At 2 a.m.

When you wake up at 2 a.m. this is a good thing to do:

Then make a garland from them and string it across your kitchen window.

If they look like this, fear not! They have not magically (and rather sadly) lost their colour, no you dummy, it is because you have taken the photograph against the light.

I made stacks more - I am thinking of using them to pelt passersby from my window - hahaha!
To make them, see here.

Little Boxes (music & lyrics by Malvina Reynolds)
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky tacky,
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes all the same.
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one,
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

And the people in the houses
All went to the university,
Where they were put in boxes
And they came out all the same,
And there's doctors and lawyers,
And business executives,
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

And they all play on the golf course
And drink their martinis dry,
And they all have pretty children
And the children go to school,
And the children go to summer camp
And then to the university,
Where they are put in boxes
And they come out all the same.

And the boys go into business
And marry and raise a family
In boxes made of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one,
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

T-A-D #8 As Time Goes By

Well, I obviously didn't make the entire thing myself, but I think this still qualifies. A few years ago a friend gave me a little music organ. (I don't know if that is its proper name, but you know what I mean, you crank the little handle and a tune comes out.) The outside surface always bothered me - it was a picture of a shiny purple and green clown - but the tune it plays is As Time Goes By! So my project for today was to cover it in strips of leftover book pages (from all those paper projects I did ages ago) and a nice picture of Humphrey and Ingrid. And of course, some red hearts. I even made a recording for you here. (Handle cranker: Anairam Traws; Technical Consultant: L'Usband)

I also give you this rather more beautiful recording by Stephane Grapelli - on youtube.

Art Journal - a new page and an old one, amended.

" ... in the east the cloud-flower blossoms ..."
Collage with paint and marker pen. This is an earlier page which I made darker and added the image of Fat Man.

Drawing with pastels and marker pen. I realise that the column of the mushroom cloud should be much higher, but I needed to fit it all onto the page.

I did these two pages after seeing Dr Atomic, an opera about Robert Oppenheimer and the last days of testing the bomb at Los Alamos. (Music by John Adams and libretto by Peter Sellars. It is one of the Met Goes to the Movies series.)

Shadows and light

From Sunday - in Simons Town:

"Every picture has its shadows
And it has some source of light
Blindness, blindness and sight"
(from Shadows and Light - Joni Mitchell)

Blue

'Blue' was the first Joni Mitchell album I ever listened to and bought for myself - ages ago. When I saw that Laurie Hastings had based her Edinburgh exhibition of screen-printed illustrations on Mitchell's album, the song Blue was back in my head, instantaneously. The exhibition is on here:

If you live in Edinburgh, go have a look! I will console myself by listening to Blue. Songs are like tattoos. Yep.

(Via Rojo Magazine)

I've been to Opera at the Met!

"What opera isn't violent? Two things happen, violence and love. And other than that, name something else. You can't. " (Cab Calloway)

What a treat! The Metropolitan Opera has been broadcasting a range of live operas as movies - which are now also shown in CT (at V&A Nouveau). It is truly a worthwhile experience, even if, like me, you are not opera-crazy. I have quite a few favourite arias and duets from a range of operas but have only two favourite operas - La Boheme & Madame Butterfly - and to sit through a whole opera, well, it has to be extremely engrossing or the sets and costumes have to be pretty damn exceptional or it has to be one of my two favourites. But sitting in the movies listening to opera is such a weird & wonderful experience that one must try it at least once: you can munch your way (though quietly, very quietly ....) through a box of popcorn. You can go to the opera in the morning (how cool is that!) And you can wear jeans and takkies. As you sit 'with' the real audience & through their intervals as well, better prepare yourself for a longish movie - about 3 and a half to 4 hours, depending of course on the actual length of the opera. I loved the sneak peeks behind the scenes, seeing wonderful close-ups (not achievable with opera glasses or binoculars) and hearing the world's most fantastic singers. Last week we saw La Boheme, with the wonderful Angela Gheorghiu and Ramon Vargas. Oh dear, all that emotion and tragedy - I sobbed and sobbed!

This week it was The Barber of Seville, not one of my favourites, so I opted for some wandering around (see next post) while Le Husband indulged. Next week I will definitely join him to see Anna Netrebko in Romeo et Juliette and I can't wait to see the madcap Natalie Dessay in La Fille du Regimento the week after! And just for the record, apart from some minor Ster-Kinekor-related problems, the sound is pretty good ....
PS For the fashion-conscious among you, I see that Isaac Mizrahi has designed the costumes for the Met's chorus for their Summer Concert and will be doing some other designs for them as well.