Obsession

Posted on by Alasdair

Reading an article this morning, The Design Disease, reminded me of something I’ve long held to be true – that while you or I might create Art now and again, it’s not the same thing as the urge to be an Artist. (Or in this case Designer.)

Everyone I know who has become a successful (by which I mean: makes their living doing it, and receives at least modest acclaim from their peers in the field) creative type has one thing in common – brain damage. They’re obsessed with their field. I swear to god, I could go round my friends with creative aspirations, and point fingers saying “will make it”, “Will do a few bits and bobs, might make a modest living”, “no chance”, purely on the basis of the level of their obsession. I’d be right about 95% of the time.

It’s a long documented thing, the thin line between Artist’s gift and madness. But the thing I find most interesting is the idea that it can be taught. You can make yourself an obsessive, with a brain that is optimised to do certain things, and you will do better than your contemporaries. All you need to do is be willing to sacrifice a bit of your normal human function in exchange. For some people, this is no contest at all. Others, they hold a bit of themselves back, in fear.

Whoops.

Posted on by Alasdair

In a move that is obviously all the fault of [info]hirez, I appear to have accidentally bought myself one of them there lomo things – specifically, a Holga. And some slide film, for purposes of cross-processing.

Still, it was all cheap on eBay.

So, adventures in non-digital photography to follow.

City Dweller

Posted on by Alasdair

City Dweller

The first appearance of cross-processing on this blog. This is a technique where normal colour film is processed with the chemicals that are supposed to be used on slide film, or vice versa. Obviously, I do it with a photoshop filter, but the effect is the same – slightly unreal colours, and a sort of dirty sharpness that plays into the effect I’m after here.

That’s probably all I’ve got from Exit – there are a couple more shots I’m still playing with, but I’m not sure I’m going to be able to make anything of them.

If I’m slow at responding this week

Posted on by Alasdair

It’s because someone has unfortunately afflicted the electric internet pixies in our phone line with a case of the black death. We’ve dumped their little digital carcasses in a plague pit, and we’ve got a fresh batch on order but apparently there’s a quarantine period, and BT won’t let us have a fresh lot in until Monday.

(I’ll stop torturing the metaphor now.)

I won’t be on-line outside of office hours. If you want to get hold of me, use the mobile. Or your hands.

If I’m slow at responding this week

Posted on by Alasdair

It’s because someone has unfortunately afflicted the electric internet pixies in our phone line with a case of the black death. We’ve dumped their little digital carcasses in a plague pit, and we’ve got a fresh batch on order but apparently there’s a quarantine period, and BT won’t let us have a fresh lot in until Monday.

(I’ll stop torturing the metaphor now.)

I won’t be on-line outside of office hours. If you want to get hold of me, use the mobile. Or your hands.

Digital Real Estate 2007

Posted on by Alasdair

Just trying to organise my thoughts about what I want to do with my on-line presence this year.

  1. Well, there’s this LJ. The same old rubbish.
  2. Flickr/electricana and Electricana.org. Photography. I need to put a portfolio site together on the domain proper – I’ve tried a few variations of the thing there, and liked none of them, but I’ll get one sorted.
  3. alasdair.biz. Remains as it is – linklog and occaisional spot to think about websites.
  4. ala.sda.ir. As is. Aggregator.
  5. Vox. Scratchpad for this photos/text idea I’ve had kicking about for 18 months now.
  6. Myspace. I think I’ll just sack it off. It’s a means to keep in touch, but it’s not a good blogging platform.
  7. Dead Air. A place for things I’m actually thinking about, which these days mostly means Art. I need to write up something on graffiti, and something on Duchamp’s Fountain, before they leave my head.
  8. Black Ink. Finally got a blogging platform back on it after a year of it being dead. Still wondering what to do with it. Used to keep short fictions there, but since I produce them at the rate of about one every three months, there’s no point. What little of that sort of stuff I do should go to Vox for now. Thinking about trying to something halfway to topical with it. Or possibly just writing the most outrageous madbastardism on it – stream of conciousness fragments, cut ups and general randomalia. Alternately, I may move what’s on Dead Air to Black Ink, and then use Dead Air for madbastardism, just because the title fits better.

Secondary thought: I’m moving away from LJ as a place to write anything over a couple hundred words, because I don’t feel it’s the right kind of context for anything other than personal life and conversations with friends. I find I censor myself, thinking “no bastard on my friends list is going to give a toss” or even just worrying about seeming pretentious. But, saying that, I also know that it’s trivial these days to post anything I produce in WordPress to LJ. Should I set up another journal for the purpose of dumping the contents of alasdair.biz, Dead Air and whatever I wind up doing with Black Ink to? Should I just dump it here anyway?

[Book And Album Reviews] Week 3

Posted on by Alasdair

Getting these in early this week.

This Week’s Book: The Penguin of Death by Edward Monkton

Things you need to know about The Penguin of Death:

  • He is strangely attractive because of his enigmatic smile.
  • He can kill you in any 1 of 412 different ways.

Someone (and I apologise for forgetting exactly who) gave me a birthday card with this on it a year or two back. It’s one of the few birthday cards I have kept, because really, what’s not to love about a card with an enigmatic penguin of death on it?

And then the other day while risking life and wallet in a bookstore in January (Fatal. Fatal, I tell you.), I ran across this book, which is an illustrated short poem about said Antarctic bird, beauty and death.

I’m not really sure how to describe it, except to say that I loved it.

(I feel a bit like I’m cheating talking about a short book like this. I’m also reading “Still Life” by Joe Donnelly, but since I just got a jbo lot of his books second hand the other day, I think the odds are reasonable that I’ll be talking about one of them next week, hence the penguin this week.)

This Week’s Album: Gutters and Pews by Preacher Boy

I can feel this one growing on me. I picked this up via Emusic’s recommendations engine, where it drew comparisons to Tom Waits and Louis Armstrong. And on first listen, it’s perfectly acceptable middle-of-the-road blues rock, that I wouldn’t be sorry to hear when it comes up on the random shuffle, but I didn’t see myself seeking it out a lot, either. But I’ve listened to it a couple more times, and I find it a little more appealing now – while the musical arrangements are, like I say, a bit straightforward, there’s a bit more to the lyrics. On the strength of this, I might give one of his more recent albums a try.

Take Flight

Posted on by Alasdair

Take Flight

This is a detail from one of Sheone’s larger works, and honestly, I don’t remember how reflective of the larger piece it is – possibly not very, as I was conscious of being very selective with the viewfinder. I honestly have nothing else I can possibly say about this that isn’t going to sound like utter pretension, so I’ll leave it at noting that I’m quite happy with how this turned out.

[Book And Album Reviews] Week 2

Posted on by Alasdair

The week’s book: In Search of Perfection by Heston Blumenthal

“What’s this, Alasdair?” you cry, “A cookbook? Are you changing your ways? Surely if you want to try learning to cook again, you could try something simpler than dishes created by one of the most finicky chefs in the world?”

No. I still can’t cook, and this isn’t a cookbook. It’s a 320 page book that happens to contain 8 recipes and some general tips about making food.

If you saw the BBC series, well, you probably know most of it, but it’s quite nice to have it flip through. If you didn’t, but you’ve heard of Blumenthal and are thinking “why the hell would anyone want his cookbook? Who needs to cook snail porridge, for god’s sake?” I should point out that the recipes are for traditional ordinary dishes. Roast Chicken. Spag Bol. Steak and Salad. The book is about how to produce the absolute best version of them that’s possible. This is a book about farming, about the role of food in society, about the ways in which science and technology are changing the way we do things. It’s entertaining and informative, and is very, very clearly the work of a man of passion.

This week’s music: Rogue’s Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs and Chanteys by Various Artists

Recommended by burge and stu_n among others. Ace. Utterly Ace. I could go on at length about the relationships between chanties, worksongs, folk and blues music, but there’s no point. There’s not a bad track on this, and some of the people you’d expect to be less than exciting are suddenly stellar – I mean, I like U2, but I’ve never enjoyed Bono’s singing like I have on this album. And likewise, suddenly Sting has produced stuff I really enjoy for the first time in years.

And y’know, a lot of it is complete filth, too. Which is always nice.

Highly recommended.