New works to round out the year

I wanted to put up a few images to show what I've been up to. As many of you know the end of year period is hard for me, and like many people I find myself at a loose end. Perhaps if I'd made better life choices when I was younger things might've worked out differently. Or perhaps there were other factors, factors outside my control. I sometimes question myself. 

In any case i like to keep busy.. A few days ago I was doing so on social media when I entered a parallel universe that I normally stay away from, the universe in question being a flame war zone. Normally I steer clear of such controversy but because I was bored and because I assumed that people would exercise their imaginations with me (they didn't, it needs to be said at the outset) I posted something that was taken badly by several people.

This was a shock to the system but I did what I normally do in such situations, I stepped away and entered my own universe, the one circumscribed (or, rather, not circumscribed) by art. The first image I will  share was the result of this contretemps. I won't need to add any commentary I think, the gist is pretty obvious, especially as you've read already the chronicle of the period of gestation.

'Looking up at the helicopter the thought police', 2023.

Having done this I naturally felt pretty pleased with myself. How might I react to having made such a fetching object? It was easy. And because it was easy I got to making more.

'Bright yellow stripe (Automotive fabrication)', 2023.

The last time I had made such things was in October 2022. In November I started making watercolours so sort of overnight abandoned making my paramontages (see link above for more details abot this word). I started making paramontages in April that year but before that the last time I'd used graphical manipulation software to make images was in about 2014. I actually made others in 2008, and some of the photos that I'm now using to make combines date from that era.

The main reason for posting about these things now is that the blog is like evidence. It's proof of practice. So I can say to someone who asks when i started making the combines, "Take a look at the blog for details." I can easily just tell them to Google the blog name and they're set. In fact we're both set. They get the reassurance they were after and I get peace of mind.

Another reason is that I just like to share.

Sharing was, after all, the thing that led me to make this series of works. Since we're on this track I'lkl share something else as well. The following combine was made using images I captured with my camera (not phone) in the period from July 2016 to June 2017. My mother died in July 2016 so I know now why I took the shots. In the middle of 2017 I started to come back to life, and I began to make myself busy, for example my homelessness series of posts dated from the second half of 2017, as does my series of posts on brutalism. So the period matching the financial year 16-17 was a period of mourning, and I titled the series I'm going to give you a sample of, accordingly.

'Mourning raiments XI', 2023.

There are 14 panels in the series, each of which has six selfies. I gathered 84 such images early this morning and made the entire et overnight, finally getting around to the business of tidying up late this afternoon. Each panel uses different colours, red blue yellow teal, and I sort of like the fact that when I took the photos I had no notion that I would one day use them in this way.