Palhoça; New York

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The back of Palhoça, oil on card, 11.5 x 14 cm unavailable

Pleasing semi-suburban landscape behind Palhoça, which is rapidly merging into greater Florianopolis. Thisis slightly bigger than ,my usual size.

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I have decided to go to New York in October. 

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I am interested in contacting galleries or dealers who might find my work interesting. I am also looking for affordable accommodation for about 20 days: perhaps a sub-let or the use of a room. 

It is a long time since I was last in New York and my memories of it are surely utterly distorted by films and photos. But I fancy it will be good for painting and at very least the Autumn colours will make a change.

 

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Near Aguas Mornas

 Farmstead near Aguas Mornas, oil on card, 16 x 17 cm 

Red rock, oil on card, 11 x 14.5 cm 

 

 

Brilliant sunshine: two painted after a week of artistic abstinence.

 

I must think of an October trip.

The bookshelf

The bookshelf, oil on card, 18 x 12.5 cm

It`s been a great pleasure working with brighter colours and exploring patterns, leaving the perceptual painting tradition for a little while.

Curtains

Curtains, oil on card, 12.5 x 14 cm

It`s great to be working with high fast colour. I love laying out the colours and mixing them just seeing what happens when they meet.

Do we really need an obvious subject for a painting to be enjoyable?

Vase of flowers, the green room, Miro.

Vase of flowers, the green room, oil on card, 12 x 15 cm unavailable

More work about my apartment. I`m finding great delight in brighter colours these days, really pushing them out, trying to keep them bright and sharp.

 There are fantastic Miros that feature an expanse of blue punctuated by a dot or dash of red,(such as Blue III, 1961)paintings that seem to be all about timing, and are so very musical and full of humour, and which I wish I could easily visit for inspiration.

A friend

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A friend, oil on card, 15 x 11 cm  -  available

A corner of my room. The flat has boxes of Ensorian items which I put in storage, in boxes. They were collected when I was painting still lives in gloomy London. The visual language I used for still life there was, naturally, an extension of that huge and yet most eccentric of North European capitals, a place where so much is hidden behind circumspection. Thus, I developed a style had antecedent in Fantin-Latour and and Ensor.

This didn't translate to this context- Brazil- but finally I`ve found a way, via the interior, to revisit the still life.

Bottles in the kitchen

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Bottles in the kitchen, oil on card, 13 x 16 cm - available

A bottle in a cupboard, oil on card, 13 x 10 cm

Continuing the pictures about my place and my things.

My place

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 Painting junk, oil on card, 9.3 x 12 cm unavailable

Where I sleep, oil on card, 12.5 x 13 cm  unavailable

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A trip to Serrana

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 Serrana, from the outskirts, oil on card, 15.5 x 12.5 cm unavailable

 Serrana, hillside, oil on card, 12.3 x 10 cm -  unavailable

 Serrana, hot day, oil on card,  11.5 x 14 cm   available

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Church, Ribeirão Preto, oil on card, 15.5 x 13 cm  - available

Five paintings from a trip to Serrana, and the larger town of Ribeirão Preto- the interior, where foreigners do not go, and mostly don`t go for good reasons- religion, country music, rotten architecture, endless  sugar cane production, boredom and more boredom and that asphyxiating provincial claustrophobia- lots of it- making Florianopolis seem cosmopolitan in contrast.

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Flowers, Vuillard, 12 x 12 x 12

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Flowers, oil on card, 8.5 x 12 cm

There was a big Vuillard show in in London some years back at the Royal Academy, and I kick myself for not having gone- though in truth these large shows have become increasingly unpleasant because of crowds. 

The last of these blockbusters that I went to weas Turner, Monet, Whistler and it was more or less impossible to enjoy the work because of the bus station atmosphere.. I don`t know where all these people have come from, exhibitions didn`t seem to be so tremedously popular in my day. I am dubious that they illustrate a surge of interest in the arts- most museums and galleries remain blissfully quiet most of the time.

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I have decided to work on a series of pictures about the apartment, and the things in it for Jim Mendola`s monthly `12 x 12 x 12 event- which is mainly a music thing, but which is open to other media.

 As I envisage them, these pictures will stylistically and thematically extend from yesterdays carafe and today`s flowers to describe the atmosphere of the apartment and who I am: a sort of autobiography in objects- van Gogh meets Guston and Vuillard at a party and they start talking in low voices.

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Two pictures sold in Edinburgh

Valparaiso- Cerra Belavista and A view of the mountains in April were both sold in Edinburgh recently respectively at the Society of Scottish Artists and the Visual Arts Scotland exhibitions held in the Royal Scottish Academy.
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My shoes

My shoes, oil on  card, 10 x 14 cm  unavailable

The shoes suffered in Egypt, I walked a lot and I should have taken them to be re-heeled by now. Actually, following the rule that I am permitted a new pair every year, I am due a visit to the shoe shop.

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I am bored out of my mind here in Florianopolis and am longing to go travelling soon. Fortunately I have a little trip to Serrana coming up this weekend.