A Night, Moonlit

Early morning, late night, did not check the hour. A hurried phone call - get up, get dressed, drive to hospital. I'm fine, we're fine. Just an alarm we found, thankfully, false. Nevertheless the A&E (Accident & Emergency) Room, lags. Drags. A strung-up tension pervades with the lingering scent of spilt bottles/cans. So quiet except for the hum of the coffee machine. While I wait for the doctor to see our loved one. I sit, write and look out. Expectant of a long night. All around us, the murmurs of humans. Delicate, hushed. All the vulnerable souls in this room are in it together yet utterly separate. Small islands of fear, trepidation, calm.

I am fine, we are ...

A woman with red hair and white clothes bobs her head to her ipod. A young woman with short hair and pyjama bottoms holds on to the hand of her beloved for dear life. Lifeboat love. He is young - dutifully responsive without looking at her. Shy - embarrassed, I can't tell. She rocks back and forth for a while then continues touching him - his hair, his blue-jeaned leg. He might as well be in another room. I notice the twin-taped cuts on her shins, then look away.


Not for the first time, I notice the lady with the green shoes. Beauty with tired eyes and hair. She looks alone, even desolate. Somehow she has turned up stylish. Looking at "us", so did we but this was done in a haze of sleep. Her green shoes glisten in the fluorescent glare. Her eyeliner, smudged. Is she alright? The result of a late night or late life. She curls up in her steel chair. Then stretches here and there, head back, uncrossed then crossed legs, conspicuous. I think that I am watching a show. Perhaps she has played the role of beauty too many times, opposite a beast of a life.

It is now 2 a.m. I write and ignore any gaze from me to pen and back again. Why can't they look at the lady with green shoes? Stream of consciousness, I am adrift. Thank God for this pen. Ipod lady has started speaking with two porters, they are pally. I wonder if it is a return trip. The lady with sore taped shins has stopped touching him. I feel relieved. Almost want to get her a coffee. It's alright, he's brought her one. Perhaps that's how he touches. Perhaps it's none of my business. Yet tonight I feel we are all in the same lifeboat, - While children sleep, mothers worry and God watches. A microcosm of a night, somewhere in England. I am fine, we are fine. Looking back on what I wrote, thinking. Sometimes I know I love the whole world and see only beauty, soft-winged beauty.

Peace,
x

Carnaby Street

Dear all, I've run away to join The Sixties.

And this man is about to run away with that outfit...

Saturday 12pm - London's Carnaby Street was transported back to when it was the hub of the Swinging Sixties.

For those unfamiliar with the street, a short film I grabbed off youtube plays below:



Although I am a child of the eighties and nineties, I adore The Sixties/60's (along with the thirties). So many "ies" in that sentence. The best music burst forth from that decade, The Who, The Beach Boys, Cat Stevens, The Kinks, Motown and John Barry - Mozart of the century. The poetry discarded form, the books broke barriers. Such a flood of creativity, colour and vivacity, while the rest of the world tried to cope with a new identity, a new era.

One of my favourite films is a little known gem from that time called "The Knack and How to Get It" - someone kindly put a preview up on the 'tube:



It spells out the struggle between new and old, wild and innocent, pretentious and truthful, it also sends up the era it exists in. This is the film I show to very special people on a rainy day in.

Back to Saturday; Londoners and tourists alike came for the spectacle. I liked it that those who experienced the era got to revisit it so fondly. A few even dressed for the occasion and brought their beautiful toys:

The most 60's Woman (not age wise, mind) was this lady, I want her choker:

The male equivalent was him:

A gigantic crowd suddenly gathered around a stage; they knew before I did that the highlight of the day was the sound of The Small Fakers, tribute band to (The) Small Faces.

If the point of the day was to celebrate the 1960's, then this band brought it home sweet home.

The drummer and Hammond organ/piano player were consummate professionals. The solid base player complemented the overly charismatic lead singer/guitar player.

The energy The Small Fakers brought was raucous and wide open, underpinned by serious musicality. The crowd, a mix of ages and tastes, was swept up by the music and good humour pouring from the stage. Classics from "Tin Soldier" to "All or Nothing" rocked out.
Who knew that one of the best live sounds in London would spring up in Carnaby Street? If they wrote some original material, I would film them. Do check them out, you might be as pleasantly surprised as I was.

After the encore, it was time to drive away and savour a Waterloo sunset. Wish you were here.

Peace,

x

Julian Beever- Optical Illusionist and good fun

This London artist makes completely flat on the ground images appear 3-dimensional, these surprising images also make one smile and have something to say.

Julian remembered his school teacher telling him that although he was a good artist, he stayed safely within his boundaries. That hurt at first and then helped define him. This humble and peaceful character soon developed into a street artist who pushed himself while still maintaining a playful smirk.



Julian begins each work with the location, think Mel Brooks's crack about the vampire's stake through the heart: "Location, location, location". He chooses busy city walkways and pavements were a) people are walking towards a well known and established gallery (Tate Modern) or more simply b) people are leaving their concrete cages for their 1pm lunch. They mill around him throughout the process, sometimes lasting days. This encourages the artist, the open companionship with the crowd. He also has to watch out for the sometimes less charming council employee who can legally order him to stop his "graffiti". This has driven many artists underground and sparked their notoriety.

Julian soon chooses the landmark or subject he will reproduce and the angle of distortion. Very important in creating an illusion. He then chalks it, think art class and Vermeer, pulling a chalked piece of string and then pinging it on the ground like an elastic. The lines are now formed which will be the skeletons of his perspective.

All the while, the idea is bearing fruit in his head and driving him, along with, I suspect, his eagerness to please an audience. This is not lost on them either as he sets up his camera (every artist should carry a camera) and examines the bare scene through the frame. Modestly, he will not feel above asking passersby to look through the lens at the chalked marks:

"Does that look like a perfect circle to you? Are those lines matching?" He will spend at least an hour(s) getting the perspective just right, enough.

Julian is a street artist although he sounds a lot like my former well spoken Geography teacher, Mr. Lardner. He draws you in, but nicely, you expect him in his smeared jeans and cap to break off and offer you a cup of tea. Instead he wields his chalk and colour, chatting away.

He does stop though to have a jibe at the Tate Modern artists. Again, as my old art history teacher did (he has struck a cord here). Conceptual art in it's, pardonez moi, bull manure sense is not "cool" with him. I must interject here that while I don't disregard conceptual art, I do find his irreverence amusing. Placing a stretch of tarpaulin on the ground to protect the work from the rain, he quips that that ought to be enough to get him into the Tate Modern.

There is something about him, his experience coupled with his very vital street art that hints at the outsider. He is not establishment, then again who wants to be? He is also not the normally praised street artist with a "hip hop, rewind, choon, selector" flair now rampant in London. If the above combination of phrases have confused you, please check out the urban dictionary.com, which deserves a post of it's own at a later point.

The one thing we need to realise about art of this kind is that it is free, it is neither corporate nor appeasing the masses, nor dumbed down. It is truly independent art. Anyone can do it! This is both expansive and down to earth. Street-level down to earth. I hope you have enjoyed this foray into Julian's pieces and that you enjoy more art in your street soon.