate but seriously, I thought it was brilliant. And shot so beautifully on video. And Johnny Depp...

I am so happy to be back...
Again.
x

2009-06-30T23:12:00.008+10:00

Once she would have liked to see a ghost. As if that would have confirmed everything she already knew about the world. Now, watching her son, she no longer needs the corroboration of an unhappy ghost. Life is diaphanous. Being alive is not much different to placing paper on bark and rubbing over it with a lead pencil. These days she feels as if she is surrounded by the scratchings of another world, a world too full of the shapes of things, of knowing and not knowing, where to think is to be certain.

(I love the photo above but I have no idea who took it or where I found it, if you know, please tell me)

2009-06-25T18:16:00.001+10:00

one afternoon

2009-06-23T16:07:00.005+10:00

fancy.
Under the Ivy (the film clip is kind of gorgeous, especially Kate's smile at the end).

Happy Birthday Lauren!

2009-06-22T11:00:00.007+10:00

So I have a room with a view. Such a novelty in this flat capital. A great big room with a great big view. I live in an apartment above a big old shop and on the back of the building is this rather spectacular old sign.

I look out across Melbourne's lichen covered rooftops.

(no lichen on these rooftops, this is from the bathroom)

In this new elevated position a gloomy Melbourne winter takes on a new and rather enjoyable quality. The sky changes. And changes. And I can lie in bed and watch it shift. I think about taking photos only of the sky. Someone described Melbourne's winter skies to me as a bit like living under a tupperware lid. It is true, the sky does seem to be grey and low for much of the year but lately I have been quite taken with its shimmering quality. And the sky, for some reason, it always makes me think of the past. Of what this part of the world was like before Melbourne was here.

Lately, I haven't been sleeping. I tend to spend many hours awake in the middle of the night in what feels like an excruciatingly uncomfortable bed. Sometimes I read and sometimes I just lie there. Sometimes I stare in to the darkness. Sleepless nights are hardly pleasant or enjoyable, as everyone knows, but sometimes I can just let myself go and think. And think. And in its own way this tends to dissolve the small knot of anxiety at the base of my sternum.

I feel a little bit like a snake sloughing off an old skin, discovering how cold and raw you are underneath. A feeling that is both terrible and pleasant all at the same time.

2009-06-06T09:13:00.002+10:00

Phew!
I am happy to be back.
In a new house.
With a different kind of life.
On my own.

Sleeping it off in Rapid City

2009-05-14T13:52:00.001+10:00

for the love of Guy

2009-05-08T10:59:00.003+10:00

The beautiful work of Theo Jansen. I love these creatures, I love the way they move and sound.
You can hear him speak here.

2009-05-08T10:25:00.005+10:00

via swissmiss. wonderful.
(Oh wait there's more here. And the screen isn't chopped in half).

2009-05-04T23:02:00.004+10:00

And last week, garlic soup.
Though it didn't really count, I had such a bad cold I could hardly taste it. And it was too strong for Matt, he only got through about half a bowl. From the fabulous Moro cookbook.

2009-05-04T22:56:00.000+10:00

The best seat in the house.
Olive's favourite things in life: clean washing and a heater.

2009-04-28T13:18:00.003+10:00

I flew to the cold watery city of Hobart.
It snowed on the mountain.
I caught a chill.

Sometimes life intervenes.
Thinking about the past shines a dull light on the future.

2009-04-17T07:57:00.006+10:00

Easter came and went.
I made a list of things I love and it turns out I love a lot of things.
mozartmozart

2009-04-09T08:25:00.002+10:00

hello.
I'm taking a break.
I'll be back in a week.
Have a nice holiday if you get one.

2009-04-08T11:15:00.001+10:00

Birthday pancake leftovers.
Happy Birthday Matt!!!!!!!!!

2009-04-05T23:36:00.003+10:00

Yesterday I sat in the sun drinking coffee. I haven't sat down like that with no purpose in such a long time and there is something so wonderful about being able to sit with the warm light on your face without fear of sunburn (I seem to spend an awful lot of my life obsessing about sunburn). The sun has lost its burn. The clocks are back again.
When I opened my eyes the whole garden was blue, my eyes were playing tricks and it reminded me of being a child, playing with light. Like looking at the sun with your hands across your eyes and the bright red glow that seeps through the edges of your fingers. The kinds of games that might remind you that you're human and that you have flesh. I don't know but the older I get the more I seem to forget.
I was talking with a friend the other day about sucking on a face washer (yes! I really was) and we were both laughing because we could both remember distinctly sucking the bath water out of a face washer and its particular metallic taste. I guess it's like chewing on grass or the smell of dirt. Or the smell of horses which is a beautiful smell that I will always love.
Too much time working in front of a computer this weekend. I really need to get out more.

2009-04-03T12:54:00.003+11:00

Howard Finster and other web wonders from Design Observer.

(the Where the Wild Things Are trailer and the Extreme Sheep video are my favourites).

2009-04-01T20:48:00.003+11:00

My favourite flickr group is map of dreams. I love unmade beds.
This is a great Marcel Dzama video, via Camilla Engman.
Also, and weirdly, I have another project up. It is still in its early stages but it is an ongoing blog for the Australian Graphic Design Association. It has taken a very long time to get up and running and now that it is I feel very nervous about it. So please, go and visit it here. And let me know what you think!

2009-03-31T21:48:00.004+11:00

A garage sale (quite a successful one) followed by a trip to the op-shop and half our house is gone. Almost empty. It feels so good to only have the things in our house that we both actually want. I feel prepared. And excited.

I actually feel a bit like a child who doesn't want to go to bed at night.

Exquisite Corpse and The Posthuman Dada Guide. Codrescu is a man after my own heart.
Also 3:AM Magazine and Bookslut.

2009-03-26T16:14:00.002+11:00

Andrew Putter via vvork.

2009-03-25T21:53:00.003+11:00

Surprisingly I have nothing to say.
Except perhaps that I have fallen for that age-old trick of half taking a photo of yourself. What does this say about a girl?

That I have big hands.

2009-03-24T12:58:00.004+11:00

A shiatsu at home this morning: having been floating somewhere above my left shoulder for several days, my head is now reattached to my body.

2009-03-23T23:15:00.002+11:00

Jeana Sohn reminded me of this.
I love this version, without the Amelie music.
I think everyone should dress like a french school boy from 1956.

2009-03-23T09:57:00.002+11:00

Derek Jarman's beautiful garden at Dungeness. More photos here. And a film here.

2009-03-22T20:24:00.001+11:00

via vvork.
sometimes I think I'm too literal for my own good.

2009-03-22T14:04:00.001+11:00

2009-03-22T13:04:00.005+11:00

The best thing about a new piece of art (apart from the art itself, thank you so much Gracia & Louise), is it gives you (or me) an excuse to rearrange the entire house. Which might just be my all-time favourite occupation ever. It also gave me an excuse to get rid of the rug, some furniture and a whole lot of stuff. As you can see I am yet to master the art of photographing things behind glass, so it's not such a great photo. I really love it. Olive does too, she spent quite a bit of time up on the table inspecting it. I think she thinks that the table with the bones and the cat picture might just be a shrine to her. She might be right too.

It's been so beautiful and warm and sunny I took lots and lots of photos. More to come...

2009-03-21T09:51:00.000+11:00

2009-03-20T12:43:00.000+11:00

2009-03-19T21:48:00.005+11:00

Struggle has not been a very popular theme in the American art of my lifetime. My generation is better summed up in the word "whatever," an attitude that opposes all forms of struggle.

1. When I am really thinking or concentrating I tend to smell the back of my hand. When I am daydreaming, I tend to smell my hair. I have smelt the back of my hand, with my nose resting against the joint between my hand and my wrist since I was a small child. This is why I think books with their scent and their paper are so important, why the internet is so weird. I read this interview (with the spirit surfers guy, which is quite incredible) and it made me think about the spiritual and how for me, the spiritual is tied up with scent and with touch. I never thought about it before. (Perhaps I am thinking about the internet as though it were an extension of publishing or books rather than something more like film or music. I think I am more a tactile, visceral kind of person. For me film and the internet seem to be more an intellectual exercise rather than a sensory one. Books on the other hand seem to be both).

2. I am no surfer, I am more a scavenger.

3. I went to my volunteer teaching English class today (I teach English to a girl from China each week and I am learning how to do it, today was my second last class), I arrived late, stepped out of the lift, saw the people in the class doing group work, turned around and caught the lift back down again. I hate group work. My french teacher said the other day that she thinks group work is dogmatic. I love my french teacher. She has a book coming out, it's called Terror and Joy: The Films of Dusan Makavejev. It's very good.

2009-03-18T21:22:00.004+11:00

Another earthquake yesterday. The second in a month. I love a little earthquake when the walls rattle and shake.
This is a beautiful blog. And what great projects here and here. Both of which feature my friend's Gracia and Louise.

2009-03-18T19:25:00.010+11:00

The liberty print shirt that belonged to my mum.

A spider's web. Now gone.

This building.

The little espresso I make each morning.

New friends.
Crickets.
Night time.

2009-03-17T17:41:00.002+11:00

Sometimes the anticipation of change takes my breath away. These days I am longing for it.
I feel captivated by something that I can't quite put my finger on. I spend long periods of time staring at walls.

2009-03-15T01:32:00.003+11:00

I'm up too late again.
I've been changing a few things. I disabled the comments. I thought I would give it a shot and see how it went for a while. It's not that I don't really love and appreciate all your comments but I feel like I need a bit of a change. If you feel like getting in touch, please just send me an email. I'd love to here from you. Thanks so much for visiting.

2009-03-14T23:47:00.002+11:00

2009-03-14T21:14:00.003+11:00

I left the damp (yes! rain!) environs of Melbourne for a work lunch in Sydney today. Lots of tourist shots but I couldn't resist. We had lunch on the harbour and it was spectacular.
The harbour bridge is beautiful close-up with its rows upon rows of rivets, in incredible patterns.

I feel like disaster has been following me around all week but hasn't quite got hold of me yet. Yesterday, I was nearly hit by a car on my bike and today on the way to airport I had one of those psycho taxi drivers with a death wish and a chronic mobile phone habit. I feel like I need to see a witch doctor.

I want to go and see this tomorrow and this.

2009-03-11T22:44:00.001+11:00

Mount Eerie
Lost Wisdom

2009-03-09T22:36:00.007+11:00

I can't help but fantasise about one day living in this A-frame apartment block. Everything would have to change though, for a start I'd need a new dressing gown and some slippers.
Today we walked a long way to see Vicky Cristina Barcelona. We ate a bowl of pasta at Tiamo and walked home again. I ate a lot of chocolate and spent this morning reading Evening. Last night I drank a lot of wine with an old friend from high school. It was odd, those first moments of friction followed by an unravelling, as though we were both seeking out an earlier, original version. And thankfully few of us change that much, especially after a glass or two of wine.

Last night I dreamt that six white creatures almost like horses came to the door of my childhood home. It was a lofty kind of dream, a bit like dreaming about wolves.

Can you see how dry it is in Melbourne? We are almost a desert. I love the strips of green though, the way they snake across the parks circling the trees.

2009-03-04T21:43:00.002+11:00

I think I regret filling my life up with so much stuff. Like work! Too busy.
On a lighter note, I tried to do this detox thing and lasted all of 24 hours because not having my one coffee a day nearly killed me. I felt like I was close to death on Monday night.
Have you seen this Michael Mann film? The sets and interiors are incredible.

2009-03-02T16:04:00.003+11:00

Wandering.
I haven't had a coffee today and my head feels a little bit like it might take off.
I went to see I've Loved You So Long on the weekend. It was beautiful. Kristen Scott Thomas was amazing. I went by myself, I used to go to movies on my own a lot. Somewhere along the way I forgot how great it is to see a film on your own, how absorbed you become. And how weirdly exciting it is to walk out of a cinema, still consumed, and wander.

2009-03-02T13:13:00.003+11:00

Ages ago, I bought the Moro cookbook. I made paella and it didn't really work (I think it was more my cooking skills than the recipe) and then I didn't look at it again. Last week I rediscovered it. It's amazing and much simpler than I thought (I really hate complicated recipes). Last week I made the chorizo and butter bean salad above twice, flathead (it was cod in the recipe) baked in tahini sauce with rice and chickpea salad, and spanish marinated fish. Next I want to make Carlos's Stuffed Squid. So good!
This is a great blog, lots of beautiful clothes.

2009-02-25T21:00:00.002+11:00

Cats on a treadmill and other miscellany from modern life.

2009-02-24T11:38:00.002+11:00

It's not really the right season, but I crocheted another scarf. I am quite addicted. Next I want to make a hat.

I have been spending quite a bit of time on Design Observer site lately. It's such a great blog. This is a really interesting article on Stan Brakhage's journals.

2009-02-23T22:46:00.003+11:00

We went to see the GERDA STEINER & JÖRG LENZLINGER show at ACCA on Sunday.
It was such a fantastic show.
A desalination plant for tears, gleaned from the stuff of Footscray.
I can't tell you how much I love stories in art. Narratives. Fantasy.
And crystals.

2009-02-22T16:57:00.004+11:00

These are our new neighbours, Frank and Shirley. Frank's a bit of a show off. Especially when Shirl's around.

2009-02-20T22:26:00.002+11:00

A feather landed in my beer. I am hoping for good luck. And maybe money too...

2009-02-17T10:11:00.002+11:00

Currently looking for a little light relief. Things have got a bit serious around here of late.

2009-02-15T16:52:00.004+11:00

I read the Jonathan Lethem interview with Paul Auster today in the Believer book of Writers Talking to Writers. Paul Auster said some very interesting things about writing and art:

What's beautiful about art is that it circumscribes a space, a physical and mental space. If you try to put the entire world into every page, you turn out chaos. Art is about eliminating almost everything in order to focus on the thing that you need to talk about.

Almost the same as meditation, it is an idea that makes me think about this great blog. Auster's idea describes a kind of minimalism I suppose, a kind of intellectual opposite to the Henry Darger's of the world. Sometimes I think that while I ascribe or aspire to this kind of restricted creative universe, my impulse or greatest desire would be to record everything in proustian detail. I guess I might be getting my recording mixed up with my creating (though are they really any different?), and that in reality the proustian detail is not so different to what Auster is talking about. Perhaps the limitation lies in what you allow people to see rather than what or how much you choose to record.

He also said:
It's all coming out of the deepest feelings, out of dreams, out of the unconcious. And yet what I am constantly striving for in my prose is clarity. So that, ideally, the writing will become so transparent that the reader will forget that the medium of communication is language. So that the reader is simply inside the voice, inside the story, inside what is happening.

I like this idea a lot.

2009-02-13T10:51:00.003+11:00

Beautiful light at 7.30 this morning.
I have been a bit absent of late, struck by a bout of malaise. Currently looking for inspiration.

My new years resolution this year was to have a routine. Where I get up at the same time each day. And do the same things. Every single day. It hasn't happened yet. I am beginning to think that I am not such a routine kind of person. I like to wake up early but I get distracted and don't eat breakfast until 11.30. I spend three hours faffing around on the internet and then end up working into the night. I prefer to work in the mornings. And some mornings I am up with the birds and have done several hours of work by lunchtime. So, I worry that my quest for a routine is actually stopping me from getting things done. I worry that I am turning in to an incredibly boring person.

Writing this has got me thinking that maybe my approach to the routine has been all wrong. Perhaps, I am filling my mornings up with stuff, like yoga, french practice and elaborate breakfasts when really I should just be writing.

2009-02-09T12:32:00.002+11:00

So many people died over the weekend in the bushfires. It is hard to imagine. I feel so sad for all the people who lost their homes, the people they love and their neighbours. It was such a horrible day, and all last week it felt as though disaster was in the air. I guess it was.

2009-02-07T15:29:00.002+11:00

46 degrees celsius. The hottest day ever recorded.

2009-02-06T15:57:00.006+11:00

I was tagged by Gracia. And here it is, the 6th photo from the 6th folder. It brings back funny memories. This is a photo of Mark. He used to work in the jean shop next door and he spent an awful lot of time not in the jean shop but in our bookshop, preening, dancing and checking out the cute, "intellectual" boys. He was very entertaining. I tag melindatrees.

2009-02-06T15:18:00.004+11:00

Delicious summer bounty: the nectarines from our lovely old Italian neighbours across the road and the tomatoes grown by me. Little but tasty.
Note fantastic red Margarethe bowl. It was a birthday present ;)

My favourite french word so far is hibou.

43 degrees again tomorrow, the premier reckons it's going to be "the worst day in history". Great!

2009-02-06T14:50:00.004+11:00

Ages ago Brinja tagged me to show my desk, and then Kindra and I am ashamed to say that it has taken me this long to do it because I wanted to tidy up my desk first. So here it is. Without the cascading piles of paper and junk. If you look closely in the second and third photo you can see my favourite picture, Edie Beale standing outside her house. The image is taken from Grey Gardens.

I have been in the strangest mood all week. I keep waking up with a sore jaw from clenching my teeth but I can't imagine what it is that is actually bothering me. I think perhaps all the talk of crisis and the world coming to an end is actually starting to get to me. Luckily I have Fleetwood Mac and Bonnie 'Prince' Billy to keep me almost sane, that and Azita with her strange angular voice.

2009-02-02T17:29:00.005+11:00

more wedding photos!~

2009-02-02T16:22:00.012+11:00

Over the weekend we went to the most beautiful wedding. Ever! It was lovely, and even relatively cool under the ancient oak tree in the garden.

2009-02-02T11:43:00.005+11:00

These are some of the last photos taken on my trip to Tasmania. I wanted to include the top photo as it was taken on the way to the beautiful and World Heritage listed Liffey Falls National Park, perhaps not a kilometre away from the boundary (and with a nasty irony, very close to Bob Brown's house). How can they get away with it? Australia's environment is so fragile and it feels so close to being completely destroyed. Living through extreme temperatures like last week, with four days in a row above 43 degrees celsius, it terrifies me that they continue to allow the destruction of such a beautiful, and until relatively recently, untouched place as Tasmania. It blows me away that they can continue to destroy native, old growth forest while Tasmania continues to suffer through a drought (like most of east coast Australia, it has been in drought for nearly a decade).
Almost as horrendous as the clear felling were the weeds. All along the sides of the roads and up into the bush were Foxgloves (Digitalis). So while the loggers had stopped at the boundary to the national park, their destructive and insidious arms had stretched into the bush regardless.

2009-01-29T11:35:00.003+11:00

Currently enduring Melbourne's longest heat wave in recorded history. I'll be back when its over. Right now, barely have the brain capacity to brush my teeth.
And can I just say its bloody hot!

2009-01-23T15:58:00.009+11:00

The man bent over his guitar,
A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.

They said, "You have a blue guitar,
You do not play things as the are."

The man replied, "Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar."

And they said then, "But play you must,
A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,

A tune upon the blue guitar
Of things exactly as they are."

I love Wallace Stevens. And incidentally, so does this guy.

It's been quite a week. And things are changing already. I was so happy to read that they are closing Guantanamo. I am always sceptical about things but I can't help but hope.

Have a happy weekend!

2009-01-23T01:29:00.002+11:00

hello!

2009-01-23T00:48:00.006+11:00

Last sunday we went for a walk around the Evandale Market. I was overwhelmed and bought only one thing. I regret it now. I should have bought everything I saw. Hah!

Such hot hot days. They slow me down to a snails pace.
And now it is the middle of the night and I have only just finished work.
I had a French lesson today though and loved it. A bit of my highschool French even came wandering back: Qu'est-ce que c'est?

This Joy + Ride featuring Gracia & Louise. Beautiful!
Now: bed.

2009-01-20T22:34:00.003+11:00

I am back from Tasmania. Launceston is such a beautiful yet ultimately weird place. I don't necessarily recommend returning to a place you spent an awkward adolescence to celebrate your 32nd birthday. It's too strange. And makes you feel far too old.
I have many more photos to post. But you will have to wait...

2009-01-16T09:33:00.006+11:00

The lady is a tramp! And spends most of her time in the gutter these days. Looking for love...

2009-01-15T20:43:00.011+11:00

A scarf crocheted by moi. I learnt to crochet while away on holidays. I can not show you in any kind of detail because it is wonky ;)

Next week I start French lessons. I am excited, but scared. My old honours supervisor is teaching me and she is BRUTAL! And tomorrow I fly to Tasmania for the weekend. I can't wait for cool clear sunshine.

I am really taken with these paper garlands, via aaA.

2009-01-14T11:01:00.007+11:00

I'm not sure I was ready for the blistering heat, the hot northerly wind. This morning I was saved only by my breakfast of mango, peaches, blueberries, strawberries and yoghurt. And now, a coffee and a cool southerly breeze.
This is fantastic.
This is heartbreaking.
& thank you for all your kind comments lately. They really mean a lot to me.

2009-01-12T15:37:00.001+11:00

Hot days coming. Tomorrow it will be 37.

2009-01-10T22:47:00.002+11:00

I have a new camera.
Hooray!
M gave me Patti Smith: Dream of Life for christmas. Such a wonderful film. And so inspiring. Anyhow, must dash. I have photos to take.
And words to write.

2009-01-07T11:24:00.002+11:00

I am back in Melbourne with a heavy heart. It is so great to be back home again with M and Miss Olive but I miss the island, the sky, the sea and the quietness. And my family! And the many animals: Chloe (the poodle), the ubiquitous and enormous cat, Clive and the many other dogs, ducks, chooks, magpies, Mr and Mrs Wedge Tail Eagle and all the rest.
Today after the plane took off we flew north over the island almost directly over our house. And as we flew, I saw mum and my sister driving home in their little silver machine, moving along and it felt incredibly strange. Me in a small plane, thousands of miles above them in the air and there they are visible, moving forward. Existing. In an odd sort of way. And weirdly, it made me wonder if I somehow expect them to STOP as soon as I leave the room. Looking down at them it felt as though I was allowed a glimpse in to another world. Like in a dream.
My camera is half dead so I took hardly any photos. Just of the Fjord foal and his mother. He was only 1 month old and he wanted to play.

2008-12-23T13:53:00.003+11:00

(I stole this image from my friend phil)
I've been sick and then extra busy. Today is my last day at the bookstore after 9 years (very sad).
Tomorrow I escape to Flinders Island. I'll be back in a few weeks. Wishing you all a peaceful and happy new year!

2008-12-14T19:59:00.003+11:00

I am not sure whether it is right(?!) to draw what is essentially another person's photographic composition but it something that I love to do. And everything seems to change in the doing.
I spent a long time awake last night (we made the mistake of having an affogato after our yummy Italian dinner) thinking about The Gleaners and I. It has been a long time since I last saw it but I think what I love most about that film is the way that Agnes Varda tells an ever more elaborate story about gleaning in such a deceptively simple way. To me, her approach is the best kind of intellectual approach, she opens up a whole range of possibilities for thinking about gleaning and waste and art and how we live but is neither contrary nor overly theoretical. And in doing so she makes a really very beautiful and moving point. I love Agnes Varda!
A bath and dinner awaits.

2008-12-13T13:35:00.001+11:00

Things to think about...
'Pleading like angels, trumpet-tongued,
Against the deep damnation of taking her off.'

I finished that big freelance job. Now it feels like it is time to do some real work. I have a list as long as my arm. I am thinking about vanishing. Not literally. Maybe metaphorically.
Last night I had a dream I was being stalked by a man with a fake bald patch, kind of like a rubber prosthesis on the top of his head. Why do we dream things like this? I'm not sure I believe that dreams should be interpreted, I think sometimes they should be left alone.

2008-12-13T11:16:00.003+11:00

The above photos (of Cesar and below of Nicolas de Stael and Nadia Leger and students in Fernand Leger's studio) and are taken from Doisneau: Portraits of the Artists. The photos are so beautiful. But the artists are almost always men.

2008-12-11T15:40:00.003+11:00

Lately I can't stop thinking about India.
I think after the initial shock of the place something about it captures you and won't let go. I had intended to go to India in January but not any more. A small part of me wishes I could just get on a plane and go. A friend from uni is there right now. He writes beautifully about being there, how strange it is. His blog is here. It is worth a visit. It makes me homesick for a place where I really don't belong. I think that being there, on my own, or maybe just travelling on my own, gave me a quietness that I really don't have in my day to day life. It felt like a test of endurance and the entire time I was there I kept thinking of that phrase or title, 'the loneliness of the long distance runner.' Maybe next year I will go back. I really hope so.

2008-12-05T20:13:00.002+11:00

It's warm and me and my friend Olive have been hanging out in the garden eating squid salad. I am going to spend this evening drawing. Happy Friday!

2008-12-04T21:55:00.002+11:00

Lucky for me, strawberries exist.

And tuna salad with spicy hommus. And a delivery man with a box of organic veggies comes every thursday.

2008-12-04T20:43:00.004+11:00

A Christmas party last night and I am suffering for it today. Thankfully I have been saved by my shiatsu therapist and I am feeling a little better tonight after lots of mineral water and some gardening. I had a long chat with an old woman who lives on our street. She grew up in Sicily and has lived in the same house for 45 years. She said: "I tell my husband 'you need talk to me, I need to talk' and he says 'why? what do we have to talk about?'"

2008-12-02T20:52:00.003+11:00

lately I have felt quite sick of this space. I think about changing it.
work seems to go on and on and I am looking forward to long slow days doing nothing at all. I have been dreaming about drawing and sleep and long breakfasts and spending time in my garden.
today I found this wonderful blog and she lead me to the music of shannon wright, who in turn lead me to more great music, shipping news and the rachels.

right now we are filled with coffee and chocolate and both ready for a long night of work. tomorrow, I am hoping it will all be over.

2008-11-29T18:08:00.000+11:00

Life

2008-11-25T12:20:00.006+11:00

It's a beautiful sunny day today. I escaped into the garden with a cup of fresh peppermint tea (grown in my garden, amazingly good) to discover a ladybird having a rest. There seems to be an abundance of ladybirds at the moment. I love them. Fuschias always remind me of my Granny.
McSweeney's lists are very funny, particularly this one.
I love these trousers. Found via dank en.
Did I tell you we booked tickets to Europe next year, to visit my sister in London and to go here (doesn't this castle look incredible)?

2008-11-22T14:19:00.004+11:00

These cakes always make me think of little round pink bottoms. I have never actually been brave enough to eat one. They looked so incredible when I went to get my coffee this morning in the freezing SLEET (it's hard to believe 2 weeks ago it was 30 degrees).

& I am reading The Brief & Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao at the moment. It is brilliant!
This book is also fantastic. & this one.

2008-11-22T11:10:00.004+11:00

Just around the corner from the bookshop is the wonderful Chapel St Bazaar. Often when I have a break I will spend some time in there. Yesterday, I was quite taken with the chandeliers and this villeroy and bosch cup. I think I want that cup!

2008-11-20T12:26:00.001+11:00

2008-11-20T12:10:00.000+11:00

2008-11-20T10:42:00.002+11:00

I dreamt about these baubles last night. When I looked at them a few days ago they must have made an extra big impact on my subconscious. They are from Etsy here. I wonder if that means I should buy them?

2008-11-18T22:54:00.000+11:00

fantastic news!!!!

2008-11-18T14:12:00.004+11:00

One of the people I had to interview for this freelance project I am working on is the Swiss graphic designer, Werner Jeker. He is renowned for his beautiful posters and I really admire his work. But he certainly didn't give me much to go on. To each of my wordy, verbose and elaborate questions he replied in only one or two words. For example, when I asked, 'You are renowned for your very beautiful and considered posters, when you begin a poster what is it that you hope to achieve? Is it clarity? Or something else?'
He replied, 'Have the better and appealing image.'
Perhaps I could learn something from Mr Werner Jeker.

2008-11-17T20:17:00.006+11:00

Katharina Grosse's work (top 2 images) reminds me quite a lot of John Divola's at the bottom (which I love). His book, Three Acts is great.
& I am very excited, I finally got one of these posters. Hooray! The dollar is depressing though.

2008-11-17T16:45:00.002+11:00

Both these images are from BLDBLOG. Such a great blog. Via ffffound!

2008-11-16T19:48:00.000+11:00

I want to go here. Maybe next year...

2008-11-16T19:28:00.001+11:00

I love this house. From The Selby.

hot

2008-11-12T17:57:00.003+11:00

It is super duper hot today (it feels weirdly hot for this time of year, like mid-summer but perhaps I am just being paranoid). I am off to yoga in a minute. I am so overwhelmed with things to do. My list gets longer and longer and I feel quite elated when I get to cross something off. Which doesn't seem to be very often. So I thought I'd share this photo of my mum and my sister on Flinders Island last summer. Oh to be there swimming right now...
I love Ari Ogasawara work. I am sure I got this link from somewhere like Smosch or Camilla Engman or Fine Little Day but unfortunately I can no longer remember which.
Also reading Case Histories by Kate Atkinson & The Believer Book of Writers talking to Writers. Both are great.

2008-11-09T21:58:00.004+11:00

Josh Petherick

2008-11-08T15:46:00.006+11:00

I have worked in the same bookstore for 9 years. Here is a list of people I have met while working in the same bookstore for 9 years. Some of them are real people and some of them are types. A lot of them are lunatics.
1.The person who will steal anything if they can. Usually travels in pairs and likes to remove several books from the shelf at one time. Lingers in the grafitti section.
2. The junky. With husky voice. Usually too stoned to actually steal something and always easily distracted.
3.The person who is after a yellow book but can not remember the title, author or what the book is actually about. Usually if we do manage to guess what book it is, it will be blue.
4.The psycho comedy club guy. He comes in about once a year trying to sell tickets to stand-up comedy. He says something like, "Hey! You guys into comedy?" and we say, "No." He asks why not and we say because we don't really like comedy. And then he gets really really angry. Who on earth doesn't like comedy? Don't we like to laugh? What kind of psycho-bitches wouldn't like comedy? He becomes so irrate he begins to cry and has to leave.
5. The man who is infatuated with my boss. Unfortunately for her they are nearly always married.
6. Nick Cave in his perfectly tailored trousers with his remarkably round and gravity defying bottom, accompanied by two very posh kids.
7. The writer who washes dishes around the corner, always shouts and collects books of facts.
8. The author who wants their book in the window.
9. The authoritarian. Because I wouldn't know how to wrap a book, or conduct a transaction. Or anything about anything really.
10. The bragger. Who just spent two weeks in London hotel paying $800 a night, is just so incredibly wealthy and likes to collect books on design.
11.The person who knows everything there is to know about everything and who has read every book that you might ever wish to suggest to them (closely related to the bragger and the authoritarian).

2008-11-06T20:05:00.004+11:00

I have been tagged by the lovely Gracia, lady of the anagrams (though was disturbed to discover that Fart Bistro is an anagram for my name). Seven random facts about myself:
1. I am impulsive. I do all sorts of random and stupid things. Like decide to delete the operating system from my old ibook so I can put the new operating system on. THIS WAS THE WRONG THING TO DO!
2. I knocked my front tooth out when I was seven doing somersaults from a swing set on to a trampoline. The entire tooth came out and landed in a small patch of dirt.
3. I was totally in love with Jarvis Cocker for a very long time.
4. I have a black streak in the front of my red hair. When I was born it was a birth mark. I like to think that if I had been born 500 years ago I would've been burnt at the stake.
5. I have a younger sister who has been living in London for about 6 years. Before that she lived in LA. We had an amazing dress-up box when we were growing up and spent most of our childhood traipsing about the bush in full regalia playing elaborate make-believe games.
6. I am extremely scared of big dogs like Dobermans, Alsatians, Pitt Bulls. I think they will know how scared I am and attack me. It's stupidly circular. I love other dogs though especially sheep dogs, poodles, grey hounds, whippets and terriers.
7. I love Agatha Christie novels. I like reading them on Sunday nights.
I am going to tag melindatrees, Kindra, Juliet, Ro, MattO. It's not quite 7 but what does it matter anyway? So, will you do it?

2008-11-04T21:27:00.003+11:00

It was Melbourne Cup day today. Matt and I tried to work before being driven out by the idea that everyone else in the world was having a good time except us. We went and had a beer at the pub but missed the big race. This morning on Radio National they repeated a talk Ian McEwan gave on truth and fiction at the Sydney Opera House earlier this year. It was very good. I cried at the end. You can listen to it here.
I really like the work of Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison (it's one of their photos above). I especially like the staged and theatrical qualities of their photographs. I have been thinking a lot about theatrics in art and in real life. I am quite fascinated by the idea of making up real life, I guess like Sophie Calle. I spend most of my days preoccupied with parameters and making up rules. In my meditation class people liked to go on about what a bad word discipline was. I actually really like the idea of discipline (though remain fairly undisciplined- see trip to the pub above). Perhaps it's my control freak personality or my over-blown capricorn-ness. I like the idea of discipline because I like the idea of planning and changing every aspect of my life. I live in a fantasy world of future achievements. I guess I wonder what it would be like to live in a fantasy world of narrative propositions. If that makes any sense. Perhaps it is time I read Life: A User's Manual.

2008-11-03T15:50:00.005+11:00

It rained all night last night, and for most of this morning. It hasn't rained like that in months and months. This week I am interviewing Stefan Sagmeister and Werner Jeker and eight others for this thing I am working on. It's exciting and nerve wracking. Sagmeister gave a great talk on happy design at TED a few years ago. It is here. You can find Maira Kalman's fantastic lecture here too (this has been linked to by lots of people but I thought I would again).
Did I mention that yesterday at the gardens while looking at the numerous eels in the lake I heard a man walk past and say, "Trust Australian's to put eels in a lake instead of goldfish." I actually thought the eels were quite beautiful in their slippery slimey way but all my photos were pretty bad. You'll just have to put up with Melbourne's type obsessed stencillors...

2008-11-02T17:15:00.003+11:00

We had a family outing today. We went to the Royal Botanic Gardens with my cousins, Gill and Christina, Gill's little boy Quinn and Christina's partner, Alex. It was hot and dry.
On the way home we stopped for Vietnamese noodles and a beer in the city. And as we walked home from the tram a group of boys were letting off fireworks near the commission flats, a loud crack and then a sound like the sky was ripping.

Can you feel it: Dance off Extravaganza 2008

2008-11-02T12:03:00.002+11:00

Last night's Dance off Extravaganza at Collingwood Town Hall. It was so great!
The photos are a bit weird as they were taken with a camera phone. The JiveAmatics at the top won.

2008-10-31T16:16:00.004+11:00