Vincent Bakkum

Vincent vincent vincent I wish I had the balls to try and use your designs in my sketchbook, your drips are sublime

 

Oh I nearly swooned when I saw he'd painted this beautiful chicken..

thankyou to G for introducing me to this man via that 60 illustrators thing you put up X

Allo

At the mo I'm going through a phase and just can't get enough of John Mayer and Simone White, it's probably because they are uber relaxing (step away Mumford and Sons, I don't need your drama!) John Mayer just makes me think of chocolate, his voice is just mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm and more. Simone's voice is almost unbearably soft but her lyrics seem to jar it a bit so it's not all sweety sweety, it's kind of dark and humorous, like these are some lyrics from Victoria Anne:

got a hiding and a licking

and a seeing to

boy my butt was sore

was your butt sore too

Oh its so good

FACEBOOKDOM

Facebook is sucky, it allows everyone to know everything about you without asking. It's passive and passive is not good. Loads of people say like, oh it helps you keep in touch but seriously?? No. It doesn't at all, what it actually does is allow you to passively watch someone's life. Not only is that slightly creepy but it's unneccessary and at times pretty frustrating, say you want to speak to someone on chat, what's the point, you can already have a pretty good outline of their life just by scrolling the home page, and you know that the conversation is going to go something like (no matter who they are)

'Hey'
'Hi!'
'how are you?'
'good thanks, how are you?'
'fine. What you up to?'

and blah blah blah you know the drill. I really don't care how you talk to me, it could be 'how many bananas have you eaten this week then?' just summin else for christs sakes. Go ahead, make people smile, doesn't even matter if it's a kind of 'ohmygodyouarefrickingcrazy' smile its better than just sitting there making mindless small talk to a computer screen.

.. also I realise how hypocritical this is because I'm kind of broadcasting this via computer but I don't think many people look at my bloggery soo I feel I can say what I like :) its good maan. I must say actually if you don't have a blog do try it out, it's a lot freer than facebook, for reasons I can't fathom xx

Moodyboard

I can't choose which one to do!!

Hair scarf

Hehe its bizarre!

Filmic stuffs

...coming soon..

cho

yep they are all real, even the green one at the end

Fox hat

I don't even like it any more! But it took soooooooooo long to make and was a real challenge, made out of curtain lining, kitchen towel and chicken wire oh and post it notes, which I bleached, dyed, fringed and frayed and stuck onto a frame.

The thinking behind it was that post it notes can aid memory and my chickens were all eaten by a fox because we forgot to lock the chicken house, so I got this fox to with reminder post it notes clearly coming off of the tail. If I made it again I'd make it subtler, maybe not use a lifesize fox model!!

EXCITING!!

News: collaboration with the Rysensteen Gymnasium from Denmark to create an installation for the Tate! They look really cool and it's an amazing opportunity, we are having a workshop soon, so I'll put up pics and keep you posted :)

http://www.rysensteen.dk/

India

I was looking for headscarf pictures, here's one of the beautiful Hannah wearing one Indian trekker style:

and heres some more of my fave pics, there aren't really relevant to the headscarf theme but they give a taste what the trip was like

Well I'm wearing a headscarf in the last one so that counts :)

POLAND!

I like the way they wear their headscarves, can't say we particularly liked the singing though..

Hermes Scarves

Doing a project at college based on this beautiful scarf my grandmother left me, so heres some sketches of me wearing it different ways, think I look a bit Nordic:

 Then Queenie style:

 As a neck-scarf:

Just by itself:

And as a turban:

 

also here are some more ways to wear scarves:

http://www.savvymode.com/2009/01/how-to-wear-hermes-scarf-as-head.html

Jet and Rose

I LOVED THIS! Basically I went to the Netherlands and did some doodles of clothes, then came back and developed them into designs with lovely deep colours and developed a kind of storyline about the models, Jet and Rose.
Jet is the Dutch one, she is very beautiful but sees things in a very black and white manner which sometimes can cause her problems, She's best friends with Rose who wears the clothes inspired by English stuff and I imagine her to be a bit over emotional and of a romantic nature.

It's a bit vague and I hate to write 'inspired by' over and over again, but I'll run you through what first sparked an idea for each garment. 

Jet is clogs (sorry guys, couldn't resist :) and Rose is books

Jet is Hagelslag and Rose is tea

Rose is an English cottage and Jet is Heineken beer

Rose is an Oak tree and Jet is a a lovely house in Amsterdam

Rose is a Raven from the Tower of London and Jet is windmills

I used watercolour and inks, I'm delighted that they've found a place in my portfolio

Chickensssssss

They need a bit of a mention because hardly anyone really gets my fondness for chickens so here's a little story of all my favourite chooky wooks.

The white chickens are the sputnicks, all young cockerels in this picture, I have no idea why they were called that, but there you go. When they grew up a bit they were simply called 'next' as we and our neighbours enjoyed lots of roast chicken (it was a bit upsetting but necessary, you can't have loads of cockerels)

These are Cream Legbars, very poplular as they lay eggs with blue shells but they DO have a skittish nature so not the best for pets, that's my little sister with them

I LOVED THIS CHICKEN Sorry I know I must sound mad but this is Bill Flint, a Black maran and he had such a lovely nature and he was so beautiful and and and his loss is the reason I loathe foxes. Maran cockerels are really valuable because when crossbred the beautiful egg shell gene associated with Marans is inherited, and people will be more willing to buy eggs when they look beautiful and have a more reddish/brownish shade. I think it's because people consider them to look more organic and therefore more valuable.

This was Willow and he was a Dutch booted Bantam, I had a little obsession with this breed because they have very pretty fluffy feet and the hens make great pets, their feet make them ideal for people who like chickens and gardens because the feathered feet prevent serious damage to plants. However I think the cockerels get small man syndrome or something, Willow especially was a very nasty individual, he really was, used to fly up and attack anyone who came near.

this is my other Dutch Booted Bantam, Bryony. She was a bit scary and skittish so we kept her.

... But she made a really lovely mum.. this is her least successful hatch-only one chick and not even a pure breed! the chicks yellow legs give away that she is not a pure bred Light Sussex.

this is that chick all grown up:

She was friends with Bill Flint and his sister, these scraggy little things:

Then there was Cherry, a golden/buff silkie, everyone knows that silkies make wonderful mothers and are notorious for spending the majority of their lives trying to hatch chicks, she was our main hatcher:

And this is Catherine, who was my very first chicken and was a really weird shape:

Looked like she was wearing bloomers or something
um then there was some that just didn't make it..

But plentyyyyyyy who did

Aww heres Skinmaud, she was sweet, black bantam wyandotte

and the exchequer Leghorns, a breed I would not recommend to anyone, but a good experiment.

Oh and this is just a really weird egg that we found

So yes! I bet I sound like a right nutter now but there you have it, a little history of chickendom x