well i'll be Buttered on Both Sides [again]

dropped into my blog this morning and discovered that the number of friendly readers has suddenly hit the 250 mark.

this is a big thought.

tried to imagine how that might look in bite-size lumps

10 groups of 25

5 groups of 50

50 sewing circles of five people around a table

or a tree full of twinkle lights like the one i saw in Copenhagen recently

so of course i went looking for the photo

and found a few other nice ones

here they are

my stuff in the Mostings Hus [apologies, the 'o' there should have a line through it]

the middle piece, called 'petroglyph' has found a home in Denmark

in the image above you can see how Anette Blaesberg Orom [again, insert stroke through first 'o'] provides the gentle order to my chaos

our work is in dialogue

yin and yang

give balance to the Planeta Project

and as you wander through the four rooms of the exhibition

stories and readings

change with perspective

we think it works

here's what the exhibition space looks like from outside at night

we were SO lucky that our dates were changed from autumn to winter

during daylight hours the reflections from the snow cast an ethereal glow in the space

and at night

wandering into colour from the frozen whirled outside

was simply splendid, if i say so myself

wondering where this brilliant pink came from?

not from me.

twas brought in as a lovely 'show and tell' by someone who had putting their copy of

Eco Colour

to good use

contact prints from begonia leaves

with a bit of help from all that calcium dissolved in the locally reticulated water

thanks folks, for your kind support

for swinging by and leaving a calling card

and for reading what i write

Mit luftpudefartøj er fyldt med ål

the artist house at Tranum is in a magical spot

with a view on a wonderful red barn

that constantly changes colour with the light

we take long walks by the frozen sea

pondering whether the waves were so cold that they might have had the consistency of honey at the moment they suddenly froze

and in case anyone is wondering what the Yeti wears under its coat

the answer is

a LOT more than a Scotsman wears under his kilt

and [close up] it looks like this

but even in the snowyness

there's treasure to be found for a wandering dyer

at this moment the Yeti

turns into a Bear

and begins to dig and scratch

revealing seaweed, rich in colour

old habits die hard

at the end of our week of walking and working we pack our things and begin the trek back to Copenhagen

a taxi collects us from Tranum Strand for the short trip to Brovst. the driver, a cheerful and gregarious chap, looks as if he could be a cousin of Viggo Mortensen, complete with gap-toothed and charming smile

he's pleased to hear that i live in the Hundred of Jutland on the fringe of the Barossa Valley

and tells me something i know already, that the best Shiraz in the whirled comes from there as well

we are in complete agreement

he's also very keen on Crocodile Dundee who has just been shown on TV, again.

i resist the momentary temptation to tell him that I'm Crocodile Dundee's sister.

at Brovst we board a bus to Aalborg

where

after consuming the mandatory railway station hot chocolate

something one has to do once in ten years

but not more frequently

we find our train back to Copenhagen

refreshed in spirit

and still a little light-headed

after a splendid week

full of plans for what we are now calling

'The Planeta Project'

which [after our two Planeta exhibitions, the one in Ararat, Australia

and the other here in Copenhagen]

is taking a tip from the landscape

and beginning to snowball...

ps the title of this post translates as

"my hovercraft is full of eels"

just

because i can

Planeta in Denmark

for those of you whose Danish is a little rusty,

Lars Pryds has expanded on the above here

planeta

in 2001 i was invited to take part in a fortnight-long residency at Zvartava Castle [more of a Manor, really] in the north of Latvia [the beautiful country of my mother and grandmother]

on the journey there i met my friend Anette. for the past eight years we've been nourishing a creative friendship through emails [aah, the magic of the internet pixies] and the occasional parcel. some time in 2007 we began to plan an exhibition. Ararat Regional Gallery kindly offered to host the only Australian exposition which opened on February 26th 2009.

Anette's works are small, considered and exquisite. the gallery allocated to her works provides a clean zen-like space for contemplation. the work invites close study...

to reach the place of zen one has to walk through a forest...of garments and of groundsheets that look as if there might be a sleeping body hidden underneath. one visitor to the opening told me next day that she kept expecting dancers to emerge and begin some sort of performance. it's a good idea, perhaps next time...

here's a detail of a groundsheet [above] ...which [disconcertingly] hangs on the wall [but without a deceptive shape within]

Ilka White [pictured at right] kindly did the honours and spoke poetically at the opening celebration. she talked about the complex simplicity of Anette's work and kindly mentioned my catchphrase [borrowed from J.R.R. Tolkien] "not all those who wander are lost"

Anette's and my work is very different, but we're singing harmonies from the same songsheet...the curatorial focus in this exhibition is not in the immediately visible... but in the common ground that our similar life philosophies walk...we chose the name 'planeta' as it's Latin and in itself common ground [rather than using an English+Danish title]. it means to journey or to travel as well as planet. further recent reading on a newly anointed 'blog of note' called "dear planetary astronomer Mike" offers more enlightenment...that in Greek planet also equates to 'wandering star'. which fits....