To keep me going on this marathon mosaic I have been listening to sea shanties and work songs to motivate me!
As I have now reached the half way stage completing the 'Blanket Hall' a promenant building in the town, I would like to sing you a few verses of my favourite sea shanty as way of celebration at reaching this significant point.
Oh Santy Ana gained the day hoo-ray, Santy Ana ooh
Oh Santy Ana gained the day all on the plains of Mexico
Oh Mexico Oh Mexico hoo-ray Santy Ana ooh
Ooh Mexico Mexico where I must go
All on the plains of Mexico
Oh Them Liverpool girls aint got no comb hoo-ray Santy Ana ooh
they comb their hair with a kipper backbone hoo-ray ooh
all on the plains of Mexico
Times is hard and the wages low hoo-ray Santy Ana ooh
It's time for us to row and go Santy Ana ooh
Oh all on the plains of Mexico.
Now as it turns out according to the CD sleeve notes, this capstan shanty suggests Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana, far from gaining the day was defeated by General Taylor at Buena Vista in Feb 1847, in one of the decisive battles in the war between Mexico and the US. Many British sailors deserted their ships to to join Santa Ana's army. The shanty singers have reversed the run of history in their songs.
This mosaic slowly moves along and today I thought I would show you what a stonking good days work looks like. This includes a late evening session after the dog walk, because I really wanted to finish the loom.
So the days work: The front of a non-descript building, someone weaving (who has only one leg) and 3/4 of a loom.
Now Andrew Bryant was asking about WHY do people blog? I finish cracking rocks hard labour at 11pm ish and my wife is asleep, my two daughters are asleep and my son is watching 24 or Monk or some DVD or he is asleep. Cosmo he's snoring and manages to roll over so I can rub his belly. So I aint got no one to talk to: Exept unknown artists out there, anyone who can be bothered to listen while I kind of wind down relax talk rubbish about the woods or totem poles or something. I also have blogs of other peoples I read. These are my replacements for Coronation St. and Emmerdale, I missed those because I was out walking with Cosmo. So may be then its a lonely in a wide world thing.
It is also a the diary/journal thing and according to tradition I have in the last year documented alot of my projects as they unfold. For posterity or history, as when the years have rolled by and you re-read what happened to you, a warm glow of satisfaction comes over you.
Now, if others interect along the way thats Dandy as well. I do think this is developing as an online community and Andrew is right to encourage commenting on peoples blogs as its nice to know youre not alone and someone is actually taking an interest and making constructive suggestions to aid research or provide usefull information.
So I would like to thank my right honourable friend for his comments and recomend his policies to this house.
I have been working on this mosaic very hard lately. I have got 32 sections to complete and have done about 10.
My mind has usually imploded by now on these large mosaics, but this one is different.
Because:
It's composition is such that it moves from one scene to another. I get bored but there are always new things just ahead. This has worked really well. I am currently doing a spinning wheel and the next bit is the loom, then after that it is the weavers guild building which is just shy of half way. This 'next thing' anticipation has been a god send.
The worst thing I can remember was the leaf boarder on the Ridgeway Map Mosaic, it looked fab, but after about half a dozen leaves I was pulling my hair out, there was probably over sixty in total.
The Indian will be the very last thing I make, I have done the shephard and he came out fine, the sheep were much better than I expected. Tommorow, 3 spokes on the spinning wheel and the spaces behind, the shadow of the building, and some sky. Lesser people would have lost the will to live by now.
Do you remember that film I think with Charlton Heston as Michaelangelo called 'The Agony and the Ecstasy', well that is about right.
