Daniel is swept away

I have a real problem finishing work off. I spend hours designing and cutting a piece, then when the cut is almost done I get bored with it (or is it fear?) and so I put it to one side and leave it until another time. This piece has been hanging around for about a year and I've finally gotten around to finishing it. Yippee!
As usual it is a silk paper cut (red and gold silk paper mounted on white). This time I experimented by adding an extra layer of gold silk behind the red image to emphasize the flowing water.


The story is simple, but as yet unresolved. Daniel, the clumsy boy he is, has tumbled into a raging torrent. Swept away, his calls for help are unheard above the roar of the water.

The waves see their chance and crash down on him pulling him deeper under the water.

Daniel is overwhelmed and gives in ... or does he? Is this the end for my hapless hero? I don't think so ... I have some ideas as to how he escapes, but I'm not gonna tell!

Lost in Forest Wild!

Here are the first silk paper cuts of a story that I'm currently working on. They are, as yet, unfinished and fairly unrefined (that's the hard/ tedious part and comes later). The story involves my character, Daniel, who gets lost (surprise surprise!). Some of the imagery maybe familiar as I started the idea for this story more than a year ago and did some preliminary silk paper cuts then. Hopefully the whole story will be exhibited in May and I hope to use lighting to its full potential to create dramatic shadows.
For now here is the Title page - 'Lost in Forest Wild'. You even get a bit of my Taipei nighbourhood thrown in if you look carefully.


Here's a bunch of bugs, but can you see the artist's name?


Here's Daniel fleeing the trees. They want him!


Now they really have caught him. What can he do to escape..?


You'll just have to wait and see!

Analu Prestes

It's almost impossible to be truly unique anymore as I found out several times recently. First, I did a post on my new moleskine sketchbook (see Feb 5 post) only to discover a million billion other people using the very same sketchbook and they're all using it better than me! Then I start playing with light and shadow on my silk paper cuts (see Jan 18 post) only then to come across the Brazilian artist Analu Prestes and her fantastic paper cuts. She's had the benefit of exhibiting her cuttings and lighting them to create stunning shadow play. Check out her work at Flickr and her Website. She describes her paper cutting as 'Alumbramentos'. I'm not sure what that means, but her work is impressive in scale and variety. Here are some examples.


It's interesting how, after cutting the paper, she gently lifts it giving it a 3D effect.

I like the way the work is hung away from the wall allowing shadows to form. Some are lit from above and some below. Some walls are curved while others are painted black. Each giving very different effects.

Dancing and Chatting

The roots of paper cutting go way back in history to the time paper was invented in Chinas. This is a fragment of a 1000+ yr old paper cut discovered in a tomb; it was preserved by the dryness of the air. It is of monkeys (or the monkey god) joyfully dancing around flowers.


This image became the inspiration for my cut, "Dancing and Chatting" (unfinished). It shows my Dancing Boys and Gals in a circle dance. Some are having a good time while others are not. Each pair is talking, hence the red speech bubbles. For this cut I thought of all the things I overheard at clubs whilst a reckless young man. I was never any good at dances, discos, clubs - whatever you want to call them - I couldn't move in any kind of rhythmic fashion, I couldn't hear what people were saying, I didn't have a warm inviting face (I was concentrating on trying to 'dance'!), and the smoke just gave me asthma attacks!

"Don't pick on me." "What?!"

"Look at you." "This isn't for me."

What do you remember talking about?

As a follow up to my Moleskine post read about Aimee's adventures with hers. Her amazing moleskine / journal is fantastically colourful and varied - just what a molskine is for! Check it out!

Silk 'n' Moleskine

I've always liked the feel of a new sketchbook with it's fresh smell and the potential of so many blank pages. My choice has always been a Moleskine sketchbook as it is the prefect artist's objet d'art - perfect size and beautiful paper (check here for more info on artists who use Moleskines). The first thing to do was to put my mark on it, so I glued a silk paper cut on the front. Now my Moleskine is sitting here, in front of me, waiting for the artist's first scribbling. But this artist is afraid lest he might despoil the purity of the white paper! WhatamIgonnado?!!


The new Moleskin is on the right. On the left is a collage of an exploding Dancing Boy made with scraps of silk paper. Why exploding you ask? To be quite honest I have no idea!

The Year of the Ox

Belated Happy New Year of the Ox! This is the most important festival of the year here in Taipei. The city becomes deserted with everyone returning to their ancestral homes. This gives us lots of time to wander and enjoy the empty streets. Here is my son, Adam, standing in front of Taipei city hall admiring the enormous paper cuttings without getting run over!


On New Year's Eve after the traditional evening meal with the in laws we returned home for midnight when all the windows were opened at 12am to let the New Year in and to say 'Hi' to the various Gods. That's also the time when the people set off the traditional firecrackers, leaving a lovely pungent smell of gunpowder in the air.


Last year was the year of the Rat. 'Coincidentally' we caught a rat in our house on the first day of the year of the rat!! We live on the 12F of a modern apartment building which is a heck of a climb for a little rodent. Anyway, I proudly boasted of my capture until someone told me that if the rat was killed (which it was) our fortune would leave the house. The credit crunch certainly saw to that!! Hopefully the year of the Ox (which is my sign) will bring us better luck. So far I haven't seen any sign of ox droppings in the kitchen....Yet!

Silk Shadows

After a chilly week the sun came out today and while basking in the warm sunshine I took a few photos of my new 'Bug cut'. Since working on the silk paper cut 'Taipei Living' (2006) I've become interested in bugs - their long legs, bulging eyes, and general scuttleness fascinates me. The art work for 'A Walk on the Wild Side' (see previous post) had lots of bugs hidden away. This new cut can actually stand up as it's made from two pieces of silk glued to card. Boy, it was really hard to cut as it was so thick!


I'm thinking on new applications for my silk paper cutting and I'm really interested in getting my cuts to stand up and using light to play with the cut and shadows.