Happy Sunday!

Good Evening on this pretty nondescript Sunday.....

I have had an odd weekend where I have moved from room to room, coughing and wheezing, and then, desperate to get out, wrapped up for the weather and lasted 30 minutes before having to come inside again. I haven't been to the studio all weekend.

Saturday was cold and a bit drizzly for most of the day so I didn't mind being indoors. It got to around 2pm and I was climbing the walls to get out. I went for a wander, anticipating a half hour walk around the bay, but ended up staying out for much longer and finding my way to the sea cliffs. I also walked around the harbour but cannot remember when. My excuse is delirium.....

Anyway, I only took my phone as the wind was quite strong and I didn't want to carry the camera and tripod. I went with the anticipation of finding good spots to come back to with all the kit.

This sums up the place for me yesterday until I got to the sea cliffs:

Slightly unfair, because you don't have to look very far to find stunning natural beauty, but this was my pathetic ill mood.

The harbour reaped another type of reward. I love the broken down remnants of human activity.

That ladder looked so inviting.... Maybe tomorrow.

I then wandered into the odd mid area between the houses and the beginning of the countryside and found an odd stream which had a peat like colour. It reminded me of the water in the stream towards Buxton after a big rainfall. There was also an attempt to plant wind breaking bushes. These must have been planted in the autumn as they were single stalks - very young. There is no tree cover in Iceland that I have seen and very few bushes. The wind just rattles across all open areas and gains momentum to knock you off your feet. (into the sea...)

tree planting Skagastrond style

Rusty water

a plant stand....

As you can see from this, I am a little short in the actual making art department.... Well I have excuses, nay reasons. However, I did have this lovely wander around the sea cliffs and took quite a few images of where I would like to go back with my proper camera and make something. These are from my phone but I loved the colours - considering it's mid winter, the mosses and grasses are so green and there seems to be colour everywhere. I still miss the snow, as do all the other artists, especially the ones who are only there for one month, but it's inspiring to be able to walk in places I couldn't get to last year and its also good to not be falling over all the time.!!

I got back exhausted and had to sleep! I have been in all day today and am desperate to feel better tomorrow. I am still feeling a bit sorry for myself but promise I will turn it around and get back to happy, optimistic me as soon as possible!!

Just finally, opposite the house is a pile of rubbish which is very pleasing. This is what I leave you with tonight. It's obviously been pitch dark for hours, so I will be in bed for 10pm. Tomorrow is another day!

Bless bless

Love,

Aly x

Feeling sorry for myself...

It's Friday and I don't expect that this will see the light of the internet until Sunday as I think I will have little to show for the weekend. I had bronchitis before leaving the UK which was virtually gone after antibiotics. It's come back with a vengeance and I am trying to stay indoors, drink lots of liquids and rest, hence the lack of art work.

I will begin this now and add to it as the weekend goes on. I didn't go into the studio yesterday because of feeling ill, but also because the wind was very strong. I stayed in trying to make sense of the Wacom Intuos Pro Tablet I bought to bring here with me, but ended up having to leave the room in case I threw it out of the window. I will try again tomorrow but it feels really alien to me. It has become a personality that I detest and I am shouting at it all the time. Maybe I should give it a name??

I still haven't gone accustomed to the light patterns yet. It's not even a tiny bit light until 10.15 and that's a kind of dull, horror movie type of half dark. The sun rises over the mountain around 12.10pm and is amazing when it does as the whole place changes from dull grey/blue to yellow/orange. It's remarkable and everyone becomes aware of it. The light starts to disappear soon after 3 and by 5 it's completely gone. Evenings haven't been too bad as it's so similar to home, but not having any light to wake up to is weird and disconcerting.

I packed my camera bag today and began the windy walk to the studio armed with backpack, tripod bag and Tesco Orla Keily bag (filled with various art materials, computer, tablet with no name - yet!, coffee, milk, baby wipes and loads of other stuff I didn't really need. This was at 12.20pm and the sun was beginning to rise above the mountains across the Fjord.

There was a welcome meeting for the January artists and I met those I will be sitting next to/avoiding storms with/collaborating with/travelling with. There are 11 of us, 10 women - I am the oldest by far! and 1 man from the UK. A mixture of nationalities including Americans, Australians, French Canadians, Israeli, Irish, Greek and UK. Watch this space for ongoing dramas and the inevitable excitement of putting a bunch of artists in one studio with the distinct possibility of being snowed in at some point. Speaking of fireworks (see what I did there?) there was a celebration of sorts in the village tonight with lots of fireworks going off. It seems to be the marking of the end of the Christmas with epiphany - 6th of January.

I have been playing around with making some charcoal and paint pieces which I intend to layer up with photographs (I Think...). This is work in progress, but it does show that I've done something other than cough all day.....

I have played around with one image so will keep playing until I get something. Also the photographs are taken with my phone which is not high spec enough to make big images.

I've decided to post this after all so that I can sleep comfortably knowing I am not going to renege on my 5 out of 7 days of blogging promise.

Sleep well this Friday night. I am about to walk from the studio back to Manabraut, across the windswept gap in the houses where the gale attempts to blow me off my feet. Send me some positive thoughts to get better! I need to go out and make photographs.

Bless bless

Love 

Aly x

The Journey North

Well here I am, after one full day in Iceland. I got the bus this morning at 9am from Mjodd Station in Reykjavik in the pitch dark. It stayed dark until around 11.30am when a sliver of light began to speed very slowly above the mountains. This is a pictorial record of the key points! The Netto at Mjodd station where I bought a barley and avocado salad in a plastic carton and some orange juice for later, This cost 1300isk, which is about £10......

Netto

Getting towards 11am and still dark

Fabulous Knitting ladies all over the bus 

Fantastically filthy window at exactly 12.20pm. Sun just popping over the hill to say 'morning'.

The light did become glorious once the sun appeared and the saturation of colours was beautiful. Hardly any snow to be seen - even on the tops of the mountains, except when we caught a glimpse of the Westfjords, which were pretty white all over. After a 4 hour journey we arrived at Skagastrond to Manabraut 1. My room is spacious and warm - everywhere inside in Iceland is toasty but it's a bit of a pain getting in and out of thermals, gloves, hats, coats etc. every time you want to venture outside.

The best thing about being here without snow for me, is that I can walk to places I didn't manage to get to last year. I also managed to find the hole I fell down and it's really scary. I went for a wander with my phone, rather than the camera and caught a gorgeous sunset as well as managing to get to the trig point with a view over the village.

My very spacious room in Manabraut 1

The view from the back window in my room

View from the front window in my room

If you follow the ditch left to the sea, this is the hole I fell into last year which was covered with snow. Looking at it today, it's at least 7 feet deep and is actually a stream.

These next 10 are simply images from my phone whilst I was wandering along the black sand beach near my house. It was sublime. I'd forgotten how much pink there is.

After the beach, I climbed onto the sea cliffs for the last light and saw the village from a place I could access last year because it was too dangerous.

I then finally managed to drag myself to the studio, got my paints, charcoal and bits and pieces out and did a quick refection of what I'd seen throughout the journey from memory using charcoal and watercolour paint. Linzi will be proud of me (I think!)

I am hoping that I can get back to layers throughout the residency and build some work from a combination of digital and hard copy. We shall see.

Night night.

Bless bless

Love

Aly x

deja vu

So here I am again. After an uneventful flight, during which I nodded off and probably dribbled.. I have been in the speedy Grayline bus (sitting waiting for stragglers for 50 minutes) into the metropolis that is Reykjavik. 

Still lots of Christmas lights up and some air of festivities. The sunset was beautiful but there is NO SNOW!! The countryside is brown. Different shades of brown, but nevertheless, totally brown.

It's interesting that in a similar way that I expected my second child to look and 'be' exactly the same as the first one, I expected Iceland to be a duplicate of what I saw last year as I was flying over Keflavik airport and during the ongoing journey to Reykjavik.

This is February last year:

And this is today:

I am off to have a walk around Reykjavik and buy some chocolate. The no drinking and diet starts in Skagastrond!!

Did I mention that I don't really have any kind of plan for this trip. It's an artist residency, so I want/need to be creative but it is clear case of 'watch this space' as I have no idea what it will become.....

Part of the sense of deja vu is that I have the same room in my little Igdlo Guesthouse (hostel). There is still free food and drinks and shared bathrooms, but it is sweet and tiny...

I will try take pictures and make notes on the long journey north tomorrow and if I can't send a blog update from my phone, I will sort it out tomorrow night. Missing this lot so much. I bet you're having a stress free evening for the first time in a week!

I've just arrived back in my room after meeting up with a new fellow artist in town. As I haven't got to Skagaströnd yet, I had 2 glasses of wine.... Reykjavik was busy and still very twinkly. These are just wobbly snaps from my phone. I really am off to bed now. Tomorrow the journey north begins, away from people, tourists and buildings! It's very odd without the snow... I'm not sure if they have much in the north but it's seen as having its own climate.

Bit of a pedestrian start to the blog, but I'm hoping to get into what I'm making and the processes involved. I'm setting myself a target of 5 blogs per week, so let's see how that goes.

Bless bless

Love

Aly x