Over summer there has been some time for doing just that ... sankofa ... not sure what language that word is from ... it was found here on an interesting tumblr site called otherworldly... where, under 'about' it says that this blog; " is about strange and lovely words. Sometimes those are words from other languages that can’t be translated. Sometimes they’re words for feelings we’ve felt but never been able to name. Sometimes they’re just words that sound good." That description of 'otherworldly' is quite fitting for describing the space I sometimes get into when working in the studio. Reverie... musing... formlessness... the mind quietly letting loose and thoughts going where they will... the "going back and fetching it" referred to above is something I actually did a lot of over summer! And on some of those days I was in the studio making, printing, painting... but doing it in a loose way. Not task oriented... allowing things to just be, to become from simple beginnings. Like these experiments on paper using one simple motif of a seed capsule cross-section. juxtapositions... with colour shifts and this pod form below shifting the composition slightly... or the colours a book yet to be bound... not sure about this one... There was no particular imperative to this as yet unbound book. It was a simple visual experiment and I was more than pleased to work without boundaries for a time. Some days there was just the simply rhythm of applying paint to lino and printing and then painting over, on, around ... all the while the radio paying the best programs of the year on our national broadcaster. That only added more layers to the reverie. In the last week however the momentum is on to get ready for the showing coming up soon... see previous post. I'll be beck with more details before long. And images! Sophie I forgot to say... if you pop over to the visual eclectica blog I posted on new work for the show... a large cloth that in some key ways references the tradition of the Tapa cloth... without being derivative or copying ideas but through creating as a homage to the seed this cloth which can be hung in a large space ... a work to meditate on and slowly take in... noticing endless little details and subtle shifts in colour and form. A close up: