Day-planner sketches

For most of January and February, I have been back to work on the studio attic, trying to sort and purge things to make space (and sense!) so that I can get back to painting. Perhaps I have not been brutal enough, as I am still hanging on to quite a lot of "stuff", but I have been doing a fair amount of shredding (about 6 bags full so far) and recycling. One thing I have finally realised -- this is like a revelation to me -- day-planners are not the same as diary-journals! With this knowledge, all I had to do was rip out the personal details to shred and recycle the very useful, but no longer necessary, items. Good thing I do check them before discarding, as this sketch of my daughter (I remember her being asleep in the car) was in the 2005 book.

I do use sketchbooks most of the time, but if my purse is too small a sketchbook doesn't fit in it. So if needs be, pages in the ever-present day-planner get used, and I always carry a pen with me. I was living in rural Kerry in 1995 and I must have done these cow legs while walking past fields.

Again from the 1995 day-planner, I was taking a close look at cow parts -- here are two views of a snout (along with a bit of budgeting info!). Because of the date, I am presuming these cow sketches were research for my cow curtains, exhibited for the first time in November 1996 as part of "Pastures Green and Dreaming for Dad" at The Basement Gallery, Dundalk.

This sketch of my husband (before he was my husband) is from my 1993 day planner. I had to do a bit of research on this one to find out that "Last Temptation" was a tiny club in Toronto's Kensington Market. We were out providing support to a friend who was playing a gig there. It was February in Toronto, still cold -- my husband still has his scarf and coat on even though we would have been indoors. As I type this, it is February in Ireland and, though grey, outside my window I see lots of pink blossoms in bloom.

Sept 3 1995 - RIP Dad

It's been 19 years since my Dad passed away. Where did that time go? Dad is a presence in my life, most especially obvious in my love of music. My Dad was a musician (double bass and guitar) and a carpenter. Though I don't play any instruments, music is an important part of my life and I have always loved making things -- painting being my prime focus.

In 1996 my double installation exhibition in The Basement Gallery (Dundalk) entitled "Pastures Green and Dreaming for Dad" was both a memorial to my Dad and a celebration of life. After passing through two large painted curtains of calla-lilies in the smaller room, one encountered a small icon diptych. The curtains were set away from the wall in such a way that the lighting cast a great shadow. The curtains are each 226 cm x 162.5 cm, acrylic on polyester net curtain.

Calla Lilies Icon (Dreaming for Dad), mixed media on handmade paper, 17.5 cm x 25 cm (diptych).

Recently I came across a reference to William Shatner meeting a "sawyer" at a desert diner and wondering what that was. Well I had never heard the word in terms of someone who played the saw musically, but that was how it was explained to Bill...It reminded me, however, of my Dad and the day he bought me a lovely saw and then pulled out his bass bow and showed me that the saw could be played to produce an eerie sound.

Dad, mixed media on wood, 23 cm x 15.5 cm, 2009, collection of Tallie Whelan, Ireland.