Monday, January 28, 2008

Barack Obama

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUmP3VVaOgc
He really does seem to be the one who "gets" it - but I've thought that just about the whole of the last year. God, it would be wonderful!

Saturday, January 26, 2008

More links, more thoughts.

A mention for an appealing blog that does a "deck of the week" series of readings. This week it's been our Bohemian Gothic. You can read the interesting commentary here.

Thursday, January 24, 2008

Svankmajer, the wolf and age

Here are a couple of photographs of Jan Svankmajer's wolf (we are told it's a real wolf, and sure enough, it was howling at the moon in an almost cliched way) standing on his balcony. Which brings me to the subject of ageism - one of the "isms" that's still seen as perfectly respectable (time for a revolution?). I find that when you talk about Svankmajer with many people now they take quite a patronising view, "Dear old man" sort of thing. This makes me more than uncomfortable. Why do we expect an older artist to be sweet and to play the Grand Old Man? He may be busy and cranky and not in the mood for visits, just like any of us. He doesn't, I would guess, particularly want to look back and be patted on the head for his wonderfulness in influencing young artists - he's working on this new piece and I expect he'd mostly like people not to bother him. I remember years back talking to someone on a forum about meeting Zdenék Mezl. "Oh," he said, "Why don't you organise a lovely party and invite all his old chums so he can see them again." You WHAAAT? I mean, what, you want a perfect stranger coming along and organising a party on your behalf where they invite what they imagine are all your "chums" to come along. Like a charity event eh? Something lovely, lovely for the poor old man? I was speechless. Why are people so unthinkingly ageist? Older people do not revert to the status of toddlers and if they want a party - well, they can say so, and decide for themselves who comes. Anyway, I could say a lot more on this. In a post soon I'll tell you what a psychoanalyst I met said on the subject of age - it was truly unbelievable and did make me wonder if she's in the right profession (or should specialise only in people below the age of thirty). But for now, enjoy the wolf. Like it, sometimes I feel I should howl at the moon.

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Blog featured!

I also wanted to put in some links to people who have mentioned our work. It's always fascinating to see what's being said - and the links/features are much appreciated. So, firstly, here is

My Fairy Babies blog

which is currently featuring the members of the Irish group on Etsy (memorably called Irish Rogue Artisans). The group is quite small and a lot of fun - some really nice people there.

Krochet Kids

I came across this in the latest issue of Selvedge. It looks - well, a bit patronising perhaps but very well meaning. It would be good to see it achieve something. Somehow, I rather doubt it will, but I hope that's just me being overly sceptical:

The Krochet Kids

Friday, January 11, 2008

Tearing my hair out trying to photograph the bucket bags

We have finally got our first batch of new, larger bucket bags made. They are truly gorgeous - great big luscious prints that go all the way up the handle combined with vintage fabrics and soft cotton velvet. You could spend half the evening just sitting and stroking this. But I cannot seem to find a way to photograph these well. If you have a moment, please take a look: http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=8864775 and tell me honestly, does this look as good as it should? The problem is that they're big, soft bags and it's hard to stuff them full without giving the impression they're stiff. Aaargh, I need inspiration!