Napoleon's Eye.: We are family!....come on everybody and sing!....F...

Napoleon's Eye.: We are family!....come on everybody and sing!....F...: Day in day out we love to post our crazy lives up on the facebook wall......man it's fun! A mixed and varied family of connections f...

We are family!....come on everybody and sing!....FB.

Day in day out we love to post our crazy lives up on the facebook wall......man it's fun!
A mixed and varied family of connections from all over this big wide and beautiful world of ours.
Locked into a little machine that speaks 24 hours a day and never stops serving us in our artspeak.


This morning waking up and realizing it was Sunday ....a whole glorious day of just being Sunday.....that's something in it's self......freedom for most of us who are stomping the workforce trail.......and a treat to see what our FAMILY IN THE WORLD....is doing.

Duggie Fields and Rupert Thompson....are posting in our wee hours of the morning....then comes my beautifully placed friend...Horizons....living in Nice....and posting her azzura blue ocean shots to me ....and me loving her french dialogue!....................THIS IS TRULY WONDERFUL...YEAH!

Laughter is then infused ........and I mean infused....by none other than the INVINCIBLE....Monsieur Cox.....the court jester extraudinaire!......who packs a punch with his band of merry followers....he never fails to bring us kicking and screaming with HYSTERIA......recently he started to check on all the variations of spelling and pronunciations posted to our wall.......Man he was quick!!!!!!

After waking up to his wrath......I quickly found myself having to explain myself to none other than the other Cardinal de Comica.....GARETH SANSOM.....for spelling his surname incorrectly ........a blight on my good name as an artist and lecturer of art and fashion.......GOD HELP ME......I forget to spell my own name properly...........ah!........one big happy FAMILY.....love to all who participate in our madness........oh!...I forgot to mention my friend and fellow artist ARTURO SCHMIDT.....who has now been reincarnated as a BISON......and lives indoors in NORTHCOTE......yeah just another day in

Paintings : Not easily deciphered by normal codes of logic.

Recently I began a discussion with an Artist about his work and his life. He lives in the United Kingdom but he is from Israel. Over the course of our getting to know each other, a significant dialogue has  developed. His background and story reads like many young men growing up in the Middle East along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea.

Jews from around the world have brought their culture and religious traditions with them, creating a melting pot of Jewish customs and beliefs......and Israel's substantial Arab minority has also left its imprint on Israeli culture in such spheres as Architecture, music and cuisine.

Israeli literature is primarily poetry and prose written in Hebrew....a language spoken since the mid-19th century.

VLADIMIR ZACHODIN.

We talk about his childhood and his family and also his start in a career in Architecture.
He wasn't happy in that profession and is now pursuing his painting.....they are autobiographical.

Many nights we talk about analysis of the cross-references and connections in painting.....we speak about mutating self-portraits and erotic fantasies/ fears/mythology all overlayed with the re-interpretation of various artistic sources....Surrealism/ Renaissance/ Expressionist....all to create a labyrinthine field that is not easily deciphered by normal codes of logic.


I leave him most nights, wondering about the term nomadic....a nomadic existence is when you deliberately change geographic and cultural perspective with an almost disciplined regularity.


Vladimir lives for trying to stay true to his plight and by working in his chosen field.....painting in all its manifestations....rich in his knowledge of those who have come before him....he produces a highly imaginative order of works with attempting to evoke an idea by various associated images.

VLADIMIR ZACHODIN.

I am totally absorbed with other ways in which artist's work....how we all think and where it all comes from....this Israeli is unique...in that he paints solo in a country far from the idyllic.

Great Teachers : Few and far between....

ARTEMISIA GENTILESCHI.

Theatre and drama were very new subjects in my early years at High School.

We were country kids in one of the loveliest parts of the Yarra Valley.
The local High School was situated between two rolling paddocks, with tall gum trees surrounding the entire school.Every morning there was assembly.....everyone standing in lines in school uniform.

It was announced to us all that we were about to have four new teachers....they were from the city.
When I looked up at the Headmaster....he seemed a little nervous about introducing these people.

First up was a woman in a very short mini with gorgeous long dark brown hair, and what I now recall as a pair of Gucci sunglasses. She also had very high wooden stripey sandals with hot pink ribbons sewn on the sides.

She smiled out at us like a beacon across a wild ocean.

The three other teachers were gorgeous hippy clad men with really long scruffy hair and desert boots.
After all the standard formalities.....we started our day.

The City teachers were very different to our regular teachers, in that they actually asked you how you were...from time to time they would pleasantly stop you in the corridor and say hi!...

Hard to imagine for those times as some kids were still being severely punished ...in all the traditional ways...a standard practise.

A few months in and my lovely Drama teacher decide to put on a performance of A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.....by Mr Shakespeare.....we did not know anything about him or why he spoke in that particular manner....but she taught us everything needed to understand this play.

She cast us with great deliberation and I scored the role of Titania queen of the fairies and my crush was cast as Oberon....I was really  excited to think he was my love in this play....I don't think he was too thrilled about it though. As the weeks rolled on we all laughed and played out our parts with nervous energy and clumsy shyness......we were all terribly young and silly most of the time..however .........our teacher revelled in the merriment.

Days were going by when one afternoon she informed us that we would be putting the play on at night.
That sounded right....but her take on a venue for the play, was the beautiful back paddock of the school grounds.....and not the multi-purpose room...we normally used for such events.
The laughter was resonating across the room at tremendous sound.....we all looked amazed by her words of excitement.

Her name was Sandra....she had been trained and educated in Europe ...she spoke several languages and had also lived in very fashionable circles in France. This teacher was one of the most inspiring and genuinely committed teachers I had ever met....one day she held me back after class, to inform me of her plan to decorate my hair and body with large clusters of hydrangea's .....for the deliriously  enamoured Titania....... queen of the fairies.

Sandra said ..."now when you awake from your dream you will be a different queen....you will be very sleepy and free....you will dance around in your nightie and appear beautifully dressed with gorgeous flowers all over your body....after all said and done .....you are in love with the donkey!"

Yes .....it sounds funny now!....but she provoked an awareness....of the sexual kind....in her worded descriptions like a true director of wisdom.
I loved her like a guiding angel....she changed my young life with her zealous nature  and convinced me I could perform with confidence and charm. Two things I have always had in spades...so I'm told.

A Midsummer Night's Dream was an outstanding hit...in the paddock...with my father and mother bellowing with laughter at my silly dream like state....a moment in time, like no other to recall.


Today I can say with all the years gone by that that woman has played such a significant part in my chosen fields of interest.
Its as I say...... a wonderful endorsement for myself as a teacher to treasure and guide my charge...the best way I know how.....and one other mighty revelation to this story is that ....the teacher called Sandra...was actually the grand daughter of Helena Rubinstein.....an icon of 20th Century history.

Sandra you were the best!....queen of all the fairies!.....x

SELF PORTRAIT

POST SCRIPT: If it hadn't been for Gough Whitlam these teachers would never have come out to the country schools......he played a massive role in the education of working class kids....in this Country.
Forever loved.....The Tower of our cultural identity...x

Napoleon's Eye.: "Where the heart is".....as an artist.

Napoleon's Eye.: "Where the heart is".....as an artist.: In the Studio.Sydney 1985. Melancholia.......has been the subject in paintings and literature.....for some considerable time now. Whe...

"Where the heart is".....as an artist.

In the Studio.Sydney 1985.

Melancholia.......has been the subject in paintings and literature.....for some considerable time now.
When I moved across to Europe to live, I had limited funds and no real prospects....other than a good education and a passionate teaching methodology.

I had only imagined what living in a different country might have been like......alas everything became a reality....very quickly indeed.

Europe was where most things happened......all through history, the most enlightening and enthralling evidence......occurred there.
Life was about taking yourself everywhere and experiencing the traps and the higher plains....in order to gain your knowledge. I recall the wise words of my Grandfather....whilst becoming his hairdresser at an early age......"Now my dear....do you know what the term black dog means"?......no Pa....I don't I said......he then explained it to me.

It seems from his many observations that some  creative types have a predisposition to a sorrowfulness, which can lead to despair........something about ......what he thought was an extra sensory perception.

Leonard....my grandfather.......was a wonderful teacher.

Years later when I had been living in London for several years.....he wrote me a letter.
Knowledge he said never really leaves you.....my dear....take the Cutty Sark...for example.

Now you live in Greenwich you will recall our conversation regarding the Maritime Museum.
And he was right....I had remembered everything he had taught me.

I find it so incredibly ironic that my first and most rewarding position I held in London,
 was at the NPG in the archive department.........simply because it was my grandfather who coached me on all the wives of Henry the VIII and the Tudors.......not to mention the symbolist's and the Scottish Colourist's as well...........perfect prerequisite for the job.

As an artist.....geography is one truly distinctive subject area.... I adore. Having travelled extensively across the globe.....I found my artistic endeavours, to be the best experiences of my life ...so far.

Self Portrait.

My heart has filled itself up with endless longings and sacrifices over my time....and if the heart feels....like I know it does.....my fathers death, only created my wanting to travel....even more.

He wasn't happy about me becoming an artist......he cared about where the money would come from.
On most occasions he would often talk to me about his home town in Italy......simply because he subconsciously knew that one day I would be there.......exploring his favourite spots.

His heart was always there.........and could sense mine would be there too.....he without knowing...was an artist himself. My passaport and citizenship de Italia......was our most treasured topic of conversation, hands down.

All roads lead to Rome........................and where my fathers ancestors built magnificent aqueduct's and splendid fountains with colossal mermen blowing into giant seashells.....he built roads too.......
that's where his heart was.................and mine too.

The Romans were the best road makers the world had ever seen and as I had to deliver my fathers eulogy......the words were clear.....my father made beautiful roads, remember that, the next time you travel on the Hume Highway..............one of the best.