Absence Of Memory

1:1:11 ABSENCE OF MEMORY
Shot and processed iPhone 3GS

Here's another of the images that I created from the shots I took whilst getting lost on a Welsh Hillside, on New Year's Day.

Pilgrims of Light

PILGRIMS OF LIGHT: LAST ASCENT TO THE RED CROSS

shot and processed iPhone 3Gs

I'm very behind posting photos, so the next few days will be all about images, with very few words. This photo was taken in December 2010, when we made our 8th pilgrimage to the Fetes des Lumieres in Lyon, France. Don't forget to leave a message with my last blog post HERE if you'd like a chance to win a print of any photo from my Flickr Stream!

My Second Bloggerversary!

JANUARY WALKING: EVENING PRAYER

shot and processed iPhone 3GS

JANUARY WALKING: OUT OF SIGNAL

shot and processed iPhone 3GS

On New Year's Day, we went for a stroll with a friend and became lost at the top of a rather cold, damp, Welsh hill. One session of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy isn't quite enough to get a severely anxious person through that kind of life-challenge without a considerable amount of panic, but as misty, evening darkness drew in around us, my thoughts turned to practical matters: would it be possible, I wondered, to fell a small tree with the edge of a Co-op loyalty card? Then we could construct a shelter. I wasn't so concerned about the cold for myself or my husband, but our friend does tend to moan a lot about the weather and I feared that at some point, during a night spent outdoors with him, we might loose the will to survive. I consoled myself with the thought that this was a very beautiful place in which to die of Hypothermia. My friend asked if I had the App that transforms the iPhone screen into a torchlight. Of course not! Why would I want that? Can I make pictures with it? Faced with the choice of saving my remaining phone battery power to make an SOS call or take more photographs, I chose the only logical course of action...I took more photographs...

Quite frankly, I haven't bounded into the new year full of vim and vigour, more like dragged myself, sluggishly, out of the old one, when I'd much rather have a nice long lie in. My conscience is grumbling: "it's 2011, the start of a new decade, that means you have to DO SOMETHING POSITIVE!" So, to show willing, I'm making lists...and I'm crossing things off...and I'm trying very hard not to mentally thrash myself if I haven't crossed EVERYTHING...or indeed, hardly anything, off the list, at the end of each day...let's see how long I can keep that up...

There's a lot that I want to accomplish over the next twelve months and now that I have a bright, shiny, new little garden studio to work in, what excuse can I possibly have? Well...the Panto Season may be coming to a close, but Mental Illness is like having a couple of Ugly Sisters permanently performing inside your head. They are not great company: Depression saps the imagination of its hopes and dreams. No sooner have you kicked her out the door than Anxiety comes knocking, nagging at you with countless reasons why hopes and dreams are bound to end in disaster. Before you know it, Depression has invited herself back in, put the kettle on and is eating her way through the chocolate HobNobs. Then there's The Cat...while we were away, just before Christmas and over the New Year, she had a little holiday at the vet's and so now I have a lot of making up to do. The Cat has an uncanny knack of knowing when I am just about to do something and at that precise moment, she desperately needs my lap and half an hour's reassurance that she is still the centre of my Universe. Whilst I'm in the midst of dealing with complex "nurturing issues", how can I possibly refuse?

Today marks my second bloggerversary. It's a cliche, I know, but it really does seem like only five minutes since I was writing my first bloggerversary post. Much has happened since then, but I have blogged about only a fraction of it. I've been away so from here for so long that this morning, I found it difficult to navigate my way around the dashboard and I've discovered an alarming number of half-composed postings in my drafts folder. However: I'm determined to complete this one, to thank visitors old and new for spending some time here and for your messages of support and encouragement over the past year. In the spirit of generosity that abounds in Blogland, I'm going to do the bloggerversary thing of offering a small gift as a token of my appreciation. Leave a message for me with this post and in about a week's time, I'll put everyone's name in a hat and pull one out. If your name is chosen, I'll send you a print of your choice from my Flickr Stream.

Wishing you all a very happy New Year!

Last night I dreamed that you came home

LAST NIGHT I DREAMED THAT YOU CAME HOME
shot and processed iPhone 3GS

By now, some of you may have read my recently-published piece in Artful Blogging, that touches upon my experiences of adoption disruption and subsequent struggle with anxiety and depression. While I don't wish to define myself by what has happened to me, it did happen and has left me with a very sharp view of a particular emotional landscape. Finally, after three years, I've summoned the courage to redecorate what was my daughter's pretty, pink bedroom.The original plan was simply to apply a fresh coat of paint, but I ended up removing the paper on the wall around the window and will have to reline it. Now I'm attempting to paint the other walls, but the pink stubbornly refuses to be obliterated. Memories of preparing for our daughter's arrival come flooding back with every brushstroke and it is taking an age to transform the tiny space. My instincts are telling me that fresh paint is not enough, that I'll never feel comfortable in this room that is to be our home office unless I scrape off every last scrap of lining paper, go right back to the bare walls, and completely begin anew. This could be due to my innate belief in "doing a job properly" but I suspect a deeper motivation and need.

The leaves that are green turn to brown

OCTOBER WALKING 01
shot & processed iphone 3GS


OCTOBER WALKING 02
shot & processed iphone 3GS

OCTOBER WALKING: THE OLD TRACK
shot & processed iphone 3GS

OCTOBER WALKING: THIS FAR, NO FURTHER
shot & processed iphone 3GS

This is my first post in over a month and the first one written from my new studio. It is everything I'd hoped for: there is (pretty much) room for everything and the space is light and airy but at the same time, a warm and snug retreat from where I can watch the seasons change as I work. This afternoon, twilight and raindrops are falling on our pond and clinging to the bare branches of the elder tree. To my right, I should be able to catch a glimpse of the hill, but shrouded in English Autumn weather, it has completely disappeared from view. A few weeks ago, I took a walk up there and shot the photographs that were the beginnings of the images posted above. The apps used were Toy Camera, PhotoFx, Iris and Photo Copier.

TOUCH

TOUCH

digital print
IPhone 3GS shot of erotic film-clip, cropped and processed iPhone 3GS
Textures by Les Brumes

Last week, we received notification that our planning application had been passed and so now, it's full-steam ahead! In front of our house, there are four tons of gravel that will be the new base and surround for our tool shed when we move it 2 metres further down the garden, to the very back of the plot where my studio is to stand. Sadly, the Honeysuckle has had to go because when the space was clear enough to allow us to measure up and draw an accurate plan, we realised that there was not enough room for my studio and the shed unless the studio was: 1. orientated across the plot rather than lengthways and 2. situated a lot closer to the pool/bog than we had originally intended. John, the unflappable gentleman whose company is building and installing my studio, coped very well with my panic attack and drew up a revised set of drawings in the hour he had before leaving work for a week's holiday. The new arrangement will be better because the the building will be wide and shallow, rather than narrow and deep, so more natural light should get into the space.

Those of you who have been asking how I make my iPhone collages may wish to purchase the Autumn edition of Somerset Digital Studio where I reveal some of the Apps and techniques that I use. In the side bar on the right, you'll find a link to where you can order a copy. Writing the tutorial was a challenge as I'd been asked to recreate a specific collage: one of my first. By some good fortune, the images that made up each stage of the collage's development had somehow escaped several hard-drive clear-outs, but I still had to recall and retread every step of what was quite a fiddly and complex process. I hope to write more tutorials: if you get sight of a copy, do please send me some feedback!

Shadow Gardens

Shadow Gardens 01 & 01

digital prints shot and processed on iPhone 3GS: Photo FX, Iris & LoMob apps

Just when it had begun to feel like Autumn must be around the corner, we have been blessed with a few warm days and bright sunlight. This has given me some lovely shadows to play with and I've created the two images posted above.
We're taking advantage of the good weather while we can, as our garden is the scene of a major project. Much as I love our home, I'd gladly leave this town: too many sad things have happened to us here, but for the moment, we must stay put. The compromise is to build a little studio space for me, at the bottom of our garden. Today's task has been grappling with an old honeysuckle that scrambled, in a free and easy fashion, through the trellis pergola and fence that bound the area where my studio will be situated. I've been brutal with the loppers and secateurs but it takes a lot to kill Honeysuckle and I'm confident that this time next year, it will have sprung back with renewed vigor. Of more concern to me are the Grape Vines that trailed through the other side of the now-dismantled pergola. This year, for the first time, the vines have borne grapes that are actually sweet and edible and I am leaving it in the ground until the very last minute. With any luck, I shan't have to move it at all and I'll train the vines over the replacement pergola I'm going to build in front of the wooden chalet. We're having to find somewhere to put all the junk, I mean: "vintage treasures and things that might come in useful" amassed over the past 20 years, so the rest of our garden resembles a reclamation yard. This makes me very anxious and so, in an attempt to keep calm, I'm doing lots of visualisation exercises: in my favourite, I'm sitting under a vine-clad pergola, outside my cosy studio, sipping a glass of home made elderflower wine, whilst admiring my beautiful, newly-planted borders as rain pitter-patters gently on the garden pond. Ah yes...the pond...in reality, it's an overgrown bog and will remain so for yet another year, should the weather turn foul in October...