Patrick Hruby Draws Things

If I was Patrick Hruby I'd be drawing things too.  This cool cat has been producing gorgeous illustrations and smartly adapting them to things one might like to have in one's kitchen, or give as presents to small childers.

http://www.patrickdrawsthings.com

The NGV has been stocking some of his kids games (puzzles, cards, and did I see some kind of colouring book?) and that's not a bad effort for an American designer who seems to have only just graduated recently.

Somers days... sweeping the...clouds away

As a fan of tea-tree and sleepy coastal Victorian hamlets, I found a lot to like about Somers, on the Mornington Peninsula.

Nice empty beaches, low-rise low-fuss architecture, and not too far from Melbourne. Win win win.

Our holiday rental home away from home came with the essential mad furniture, eclectic music collection (Daryl & Ozzie, Cleo Lane, and INXS??) and mismatching 'art' on the wall.

Intriguingly the citizens of Somers recently voted against the introduction of a to-your-door postal service, in favour of everyone having to march down to the general store to collect their mail, and consequently running into their co-Somerians for a chin-wag. Is that enforced socialising? Charming, or like RSVP for offliners?

To Markit To Markit

The Fed Square design market is on this Sunday, and if I wasn't going to be away down the coast I'd be all over it.

Groovy jewellery, clothes, arts and crafts from inspired designers and artisans, it's just glorious.

http://www.markitfedsquare.com.au/

I'm proud and a little worried that I possess several products shown just on the home page - to cringe or not to cringe, that is the question.

Anyway the people who will really miss out are the ones I would have bought Christmas presents for, poor poor buggers.

Conical Panda

Conical panda doesn't wish to talk to you right now.

A Tranquil Heart in Art

Johnson Chow Su-sing: A Tranquil Heart in Art
Hong Kong Museum of Art


When travelling it absolutely pays to amble into galleries.  Hong Kong has many charms, but it's also all busy traffic and when you look like such a gringo, hassle from copycat handbag salesmen.  So, escaping into the Hong Kong Museum of Art is a great way to balance your yings and yangs.


Disappointingly the permanent contemporary art collection was closed (boooo) and the painting gallery was showing only calligraphy.  But there was a small miracle going on in the temporary exhibition space.


I'm new to traditional Chinese painting but this retrospective of the work of Chinese artist Johnson Chow Su-sing was a marvel.  The landscape paintings were spectacular, particularly the epic vistas of the Chinese mountain and river regions. 


I was told somewhere that traditional Chinese landscape painting should depict time, as well as space, and this is why you often see the same people or subjects reappearing in small vignettes throughout the picture, evolving as time passes. Very cool stuff.


One complaint about this exhibition: where the feck was the merch??  The citizens demand softback catalogues!

Johnson Chow Su-sing: Two Shores

Random Acts of Exercise

Recently, on a wander around rural China, I noticed some very strange goings on.

* People shuffling backwards, clapping their hands.
* People jogging backwards along main roads (almost but not quite on a footpath).
* People doing knee lifts along the tracks of high-speed intercity railways.

Random acts of exercise - what a lovely oddball way to get your motor running!