Intruiging Novel

"Families have secrets they hide even from themselves."

It is my habit to read good books very quickly, sometimes ignoring all my chores to read the book within a day or so.
The book I just finished reading: 'The Memory Keeper's Daughter' , written by Kim Edwards, had just the opposite effect. The story is so fascinating and the way the lives of the characters are described is so well done that after each chapter I had to lie down the book and try to absorb all that I had read. I felt like I was becoming really involved with the book's characters.

The book unfolds the lives of one family affected by one big secret, even without knowing about this secret for years.

The author knows very well how to describe the feelings, thoughts and emotions of the people. Showing that by keeping a secret, one influences his life and that of those around him without even realising the impact.

I bought this book while we were on a city trip to Stavanger, Norway, last August. My husband had won the trip as a prize. Since we had several days to spend in that little town, and because I get bored easily, we bought some English books that I found in a bookstore.

Stavanger: the old part of the town.

But it wasn't until a few weeks ago that I picked up this book to read. Soon I was mesmerised by the author's art of storytelling. This book really draws you into the story of the two families and the secret that shapes the lives of each individual.

This is the cover text on the back:

"It should have been an ordinary birth, the start of
an ordinary happy family. But the night Dr. David
Henry delivers his wife's twins is a night that will
haunt five lives for ever.

"For though David's son is a healthy boy, his daughter
has Down's syndrome. And, in a shocking act of
betrayal whose concequenses only time will reveal,
he tells his wife their daughter died while secretly
entrusting her care to a nurse.

"As grief quietly tears apart David's family, so a
little girl must make her own way in the world
as best she can."

My favorite books are "The Mermaid Chair" by Sue Monk Kidd, "Something Migh Happen" by Julie Myerson and the books of author Barbara Ewing. Seems that this book will join the ranks of this list!

Three Wise Owls

Yesterday I uploaded this image that I made from my photographs to Ephotozine.com and it was awarded with one of the EPZ awards: the HC!
Quite an honour! This is only the third HC I received on the site for my photography (and digital manipulation).

The first HC I received was back in 2006 when I mainly photographed flowers with a macro lens.
The second HC was for my (reworked) version of the waterfalls of the Buachaille Etive Mor (Glencoe, Scotland). It was only after removing some branches that the picture was awarded the HC...
It took quite a while to clone away the branches in Photoshop without any traces. You can find that picture in my blog in the entry of 1 december 2008:
http://exploringart.blogspot.com/2008_12_01_archive.html
Scroll down the page to view the picture.

So these owls have received my third HC award. Now I even have to work harder to achieve the Premier Award, the highest award on the site. It might take a couple of years or so to achieve that top award!

Neglect

I am still working on processing pictures that I took from our last trip in November to Scotland. Because I shoot in RAW, it leaves a lot of room to play with the picture before the final result is achieved. That is a lot of fun, but also a lot of wondering what I should do with the image. Which parts of the image should be a bit darker, which parts need more light, how do I crop the image, is this composition boring... etc...
Loads of thinking is involved and a lot of decisions have to be made. After all, I want to get the best of the picture that I took.

I really like to get involved so deeply in an image, but so now and then I just need to play! This is what I often do with the digital collages that I make. Often there is just a word, a mood, a sentence from a book that triggers an idea that I want to translate into an image.
So with some photographs that I took while we were in France a few years ago, I made this collage with the concept of Neglect.

This boat symbolises for me what happens when we neglect important things in life - whether it is about feelings, relations or important events. When we ignore them, we tend to not take care of them and often the results are like this boat. It gets broken, the paint peels away and the wood rots away. In true life neglect can result in loss and wounds. Sometimes even beyond repair...

Sad news, sick people

Last week we got the news that this beautiful red deer stag of Rannoch Moor was shot repeatedly with an air rifle in the head. The animal was so bleeding and in pain when it was found, that it had to be humanely killed due to it's injuries. Another stag, in the nearby Etive area suffered the same fate.

It seems that several young men were the ones who thought it was fun to go out and wound these defenseless animals on purpose and leaving them to suffer in pain.
Sick!

This stag was famous in the area since it was a bit semi-tame. He was the one that I wrote about in my blog in november 2007. I nicknamed him Jack.
Last november when we were in Scotland, we went to see him again and I found him in the pouring rain in the dark. I did not want to disturb him by taking pictures while using flash. Little did we know that it would be his 2 last months on his favorite spot.
I have some great photographs that I took of him, and always had fond memories of our encounter, a magical moment in a golden sunset. Now I can feel only sadness when I look at the images.

A Winter Wonderland in the Netherlands

Last friday we woke up in a beautiful world. Everything around us was covered in a thick layer of frost, turning the landscape into a christmas card. The sky was clear blue - no grey clouds - and the sun was shining.

Time for some photography! Walking around in this winter wonderland was wonderful - the white cover made even look the most common bushes special.
I felt like walking in an infra red landscape - just turn the blues in the photo into black and it seems almost like infra red...


And this weekend it was clear that the ice was safe. A little lake between the dyke and the river was frozen solid. People from our little village were ice skating and even playing ice hockey. I had no time to take real good photographs, but here is a quick snapshot of the scene.

What was I thinking?

When I started with this quilt, several years ago? It is just black and white patches, no colour, the design is not working and the size is huge!
Although the quilt was named after our cat Pico (yes, the b&w cat) who already tested the softness and the quality of the fabrics I used, in reality this is my frustration quilt. I only work at it when something is bothering me, when I am frustrated or am wound up.

There is something calming and relaxing in hand-sewing quilts. With small patches you build a block. When you start to sew the blocks together you get this large top of soft cotton. Baste this top, a soft padding and a backing fabric together to form a textile sandwich and then start with the most tedious work: hand stitching through these three layers - the real quilting.


And that is where I made the mistake. I was so eager to make a new quilt, something to do that would be relaxing and calming because I just needed that. So eager that I completely overlooked the importance of the design process. Instead of carefully selecting a design, I just took an old design which was tucked away in an old folder (that is the reason it was tucked away of course - the design was just not good enough). Not even bothering going through all kinds of colour decisions, and picking out the bunch of black and white fabrics that for some unknown reason I had been collecting, I started - just wanting to get going.


And when I started piecing the blocks, it got so addictive that I kept making them - all 224 of them. By the time the top was completed, I was convinced that I had truly made a big mistake. And there I was, with this huge quilt top that I could either disregard or finish. Seems that I am not the quitting kind of person. So I keep on quilting, pulling the thread through these layers, bonding them together. Regretting that I did not take the time to make a better design cause this one is not working. Regretting the choice of black and white - I know that I am not a black and white kind of person anyway. Regretting the size...

What was I thinking when I started this quilt? The point is, I was not thinking at all.
Just wanted to get something going. Did I learn something from this? Maybe. Probably. The next traditional quilt has already been designed in my head. I know which colours will be used and the quilting design is planned as well.

I might not have planned this time-consuming quilt - I might do that with the next one. But so now and then, I just need to get things going. Spontaneous. Not taking too much time to think about it. I dared and it did not turn out so well. Maybe the next time it will?

Maggie Ayres, Textile Artist from Scotland

Just when I really convinced myself that I needed to focus myself on photography and 3D modelling and let my interest in texiles just rest for a while, I stumbled across the videoos on YouTube from Scottish textile artist Maggie Ayres.
And thus spend most of my afternoon browsing her gallery and viewing her YouTube videoos.

She creates intricate, but in my opinion, delicate texile pieces that speak volumes. She has no problems with showing her emotions in the work - which makes it a very personal encounter as a viewer.
What I also like is that despite the complexities of textures and the variety of tones and colours there is a sense of openness and lightness in some of her pieces.
But you really have to see for yourself!

Anyone interested should check out her website:
www.maggieayres.co.uk
there is also an option to subscribe for her newsletter on this site.

On YouTube you will find several videoos by Maggie about her work. You will find an overview on this page:
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=maggieayres&view=videos

Here is a small overview of one of her shows:

A Little Bit More of Scotland

This is one of the landscape shots that I took in the Scottish Highlands. The mountain is called Bauchaille Etive Mor, or also known as the Black Sheperd. Depending on the weather, this waterfall is a small stream, or is a strong force of water.
On this particular day, the snow on the Bauchaille looked like powder sugar, the mountains far back in the background were completely covered in snow. The sky was often just gray, but because the weather changes so quickly up here, one can always wait (in the car) to see if the weather turns around. And it did! The rain was mostly gone and suddenly we had even an empty space in the sky where the blue came poking through. A magical moment!

I had found a spot, a bit lower, and balanced on a small rock which stuck out from the side. It was hardly enough space for my feet ánd tripod. But it gave me a good view on the waterfall itself and hopefully the viewers a sense of the power of the waterfall, the wideness of the scenery and the roughness of that piece of country.
It was only later when I climbed back that I realise that the rock I stood on was not very stable. Don't think that I will ever try to repeat that!


Getting lost in Scotland happens to us more often than any other country I have been too! But it has the advantage of taking you to places that you would otherwise not have found! This shot of horses as taken on one of our 'little detours' thanks to the Scottish way of using roadsigns...
We drove a while into a very deserted place and spotted these horses. At that moment is was so cold that I could not even keep the camera steady - I was trembling of the cold.
With an iso of 800, and placing the camera on a wooden post, I was able to get some shots - but because of the amount of noise, I processed the image into Black & White and added a soft tone too.
I just loved the way they were interacting with each other - so playful, even jumping around so now and then. Too bad that they became a bit shy in front of the camera!

Altered Book: Truth, Secrets and Lies

The new Round Robin has been organised on the Altered Book Europe Group on Yahoo. It took a while for me to get to work on it. I intended not to sign up for this Round Robin since I still have loads of work to do, untill I saw the first pictures being uploaded by group members...
The books they had altered were so beautiful that I wanted to join anyway! Luckily I had already a book prepared for altering and a list of themes I would like to work with.

The cover is very textured. It first started out as a painted cover with 3D letters glued to it. But I felt that it was not good enough - so I started glueing down all kinds of threads and yarns. Very messy work since the glue sticks more to the fingers than to the yarns and covers of course.
To keep everything together, I added pieces of tissuepaper to cover everything and added again some layers of paint.
As usual the picture does not bring out the textures that well...
I choose the theme Truth, Secrets and Lies. My intend was to write down little truths, secrets and lies down and cover them with layers of paint and collage - leaving bits to be readable and let the viewer decide what was a truth, a secret or a lie.
Guess I am not ready yet to do that - instead I started with some quotes about Lies and Truth.
The book will be send to Germany, and then travel through Europe to France, Danmark and the United Kingdom for other artists to work in.
When the book gets home, there will still be some pages left for me to write down my truths, secrets and little lies... For my eyes only... :-)

Just back from Scotland...

Just got back from an EPZ (Ephotozine.com) Meet in Scotland. Fifty photographers sharing one hostel at the shores of Loch Lomond! Literally chasing the light in the Highlands because of the rain, sleet and snow.
A lot of fun in the evenings, but quite exhausted after the meet... We made some new friends, met old friends again and met people in person that we only knew before from the website, often just the avatar name!

For the first time I tried my new Sigma 10-20 mm wide angle lens which is perfect to capture landscapes. But it also distorts the view which made it harder for me to compose good shots.
Back home reviewing the photographs that I took, I felt that I better also had used my old 18-55 mm lens...

Scotland is a great country to be in. I like the remoteness and the roughness of this country. Nature rules here and you simply have to adjust to it. I was so glad that I brought some waterproof boots, warm gloves (thin enough to fiddle with the dials on the camera), warm silly hat, waterproof pair of trousers and a windproof jacket lined with a fleece!
Otherwise I would have had to shelter in the car most of the time. Especially since we spent 2 days in Glencoe.
The weather changes there by the hour. Which gives one hope - is it raining, you can wait in the car untill it stops (maybe even for just 10 minutes or so).

This was the last EPZ Meet at Rowardennan that Davie organised. Still I hope that it is not the last time that hubbie and I visited Glencoe, Lomond and the Trossachs. There are so many beautiful places to capture!

Autumn...

Summer certainly has gone. It is not that I know this only by nature colouring the leaves and shedding them, but also because my agenda gets swamped again with appointments and paperwork is piling up again.
Luckily we managed to get away last week for an afternoon and spent some time in the woods. Not for walking of course, but photographing mushrooms!
It must have been quite a sight: both my partner and I, lying on the damp ground, looking through the camera with these large lenses to capture even the smallest mushroom. That alone might have been funny, but if you knew how much gear we had with us... Photobags, beanbag, reflector, tripod, different lenses (though I only used the macro lens). A jogger even stopped and asked if we were professionals - oh no, just some crazy people trying to get away from the pressures of our life and trying to relax! :-)
Well, not all pictures turned out so great in the end. But getting in touch, literally, with nature was a rewarding experience.

Blind Fool

I finally managed to work on the next digital collage. Blind Fool is the title of this collage.
I think everybody can relate to that title so now and then. Obviously this falcon has been blinded by his owner, but sometimes we blindfold ourselves hoping that some problems will solve themselves if we just don't look at them or don't think about it.
Ahhh, blind fools we are...

Digital Collage: "Empty"

One digital collage of the 'Journal' series. All the images used are my own photographs: landscape and sky from The Netherlands, seagull from Scotland, window and shutters from France, and the chair was shot in my backyard. The old 1830's paper was folded and scanned.

The weather has changed here in Holland: it is pretty warm, too hot to sit in front on the computer, too hot to do anything except sitting in the shadow and reading a good book!
The ideas for a next collage is already forming in my head, but I am heading for the garden now!

Jane T.: I make these collages in Photoshop. I have been using the program since version 3 so I feel that I know my way around this piece of software. For this collage I used Layers, Layer Modes and Layer Masks only. These features, as far as I know, are also available in Photoshop Elements and Corel PhotoPaint.

Digital Collage: Opening Up

When the weather is good, I like to eat my breakfast in the garden. On the garden table stood this plant, ready to be potted up in a larger pot. Every morning I could see the new buds appear and watch them growing. After a few days the buds would open up, unfolding their petals from the bud, ready to burst wide open and to soak in the light.
What an eagerness for life and light! I just love the stage when the bud has been opened, but the petals have not yet completely unfolded. This is one of the many shots that I took from that plant.

New Digital Collages

The last couple of weeks I have spent most of the time in the garden, enjoying the weather, the sound of birds and sometimes even fighting the weeds - a battle that I always loose...
Not much time is spent behind the PC during these quiet weeks. Still I wanted to do something with the photographs that I had taken over the last few months.
I wanted to work quickly, trying not to 'overthink' the piece. Just using a thought, a phrase or a mood for the collage.
This is the first one: Fly Away.
The seagull is one of many that I tried to capture while on holiday in St. Abbs, Scotland. The sky images ( I combined several) are from my own stock, and so are the textures.
It was relaxing, working this way, and I even liked the result!