The latest collection of poetry is nearly completed. I am in the middle of the final poem which is an extended piece called ‘seventy nine to eighty two’. Here’s a verse from it: Watching bands at Eric’s – seeing Simple Minds Keyboard player with his head between the beams Music bouncing off walls, everyone saying … Read more
I’m reading Michael Gelb‘s ‘How to think like Leonardo da Vinci’ which is an excellent book. I’m working through many of the exercises and finding them deeply inspiring. Over the weekend I did the 100 Questions exercise. It’s simple – in one sitting write down 100 questions in your journal that are signficant to you. … Read more
I first found this website a couple of years ago. Another look today, and I see that it is still thriving. So many websites are ephemeral – they come and go. But ones like the Global Children’s Art Gallery deserve to persist as the web grows and evolves. Put simply, the site is a collection … Read more
We went to the Tate Gallery in Liverpool at the weekend. Liverpool’s preparations to become European City of Culture next year are going well. There are new buildings appearing all over the city centre, and the roads are slowly improving as a result of much road digging and disruption. There were two fabulous exhibitions which … Read more
I have been following the work of Mark Rushton for a couple of years now. He used to run a website called ‘Hooray for Vouvray’ and then migrated all of his activities to his own domain. As well as creating ambient and drone music, he is also a painter. He produces a new podcast every … Read more
“Leonardo da Vinci” by Sigmund Freud was a book which I bought at the local library in a sale. Every few months they clear books and sell them on at ridiculouly low prices. Amongst the stack of trashy novels and last year’s annual books there are usually some real treats. It took me a while … Read more
Some time ago I read a book by Robert Fritz called ‘The path of least resistance’. It was a marvellous exposition of uses of creativity. I thoroughly enjoyed working through it. Well, you often find yourself going around loops and back to where you started. At the moment I am reading Peter Senge’s ‘Fifth Discipline’ … Read more
Art therapy – a technical formalisation in language for something that I dabbled with at the start of my career. Back in the 1980s I worked within a team of artists of a wide range of disciplines. I was the poet who mucked about with photography and did the latter very badly (noble ideas without … Read more
I’ve been back from holiday for a week now, and things have been really hectic. I’m just finding time to rise out of the chaos and resume the weblog. The holiday – a week in Languedoc, South France followed by a week on the coast near Begur in Catalonia, Northern Spain. Then, to finish, a … Read more