Everyday number 16. Two pieces.
The story of the first, above: I came across a flock of sheep in the huge wild Casa de Campo parkland to the west of Madrid the other day, and saw two young shepherds and their sleepy dogs. My mind had been racing with tech nonsense and finding them calmed me down in an instant. Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity. De-complicate life. Making this picture drove me a bit crazy. Adding bits, taking away, adding, taking away. And then the next one was quick, and fun:
I wonder what kind of art I’d really like to make? Just lovely simple stuff with strong colours. Messing around with stuff. Playing! This picture above started out as hundreds of marks made on paper with felt-tipped pens, then photo’d into the iPad for some fun with all the whacky levels and settings. And …. Aha! There it is. Just what I was after. Abstract! Colour! A planet!
“The materials that I use and have really always used have always been paper. The tools of civilization, how we build and destroy ourself, are the materials that I’m really interested in, and paper is one of the main ways in which information is displayed. Paper in itself is simply a bunch of fragments held together by a binder.” Mark Bradford. See video here. Interestingly, now the tools of civilisation are ever more digital. A bunch of pixelated ones and zeros held together by screens.
Notes from Ben 