Who is the real Santa?

It seems that pagan is just a word that encompasses many of the earth religions such as wicca, celtic pagan, druids. There are more but I'm just learning.

In some pagan tales the oak king and the holly king fight for supremacy over the seasons. The Oak King rules the the Holly king represents the darkness of the old year where the Oak King represents the light of the new year. Each year they fight the battle to rule the seasons, but ofcourse the Oak King always wins!

Some say that the image of Santa Clause comes from the image of the green man.



I've always felt an affinity with the oak tree. For many years cezannes 'great oak' was my very favourite painting. After my mum died I would go for walks by ninewells and sit under the oak trees. It makes me feel so much better. Under any oak tree is my special place for consideration. It seems like the Oak king could be responsible for my wellbeing :) LINK TO ARTICLE


Druids and Wiccans speak of the horned god of the forest Cernunnos, the male partner of Earth Mother. Apparently he was such an important deity to celtic pagans that the christian church has adopted his horns and his status of guardian of the underworld as being the Christian devil.

"He is perhaps best known to us now in his Celtic aspects of the untamed Horned God of the Animals and the leaf-covered Green Man, Guardian of the Green World, but He is much older. Cernnunos worked his magic when the first humans were becoming. Our prehistoric ancestors knew him as a shape-shifting, shamanic god of the Hunt."

(http://druidry.org/obod/deities/cernunnos.html)


I found a nice page on Scottish (orkney) Yule traditions. Easy to read and cover quite a variety of stuff

http://www.orkneyjar.com/tradition/yule/index.html

geeking it up on a saturday night

I've recently taken an interest in Earth religions such as Celtic paganism and Wicca. I don't believe in any kind of god but I do be live in the wonder and power of nature.
It got me thinking about different things. I've heard before that menstrual cycles are controlled by lunar activity. The 28 day month was established by the phases of the moon, I think, so a logical link would be that it can't just be coincidence that that is the same for menstrual cycle.

I read a few articles and journals and was surprised to see that there seems to be a lot of doubt as to whether or not this phenomenon actually exists. I just took it for granted from my own experience that it does exist.

Craig gave me an interesting book that I'm going to be looking at over the holidays. Its about Celtic traditions and explains a lot of the pagan routes of our christian festivals.

I don't really like Christmas. Not being a christian , I kinda felt a bit of a fraud celebrating Christmas. I got it as a purely consumerist event, encouraging us to spend spend spend on more crap we don't really need.

However, looking into the routes of Christmas from a pagan perspective I'm beginning to get it a bit more. Mother Nature Rules OK.

More to come on my journey of discovery into the true meaning of Yule.

Dissertation begins dum dum dum

I wasn't very well prepared for my last dissertation meeting so I've decided to give myself a wee kick up the arse.

I'm looking into the area of social design. This area seems bigger than I ever imagined. I was initially interested in community projects like DOTT. It was one of the things I've come accross and thought yeh this is brilliant. and I've been really enjoying the focus of textiles this semester. I think I got frustrated last year when we were doing trend forecasting. I found it a bit boring. We were hearing about all this big world stuff in DHTP but couldn't really use it. This year however has seen those two courses tie together..Its fab....but yeh I am a total geek.

I came across a good youtube videotoday on www.socialdesignsite.com that nicely summerised that social design is the future, its kindof undifined but people had a bash anyway



.

I've taken some notes as the video was playing for my own use

The world is changing fast, what kind of change is it, what future are we heading for.

"Interact / ballenced and created human relations/ design with a meaning/ a nice word/ make people aware of issues that cause social change/ dont earn money from the work/"

we as a sociaet have experienced difficulties or have failed. Also things we are doing pretty well

health politics education communiation architere product

EVERYTHING THAT IS MAN MADE

We all create the world we live in.

Bring back the responisbility of every singe action to the people.

Watch your thoughts for they become words,
Watch your words for they become actions,
Watch your actions for they become habits,
Watch your habits for they become character,
Watch your character for it becomes your destiny

Trains project cont.

This is my faveourite so far today...get this printed at home

Fun Theory

I think this really relates to what i'm trying to do... This is incedental excersise. People are more likely to take the stairs when they are novel and fun. An attitude I think can be taken into other things

( taken from the dundee university design school blog http://design-cultures.blogspot.com/)

RSA Working Late - Serious Play

The topic of the brief I have chosen is increasing physical activity in the workplace for all throughout their lives.

I'm a big kid at heart and really believe that your never really need to grow up and loose the inquisitive, free, fearless feeling that we all have through childhood. I have lost count of the number of times I've been told that I'm daft for just having fun and not giving a damn what people think of me.

Playing in a park is just as fun at 2 years old as it is at 22. Who says when your too old to still go out partying or too old to splash in puddles.

Not only is it great fun and a release from the seriousness of adult life but there is evidence that play has emotional, physical and psychological benefits to adults as well as children.

Stuart Brown in the above Ted talk SOME OF MY NOTES

Notes social play/rough and tumble play/spectator ritual play/imaginative solo play/ story telling/

rats- play creates survivors.
homer simpson- play deprivation - couch potatoes- don't develop brains properly

The opposite of play is not work its depression
Play signals- facial, gestural

NEOTENY- humans are the most playful of all creatures into adult life

From play to innovation - d.school stanford - crazy suit thing that you can take your meeting back to your iffice..boiler suit that is written on

x marks the spot

Today im working on my railway project. Supposed to be developing a design for kids. no colour as of yet so it may look a bit more kiddy when i do. hmmm or maybe not!? kinda like it though. photoshop isn't liking this design for some reason. lost of freezing and not responding. I'll see if i can get a picture up

RSA

Onto the next prject of this year. I'm hoping blogging this will help me figure out some ideas...I hear it helps.

So Digitex is supposeably the future of the textile industry in Eurpoe. Were being asked to develop a textile that uses a set of specific textile coatings to make intelegent materials that respond to the environment that they are part of. Work wear seems to be focused on heavily but were free to explore any other applications as we see fit.

I don't think I'm too fussed about the workwear idea. Firstly because the brief hints at it so heavily I get the impression lots of people will go for that . Secondly I'm finding it difficult to think of any that aren't obvious applications.

temperature/acid alcaline/ light reactive dyes- people who cannot percieve heat correctly? uv light dangers- sunbathers?

chemical dispersion through the textile- pain relief? heat? burn victims? what can be absorbed by the skin? sports injuries? perfume? oils?

antistatic/antibacterial- hospitals? people working in labs? working with animals?working in computer industry-static. People not wanting to get struck my lightning.

hydrophillic/hydrophobic- getting moisture away from a surface through absorbtion and propelling on other side?Not quite understanding the difference between this and other breathable fabrics apart form you can have it with natural fibers.

Sunday time

I love sunday mornings....It really is my favourite time of the week. The time where I take a few hours just to chill out and not feel guilty about it. To sit for two hours with the paper and my cup of tea is just bliss. This morning it's just me and the pup. I think I've exhausted her since she hasn't moved from under the bed since we've come back from up the law! I seem to have made friends with a dog called Jamie who would rather have cuddles than continue on his walk. Dana is getting much better with other dogs and being less of a snappy bitch...hmm hopefully owners can be like their dogs too. I could maybe learn a thing or two!

An Aberfeldy adventure

When I suggested that Karen and myself go to Aberfeldy for a wee camping trip I was expecting beautiful scenery but the town itself to be ye olde typical tartan and shortbread tourist village. Oh but no, after our wander up the birks we decided to wander about to see what Aberfeldy had to offer.

We firstly nosied into the Temple Gallery (www.thetemplegallery.co.uk) where we had a long chat with Ryan Hannigan the owner. As an ex DOJ Fine Art student he was keen to impart any words of wisdom he could with reguards to surviving art school and actually making a living in the real post degree show world.

It was particularly helpful to hear how all through art school his tutors told him that hwe was pretty much rubbish and that drawing and painting in his style was outdated. He, however, held his guns and just got on with his work in a dedicated and focused manner. Come degree show night he was the one selling paintings and those who had let tutors tweak and mould their ideas weren't. I think this year many of us have learned that really tutors are only giving their own opininon. How many times have we recieved completly opposite opinions from different tutors. I decided that if I was to get on I'd have to go into tutorials and articulately and clearly explain what i had done and what my intentions would be.

Grades really don't seem to mean much at the end of the day. Whether its fine art or textiles most people don't really understand the grades anyway. In design I think it is easier to compare students side by side. With fine art..ive no idea where they start!

So ultimately we came away with a bit of a kick up the arse to say get on with your projects and do what you believe is important even if the powers that be don't really agree with you.

a quiet adventure

With all the business of term time its sometimes easy to get swept up in the work hard play had way of life. I'm pretty glad that I'm not needing to work quite so much this year and just 20-30 hours a week is doing me just fine.

This summer instead of stressing an living in new look im having a great time just chilling out on my own.

Its sometimes hard to remember, when theres so much going on in your life, that a little alone time can work wonders for the soul. Last week I drove to kinshaldy beach to just feel totally alone. Sitting by the sea, it was so humbling to feel that the only thing between myself and Noway was the vastness of the choppy north sea. It really was one of these wow moments! From there I lay around and dug a hole in a sand dune. I'd recommend to anyone to just try and get away someplace for a quiet for an opportunity to blank out. On the way home I was so chilled out I even listened to some classic fm whilst diving super slowly....hhmmmm is this what being retired feels like? if so...now i understand why they drive so bloody slow all the time!

Summertime

I've been working away on my summer project the past wee while..not very much I must admit! I have, however reached a few conclusions about where I want to take my work for the forseeable future.

The bit of our course that really seemed to turn me on last year was our DHTP (design history theory and practice) although the only lecture that really was recognisable as 'history' felt to me like a token jesture to keep the old school happy. The only thing about our arts and crafts lecture was that it was held in the beautiful but bloody freezing arts and crafts style church in the hilltown( i forget the name!) The rest of the lectures I found thought provoking( all be it a little one sided at times)

4 years ago I left school to pursue a degree in Sociology, Public Policy and Geography with the nieve hope at 18 of learning to change the world. After 4 months I had infact learned to just be a lot more synical about the world we live in and not so narrow in my beliefs so much. I couldn't figure out what was lacking for me at first! I was doing well and actually loved the content of most of my lectures. Then I realised that all I was learning was to regurgitate some academics thoughts and not really pursue what was important to me or have any opportunity to think yeah well what can I do about all these problems in the world. Its a bit depressing going to uni every day thinking what problem in the world am I going to learn to feel completely helpless to do anything about today!

I'm certainly glad that this summer I won't be graduating!! Not only because theres not jobs but because I would have missed out on what I feel I'm really meant to do!

To art school I went!!!!


Hmm well after 2 years of general art and design training I was beginning to feel a sense of whats the point? I'm in this place an what use am I actually to this world. I was getting bored with not really feeling my brain was being stretched and longed to actually learn some STUFF. Agh am i never happy!

Untill this year.........

The penny really just felt like it dropped. I really can have both! I can be spontanious, messy, creative and still engage the bit of my brain that longs to learn about the world. Hurrah!!!

I have taken more time to investigate the work of companies like IDEO and the work of the Design Council. This is going to be the beginings of my summer project.


"how long is a piece of string" hmmm what to do. I know for sure I want to design some ideas to help solve real world problems and not churn out some decorative patterns.

1. fuck florals
2. human centred design is the way forward
3. I think I may be working against the system a bit...prepare for crap grades. how much is the thoughts behind our work appeciated when florals that have been done a million times before get high praise?!
4. For work placements think design agencies not textiles.
5. hmmmmm again what am i really doing in textile design. oh well!

Yey for hunderwasser

I heart Hunderwasser. Last year, a friend had a small and shiny book sitting on their desk..Ever the magpie I had to investigate what was inside. My nosiness paid off as I was given an imaginative visual feast of colour, line and pattern. Although it was his visual style that grabbed my attention at first, Hunderwasser's underlying philosophy has continued to take my interest. I'd like to take more time to investigate further into his beliefs.

When you look at his pictures they just shout...wow nature is amazing and exciting! I especially love how he conveys his love and concern for the natural world -a very serious subject- in a accessible way. His paintings at first may seem slightly childish but his understanding of colour and pattern is very sophisticated. Hurrah for Hunderwasser!

I've been wanting reference work through one of my projects for a while now....I think I may just have my chance. I love how he rejected the use of straight lines in his work due to the fact that straight lines belong to man, not of nature. A really simple idea but one that links his phillosophy with the way he actually draws. I like that.

yey for conte pencils!

I've been using pen and ink a lot this year. I've found it had really helped my find that fine ballance between loose expresive line and accuracy. Today I rediscovered conte pencils...hurrah! It's been nice to break from inks for a while. I forgot that I didn't have a compressed charcoal pencil. Just seems to be working well with what I drew today. Life drawing in the morning creating form through line. Loved it! Thinking for my self motivated study to look a little further into texture and structure of surfaces through drawing for print. Not sure what I'm up for drawing yet....anywhere but that bloody horrible studio! I might even take to the hills!

I'm begining this blog with the best intentions.... hoping I will actually keep it up. I'm also hoping it will keep my writing up to date since I found not writing anything much for two years then having to write essays surprisingly dificult.

I'm even going to try and remember to actually put n capital letters and everything!

So today is a lazy Sunday. I'm going to be modeling for Karen for her project while I attempt to finish off things for my project. Unfortunately after Thursdays presentation I didn't have that 'mission accomplished' feeling you get at the end of a brief. Looks like I'll be having a busy Easter holidays. Its not that I've not enjoyed exploring the amazingness of Tupperware in this project! I'vefound it strangely fascinating, so it shouldn't be too hard to keep going. For my brief I have focused on the most ordinary thing I came across. exploring all the different shapes the structure of the stacks creates. Think I need to go back to my original drawings and do some more prints though.