Inanga - Hand of God Productions

Lost Dutchman's Mine on Treasure Island

2009-09-29T12:34:00.001-07:00

www - Spider Grandmother

2009-09-16T15:40:00.001-07:00

Built Earth - a view of the little constructions

2009-09-03T18:36:00.000-07:00

Rooms with a View

2009-08-31T15:08:00.000-07:00

Collage>Painting>Collage

2009-08-29T03:39:00.000-07:00

The Collage>Painting>Collage

Some Free Advertising - a new Collage

2009-08-27T04:27:00.000-07:00

This collage is called Mainly Tuscany as my paintings of Tuscany - see that gallery in www.hogproductions.com - feature heavily in the centre. If you have a HD screen you might even see someone you know when you zoom in. Not all the originals in the body of this collage are for sale - there are over 100,000 pictures in here easily seen in all their detail - acrylic swirl, definition of oil, sharpness of photograph. There is stuff in there that I will not see in this lifetime. It would take longer to look at this under magnification that it took to paint all the originals. That doesn't sound like it's fair. Hola, and have fun. 100 colour signed prints of this collage will be for sale in the near future.

inanga

Around the World and Back

2009-08-25T13:04:00.000-07:00

Homage to Picasso

2009-08-24T11:17:00.000-07:00

Angelic Realms

2009-08-24T05:13:00.000-07:00

PHi

2009-08-18T16:09:00.000-07:00

I am just testing the Slideshow feed on this plogspot. So this is a feed from my Smugmug galleries at www.hogproductions.com - see inanga paintings - CLICK - above. There are Geo tours, galleries, and all sorts of stuff in there. Art Disneyland!

This feed will not be on for long so if you see it please comment.

inanga

Aotearoa II

2009-08-17T13:55:00.000-07:00

Welcome to another Slideshow of my paintings of Aotearoa - New Zealand - a beautiful place to be. There are loads of other galleries in my website - CLICK at top right of Plog for that. In the galleries there are Geo-mapping options - you can zoom right into the scene I painted. Gimmicky but fun...

Its best to use the hide captions option for a first viewing. If you CLICK a pick you will go to that gallery. Have fun doing an artist-tour of the world.

inanga

Aotearoa Gallery 1

2009-08-13T19:18:00.000-07:00

Hi, hope you enjoy this Slideshow - heaps more of the same in my galleries - a CLICK on Smugmug logo top right of this Plog.

It's best to hide captions with the tool at base of slides.

Go for it - hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed painting them.

inanga

Tuscany

2009-08-10T14:33:00.000-07:00

What a beautiful place to Be - Tuscany. The light is something else and it lends itself to my splashes of colour.

It is best to view this Slideshow without captions. A click on any of the photos will take you to my web gallery on Smugmug where there is a Mapping feature for the paintings using Google Earth. You can zoom in to the place that the painting depicts. You can zoom out to zigzag all over the world. There are full gallery Slideshows as well. And heaps of info, switches to more informative sites on a particular subject. Oh, it's best to 'hide captions' - feature beneath slides.

Enjoy - I had fun painting them.

inanga

irenicon

2009-07-30T15:09:00.000-07:00

irenicism: the journey towards a better understanding of our relationship with God.

The irenicon in the Book of the Book harks to the wisdom of I Kings, IV, 33:

"And God gave Solomon wisdom and
understanding exceeding much
... and he spake of trees,
from the cedar that is in Lebanon
even unto the hyssop
that is upon the wall..."

The irenicon

i

Sing Goddess...

Open your left palm,
Spread it like a rainbow,
Look at the tips,
Of your fingers;
Left to right...

Tip of the thumb is Beth,
Noble birch,
A self-propogating mystery,
A flogging to spell away evil,
Tree of inception,
First month of the year;
Now the cold solstice is gone.

Tip of the forefinger is Luis,
Quickbeam rowan,
The compeller of demons,
To admit the basest Truth,
Quickfires of battle,
For whom the dragon is guardian;
An immobilizer of ghosts.

Tip of the middle finger is Nion,
Poseidon's ash,
Charm against drowning, and friend
to seafarers,
Strangler of fellow trees,
The power found in water;
In the month of floods.

Tip of the psychic finger is Fearn,
The alder of Bran,
Who stands in the front line,
"... the very battle witch of all woods,
tree that is hottest in the fight",
The bonfire of Branwen's romance;
"A burnt house, for a cut alder."

Tip of the ear-finger is Saille,
Willow of the death goddess,
Tree of Hecate, Circe, Hera and
Persephone,
Much worshipped by witches;
"Burn not the willow, a tree sacred
to poets."

Look at your fingertips
Beth, Luis, Nion, Fearn, Saille
Five sacred trees
Of the Dichetal do Chennaib:

"Tree powers,
Fingertips,
First pentad of the four,
Discover,
all your poet asks;
Drumming on his brow.

Birch peg, throbbing thumb,
By power of divination,
Bring him news of love;
Loud the heart knocks.

Rowan rod, forefinger,
By power of divination,
Unriddle him a riddle;
The key"s cast away.

Ash, middle finger,
By power of divination,
Weatherwise, fool otherwise;
Mete him out the winds.

Alder, psychic finger,
By power of divination,
Diagnose all maladies;
Of a doubtful mind.

Willow wand, ear finger,
By power of divination,
Force confessions from the
mouth;
Of a mouldering corpse.

Finger-ends, five twigs,
Trees, true divining trees,
Discover all your poet asks;
Drumming on his brow."

"Under the tongue root,
A fight most dread,
And another raging;
Behind, in the head."

ii

Glance again at your
fingers,
And before the first knucle,
See another;
Five sacred trees.

We begin with H-uath,
Or hawthorn, or May,
The whitethorn of Maia,
some say,
"Ne'er cast a clout, ere May be
out",
And Hermes conduct your
souls to hell,
The giant father of Olwen;
Stands guard at the sacred well.

Next is mighty Duir,
Of Jupiter, Zeus and Hercules,
Royal tree to All'ah,
Compassionate and Merciful,
Stout oak of the door,
That separates Dagda,
from Thor;
The wisdom: that
keeps a poet poor.

On the middle finger,
Spy the holly, passion of Christ,
Oh, spy the flowers of July,
And "... see a lady where
she sate,
Between an oak and a green
hollen,
She was clad in red scarlet."
Was she Tinne, of
the increase?

The psychic finger, in the
nutting season,
And for this we have good
reason,
Look deep into the dripping
branches,
Of Coll to find;
Poetic knowledge of
Aes Sidha.

The first of the two mysteries,
Of the crane's bag begins,
At the first joint of your
ear finger,
You will find Quert,

close companion to

the hazel,
You have found sorb apple,
Food of the god Apollo;
Tree of poetic resurrection.

H-uath, Duir, Tinne, Coll, Quert,
The second sacred five,
Of fifteen sacred trees;
Hidden in your fingertips, in
varying degrees.

"Clay, water, wool and blood,
wood, lime, and flax thread
a full twist,
Acacia, bitumen and virtue -
The nine materials;
of Nimrod's Tower."

iii

The second knuckles,
More trees reveal,
And spell out an ancient
calendar,
Read again, from left to right;
And find your way, towards
second sight.

Muin begins, the tenth month,
The spotted snake on the hill,
The skilled, powerful artist,
The hill of poetry,
The noble vine in the
vintage season,
A principle ornament in the
Temple of Jerusalem,
Between the twin towers - Boaz
and Joachim;
The poet seeks
resurrection.

Gort, the flowering ivy,
Is found beneath the mighty oak,
In the season of the
autumnal Dionysus,
When the souls of the Mysterion,
Imbibe ambrosia,
In the eleventh month

of Ariadne;
All witness Christ, son
of Alpha.

In the middle is Ngetal,
The reed sceptre of pharoahs,
The sovereign arrows of
sun-gods,
The threatening noise of the
sea,
A wave breaking on a beach;
Ready for cutting, in the
twelth month.

The second of the twin
mysteries,
Is found upon the psychic
finger,
For here lurks the blackthorn,
The mirror of H-uath is Straif,
Noble ignominy of Jesus,
attired in scarlet;
Dark heart of the poet's soul.

And last comes, elder of
the waterside,
Ah, you will remember,
"The curs'd elder and the
fatal yew,
With witch [rowan] and
nightshade, in their shadows
grew,"
Ruis is the thirteenth month;
And the tree, upon which
Judas was hung.

Muin, Gort, Ngetal, Straif, Ruis
Five more sacred trees,
Talking from your fingertips,
Telling, living, foreseeing
secrets,
Such clever consonants;
In different degrees.

"Jehovah was sworn
and will not repent:
thou art a priest, forever
after the order of
Melchizedek."

iv

But what of the vowels?
"Sweet cauldron of the Five
Trees",
Upon which are sworn
Oaths of holy tetractys;
What of?:

Ailm, Onn, Ura, Eadha, Idho,
What of these mysteries,
of the crane's bag,
The Triple Goddess in three
aspects,
Maiden, women, crone, perhaps,
Beginning, prime and end,
The mysteries of a poet's
Muse,
What of birth,
What of initiation, and
consummation;
What of repose, death and
poetic salvation?

BIRTH

He or she
shall be found...

Ailm is the silver fir,
Sacred to Artemis, the
Moon Goddess,
The tree of pheonix birth,
It is of Io, and under
the fir,
Was born the god of Byblos;
First station of the year.

Ailm, the beginning,
Was it not of you that was
constructed,
The clever horse of Troy?
You are the day,
Of the birth of any,
divine child,
Man or woman;
In any age.

INITIATION

He or she
shall do wonders...

Onn is the furze,
Prickles of the spring equinox,
"The furze but ill-behaved,
Until he is subdued",
The fiery daughter of youth,
Good against bad witches,
And worshipped by Gauls;
In ash groves.

The ash and fir, are the blaze,
on every hill,
Onn and Nion,
praise great Yggrdrasil,
Sacred to Wotan, Odin, Gwydion,
The furze is the Dominical wand,
That sprang from the
blood of Uranus;
When castrated, by angry
Cronos.

CONSUMMATION

He or she
shall reign...

"The crane must aye,
take nine steps ere she flie."

I am Ura, gathered heather,
I am of Isis and Venus,
And I dine on venison milk,
and eagle's breasts;
I set my chair in a womb
of hills.

I am the season of women,
The season of heaven bloom,
I am Arianrhod, the Queen
of the circle of life,
I reign in my prime now;
And dispense children
before advice.

REPOSE

He or she
shall rest...

Again, upon the psychic
finger,
Find Eadha as the

crane cries,
"I am the fourth tree,
of the autumn equinox and
old age,
I am shifting leaves of white poplar,
I am aspen, shield-maker's tree;
Some say: 'I am the loss,
of all hope.'

Beside the psychic finger,
You will find, the path
you take,
Towards your death,
Think now, think hard,
think long;
Can I live forever;
And like the poet,
be immortal?

"Moses obtained,
By suffering, and
In great necessity,
The aid of three;
Dominical rods.

Solomon obtained,
in Babel's Tower,
All the sciences;
Of Asia's land."

DEATH

He or she
cannot live forever...

You must overcome me,
I am Idho, tree of death,
Sacred to Hecate,
Black bulls were sacrificed
to me and,
"Ghosts would lap their
gushing blood;
Wreathed with yew."

I am the bow, and the
poisoned arrows,
Fired deep into the hearts,
Of those that fear death,
I am "... slips of yew
Sliver'd in the moon's eclipse",
A double fatal yew;
The spell of final knowledge.

Win my favour,
The favour of death
itself,
And I will give you;
The end before...

v

SALVATION

And you
shall be saved...

Two hidden trees,
sacred mysteries,
Are found far beyond,
the hand's palm,
In these two trees,
The answer will not be,
"Fir, womb of silver pain,
Yew, tomb of leaden grief,"
Gone shall be strife,
When you realise;
Death only begets
life.

Only these two trees,
Know when salmon,
Kings and Queens of
river fish,
Retire from philosophy,
Only these trees,
Have been set adrift;
on boundless seas.

Only these two trees,
Inspire poets to learn,
All secrets of the cosmos,
All secrets of the sun,
moon and stars,
All the secrets,
Of Jupiter, Mercury;
Saturn, Venus and Mars.

Alpha and Omega,
The beginning to the end,
The end and the beginning,
Ask -
"Sweet apple-tree crimson
in hue,
Which grows concealed in
Forest Celyddon..."
Where to find the sacred
thicket,
Where do you find
the palm and mistletoe
together?
The herald of new life;
And the berry of life
itself?

I am Ailm, the womb of
every holt,
I am Onn, the blaze on
every hill,
I am Ura, the Queen of
every hive,
I am Eadha, the shield
to every head,
I am Idho, the tomb to
every hope,
I am Omega, the gate to
every hell,
I am Alpha Tetragrammaton,
the door to
every heaven,
I am consort to the celestial
goddess,
I am the celestial goddess,
At times;

I am your fingertips...

inanga

Collage

2009-07-29T15:18:00.000-07:00

The Moment of Collage Collage

Wow! If this is doing what I think it is doing as I write this, I enter into one of the most magnificent realms I could ever hope to enter. Picasa has become one of the great art tools. I am cruising through one of my old Picasa photo galleries, before I uploaded a deal of my art work on line to Smugmug, and I see this button at the base of my screen - Collage.

Now, talk about putting a carrot in front of a wide-eyed donkey. You are joking are you not? I love the sound of that term - Collage.

I click into a gallery in Picasa and then click Collage. And Picasa offers me more options of randomlessness, thinglessness and nothingness. In particular do I want my Collage as:

Picture Pile: Looks like a pile of scattered pictures

Mosaic: Automatically fit pictures in the page

Frame Mosaic: A mosaic with a prominent centre picture

Grid: Arrange pictures in regular rows and columns

Contact Sheet: Thumbnails with an informative header

Multiple Exposure: Superimpose pictures over one another

Come on - choices, choices - this is starting to sound like The Dice Man.

I navigate the Mouse to the Collage button and press. Random chaos of that instant takes hold and I am presented with a collage of my paintings from one of my on-line galleries. Spooky. I imagine Matisse and fellow collagers thinking all those years ago - there must be something better than scissors no doubt. Hey, do not get me wrong, most of the images included in the collage above were created with paint, paper and careful use of scissors. And all this is happening instantaneously, on line and in real time. Definitely some sort of spooky action at a distance. And boy, oh boy they are still offering Options such as Scramble Collage and Shuffle Pictures.

I have this image in the back of my mind of Michelangelo screening laser images on the roof of a chapel as he shuffles and scrambles before pressing Paint on the Button of his ink-jet paint laser. It may sound ridiculous but that is what we humble artists are being allowed to do in a nanosecond now. I am sure that the speed of light is not a constant.

And all the while a video of Zorba the Greek is pumping out bazouki as Anthony Quinn teaches Alan Bates to dance. Tire of the movie then flick to some music videos of The Twelve Girls Band or Ayisha in French. Certainly the harmonic mix thickens.

So I go into multiple galleries and collage the lot instantaneously. It is sort of like the Show Off feature available on Smugmug. Anyway the very clever process was all available on-line for virtually free. The secret is letting yourself go, leap faithfully into the abyss of technology with the realisation that none of your actions - eg mosaic collaging on line - hurt anybody. Do it for the good and there will be no bad repercussions.

I have a url feed at the base of my Blog - it has a painting of the day (someone else's choice in a land who knows where), some on-line ads (not my choice) and a quote by Michelangelo -

The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.

In that moment amidst all this blaringly glaring technology I am humbled to think that similar acts of digital sleight-of-hand, good old-fashioned prestidigitation (there is such a word!) are taking place in millions of offices and living rooms throughout the entire world-wide-web connected world at any one time. And all this can be shared in an instant with others in what is a mere speck of the divine grace of God.

And are we not all brought kicking and screaming back into reality. I rush to the kitchen and my toast is well and truly burnt on one side. i remember my cooking days on the Coromandel - if you burnt it, eat it. It is all part of the creation of something. I eat burnt toast, margarine and peanut butter in self-imposed silence (no You-tube music) as I contemplate suitable mea culpa.

Anyway, I just noticed some more buttons at the base of Picasa... and today's art piece in the url feed at the base of my Blog is that famous 1932 (?) blue woman by Matisse - cleverly collaged of course.

Oops. forgot to mention that the megapixel magic of Picasa's Collage can best be seen by on-line magnification of the image above - either by mouse click or on-screen magnifier. Best of luck.

collage (depicted above) thanks to Smugmug, Picasa, mfnw, Blogger of Course, Firefox and the Collage button, megapixels on LCD screen, July 2009

inanga

Bungy or Bungee

2009-07-27T13:09:00.000-07:00

Aotea's Birdman

I have been absent from this plog (painting Log) as I sort out problems with my on-line gallery supplier - the US concern SMUGMUG. I am trying to feed one of my galleries into my Plog (inangawiremu.blogspot.com) - probably Tuscany as it is a colour explosion. In between this technological tweaking and twittering (without Twitter) I chanced upon this painting I had executed a few years back.

It may look comical but its intent was serious. I suppose it comes down to what were the moai all about. They are giant statues found on Easter Island; the island is described by New Zealand's pre-Maori Waitaha as Waitangi-ki-roto or Island of the Weeping Waters. The plot thus thickens...

I wonder if it is less conceivable to believe that a highly sophisticated civilisation once existed on Easter Island than it is to believe that in this explosion of the web that we can now talk face to face on Skype, download galleries of megapixelled photos and paintings, and disseminate our ideas worldwide in a nanosecond? That was a long rhetorical question (but such fare is fast becoming the diet of the Blogger or Plogger). The mere techno revolution, that we in the first world are part of, throws up daily hitherto undreamed of possibilities.

Why don't I like Twitter - it makes people lazy and less intelligent. The restriction on characters lends itself to paraphrasing, short-cutting and abbreviation. All throw up subtle changes in language rendering it less meaningful and forceful - in essence, it leads to language losing its oomph!

But Twitter is the call of the Birdman.

And our Birdman visiting Easter Island at this instant is AJ Hackett, the Kiwi who popularised (and dare I say commercialised) bungy-jumping. AJ didn't invent it. That distinction belongs to the Bougainville islanders in Vanuatu. Annually there is a rite of passage there where young men tie vines to their ankles and leap from high wooden structures. It is highly dangerous and potentially lethal, and one islander leapt to his death as Queen Elizabeth II was watching.

There is also recorded the Mexican tradition of the Dance of the Papantla Flyers (Danza de los Voladores de Papantla), that has bungy-cord like associations stretching as far back as the Aztecs. About the stretched length of my much-overused pun.

The next evolution of this 'leap of faith' happened at the Clifton Suspension Bridge on April Fool's Day (appropriately) in 1979. Members of the Oxford Dangerous Sports Club (in the spirit of other adventurers such as Philby, Burgess and MacLean) took their champagne- and cigar-feulled leap of faith before being arrested. They made later jumps, including one on the TV show That's Incredible. Bungee (bungy) jumping had emerged from myth and island vines into reality.

AJ as a Kiwi was a flightless and somewhat frustrated Bird. Without the benefit of Twitter (then) he took his first leap of faith from the Greenhithe Bridge in Auckland, and later took the much-publicised leap from the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Just had a thought for another Painting... The next step, commercialisation of the Bungy, owes its genesis to the advances in birth control. Not the vasectomy or the pill, but to advances in the security of the condom. In particular to latex. No more vines, the new strings attached are rubber. So now you could climb to the top of a high object, attach a rubber-band to your ankles and dive head-first into the abyss and not have the added outcome of an accident such as an head-splitting death (or unwanted pregnancy).

The condom made commercial bungy-jumping possible. A safe-sex jump, a protected leap. If it is not on (around your ankles) it is not on! I took my first leap of faith at AJ's first commercial site, the Kawarau Bridge near Queenstown in the South Island of New Zealand, with the latex band attached to my ankles. The water below was cold, and at that time sobering. My next jump was at AJ Hackett's Nevis Gondola, which was for a short time the highest commercial jump in the world. I wrote the experience up in one of the many editions of Lonely Planet's New Zealand travel survival kit.

I was looking at some pictures of the moai (giant statues) that looked out from Easter Island across the Pacific to where I live - Aotearoa (New Zealand) - and realised that one Kiwi in particular, AJ Hackett, had overcome one of the problems of gravity. We now had a Birdman!

But our Bird-man was a mammal not a real Bird. Isolated New Zealand, with its wealth of unique avian fauna (both extinct and still extant) had very little in the way of mammal representation apart from short-tailed and long-tailed bats, an a single species of rat, before the coming of the white explorers. So AJ was given the mammalian title of Short-tailed Bat (or as it is in Maori - pekapeka). I suppose the appelation is my way of saying thanks to a Kiwi who had the foresight to take the right protection at the right time, and give us usually flightless mammals the opportunity to take our own leaps of faith with a rubber-band around our ankles.

As in the tradition of this fledling Plog I will not say much more than the painting started as an illustration of the Birdman ceremonies that were once conducted on Easter Island (Rapanui as it is also called). Kevin Costner covered this subject matter in his film of the same name. The moai became the Seven Pillars of Wisdom, each with one of the seven main colours of the spectrum. AJ dropped in with a slab of greenstone (pounamu) protecting his head, and the island exploded in colour. When lowered down to the ground of Easter Island, and at the time of writing, he wasn't able to Twitter his location. That problem is now solved, as Twitter IS, but I fear the devolution of both language and the story attached.

Just one thing before this Plog ends - I find it curious that the Easter Islanders (Rapanuians) called their giant statues moa-i. The biggest bird ever recorded is the flightless giant moa of New Zealand, now extinct. Yes bigger than a dodo, ostrich and emu combined. It was a herbivorous ground-dweller, and surprisingly its young were preyed upon by the gigantic flying Haast's eagle (also now extinct). That is a big, big raptor with a four-metre wingspan. There is a lot more going on here than in 120 characters of a Twitter.

So let's leave the last word to the Birds.

acrylic, oil, gouache, glitter, paua, greenstone (pounamu), Biro and collage on A2 paper, 2007

inanga (a type of fish)

Enter my Web, said the Spider to the Phli

2009-07-13T14:10:00.000-07:00

The Lair of Spider Grandmother

Don't you get the impression that everything is connected. The strand of all life has been stretched infinitely - far beyond our limited three-dimensional capabilities. The world wide web is changing that, we hope. We being those who give a damn about it all in the first place.

So the story here starts in Tuscany in a Dulux-Resene heaven of exploding colour.

At first there is the palette complete with freshly squeezed paint, then the photons from that ever exploding Sun, they hit your retina, psychotropic chemicals go hog wild doing the neuron-synsapse connection thing to the pineal gland, and whammo - you see the picture in front of you in a nanosecond - and at exactly at 4.10 pm in the afternoon as the clock on the tower attests.

Hence the name given to this piece - Nanosecond Sorano. It is now the property of Miles from Nowhere and he took the image I am talking about that you see at the start of this Plog. The other picture is The Artist's Palette - the actual palette was a gift to 'mfnw' (alias Cockroach) who also took the image of the palette and the 3-D Sunflowers. Amazing what a camera and a nanosecond can do. Thank goodness our right hemispheres, under the right harmonic conditions, operate faster than light (FTL).

It is sort of odd that a picture that depicts the exact moment of creation of a scene took more time than that to paint. Funny thing happened during the painting... I was on an enforced electricity budget so I was painting by two-candle power only. I painted the time on the clock when the painting was finished - 4.10 am in the morning, or about 12 hours' or so difference northern hemisphere Tuscany time from Downunder southern hemisphere time. Are you confused with this complete mix of the hemispheres, well I am!

Needless to say, in the wee hours of the morning I was engrossed totally in depicting the nanosecond that the Sun's rays hit the town of Sorano and that image your eyes and brain scramble to equal a painting in a Plog. Anyway, the paper moved on to a candle while I was swirling the scene and it caught fire. It took be a few seconds to double take and realise that the painting was on fire (or Phi-re). I stubbed it out with my sleeve and repaired it with oil, acrylic and gold leaf, The tragedy that was fixed occurred about half-way up the right-side of Sorano.

I knew i had finished this exquisite moment in my own weird quantum reality when i signed i in the Piet Mondrian mural on the fence in the left-hand bottom corner of the beautiful little town of Sorano, Tuscany.

The life of a painting goes on - it creates its own universe. The painting was framed by a close friend of Miles from Nowhere. It went on another journey to Tamaki-makau-rau (Auckland) where it is awaiting the next leg of its journey through this 3-D stopover of Earth.

I feel I am writing these words in absentia, but I know I am not. I am about to Customize by world wide links on Spider Grandmother's intricately woven filament of connectivity.

Time to publish another Plog - painting log - and I hope those that read it get a kick out of it.

regards

inanga

Tour de France

2009-06-25T13:28:00.000-07:00

Tour de France 2005

If you are like me, and I don’t suggest that is a necessarily good thing, then you won’t fail to be captivated by the panache of the Tour de France cycling race. I stayed up late one night to watch Lance Armstrong win his seventh tour. As I watched the events of the penultimate day unfold I watched the greatest living athlete win an individual stage in the mountains. The voice of the British commentator spat out the details of breakaways, the peleton, team tactics, flat tires, previous champions, Colombian climbers and German sprinters, and I was again enthralled.

Somewhere in the midst of all this excitement I penned this poem, having been reminded that I was estranged from my own son Callum:

‘Je parle le Francais bien’
The Texan drawled - again:
‘I know these mean streets
The scenes of defeats
Of many of you ‘Mes amis’;
I came to your roads
And mountains
To drink the water
From your sacred fountains.’

‘You American
You hold the yellow jersey, every day
But a stage winner you aren’t
Not at the Col de le Gachet, no way
Not on any day

Lance grimaced
And wished his birth father
Had cradled him
With the love he deserved
He gritted his teeth
And resolved his belief
In himself
And the struggle to the top
Of his Everest
And the descent to Saint Etienne’s groves of grace
He would not stare defeat in the face
Not in this bike race…

Ullrich stopped the clock
Basso went aerodynamic and ballistic
Armstrong was a rock
And sprinted his guts out
The spectators stood in shock
Teams blazed past in rage
And asked themselves unconsciously
If Lance on this day
Could win this stage?

Lance rode faster,
And ever faster
In the face
Of life’s former disasters

[‘My father I have
Missed you most
I wished you hugged me
At the finish post’]

I am the master
On this day
In this year
I will be the winner
Of an individual stage
The best of my career

[‘I will ride
To the Champs Elysees
Thinking of you father
Please shed me a tear
I will ride
For you father
I have won you
This stage
I will love you father
When I meet you
At whatever age

I thought of you
At two
I thought of you
At ten
I thought of you
Beloved father
When I won this stage
And seven Tours de France
At St Etienne.]

I cried when I first read the poem out loud - sentimental ol’ me…

I had to paint the tour (Tour de France 2005), so an arched bridge becomes the target of the distant peleton, emerging from the French countryside. The clouds are collaged on to the canvas, as are the building, trees and the peleton itself. The air is electric and in the moment soon to happen the peleton will zoom past the spectators as a whirl of silver spokes, multilingual riders, and a rainbow of lycra garments. Sorry about the green pic above - I don't know why I did that - it looks great in colour. I might change this Plog later.

I had a few years doing triathlons in Victoria, Australia, and I fell in love with my bike and all associated with it. Lance Armstrong was one of my heroes and I was pleased to see that he recently came out of retirement. My mate Pat (Kahu) and I sneak in to the picture – we are the backpackers to the right of the building – ants in a moment – but you will need a magnifying glass to see us.

I have contacted Lance Armstrong's minders in Texas and I am sending the painting to him. I hope he forgives me for the personal nature of the poem. Poems are like the paintings, and a little like the Plogs - they just happen at the moment. The artist, the poet and the Plogger merely record the happening.

Oil, gesso, acrylic and collage (photograph and painted paper) on canvas, July 2007

inanga

Stop Press

Today Michael Jackson died. So did Farah Fawcett Majors, one of the original Charlies' Angels. The first sold the most ever record albums (for Thriller I believe) and the latter sold the most swimsuit pin-ups (12 million) and seduced millions of women to try her hairdo.

The best interview that I saw, conducted at the time of Michael's death, was with Uri Geller. He admitted to professional misconduct when he told the story of the time that he put the Prince of Pop under deep hypnosis: he asked if MJ had ever molested children in his care. In that deep, hopefully truthful state, MJ answered quickly in the negative. He loved them too much to hurt them in that way. I believe Geller's account and I am sure that the Peter Pan of Pop soared heavenward to Neverland.

inanga

Cosmic Clock Spring

2009-06-22T13:42:00.000-07:00

Landscape Portrait

Back to Blogging. I have yet to hit the optimisation stage so that I can get this material out there. I think it interesting enough to merit persistence.

The above detail (portrait shape) is of the South Westland Aotearoa landscape. In particular, it is looking across Big Bay to Tutoko, the sacred mountain in the region. You can see Tutoko, obscured by a swirl and about 2/3rds of the way down the portrait. The brown rock in the foreground is Anchor Rock, where the Waitaha Stone Seekers (Tu Mata Kokiri) knew the sacred greenstone (pounamu) lay.

The detail is from a 10-foot long scroll that sort of details my spiritual journey to date. Big Bay and greenstone was a big part of that (and so was paua shell, our abalone). I have been into Walter Russell material recently, and in particular trying to come to grips with his momumental, yet abridged The Secret of Light. See, the problem is I don't have the book and my search for information about this extraordinary philosopher is confined to the Internet. I'll have to check the Wellington Public Library to see if there is a copy there.

Why Russell? Because there are more things in his philosophy than in your heaven and earth Horatio. Sorry Shakespeare! Dr Francis Trevelyan Miller wrote in 1947:

I hasten to congratulate you on your epoch-making achievement in giving the world The Secret of Light. In this little volume, with its tremendous magnitude of thought, you have given Science and human knowledge a rebirth - a transmigration from its physical plane to its potential grandeur on the cosmic plane. You have opened a door into the infinite - science must enter. It may hesitate; it may engage in controversy, but it cannot afford to ignore the principles you have established which eventually will revolutionize man's concept of himself, his world, his universe and his human problems.

You have done for us in the Twentieth Century what Ptolemy, Euclid, Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler did for their earlier centuries. But you have further penetrated all physical barriers and extended your discoveries into definite forms of the infinite law which created our universe and keeps it in operation with mathematical precision through the millions of years.

Well needless to say that sixty-two years after these lines were written mainstream science has avoided the truths of Russell, content to stick to more traditional and seemingly rational philosophies. Walter Cronkite in 1963 hailed Walter Russell '...the Leonardo DaVinci of his time'. One of his illustrations The Winding of the Cosmic Clock Spring is shown at the top of this Plog.

Funny how some memories persist. I worked on the first edition of Lonely Planet's guidebook Virginia & the Capital Region (published 2000 I think). When I was researching to write Virginia (and the Civil War section), I read about Swannanoa and Walter and Lao Russell's University of Science & Philosophy. Swannanoa is a stately home near Rockfish Gap in Augusta County, Virginia. It is not far from the Blue Ridge Parkway and Shenandoah National Park (one of the most visited in the US).

For many years Swannanoa hosted the Russell's and interested others for hours of 'philosophisation', and Walter intricately wove together his description of the unified cosmos. He was carrying out his maxim:

I believe that mediocrity is self-inflicted and genius is self-bestowed.

Swannanoa is still there, but when I visited it in the late 90s it was no longer the centre for much at all. I seem to remember writing it up as a thing to see but not to get overly excited about. What happened there with the Russell's, was however, very exciting. Russell found that in the wave he had one of the pivotal secrets of creation. Another academic, a Dr Sheldon of NYU, said of Russell in 1931:

I am inclined to think you have found the basis for a new art... I believe anyone capable of understanding your paintings will have a much clearer conception of universal waves than he would through any textbook description.

Like DaVinci in his drawings, Russell always comes back to the spiral. He shows the universe in the light of two-way functioning; a magnetic-electric thought wave universe; cyclical; and eternally creating. All rushing out from our visibility of God - 1.618033989 PHI. All Fibonacci-sequence based Swiss-perfection-evolving holograms.

You can see Walter Russell's work on-line - a quick search under 'Walter Russell will do it.

Also, if you have a copy of ET's Psionic Machines from the Eye of Horus consult that as it has a plethora of info on Russell Wave Dynamics and Physics. The University has a web presence although the faculty grounds spiralled out of view years ago. ET is still around, and those of us who know him know him. I dare say he is immersed in Tesla, Schauberger and the new quantum realities right now. He is definitely up there in the Kiwi Spiritual Club and visits in one of his psionic machines every now and then.

inanga

Whitebait - inanga

2009-06-17T14:47:00.000-07:00

Whitebait - inanga

My nickname is Whitebait, and one species of Whitebait found in New Zealand is called inanga. So above, at the start of this blog is an autographical portrait of me as Whitebait. It mainly concerns the last legal helicopter trip into South Westland in search of greenstone (pounamu). I'm listening to Redgum singing I Was Only Nineteen, a song about the Australian involvement in the Vietnam War, as I write the start of this blog. I suppose I am trying to put off talking about myself - that is the self part of the persona shown in its veiled nature to the world. So I'll dabble in Australian and Kiwi music until I get the courage up to write.

So it is easier if I download Whitebait's Partial Autobiography from my Documents portfolio. Here it is, just like magic:

Whitebait’s Partial Autobiography

Whitebait is my nickname in the Animal Club NZ, oddly because Whitebait is a fish – the imago stage of the NZ river smelt, a Galaxid species. There are approximately six species of whitebait – six because the others may have not yet been discovered up in those hidden New Zealand streams. Some of the whitebait as adult species are depicted in the composite illustration above – see Adult Whitebait Species somewhere near centre of the picture.

Like Topsy the painting continued to grow and describes a marvellous week in my life when I went down to Big Bay in far-off South Westland to go greenstone-helicopter hunting. That is hunting greenstone by helicopter not one made up of such. What I am about to tell you could be lifted straight out of a Barry Crump novel:

‘I met Ian Moamotauranga in the Bonsai Pizza Parlour in Greymouth. He was there for a wine and food appreciation with the Wine Society, one of Greymouth’s snobbier clubs. I was there still shaking from a marriage breakup back in Australia, and of course, was comfort-eating pizza. He invited me to go greenstone hunting at Big Bay in South Westland.

Ian held on to the last licence ever granted in New Zealand to prospect for greenstone. The Labour Government in NZ had decided that all rights to the taking of greenstone would revert to a composite group of Maori known as Ngai Tahu (Kai Tahu) in Southern Maoriori dialect - because they were good eating).

Ian had been prospecting for pounamu ever since he was a small boy and thought that he would end his greenstone-hunting in style. So at some point he went prospecting in Big Bay in style – with a Russian Mil-8 helicopter, a crew of four with an interpreter, Daryl the Turkey Strangler and Jack Honekakariki Ana, the greenstone finder.

They set up on the beach at Awarua in a yurt that overlooked a pool where they fished for the legacy of Poutini, greenbone fish. Out from the yurt you could see the full extent of aptly named Big Bay, a mass of millions of gigantic boulders – some of them were huge blocks of greenstone. The largest a Mil-8 could lift was five tonne, so the boulders exceeding that had to be cut with a diamond blade on the beach. Ian, Daryl and Jack have never revealed how much pounamu they retrieved from Big Bay but it was a lot. They even have film of the Mil-8 dropping a huge half boulder (which has since been relocated but not recovered).

When they were winding up the claim they returned in a Hughes 500, piloted by Morgie Saxton, son of the legendary bush pilot Dave Saxton. I was on that harrowing trip from the Cascade River and spent ten days with them. On this the last trip before the Ngai Tahu takeover we were to spend over a week scouring the nearby strip of beach looking for small boulders.

I found mine, the Wiremu stone (seen in the top right-hand corner of the photo) I felt great, especially when Ian announced: ‘Inanga, I think you have found a stone.’ It was a half-tonne block of pure jade, and highly prized by both Jack and Ian, who organized this expedition.’

Jack is in the picture with the Ace of Diamonds behind him, Ian has the 10 of Clubs. Together they make a Black Jack, one of my nicknames for Jack, who I went to school with. The Ace is appropriate as that was the name of Ian’s dad.

My son appeared in a bole of a gum tree, as he was forever on my mind at this stage. The Aboriginal Dreaming part linked it together, and my Dad sneaked in setting up nets to catch whitebait.

The right-Hand bottom corner is a collage from the Greymouth telephone book, and it mentions three species of whitebait – inanga, koaro and kokopu. Eels, predators of whitebait, lurk above the whitebait at centre top.

Lastly, but not least, is the set theory proof that any value of x is equal to zero, part of the zero equals infinity proof. (I was dabbling in pure maths and the mind at the time.) It has absolutely nothing to do with anything.

A = {a1, a2} a1 = a2

x = a1 – a2

A1 = {a1, a2, x}

a1 – a2 = x

=> x = 0

It is a ‘partial’ autobiography, so watch this space.

Acrylic, oil, gouache, lots of glitter, gold leaf, playing cards, cover of West Coast telephone directory, collaged photographs, cuttings from DOC pamphlet, 2006

If you read the earlier Plogs [Painting Blogs] you will see an article on Te Punakaiki. The Punakaiki and Pororari rivers are famous for their Whitebait. When I wrote for Lonely Planet Publications I included my Mum's recipe for cooking Whitebait patties. I don't eat them very often as it is tantamount to cannibalism, but the recipe may well still be included in the New Zealand travel survival kit you have.

In my last Plog Spooky Action at a Distance I talked about the Hand of God, the force behind the actions of all we mere mortals. Yesterday a friend dropped in from Patland and left a book The DaVinciMethod: Break Out and Express your Fire (Garret LoPorto, Da Vinci Publishing) for me to read. It is a quick, but informative read, and covers similar subject material to this Plog.

In particular, the author refers to many of the writings of Da Vinci. Garret LoPorto sums up the da Vincian process of surrender to the Hand of God:

Your job as an artist, inventor, entrepreneur, or leader is to transcend limits. You find the burden, the dead area of your life, and resurrect it.

Your resurrection is then shared with the world and inspires others to do the same.

Leonardo Da Vinci puts it in a similar fashion:

The depth and strength of a human character are defined by its moral reserves.

People reveal themselves completely only when they are thrown out of the customary conditions of their life, for only then do they have to fall back on their reserves.

Morgan Saxton, known to his mates as 'Morgie 600' (2 x Hughes 300s), died in late 2008 after the helicopter he was piloting crashed into Lake Wanaka. Morgie was the loveable rogue of the South Island skies, and the best helicopter pilot in those parts since Dave his Dad. He was our pilot from Cascade to Big Bay and out again that is described in this Plog. He ferried out the last blocks of legally taken greenstone from Big Bay and exhibited incredible 'bird-like' flying skills.

inanga

Daily Reflections

2009-06-13T14:13:00.000-07:00

Daily Reflections

Sunday morning here in Jville, Aotearoa (New Zealand). It is wet on the hills and the valley is interspersed with cloud and rainbow. Buddha was seen over the Heath Street Flats promising freedom in the form of the Dalai Lama (who, incidentally, doesn't answer emails):

Buddha taught the principles of the Four Noble Truths and these form the foundation of the Buddha Dharma. The Third Noble Truth is cessation. In this context cessation means the state of mind or mental quality which, through practice and effort, ceases all the negative emotions. It is a state in which the individual has reached a perfected state of mind which is free from the effects of various afflictive negative emotions and thoughts.

from The Dalai Lama's Book of Wisdom.

So get over the fact he doesn't answer emails - he is too busy liberating Tibet from the Chinese, and any discussion about liberating naked intelligence doesn't win financial support. So without the Dalai's wise council, which I can ill afford, I will have to examine the Dharma in paint and written words.

The TV is on in the background with a weird crop of imitators of the Mid West Bible-belt tradition. They love titheing, these creatures, as it adds money to bolster the hokey wisdom of their self-importance. I keep referring to the Third Noble Truth trying to suppress all negative emotion. The scripture knowlege of these Bible botherers is sometimes up to scratch but most fall back upon the Jewish scriptures of the Old Testament to add credence to their New Testament-based arguments.

Get over yourself inanga and become part of your own primitive religious beliefs in their own awesome realities, and don't judge what others do. Especially don't throw stones in the glasshouses of these theocratic monopolies. The Waitaha peoples of the Aotearoa Nation (see earlier blogs) were people who followed the Third Noble Truth of Cessation, the state of absence of negative emotion. They just 'were' and when they handed down their Prophecies to the people of Aotearoa, the main still existing part of the submerged continent of Mu, they accepted whatever was the will of the God of Peace, Rongo Marae Roa.

WE ARE WAITAHA

UNTIL NOW WE HAVE HIDDEN OUR BEGINNINGS, and all that followed, in the shadows. In this way we protected our knowledge in the silence of the Whare Wananga, the School of Learning of Waitaha.

Tuatara, the Keeper of Knowledge, guards the trails to the realms of mind and spirit that give us life. We lead you past Tuatara, our ever vigilant kaitiaki [guardian], and invite you to share the words and wisdom of our ancestors. For it has been decided it is time for our treasures to be brought into the light.

Ruia, Ruia, Ruia nga kakano i Ruia mai Rangi Atea... We do this for the children, and their children, and all who call this land home.

With these words we begin to tell for the first time the sacred Histories of the peoples of the Nation of Waitaha. Once we were like the sands upon the beaches, a great multitude who knew these shores. Now we are few, but we take courage from the taonga [treasures] we still hold, because we have kept intact the most ancient songs of the ancestors.

Waitaha is older than old. Much of their history of this land is our history. We kept safe the knowledge of the Tides of Life that flow from Marama, the Moon.

Our Star Walkers joined the stars to the land. Our Water Seeekers explored the rivers and tested their waters, and the remotest mountains knew the tread of their feet. Our Water Carriers planted kumara vines to clothe the nakedness of Papataunuku [ the Earth Mother]. Our Stone Shapers brought Pounamu [Greenstone] to the peoples of this land and others beyond the distant horizons. Our Sea Gardeners nurtured the many children of Tangaroa [God of Seas, Rivers and Lakes].

We are of Tane Mahuta [God of Birds, Trees and People], and we follow Rongo Marae Roa, the God of Peace.

''AND A PROPHECY WAS GIVEN TO THE PEOPLE...' WE CAME TO AOTEA ROA TO NURTURE THE LAND and walk in peace. And we followed the gentle ways of Rongo Marae Roa down the ages and sheltered the kete [basket] that held the sacred songs of our ancestors. There was joy in the land from generation to generation and then came the deepest sorrow.

Strange sails took shape before the wind and Tu Ma Tauenga [God of War] visited the land with his vengeful warriors. We did not take up weapons, for that is not our way, but in the strength of our minds we stood against them offering healing where there was pain and returning kindness for anger.

And the Fires of War seared the land. And our tupuna [ancestors] looked behind the rising waves of pain and out to the stars, and in words of the blinding prophecy proclaimed...

'Walk in the shadows, hide in the waters, move in the mists, step behind the rainbow to save the taonga [treasures]. Protect our ancestors. Hold the truth close and warm it with brave hearts, for pain will consume the land and the circle of our dreams will be broken. And all will seem lost beyond recall.

Kia kaha! Be strong! And the day will come when the taonga will be revealed once more. And we will walk tall with the knowledge in the kete and find joy in the colours of the rainbow. And the fires of truth will burn into the hearts of all the people of the land. And they will find the trails of gentleness and peace.

Kahuri te Ao... the world turns. And the circle of our dreamtime takes a new shape for a new dawn. And people of all colours join to bind what was broken and live in hope.'

In answer to these words we kept the Histories safe within the Whare Wananga. We protected the kete with our lives. We guarded them behind the walls of silence. We placed them in the care of Tuatara, Keeper of the Gates to Knowledge.

Until now we have said nothing when others wrote our Histories for us and brought error to the paths of truth. And while it became their truth, it was not ours. We held our counsel when our ancestress [Hotu Matua], who charted the long ocean trails, emerged from the pages as a man [Kupe nga]. We smiled when brave Captain Cook was first to bring the potato to these shores [it is from South America]. We sat quietly as the names of Waitaha, Rapuwai and Tu Mata Kokiri drifted out of our memory. And by our silence we protected the sacred kete and waited in the shadows.

Now the day has arrived for the people of the Nation of Waitaha to open the Kete of Knowledge to everyone. The time of sharing is upon us, and a prophecy is fulfilled, because what was written was foretold. That hand that moves knows a wairua [spirit] warmed in ancient days and entrusted with old wisdom. It merely writes what is already spoken for there is nothing new in the Universe.

Know that our truth and your truth may not be the same. We all have our own journey to make and many are the trails that lead to wisdom. We place our sacred Histories before you in the hope of fostering mutual trust and understanding. There is no greater gift we can give to the people of this land. These are our greatest treasures. Know what is given.

pages 11-12 Song of Waitaha

I do not want to editorialize too much on these very sacred words, but a few words in explanation might be helpful to the reader. The tribal names mentioned above are the Waitaha (the Nation), the Star Walkers (Te Aitanga o Te Rapuwai) and Tu Mata Kokiri (the Stone Shapers).

The men who preserved these Histories, our beloved ancestors now, are Iharaira Te Meihana, Wiremu Ruka Te Korako, Taare Reweti Te Maiharoa, Perenara Hone Hare, Heremia Te Wake and Renata Kauere. God bless their memories...

What has all this got to do with Buddha and the Dalai Lama? Well I painted a Greenstone Buddha. That is Greenstone Buddha beneath the detail Buddha Visits the Heath Street Flats, Jville. I know Siddhattha Gotama Shakyamuni (the Buddha) was born Lumbini (in present-day Nepal) and enlightened himself by eating great amounts of Ficus religiosa, the figs that fell from the fig tree he sat under. These were high in serotonin and enabled resurrection of his third eye.

I have sepia toned the image of the Greenstone Buddha, resplendent in a Kiwi feather cloak and shouldering a kete, in the guise he would have travelled to Aotearoa in, when he first saw Te Kohanga o Waitaha near Arthurs Pass in the South Island. When the Dalai Lama visited this area he was heard to remark that it was 'the second most sacred place on Earth'. I always think that 'second most' begs several questions, and if the Dalai Lama answered his emails, blogged or twittered, then I might be able to ask him what is the most sacred place on Earth.

Greenstone Buddha, in the process of being photographed, revealed another treasure in the glass of the painting's frame. My mate Simon the Peacemaker says that it is a Cistercian monk, come to join in this type of Sunday reflection. The image of the priest is in the top of this blog; it is not on the actual painting. It bears a remarkable resemblance to my late father, balding and all!

Anyway, what is the purpose of this all over the place blog?

It is about Reflecting on the oral Histories of two great traditions - the Waitaha of Aotearoa and Buddhism. Both have as their end result - peace.

Kahuri te Ao... The world turns.

inanga

Sufi Magic

2009-06-11T14:12:00.000-07:00

The Sufi knew real magic!

I was listening to Songs of the Auvergne again, or was I? Anyway, I was having this epiphany of sorts. I was gazing at a picture I had painted of the Ratana Church near Raetihi on the central plateau of the North Island. Vanessa Mae chimed out Destiny on her electric violin and the Sufi whirling dervishes, complete with fez and moustaches, came to dance, to spin, to share in joy.

The idea was there. A neon light sculpture appeared in a magazine and was eventually torn free. I photographed the painting Ratana Church and then printed it and cut it to fit, complete with the crescent and star at the top of the cupola of each spire. I surfed the net and found that an order of Sufi-inspired whirling dervishes was touring the world energizing crowds with their amazing spins in honour of God. They reached their arms aloft as they had been taught in their mehlevis throughout the Middle East. Here they received from God the understanding that He implored to them in the spirit of true admiration:

I was a hidden treasure and I wished (literally 'loved') to be known, so I created the universe that I might be known.

The Sufis were cut from the cathode ray tube, spiralling into the background, with their fezes emblazoning the hillsides like an outburst of rata. They were applied to the board with the neon, an alabaster memorial to the Ratana's gentle faith in God, gold spray paint, oozings of soft green and bold red acrylic paint, all swirling, all swimming, all spinning... The Sufi begin to merge into the landscape and then are at one with their hosts. All a painting can reflect is the instant of light from it that hits your retina in a nanosecond. The rest is Sufi Magic.

acrylic, spray paint, collage on board (framed by the artist) 2009

inanga

Back to the Blog after a cup of Bushells Instant granulated coffee with a teaspoon of Milo in it - the poor man's cappuccino here in Aotearoa. It is OK.

I first came across the magic of the Sufi World when I went to Konya on the Anatolian Plateau in Turkey. I was co-writing Lonely Planet's istanbul to Cairo with English author Andrew Humphreys. I didn't know much about the Middle East or Islam but names such as Dun the Egyptian, Rumi, Ja'lalludin and Jabir ibn Hay'yan, kept creeping into my consciousness. I read more and more, obviously fascinated with the incredible wealth of wisdom and my conversations with Andrew in istanbul [deliberate use of lower case for the 'i'] centred on Islamic architecture, where on the journey from istanbul to Cairo we would meet, and the beautiful out over the Sultanahmet balcony to the Bosphorus and Asia.

I had chanced upon a poem from, undoubtedly a clever Sufi poet, Jasper Memory. It is called:

PHi - The Golden Ratio

William Blake said he could see
Vistas of infinity
In the smallest speck of sand
Held in the hollow of his hand
Models for this claim we've got
In the work of Mandelbrot:
Fractal diagrams partake
Of the essence sensed by Blake
Basic forms will still prevail
Independent of the scale;
Viewed from far or viewed from near
Special signatures are clear.
When you magnify a spot
What you had before you've got.
Smaller, smaller, smaller, yet,
Still the same details are set,
Finer than the finest hair
Blake's infinity is there,
Rich in structure all the way -
Just as the mystic poets say.

I read the poem to myself at Gallipoli and looked at the intricate albeit historical structure of that campaign in the poet's wisdom. In short, I found that Jasper jogged my Memory for this now being blogged. As planned, Andrew and I met in istanbul for starters, then Damascus, Amman and finally Cairo. We both vowed that we would get to Petra, the rose-coloured city sculpted out of the sands of Jordan. I wanted to see where T E Lawrence charged with the desert arabs at Aqaba, and to see the Seven Pillars of Wisdom that inspired his masterpiece of writing.

The book never went into a second edition because it didn't quite fit Lonely Planet's marketing style. It may well have been badly written but the LP 'wheels' didn't have the heart to tell us that. I saw a mint copy of it on sale - Amazon I think - for 135 pounds, and used copies were about 35 pounds. I had fun working with Andrew on this project and I particularly liked the pyramids on the cover. I wonder if the Sufis were involved with the magic of their building. Check out calcite microcrystals in an earlier Blog. The eye's the limit!

inanga

Te Punakaiki

2009-06-09T14:24:00.000-07:00

What can one say about Te Punakaiki in a Blog. Lots. The detail above reflects the beauty in simplicity. If you walk towards the Pancake Rocks and Blowholes you will look out over these Nikau palms - the most southerly growing palm trees in the world - to the Tasman Sea. The coastline here is phenomenal and I hope I get to see it again next month when I go to my niece's 21st in Greymouth.

Princess Nikau gets a feature role amongst the Royal Trees in The Battle of the Trees, an imaginary war between the introduced Pinus species and the indigenous trees of the Nation (Aotearoa) on the plains of Waiouru in the central North Island. Oh, OK, you sense a bit of a Greenie theme creeping in; a potential tree hugger here! When I wrote for Lonely Planet Publications I managed to get the 'wheels' to include a small, but informative section on the Flora & Fauna of Aotearoa (New Zealand) at the front of the book. It has since gone from subsequent editions. I'd just like to say that I would have consulted it at this stage as I write this travel blog of sorts. Their current entry for Te Punakaiki has a bit of me in it "the region is blessed with... a Westland petrel colony, the world's only nesting site of this rare sea bird". As far as I can remember I was the only Lonely Planet writer (apart from Rob from Tucson, Az) who had any feathered ornithological interest.

My family now has a bach (weekend accommodation) near Te Punakaiki. It is a monastery of sorts, and it allows much time for contemplation of things spiritual. It has always been a very spiritual place, as it was once a School of Learning for the pre-Maori people of Aotearoa - the Waitaha. What I am about to tell you won't be found in any Lonely Planet type publication. I wrote the current Maoritanga part of their New Zealand guide and I ignored all the real prehistory (and they haven't altered it since). I am not trying to say that they are misguided in their guidance - they just do not know any better and nor did I at that time. And who am I to crow in the benefit of hindsight.

Current New Zealand history is bunk, to partially quote Henry Ford.

I am about to quote from pp 222-3, Chapter Nine, Song of the God Stone, from The Kete (Basket) of Knowledge of Paparoa in Song of Waitaha - the Number One of a Thousand books you should browse before you die. I explore myth with a Joseph Campbell-ian fascination, and Song of Waitaha is the best preserved myth (history) of all our previous epochs. It is sewn as the Mind Song, but a far more intricate weave than say Bruce Chatwin's Songlines about the Aboriginal cultures of Australia's central deserts. I have some editorials in [ ] brackets.

''Move swiftly on the river to join Te Tai Poutini, the fishing tide'

With the sail stretched, and the great tide surging on, we soon lay west of our old home of Whakarerea [Golden Bay]. However, the distance to that shore was so great only our memories pierced the haze between to reach our families. Then the tall mountains of Aotea Roa [South Island] filled our world. They were cloaked with snow and wore their mana proudly.

The Long Tide curved towards the coast to find Te Tai Poutini, the current that carried us to Hokitika, Arahura [river] and Waimea Whaka Hirahira [near Paroa], the children born of the 'marriage' of the stars, for we sailed on the joining of Poutini and Mere Pounamu in the heavens. By their light we came to the waters of the God Stone, to the mouth of Nga Wai o Marami [Arahura River], and we went ashore.

'Seek the blue duck plunging beneath the fast waters'

Our stay was short because Paparoa knew what he sought. It was a precious taonga [treasure] from the past; a carving in Pounamu [Greenstone]. The hand of Ngahue shaped it; his mind and spirit released the wonders within the God Stone. Ra Kai Hau Tu carried it to these waters, and it has waited eight generations for the dream to bring it to the people again.

In the place of the taonga, Paparoa left Rangiruru on the reef beyond the river. We put aside the name Tairea, and sailed as Tirea, to honour the Stone. Sailing north we passed Waimea Whaka Hirahira and came to mighty cliffs and pinnacles, and felt a strength in this land that would never let us go.

'Landfall ahead', cried Te Hau from his station above the splash of the plunging prow. And Te Punakaiki opened before us where the Pororari river joined the ocean. He sat quietly studying the channel to the estuary as we furled the great sail. Then, on his command, our blades lifted and fell as we moved strongly through the surf to run in hard against the tall cliffs and break through to calm waters.

The waka rested in the lagoon. We waited quietly, awed by lush green forest, nikau palms and bird song. Then the keening karanga of greeting soared out from Tirea. It rushed past the trees, echoed off the lofty bluffs and silenced the birds to announce our presence. We called inviting answer but none came across the waters.

Paddles flashed and we beached our waka and planted karaka trees to put our mana there. Then we lit a small fire to bring our warmth into the land. Its smoke rose through the towering bluffs as if to carry our joyful spirit on the wind to embrace our new home. Caves and rock overhangs gave us shelter. We remained warm and dry, and welcomed the rain, for it gave life to the forests and gardens.

Bright was the fire that wrote our story on the stone. The shadows thrown by the women of the waka left wonderful messages for those that would follow us. Huaki felt the warmth of those flames and gave her shape to guide the hands that drew the pictures on the walls.

We sailed in the mana of Paparoa, and honoured him by raising his tall figure in stone to look out on the waves forever. Only those who know how to stand to face the tides, know where to see him hidden in the land. In later years, when Paparoa went to answer the last karakia [prayer], we carried his bones to Te Aka Aka o Poutini [Cobden] to rest on the back of the Tuatara [The Twelve Apostle Range]. There he was with Huaki again and in the long nights ahead another would join them.

We came to Te Punakaiki to care for the God Stone that called to us from the river. Those with the heart and hands to carve, would sit at the feet of Paparoa to learn how to release the shapes within. And we others would carry the Stone to the peoples of the Nation to honour the dream of Ngahue and Poutini, for we are of the Stone People.'

Te Punakaiki, between Westport and Greymouth on the Coast Road, one of the most beautiful drives in the world. Yes, I do see it far more spiritually than when I wrote for Lonely Planet. And those beautiful nikaus are everywhere...

inanga

Me again. I must confess that one of my character defects is addiction. I am easily addicted to things - must be some sort of chromosone gone west! Well I confess, that even in this embryonic point of my relationship with Blogger I have become addicted to it.

The subject of today's Blog is calcite microcrystals. This has absolutely nothing to do with addiction... or then does it?

The writing is in the search, in the journey, and let me assure you - well and truly in the now. We have calcite microcrystals in the pineal glands of our brains. The pineal gland is the ajna chakra of all the most ancient Hindu traditions. It is our third eye. It is our gateway to Other dimensions. We have always had a pineal gland lodged in the very centre of our skulls. It is the engine room of your body that bears your soul around on this part of its journey.

As children, the calcite microcrystals in our pineal glands were crystal clear until around age twelve - they become covered over with a concretion (thin film of concrete). No more child's eye view of the world, nor a belief in faeries, Santa Claus, and the Easter bunny. In short, paradise or innocence lost.

Now don't be frightened away by the list of sources, just look them up on Spider Grandmother's intricately woven web. The keywords are second harmonic generators - any web search will give you all you need to know about getting your third eye powers back.

In short - open your third eye with a diet high in whey protein, the source of tryptophan. There are several reasons for all of this, probably the subject of a later blog on inangawiremu.blogspot.com or www.hogproductions.com.

The picture above Te Punakaiki is yet another Business Card attempt. I am still suffering a crisis of confidence in card selection so I decided to hide myself in swirls and gold leaf. It is a detail from a much larger painting Tarawera Eruption 1886.

A guy turned up from Germany looking like a scarecrow. He liked my paintings and asked for one to take back to Germany to put up in his university dorm. He was completing a doctoral thesis on Fungi. Truth! We ended up calling him Gerry the German Mushroom King because his last name was really difficult to pronounce but it had a 'king-like' tone to it.

I remember throwing paint onto a large piece of photographic paper. The paper had a real sandy feel to it. With the right music - and I confess that it was du Hast by Rammstein - the photographic sheet was going to take on new character. Gerry was a musician, amongst many other things, and he asked me if I had ever painted to the new German Rock. He said the theatre of it was the thing.

We Youtubed Feuer Frei and were pleasantly surprised. The perfect music for a volcanic eruption. Later we had Rammstein playing with, rather ironically, a Battle of Britain dogfight in the background. Yellow was poured with red and orange at the point of eruption and defensive lines of lahars were breached.

Some one up in the sky seemed to be controlling the whole thing. Colour went where it was meant and as the mere doer of the action I didn't argue. I remember also scratching, etching I suppose, with a Stanley knife point. At this moment I am wondering where I left the .jpg.

And then I remembered where I had first discussed the subject of calcite microcrystals in the pineal gland third eye. It was then, a few years back, that I was first alerted to the subject of second harmonic generators and the benefits of whey protein in removing the concretions from around our laser beam in our pineal third eye. It all had something to do with seeing the light as I remember him saying. He recommended the work of Baconnier Simon, Lang Sidney B. and De Seze Rene Ben-Gurion University of the Negev or lang@bgmail.bgu.ac.il. Their article on Electromechano-transduction describes it all much better than I can blog it.

I threw some gold leaf at Tarawera Eruption 1886 and when it had dried Gerry the German Mushroom King rolled it up and put it in a tube to take home to Germany. Later I was alerted to the Wizard in the swirl. Life's like that - a bit of a swirl at times.

It was fun blogging the memory, a grand example of sum frequency generation if there ever was one.

acrylic, gouache, watercolour and goldleaf on photographic paper 2006

inanga

2009-06-07T14:10:00.000-07:00

Lighthouses at the End of the World

I live in Aotearoa - the jewels of the South Pacific. Island gems connected to the universe through Indra's net. For most of my life I have searched for that flicker of light that brings me home from whichever part of the cosmos my God has taken me to. Coming off a mountain all you may have is the flash of a torch in a camp far below you. Coming back from paddling around the Coromandel it may be the lights of Tairua and Pauanui heads. In West Africa it could be the lights of Ile de Goree through a fierce storm. When you live on the edge you search for the light. Often it was the lights of some town on the West Coast as I flew from Australia to New Zealand. Quite often it was a lighthouse. When I wrote the first edition of Lonely Planet's guide to Western Australia it was the Cape Leeuwin lighthouse in the Southwest.

I developed this fascination for lighthouses and wherever I was in the world I would try and get to see as many lighthouses as possible. OK, some of us have severe character defects - me included. When I started to paint lighthouses started to creep in. Perhaps I wanted to ensure that while I was locked in the action of painting I could escape by spotting the light from the lighthouse on the canvas.

One of the most fascinating lighthouses I have ever visited is the Cape Reinga lighthouse at NZ's northern tip. It is a very spiritual place and this lighthouse is the last light of their homeland that departing souls see as they look back from the Three Kings Islands. OK now we are talking lighthouses here. Above is a fine detail of this lighthouse as the sun sets unimpeded by nothing but the far horizon. I feel part of a poem coming on. It is from my long fantasy poem The Battle of the Trees:

I stir these essences
In a careful motion
Before adding
The last flower
Of the Nation
The penultimate part
Of this magic creation
Pua-o-te-reinga
Ringaringa
Has come far
From the waters’ meeting
Where the tides Of Rehia and Rehua
Exchange sides
He comes to woo Weeping ladies
Seeking The flower of Hades
Each escaping spirit
Passing Te Rerenga Wairua
Seizes the chance
To catch a waft
Of the forbidden scent
Of this creeper
They scramble even deeper
To reach and pluck
The flower of eternal luck
Before the last gasp
Before they plunge
Headlong
Into the water’s grasp

This beautiful plant grows all over the promontory upon which the lighthouse is constructed. Lighthouses are a symbol of wisdom, light and sanctuary. No doubt the ringaringa will tell us about the passing parade of souls, only if they could talk. How they passed the Light at the end of this World to go on to the light of manyworlds.

I am still smarting over business card Sunday. I should have known better than to try and work on a Sunday. It must be contradictory to the spirit of one of the numerous dharma. The issue remains unresolved. Even a Google full search, call it an Internet strip search, didn't reveal any decent multiple-card to print packages (without some necessary monetary payment).

The second lighthouse is Pencarrow on the most southern coast of the North Island. It is another detail, from Spring from a Season series. I painted the series on wood and attempted to utilise the grain of the wood in each painting to achieve seasonal effect. I will cover that series in another Art Blog if time permits.

Have an exhibition to prepare for and Blogging can be a huge tool of the procrastinator. Blogging fine art, however, is much fun, and not to be taken lightly. I had a long association with William Simpson, British Navy navvie. He was one of the first of Britannia's sailors to lose his life on the shores of Aotearoa. He is buried at Sailor's Grave, near Tairua, on the Coromandel. Let him speak for himself - he was fond of lighthouses.

Sailor’s Grave

Billy Samson the sailor
Is in grave danger
From the greedy land-grabbers
…it doth seem…
Someone wants to steal
This tupuna’s right
The right to rest in paradise…
It seems…

His peace from him
They wish to take
A very ‘grave’ mistake
So it seems…

Someone won’t allow
Billy Samson
To spend his eternal days
…in an undisturbed paradise…
…dreaming of dreams…
….making schemes…
Not for much longer
…now
…it seems…

In his paradise
Above misnamed Te Karo stream
In a grave
‘Watery’ say some
‘Salty’ say others
‘Earthy’ may say you
He lies there
With the Aldermen
And the Mayor
In full view
As the town hall clock
Strikes
Quarter to two.

Woken from his dreams
He looks out at paradise
Paradise now lost
So it seems…

But never underestimate
A boy sailor
To him it’s never too late,
…to miss duty whistle,
…or the call of a mate.

Our Billy is a tough nut
‘e almost survived
A kauri tree
Fallin’ on his head.

A weighty
Single-mast spur
Destined for the British Navy
Knocked our Billy dead
It wasn’t cannonball
Nor a lump of lead
But a kauri tree
That split apart
Poor Billy’s head…

Hurrah!

Billy rest in peace now
Above Okaroro stream
Looking to the Aldermen
In his dreams of dragons
And faraway parts
Barrels of rum
Tantalising ladies
And parade ground drums.

It seems…

Billy wakes with a start
As someone pushes a shovel
Deep into his heart…

‘You bloody mongrels
Tramplin’ over Billy
Is going to be difficult
More difficult…
More difficult than mean
Damn difficult if seems…’

‘Ya’ see, fate it seems…
Is soon to be fulfilled
It was promised to me
Promised as such
In 1842
On that fateful day in May
When me…
Billy the sailor was killed
When I….
Billy the sailor passed away.’

Billy is incensed now…
And he roars:

‘And who do you think you are?
What gives you the right?
To come ‘ere
And trample all over me grave
In the dead of night?’

‘What do ya’ expect me to do?
Turn in me grave for ya’?
Ya’ need a might more than money matey
Until a sailor will…
…ya’ want me to,…
…me to swap paradise for pig’s swill?
Never…

Ya’ see
Tane Mahuta was that tree
That kauri…
…the one that fell on me head
In 1842
That fateful day
When I passed away
When I went to me grave
In 1842
Here at Sailor’s Grave
In early May.’

Billy lies in peace now
At Sailor’s Grave
Tane Mahuta and the other gods
Promised him that
They promised him that forever
After that grim day in May
They promised him that forever
He could lie here
Intestate, in peace
He ‘Billy the late’
Above Okaroro Bay,

Consider the danger
Disturber of Billy’s bones:

Never wander Pohutukawa stream
Or Okaroro beach
Or venture towards the sailor
Never alone!

Truth will always endure
Of that be sure.

When you hear a sailor moan:
I’ve a very sore ‘ead
Stop all that digging
Ya’ disturbing the dead
Can’t ya’ let a man rest in bed
The gods to me said:
‘He may live here in peace
Forevermore.’
When they told me
They said they were sure.

Leave Billy Samson to rest
Here in peace in paradise
Forevermore
In his grave…
…above Sailor’s Grave beach…
…beside his gentle Okaroro stream…
…dreaming dreams…
Forevermore
As the god’s deem.

Leave him to gaze beyond the shore
To the Mayor
And his Aldermen
Assembling for meeting
As the seagulls exchange greetings.

And when time permits
Same time as council sits
Billy joins his black-backed gull mates
On Okaroro’s shore

For five o’clock tots of rum
Pretty ladies’ embraces…
…a whole lot of fun.

Forevermore
Above Okaroro’s shores
For
Ever
More…

Of that, be sure!

Inanga Wiremu (Whitebait) signing off

Buddha and Business

2009-06-06T17:21:00.000-07:00

Of Buddha Beach, Blogging & Business Cards

I accidentally posted this - the subject of my next blog - and am loath to remove it. I will edit the post later and get to a pet topic of mine How to make business cards and eschew attachment and desire.

posting later...

So I ask God through the beautiful voice of Denise van Outen Tell me on a Sunday please. Andrew Lloyd Webber is a genius and the web makes his prodigious talent easily available (and the incredible writing skills of Tim Rice).

Business cards - how does one produce a business card - in all seriousness - offer it to another human being and expect to be taken seriously.

'Hey, it's not me here I am on the Card!' That's me inanga, that is my name, see, that is the Hand of God there (see from the painting) that I took from Buddha Beach, Oriental Bay, Wellington. 'And that is my address there, that's my job, and yeah, the hand in the picture is that of God.' 'Oh, my actual hand is holding the card, it's really me here.' I point to myself and dissolve in self-ridicule.

The dilemma is - in order to help sell my art, and keep me eating in 3-d I have to sell art and writing. I would just rather blog them away for free but that is not that realistic. The best business card I was ever given (and depicted above) was my Lonely Planet author's card. I still remember getting it. I altered the one above to hide my true identity.

Well the thing I loved about this card was the painting by Val Tellini of the Lonely Planet staff in Melbourne, Australia. I didn't seem at all embarrassed when I handed this business card to another human being. And like my right hand in a gesture of respect, it was never proferred lightly. Why? Because I valued the image - in this case Kathmandu, Nepal - greatly. An artist had worked long to create the perfect background on which to drop one's then life circumstances.

I did a card for Miles from Nowhere and that result is above also. He is forever telling me that 'It is all good, it is all good'. He is in no way being tempted by the Big Carrot, Ohakune that bears the title 'Salvation'. As co-founder of www.hogproductions.com, and from being a student of the great Cecil Beaton, he had the last say on the image to be used. He bilocated from Nowhere to Somewhere Here to take the image. I could mess up its content but not the image - that is always the photographer's proof. I didn't mind doing this Business Card for Miles from Nowhere because it preserved his anonymity. After all, he is from Somewhere - we all have to be Somewhere at the point where our toes meet the earth. Therefore Somewhere is definitely Nowhere. Down on the Poutini Coast of the South Island they have Notown and if you look at the map it is definitely Somewhere. Miles from Nowhere would probably tell me that 'multidimensional supraholographically synchrosimilar unfoldments through A - O cycles like us' don't need Business Cards.

And what wwere the Buddhas thinking when as the two Taras they lay sunbathing on Oriental Bay Beach - certainly not about Business Cards! But then again, where did I get the idea for my Business Card with the Hand of God on it. It was sent in a flash to be by the Triple Moon-goddess Ngame from herself represented in her staff of office in Buddha Beach. So much for saying that you can't be in two places at once. What was Buddha thinking?:

All that we are is the result of what we have thought: it is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts.

By oneself evil is done; by oneself one suffers; by oneself evil is left undone; by oneself one is purified. Purity and impurity belong to oneself; no one can purify another.

I thought it imprudent to wake them as I applied real sand carefully around their beach towels.

If anyone out There Somewhere or Nowhere can tell me whether Business Card usage violates the spirit of the Dharma please respond to this Blog. As I said I prefer to let the sleeping Buddhas lie...

inanga

The Day After Grace Kelly Died

2009-06-06T13:54:00.000-07:00

It is Sunday in downtown Jville New Zealand. I am amazed by the brilliant minds that grokked Blogger. Whoever you are out there in the aether 'I dips me lid to ya'.

You are genii all...

Imagine you invented a system whereby a Blogger such as me can sit in their living room and write to the world and thus the universe. It is Sunday and it is the day to talk to God. It is the day after Grace Kelly died. Appropriate music - Stabat Mater, a kyrie, Requiem, Gregorian Chant, Buddha Bar - will be provided by Youtube, in league with Mozilla Firefox and Google.

And somehow you Blogger site people wove all this magic together. If I want to retrieve a photo of one of my paintings on line in Picasa and drop it in this Blog it is almost an instantaneous act. The ability to edit writing, recast thoughts, and allow the imagination to roam free are your gifts. You allow us to roam free in the universe and talk to imaginary friends, and above all else to our Creator. The art of navigation through the web of Spider Grandmother is not easy and it entails a full understanding of Bell's Theorem of Nonlocality. In essence, you guys write the Lonely Planet guide to the Webaverse. Everything is connected:

The universe is a net of jewels;
In Indra's net
Each jewel
Reflects every other jewel.

I can't help thinking of Ken Wilbur's the 'one taste'. In our quantum reality everything is connected to the source that is our God. It is our supraholographic reality - the fecund evolution from a simple sound Aum and one split photon (the mere seeds of any grand God idea), faster than light, spiralling out, and intertwining, Julia set-fashion, in a Mandelbrot mandala until it all begins again. The Clash support these thoughts of spiralling as they belt out Magnificent Seven from their album Sandinista. [Ed note: they must be one of God's picks for the most influential bands of this small part of the cycle.]

Yesterday when I blogged The Day Grace Kelly Died part of me died also. I thought for a moment that the remnant part of her soul in this realm would be reduced to canisters of films in library vaults and reruns on Classic movies channels. But I know it is all connected. I can begin my imaginative romance with Grace Kelly again, long after her soul soared to 5-dimension, because the jewel she was, always is. Whenever we connect our souls to all around us, all souls intertwined, we have that state of Grace that Jimmy Stewart drawled so eloquently about.

I cling to the notion here that 'past is present is future' as a suitable navigational tool out of this. 'Tat tvam asi'. I look out to the world and ask the question of God 'What are you?'. God answers, concisely and categorically (in Sanskrit) 'I Am That, exactly that which you think you are looking at.' God says desist and my will is subsumed...

Here is a poem from my lady Phil:

Skies Full Of Betty Blue

She painted her lips a ruby red
Said 'Je t'aim baby it’s got to give'
With her bag full of decorations
She’s on her way
Telling you to plant the tree
From Christmas day

She’s a women
A child so much more
She’s a lover
A mother so much more
Your heart apart she tore
Your heart apart it tore

Her skies full of Betty Blue
Fell apart in front of you
Like a sax that kills your heart
She left you dying in the dark

Belladonna you cry out
You’re the drug I can’t
Live without
Now you’re crawling, crying,
In the dark
Looking for the pieces of
Your heart
Well femme fatale
She’s taken them away
She left you to die
In the light of day

Well back to the Blog. Sorry that you are reading italics. The Toolbar won't allow a grab and font change. This could be a small glitch back at Blogger Control HQ. Who knows, and who cares, as it works most of the time. By the time this Blog is completed they may have fixed it. Once it is in the aether it belongs to God anyway.

He's Called Bob!

He's Called Bob, the painting on paper at the start of this Blog, started with a visit to Wellington Cathedral in Molesworth Street on an Easter Sunday. (I just consulted a copy of the New Zealand Lonely Planet that I had worked on to see the exact street location). They had this postcard there - it depicted a collection of the art of school kids - and its main theme was what did they think God looked like. The results were interesting and one of the kids - top left hand corner - remarks that he knows Him and he's called Bob.

It is an amazing thing - almost like Blogger - the imagination of the child. It is now established fact that at age 12 or so their pineal glands (third eyes) will calcify and they will no longer see God in a pure, innocent and unfettered way. When I cut up the postcard, resized it and selected parts of the childhood reflections on the nature of God I did it with due reverence to the innocence of their imaginations. They are all angelic painters in their own right.

What do you know there is still a glitch out there in cyberspace on Blogger with the italic/roman font flick.

Back to Bob. I particularly love the comment that Bob sees everything we do, because of course we are an intrinsic part of the looking. I also love the kid looking through the hole in the fence. And then there is the Baby Factory!

I put this collage together in a meditative state as I wanted to get as close to that childhood innocence as I painted. Thank you to the kids who gave me that 'third eye' experience, through your still functioning third eyes.

Time to sign off from The Day After Grace Kelly Died. Thanks to the chance I have had to pray and meditate as I write this Blog, I was allowed a bit of pineal gland operation and the sight of innocence. The application of paint, glitter and love was easy.

acrylic, watercolour, glitter, oil colour and gifted childlike collage on A4 photocopy paper, 2006

inanga

2009-06-05T14:20:00.000-07:00

The
Day
Grace
Kelly
Died

I worked last night at a Wellington central city backpackers' as night porter. It is 9 am on Saturday morning and I am about to go to bed for the day. I am not complaining that I have been up all night. The ability to stay awake becomes a yogic task at times but always with the will of God to the fore, Inshall'ah.

I have to present five or six framed pictures for exhibition and sale at ROAR Studios by next Wednesday (10 June 2009). That is my dilemma.

I have blogged each one except The Day Grace Kelly Died. By blogging I mean exactly what you are reading here on inanga wiremu's blogspot - this sort of thing. The blog. I write the usual guff that is put beside a painting - media used to paint, date completed, who owns it, size, what it is on (canvas, paper, cardboard, etc) and whether or not it is framed. Then I add the events that ran through my collective consciousness as I painted it. What was going on in 3-d at the time?

What harmonic was I listening to when I painted The Day Grace Kelly Died. Was it Bic Runga singing Without You or Suzanne Vega a capella with Diner? It was Karita Mattila singing Bailero from Canteloube's Chants d'Auvergne. It had to be one of the above to be fitting of a Princess like Grace Kelly.

I need to consult wikipedia right now to clear up one of my own misconceptions about the death of Princess Grace of Monaco on 14 September 1982 (after a vehicle accident the day before). In the process I found this beautiful eulogy by Jimmy Stewart:

You know, I just love Grace Kelly. Not because she was a princess, not because she was an actress, not because she was my friend, but because she was just about the nicest lady I ever met. Grace brought into my life as she brought into yours, a soft, warm light every time I saw her, and every time I saw her was a holiday of its own. No question, I'll miss her, we'll all miss her, God bless you, Princess Grace.

I remember painting this piece as it was yesterday and I am helped along by Tina Arena singing Sorrento Moon. I collage the shoreline of Monaco into the centre of the cardboard I am painting on. Another siren beauty, Cleopatra stands watch as the pyramids cut from a previous piece I had painted entitled Painting Johnsonville Red. I'll blog that later, or include it in a Rainbow Series on www.hogproductions.com. Stonehenge creeps in to the right bottom corner, from a painting I did for Stonehenge Aotearoa (near Carterton in the Wairarapa). The sea turns azure blue, the sky is gold and royal purple, the town in the foreground is nephrite green. At the moment of the princess's death God bestows his eponymous Grace in a gold-encrusted paua shell.

What was the misconception I was trying to solve? I mean nothing ill with this. I had been told that Diana, Princess of Wales, had attended the funeral of Princess Grace as the only representative of the British Royal family. I had also been told of the irony of the death of these two princesses. Diana died in 1997 in the now famous vehicle accident in Paris, France. Princess Grace had a stroke, crashed her vehicle in the French countryside, and died the following day.

I hastily framed The Day Grace Kelly Died for exhibition and sale, and I am reasonably happy with the end result. I suggest you Youtube Grace Kelly to see what an incredible actress she was. Her actions on behalf of Josephine Baker were highly commendable and led to them becoming life long friends. I am going to read Princess Grace's full biography because this short journey with her has left me intrigued.

I seem to recall that my friend Miles from Nowhere photographed her when he was with Cecil Beaton. Our Harry Potter Brendon might have told me that, or was he just sharing a wizard's tale at the time. Anyway, if I was a photographer I would have wanted to portray her. I suppose my paints will complete that task for me, God willing.

gold spray paint, collage, gesso, acrylic, watercolour, paua shell (framed by the artist), 2009

Time for this blogger to blog off to bed. Thanks for listening...

inanga

2009-06-04T13:40:00.000-07:00

Taking Steps

It is 5 June 2009 here in Jville Kiwi Land and I have just turned on the GOM player and am being served up Bedroom Eyes by Kate Ceberano, one of the classiest Aussie chanteuses ever - a sort of Vanessa Mae of the Outback. I hope she will forgive me for that!

Back into the labyrinthine intricacies of Spider Grandmother's world wide web. I have to warn you carefully and I offer my best counsel - It is a jungle out there.

I am online reading Sananda's I AM THE WAY. Please let me share:

It is said that I am the way, and it is so! None can come save by me for I am the keeper of the gate and the guard at the door, and I guard my secrets well. The time has come when the Earth shall move out into a new placement; she shall have a new orbit and a new sun, and a new moon. She shall then be given into resting before being again given unto peopling and a time of beginning again. She shall be restored unto newness and those who will be sent shall be a new people, and they shall know that which is of the Father. There shall be a new Garden and there shall be the Father's kingdom upon the Earth. There shall be the one who will reign supreme, yet man shall work as "one" in harmony, peace and love. Ah yes, there shall be peace. Each man shall be peace unto himself, and he shall be as the keeper of the peace for all. He shall be as the lawgiver and the keeper thereof, for he shall know that which is ethical and he shall abide thereby. There shall be none among man which shall covet another's possessions, nor shall they be given to know hatred.

'IT IS ESTABLISHED THAT THE NEW KINGDOM SHALL BE ESTABLISHED UPON THE "LOTUS" WHICH NOW LIES WITHIN THE BED OF THE PLACE KNOWN AS THE PACIFIC (THE SEA OF PEACE). THERE ARE PORTIONS OF THIS MOTHER COUNTRY WHICH HAS NEVER BEEN SUNKEN BENEATH THE TIDES AND WHICH WILL BLOSSOM IN GLORY AND NEWNESS.

Sananda continues: There will be a time of peace and harmony, and it shall reign for the cycle which shall last for twelve thousand years. Again, she shall be in a new cycle which shall bring in another order. Ye have moved forward into her second year [Ed. note: now the 22nd year] in the manner of the present "timing". Ye would now be at approximate three hundred seventeen of thy second year of measurement. So be it! For the ending/beginning are the scribes recording for the history is being written as we write upon the pages. These things coming forth upon thy physical senses shall be as tragedy at the time; yet considering that which is eternal, there must be no "fear" for there is naught such as beginning of ending.+ The ending of an experience and the beginning anew; what would there be to cause "fear"? I guide of thine way; simply use great wisdom in thy course choice."

I am always blown away by such words of wisdom. The web is enmeshed in all levels of wisdom. It is as the Akashic Records have opened. In the above passage Sananda highlights the role of the Pacific region in the coming Earth changes. I couldn't help but think that He was referring to New Zealand - our beautiful Aotearoa - as being the remnant of the Mother Country that 'shall blossom in glory and newness'.

Sananda's words of wisdom are so beautiful and I have painted a picture in honour of them (see above).

The fun part of a Blogger's existence begins here. I am off to Picasa via the net to retrieve the picture from my Picasa web Albums. All those megapixels are going to be crushed up, spat along a wire, air, etc and dragged into the box where I am typing right now! Sort of blows your mind. It (the pic) ended up at the head of this article, and you know what, right at this moment I couldn't give a damn as I am craving coffee! The draft autosaves in the Edit Post box so I know I can walk away for a minute, return, and resume in that moment alone. I need some music so I minimise the screen to get to the GOM selections.

Oh, I admit it I am just trying to grok this reality. Armchair quantum realists with the vaguest understanding of Godel's proof and Bode's law will understand. Spooky action at a distance...

The coffee is Greggs Granulated cheapest brand. It tastes good.

Looking for some Nimba, a local Wellingtonian West African Ensemble and Troupe. I developed a love for the djembe when I wrote for Lonely Planet in West Africa and Andy, a guy from my Friday night job, plays in this West African band. Come across the Twelve Girls Band from China. Well worth a look on Youtube. (They play the most incredible range of instruments, most of which we have never seen.)

Time to post and get on with 3-D reality; it is a realm where my defects of character really come to the fore.

inanga

As a self-styled poet painter I have to live up to the poet tag and I forgot to put this in my last post. Here is an offering, not yet burnt.

THE ROSE GARDEN

A rose by any other name
…is a rose - just the same…

Rose Marie, quite contrary
Blood-red sister Rosemary
Wondrous sight
At sixty dollars a dozen

The rose garden
Circular and abundant
Cleverly separated
Bodies from souls
Hearts were emptied,
Leaving gaping holes

The King cried
”My kingdom for a rose”
He was guillotined as rose petals fell.
His last words echoed in this dell.
‘Where is my Jane Austen?
Where is my Shakespeare?
”Where is my Maggie Barry of the bright red hair?”

Drunvalo Melchizedek
Dissected a rose
With meticulous intent
And discovered a truth
Never meant:
Crimson ascents
Spectacular descents
The holy unspeakable name of God
…couldn’t describe the beauty of a rose.

In the beginning was the Word
The flower of life -
An infinite majesty in the guise of a rose
The petals shake
In intoxicated frenzy
Scenting the perfumed breath of life

The sun rose as
Strawberry Ice
Golden Delight of Sierra Glow,
Icebergs, Mon Cheri
Veritable Coronas of exploding superstars
Ingrid Bergman shared
This hallowed ground with Parkdirektor Riggers

Champagne on Ice darling!
From Remuera to the Regensberg
As Anna Zinkeisen and Mrs Herbert Stephens
Sang Blue Moon and Red Rhapsody
And Songs of Michelango, Erotica and Sympathie

And Nancy Hayward
All westward and way less
Called “Coconut Ice, please, waiter
It’s for Mrs Majorie le Grice.

Just Joey or Forever Amber
It’s majick of the Vienna Woods
Exotic goods bound for Amsterdam
Peter Frankenfeld
Suffered from amnesia
And forgot, not surprisingly
His neighbour’s name
Floribunda Kordes Friesia

Katherine Mansfield made Ripples
At the Moulin Rouge
Dancing oranges and lemons
The Racy Lady on a Fragrant Cloud
Sang a duet to an appreciative crowd
Old masters from Maria Callas to
Claude Monet
Sang or painted their way
To a Sweet Juliet, Dark Lady, a Mary Rose or a Galway Bay

Warm wishes Madame President
I see you are now resident
In our rose garden
Here you will see
Birthday presents
Flowers for a shroud
Pavarotti’s over there
Not far from the Land of the Long White Cloud

Compassion
Reflections
Dreaming
Special Occasions
School Girl and Leaping Salmon
The wedding rose
Lest we forget and last but not least
Peace!

Flower of life from the ashes rise
Phoenix rising, desert rose
Roses everywhere to see
In this garden free
Breeze-free at the base of the wishing tree

Inanga Wiremu 2007 Wellington Botanic Gardens

Creation Song

2009-06-03T20:41:00.000-07:00

Creation Song

Iô Mata Ngaro, in the midst of the created void, dreamed of completeness. In the depths of sleep, Iô began to sing the most beautiful karakia, and the lilting sound became the harmony of creation. And the darkness of the void wove into spirals, spinning one way and the other, the sighing of in breaths and out breaths, before bursting forth as light. Iô smiled and wished that the children of the dream would witness universal love.

At first, there is the pitch black of unilluminated obsidian, then there is the god stone, and then the light of the sun bursts through the stone turning the land of he people bright green. Tane Nui o Rangi fashioned Hine Ahu One, the earth formed maid, from the red clay of Kokowai and there were people of the land. And the tears of joy of the people became rivers flowing over the breasts of Papatuanuku, and their spirits united with Tangaroa, separated by a lone cabbage tree from the sky of Ranginui. And the light was thus the gift of Tane, and therefore the people were of Tane.

Maui the demi-god, greatest fisherman of all, fished Whai Repo, the stingray, from the depths of the waves. From the island of the gods, who had been turned to greenstone, he saw the stingray spread its wings. Maui sought out Tunaroa, the serpent eel, after the eel had ravished his wife Hina, daughter of the Moon. He chanted this incantation at the ninth tier of the stream –

‘Mata Tuna ki te rango tuaiwa, ko, ira i! ko, ira i! ko ira i! to ro wai’

When the serpent eel Tunaroa lay lifeless, Maui threw its head into the sea and it became ngoiro, the conger eel. He threw the tail into the stream and it became tuna of the freshwater, and its blood gave colour to the rimu, matai, tawai, totara and toatoa, the bulrush raupo, supple-jack, and the berries of the titoki. Some of the blood coloured the feathers of kakariki and pukeko. From the hairs of the eel’s head grew aka aka, the climbing plant.
Maui’s descendants were fishermen, and they fished not for islands, but for the serpent eel’s tail. They were at one with the water, and followed the cycle of the moon, and the pull of the tides that drew them irresistibly, to the water’s edge, time and time again. They were taught the secret trust between the moon and the earth, for one could not be without the other. Both had to live within the harmony of the spheres.

And on the moon's bright face there is a line, and it starts to wriggle, and it dances a jig, a merry jig, a circle dance, summoning the offspring of the ancestral eels to leave their dying parents, to journey to the rivers and lakes of the world, where the hirama and the wisest of other fishermen are waiting. And all are guided by their knowledge of the secrets of the sea, stars and cosmos. The fishermen are waiting for the bounty for their wives and children, knowing that their friends, their lives, are returning to them from a common homeland. The eternal tides pull them together.

And those now living, they learn of love. And love is a maiden, soothed by gentle rain, baked in a scorching sun, directed by the gods, a face covered in mud and perfume, in her time, and after. And the warrior casts fear into the faces of foe, the farmer casts his seed, the birdsong ignites the forests of volcanoes, and the fishermen cast their nets of hope into the most hopeless of seas.
Love is a maiden and hate is a warrior without hope. And the ancestors come to dance, having discerned the very length of time itself. Eternal, fraternal, maternal and linked to the stars, the maiden sleeps with the warrior, and stars are flung further into the cosmos. Far flung, but a distance much shorter than that existing between past and present.
And the line on the moon danced a jig. Merry was the time before the warrior. When we danced and we sang, in the light of the stone, we were one. We took only what was needed to sustain our lives. The fishermen danced with the maidens, and the tears ran down the cheeks of the maidens, sustaining, nourishing the world. And the mud on the cheeks of the maidens turned their faces to womanhood, and the sweet smell of perfume gripped the fishermen’s nostrils, before the old women died.

And all intermingled. And the living swapped place with the ancestors in this world and another, and the ancestors rushed to fill the bodies of the newborn. And the exchanges were made time and time again.

And the moon became a fusion of dead, living, born and reborn, and all dancing. Singing as nets were pulled towards the banks, singing laments for the dead, enacting a fearsome war dance, caressing a naked body, running in joy along a beach, soaring through the sky, falling to the ground exhausted - a fusion of all, sun, moon and stars, and ceaseless long tides.

The moon disappeared behind a cloud and when it re-emerged the line had gone. There was no more singing or dancing. There was silence, evil magic, and clouds of war. This is the story of the hirama, those who fished for eels for their chiefs, loved ones, and tribes…

Kahuri Te Ao… The World Turns…

* 'Eye of the Tuna, regard the ninth heaven, over there, life! over there, life! over there, life! For Ira is the water of all tides’

Hi, can't resist getting back on this amazing piece of technology. Above is the first pages from a novel that I am currently editing for publication. It's tentatively called The Night Fishermen. At the top is a picture from one of the settings in the novel. If you like it, let me know... it's called Pink & White Terraces. NZ once had the Pink and White Terraces, described as 'the eighth Wonder of the World' but they were covered by ash in the Tarawera Eruption on 10 June 1886.

inanga

2009-06-03T16:20:00.000-07:00

The Day of the Triffids, Ohariu Valley

I hate wind farms – and so does our God of the Winds, Tawhiri Matea. He particularly dislikes the arrangement around Palmerston North. Anyway I am doing the usual checking of my letterbox at the flats to see if there is another ten day notice to leave (for non-payment of rent) and there is this pro-wind farm advice for residents of the Johnsonville – Ohariu region.

The scissors appeared from nowhere, and like these giant aether swipers, started cutting. Three of the monsters metamorphosized and begged to be allowed to ravage the Makara and Ohariu regions. A few strokes of gesso, acrylic and a swirl of black in judicious spirals and the background to day of the triffids emerged. Then the triffids, and the cross. The people of the valleys appeal to Tawhiri Matea to hold aloft a Celtic Cross, gifted by the avatar Christos, to stay the invasion. The frame was ready made as the original picture – nothing to do with the subject matter – came from it.

Gesso, acrylic, oil, collaged triffids and Celtic Cross, 2008

Hi there on June 4 2009. It's me, inanga, again. I'm in hard trying to learn this amazing blog world. Amazing because it allows any of us to send our thoughts out to the world from little ol' New Zealand (Aotearoa). 'The poet and the painter, No allowance for the other...' and something about the failing light illuminating the mercenaries creed.

Exhibiting , possibly, five pieces next week for sale in a gallery ROAR in Wellington and frightened that this belt-tightening recession has scotched the populace's penchance for fine art. Whatever God wills... Begnissimo solo tibi cordis devotianum quotidanum facio. The pic posted above Day of the Triffids is for Miles from Nowhere who hasn't seen or photographed the piece. He does the photography for me, and apart from having studied under the great Cecil Beaton, he knows what an f-stop is. Anyway, it is a detail and I don't want to go into details.

A poem as a tester:

Tumbleweed

Tumbleweed, tumbleweed
Nomadic North American son
Rambling seed of desert creed
Watching it… all be done

Rolling down Gila River
Watching Mama and Papago
Flying in cup and saucer
That came long time ago
It came to deliver
Good ol' folks from Casa Grande
Baptism in the Goldwater
Far more than they planned

Tumbleweed, tumbleweed
Rented truck in Tucson
Going to see cactus
Organ pipes play
To hear saguaro sing along
Mourning with Cochise
On some desolate reservation
From the three Mesa of the Hopi
To the Apache Nation

Tumbleweed, tumbleweed
Call wind
To come the other way
Roll time backwards
Taiowa hold the reins
Geronimo make the sway
Tumbleweed, tumbleweed
Cross another plain
South wind pushes north
Time paints a desert
Where fountain issues forth

Tumbleweed, tumbleweed
Don't tell me life's a bitch
May as well call canyon Grand
And shove us in that ditch
Tumbleweed, tumbleweed
Time will come I'm sure
Window Rock will open
And dreams rush through the door
Where Catcher Man 'ill catch 'em
As he did before

Tumbleweed, pure blood, full breed
Keep on roamin'
Keep on ramblin'
Tumbleweed
Road never endin'
Tumbleweed
Tumbling, turning, rolling, tumbling, stalling, rolling...
Tumbleweed.

Inanga Wiremu, Desert Poems, 2000

I wrote this poem in Houston Creek Over 50s RV Park near Payson, Arizona. That crazy time is described in Book I of the North Star Road trilogy The Circlestone. I have often thought that it would make a great folk or C&W number. If you like it and feel you could put music to it, just ask.

Well it is inanga out until later. Have to pick Phil up from station.

inanga

PS

I almost forgot description of Surfing the Ecliptic.

Surfing the Ecliptic

An artist spends a lot of time thinking about the weirdest of subjects. At the moment I am all-consumed with the ‘end times’. Most will know this as an analysis of the Mayan calendars (Long Term, Short Term and Venus) and the fact that they come to an abrupt stop at 11.11 am, 21 December 2012. Google 2012 a couple of times and you might be suitably surprised. No one now disputes that the Mayan calendar is deathly accurate and that when it winds down to 13.00.00.00 a new baktun cycle will start. It will start anew, hopefully at a greater level of consciousness. Each full round of the calendar has as its endgame the elevation of the species.

All sorts of other strange things are going on at the same time. You think this a kook-fringe conspiracy theory at this stage - all I can say to you is welcome to most blissful ignorance. A day Google-ing should at least open up your third eye enough to allow you to begin to question the current consensus reality. I am not making it all up but am merely attempting to paint a universe in chaos and then happily in greater chaos. Chaos is our true state - a state of ever evolving possibilities in such ratios as 3.4.5, 1.618039989 (Phi), 1.58 (13.20 ratio), etc, etc. We are the most cleverly constructed suprahologram and if you break us down into our smallest parts (even beyond atoms) then the hologram can still be reconstructed from that - the macrocosm in the microcosm or ‘as above, so below’.

We are surfing the ecliptic towards this date. It is a date when time stops in the mythological calendars of the so-called primitives who were indeed spiritual pioneers in a much more golden age - the Hopi of Hotevilla, Az; the Nagual of Mexico; the Maya of Meso-America, the tohunga of the Waitaha in New Zealand; the Hindu writers of yuga sequences; and the day of judgement of religions too numerous to mention. In the middle bottom of the painting you can see a face constructed out of red swirls. This is backed by a star chart that indicates the ecliptic we are surfing. It faces North and M36 sneaks into play…

It is said that on 12/21/2012 that the Earth crosses the ecliptic of the universe and the sun at this point gets in the way of the emanations from our galactic centre, hence a total galactic eclipse of the earth (and perhaps a total eclipse of our hearts). The Mayans called this xilbalba be (the road to the Underworld) and forewarned us that we should be on the lookout for it. I suggest http://www.2012unlimited.net/Near Future.html and Mayan-timing.html as good sources.

I finished the picture (I thought!). I picked up several tubes of acrylic paint, squirted them on the canvas, and then let my partner Phil spray it with a garden hose three times. WYSIWYG. Strange, but Isis’s third-eye is open!

Acrylic, oil, gouache, astronomical & facial collage, a garden hose and three well aimed bursts of water on canvas, Easter 2009

Welcome to Jville

2009-06-02T15:12:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Jville

Ms P (that is her on the white card – that symbolizes a canvas) borrowed $50 off me as a permanent loan without repayment or a gift. She headed down to Jville Mall looking for girly stuff. Anyway she spotted a canvas in the $2 – 19 Shop for $25 and promptly purchased it. Outside, Wellington’s fickle weather took over and Phil was almost whisked away a la Mary Poppins – she was a nanny too!

Staff in the Mall saw her plight and took the canvas back for storage until a suitable pick-up could be arranged. I did the following day and in the next 3-4 days in between work, sleep and play Welcome to Jville was painted.

From the top down:

Along the top is the usual Phi-sky plus a golden sun and highlighting Mt Kau Kau (Mount Holy Two Cows) in green oil and gold spray paint. Jade, a neighbour, turned up at an opportune moment when his Christmas 30 gm of tobacco was empty – with four pots of Resene paint samplers. (Kau Kau is our maunga or Mountain).

The tunnel represents emergence in a new beginning and the road flanking the railway line is lined with three Jville flags, each with a symbolic representation of Kau Kau. The line is one of the most scenic short trips in the world rising from NZ’s biggest and busiest rail terminal almost at sea level to the valley nestled in the foothills of Kau Kau – the trip includes tunnels, pretty Ngaio Gorge, hillside hugging houses and periodic glimpses of one of the world’s most beautiful harbour.

I moved to Jville in early 2006 as I was trying to recover from alcoholism. I suppose it was a completely different world to the one I left behind.

In the bottom right hand corner is the former industial part of Jville. Phil’s dad owns a factory there, hence the “”Factor E”” building. The others are a Gaudi and who knows, perhaps a developer with foresight will build something similar to give Jville center both heart and heritage

Gouache, oil paint, acrylic, spray paint, cardboard on canvas.

And for those who don't really want it, a poem about my Dad.

Gunner

It was said by some,
My dad had never become
What he wished to be;
Except that it seemed
When others weren’t
He was always free

He slaved for years
Deep beneath the mountain
Digging coals
For people in far-off lands
Of industrial soulless souls
And this he hadn’t planned

And over the years his body
Like a worn-out car
Wreck
Began to rust;
Inside, deep within
Himself his lungs filled
With the deadly dust

His voice crackled in his
Last years, mixed with
Coal dust and tobacco smoke;
No longer the tenor
Voice of his youth
Which had been the envy
Of all his peers
Seemed to suddenly
Disappear

And to me
My dad had become what
He wished to be;
He spent his last
Decade on a windswept
Beach in sunshine;
Far, far away from the dark
Of the mine
No longer a slave
To thieves of light and time

Well that is it for now in this practising becoming web efficient. I Googled Sananda and found a most interesting declaration about ascension. Worth a look. Will be blogging more poems, writings and paintings as I learn more about Spider Grandmother's world wide web. The Hopi have always been right.

inanga

2009-06-02T07:29:00.000-07:00

Te Wahine Hinemoana o te Pauanui

Simon the Peacemaker likes his art and one day came bearing gifts – brushes, oils, spatulas etc and a T-shirt from the Uffizi Gallery in Firenze (Florence). A series of paintings – mainly oil on recycled blinds – was in progress at the time and suddenly the T-shirt was being torn to shreds and part of it was stuck to a blind that lay on the floor. It was a reversed face from Sandro Boticelli’s The Birth of Venus.

Thick oil was oozed into the T-shirt and became fiery red hair that cascaded over the shoulders of a buxom Venus. Simon added some brush strokes and before long the now wahine (Maori maiden) had full blue breasts. I had a great time trying to make the thighs and legs match the original texture of the blinds and getting the oil to create a giant paua (abalone) shell. The paua represents the best example of the rainbow in nature that I have encountered – apart from the rainbow Itself – and it gave an ethereal quality to the emergence of Venus.

The painting hung around for a few days before the lipstick and moko (chin tattoo) was added. One could say this woman was Waitaha and a goddess, god and watercarrier.

Oil and acrylic and Uffizi T-shirt on a recycled blind

To the top her find:

Renoir Cloud

Cardboard is my favourite canvas. It has an energy and a story all of its own. Imagine!

It was once a tree and it travelled from the forest to the paper mill where it underwent a strenuous metamorphosis by chemicals, water and fire to be reborn as cardboard.

The tree was once a seed, a seedling before that, and an idea in God’s mind long before that. Its DNA can be found in the cardboard.

Anyway, the ream of paper made from the pulped tree found its way into an office in Wellington where it was stamped with an IRD logo and sent out as a final reminder for payment to a struggling couple in Ranui in Auckland’s working class western suburbs. They borrowed from friends and sent the payment reminder back to Wellington, paid in full.

Helen Clarke, then Prime Minister, had made an edict that all Government departments must pretend that they are actively recycling, so the reminder was photocopied and filed. It was imprisoned in the archives for seven years when as paper it was sent off for recycling in Tauranga.

The piece of paper, considerably munched up, became a piece of cardboard. It was sent off to Korea where it was die-cut, stamped, and filled with a TV set. That set found its way back to the Warehouse chain of stores. It was sold in Rotorua, not far from Kaingaroa Forest where it was once a tree. A Maori family took it home to Ngongataha where they had trouble with it, so they returned it to the store. The TV and box were returned to Auckland where the fault was found to be minor. The box was repackaged with the TV and it was sent to a sale in the electronics store of the Warehouse in Johnsonville.

I was in the store buying brushes and gesso. I wanted to paint on cardboard so I asked the checkout man if I could get some cardboard from their dump bin behind the store. He told me that was fine so I climbed into the bin and selected some pieces of cardboard.

When I got back to the Heath Street Flats in Johnsonville I took a piece of the much traveled television box and started to paint. I imagined a New Zealand hill with rocky tops and cloud forming above it. I saw a woman (about the size of my partner Phil) reclined on a bed, painted a few quick black strokes, and voila, Renoir Cloud.

Gesso, oil and acrylic on cardboard (framed by the artist), 2008

I am quickly learning that blogging is fun. I just hope someone gets to read them.

inanga

La Seine, Paris

2009-06-02T06:09:00.000-07:00

La Seine, Paris

Paris is great, immensely great, and far too great for most pens. I won’t even pretend that I could encapsulate its wonders in such a terse paragraph. I am not sure anymore how the frame came into my possession and it probably doesn’t matter. I need a frame and one appears dropped off by the most unlikely people - or the Mary Potter Hospice has the one I need. The unlikely are likely Maupassant, Baudelaire, Quasimodo or Edith Piaf.

The short of the long story is that when I saw the picture of Paris in the frame it sent me on one of those classic nostalgia rushes. I couldn’t tear the framing apart as I usually do – retrieving frame, glass and picture and backing board.

I wiped the glass clear of dust and started painting. The railing took shape first, then the foreground and the trees. I had seen trees like these alongside Notre Dame. I left some of the picture (the blue-gray section) because of the amazing gaslights and classic nature of the towers on the building. Then the five coloured flashes just happened as did the red spiral. Having coloured Paris to my liking was not enough.

I passed the picture on to Phil’s sister Cat for her overlay. She meticulously cut up a paint stockist’s catalogue and added the squares that add the necessary pizzazz to the painting. I was happy – it was complete and framed.

Gouache, acrylic, spray paint, metallic paint squares on glass, 2007

This is my first day of blogging so I am sort of excited. I have had a lot of this cooped up in me for a while!

I claim to be a poet as well as a painter so here is a sample. It is about the new quantum reality of Bell's Theorem (spooky action at a distance):

Cognitive Chaos, Kaos Magick

Kaos Magick
Chaos science
Chaos
Strange attractors
Order out of chaos
Harder
Chaos movement
Quantum/chaos
Magicians, mutants
Everyday life
Pure Math, and the Mind
Alternative network
Autonomous zone
Jewel, passports, Yab-Yum
Matrix Book
Revolution
Revelation 21
Visionary recitals
Seditious nonsense
A perfect place for a UFO landing
Cognitive chaos
Fractal universe
Outre/' typology
Strange attractors
Patterns of chaos
Mandelbrot and Cantor
Solved the problems
n-dimensional strange attractors
Mind maps
Ride with chaos 'lucid dreamer'
Surfing the wave function
Chance
Black modem
Hedonics
Peak
Moorish science
Brain machine
Pure
Mind machines
Cognitive chaos
Self liberation
Deep grammar

Higher
Ground, taste
Being/consciousness/bliss
Satchitananda
Tantrik
Hard sciences
Brain machine
Brain waves
Strange attractors
Iconography
Alchemical
Threshold
Cognitive chaos
Diving
Yogic powers
Inner heat
Absence of dis-ease
Descend
Collapse of the wave function
Schroedinger's [damned and] famous cat
Become
Create?

Ride the wave
Participation
Orthodox
Moment
When? never!

Alternating world
The cat is both alive and dead
Hillbert space
Attractors

Grok
Cognitive chaos
Cat Paramus
Alice's Cheshire cat
Schroedinger's poor victim
Destination
Memorized its address
Strange attractors
Probable
Universe next door
Ong's Hat Rod & Gun Club
Accident
The authorities
Cognitive chaote
Carrying
non-initiates
Anywhere! - so long as out of this world
EXISTS

...ills of Consensus Reality
Realised itself
Chaos never Died!
Sympathetic magick?
Yes, sympathetic magick
Newton emphasised force
Quantum emphasises finesse
Christians have the cross
Islam crescent and stars
Pagans have pentagrams
Buddhists have wheels
Quantum tantra the fork
It's bigger than both of us
Precise unclarity

Randomness
Thinglessness
Interconnectiveness
White, hot & sticky

Music is the connection in his technology
Why?
Because the possibilities are vibratory
Alternate dimensions
Egg-craft, travel cults, Tantrik-yoke
Answers come as a result of
finesse over force...
Conclusion

Order
Against
Health
Margin
Umm al-kitab
Shapes
Proofs
Bricoleuse
Raison d'etre
One
Techne
Icon
Attention
Other
Chaos never...
... died.

inanga Wiremu, Travel Notebook, 2001, in the year of a space oddity.

If any of those subject were of interest to you, I suggest you Google The Incunabula on www.deoxy.org.

I just want to warn you that following the trail of The Incunabula can be fraught with danger, but the path of a Seeker ne'er runs smooth.

inanga

Taking the Piss

2009-06-01T20:56:00.000-07:00

Taking the PISS out of PI-ca-SS-o

‘No one ever called Pablo Picasso an arsehole’ says the line from that song in Repo Man. I certainly wouldn’t dare call him that, knowing so little about his private life, but in New Zealand we take the P-I-S-S out of people and Pablo’s last name is an absolute gem for doing such.

When I was lurking around Te Papa, the National Museum, preparing the revelation of Kuri’s Big OE gone wrong, they had an exhibition featuring a Picasso. I wondered how the featured picture would have evolved from a number of coloured swirls in the mind of Picasso the man. The evolution was swift, starting with a Janus-face, swirling almost formed, nearly formed, and voila Taking the Piss out of Picasso.

The original is in a 3-metre by 300 mm scroll painted both sides – my poor attempt at a Bayeux Tapestry of my spiritual journey to date. More on the scroll later…

Acrylic, gouache, watercolour and collage on A4 photocopy paper, 2006

Kaitiaki: Te Papa, Wellington (at a later date)

inanga

The Fish's Tail

2009-06-01T20:53:00.000-07:00

Machupuchare

This picture was painted early in my foray into the artistic ethos. I have seen Machupuchare, ‘the fish’s tail’ mountain in Nepal on a couple of occasions. The most memorable time was when we were climbing Pisang, Chulu West and Chulu Far East peaks in the Marsyandi Valley. On the way out from the Himalayas we crossed Thorung La Pass to Muktinath and then trekked to Pokhara via the Kali Gandaki River. I saw Machupuchare from Poon Hill at sunset and at sunrise and in a gentle morning storm was given a perfect rainbow.

This was one of the Australian Army Mountaineering Club’s first expeditions in the Himalaya. How was I in the AAMC in the first place? I graduated from Duntroon Military College in Canberra and when I left the NZ Army the Aussie climbers slipped me in as an honorary member.

The thing most special to me in this piece is the execution of the Sanskrit phrase OM PADME HUM in the bottom left-hand corner. Sanskrit is a remarkable language, probably as close to the source – God – as anything we have apart from the Beth-Luis-Nion (another foray into linguistics altogether).

Gouache, watercolour, acrylic and glitter on paper, 2006

Kaitiaki: Mark W, Arrowtown, South Island, NZ

inanga

2009-06-01T20:43:00.000-07:00

‘Do you get my leaning Mr Magritte?’

My lady is indirectly Italian – from Northern Italy – and she just loves all things Latin. Well there was a play on in town called ‘The Bowler Hat” about the life of Rene Magritte and they had the coolest flyer. I was looking at a picture of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, an apple, a tie and a set of three photo albums including a 7th century montage of the Sermon on the Mount. The Leaning Tower stood bolt upright turned to Magritte, the sky swirled blue and white, the sun exploded gold photons. The tower looked down and said ‘Do you get my leaning Mr Magritte?’

The framing was equally fun and in no way what Phil expected. I painted the border in a soft blue and rusty pink and then lay the English canvas flat on paper, rather than have it stretched. A few imperfections crept in but the Leaning Tower was no longer leaning so some things can be repaired in this world.

Acrylic, oil, watercolour, gold spray paint, collage on canvas 2007

inanga

San Gimignano

2009-06-01T20:17:00.000-07:00

San Gimignano
Towers
Tuscany

The thirteen towers of the medieval town of San Gimignano in Tuscany must have inspired the skyscraper builders of the 20th century - in essence, the first Manhattan skyline. I used a bit of poetic license with the village structure here because I really wanted to test the Phi- 1.618099389 swirl in the whole picture – on the buildings themselves, in the Tuscan sky, and upon the earth on which it is all built. And the red terracotta roofs went right off!

In the left-hand bottom corner the roots reach out to a silvered stream. The stone bridge defied the swirl and took on magic of a controversial sort. The towers were built as defenses against marauders. I suppose the higher the tower the better the defense. When a Pope moved in here he built the highest tower and then whacked a Papal Decree on the town – his was forever to be the highest tower by half an inch – and that is as it remains to this day.

Gouache, acrylic, glitter and oil on paper, 2006

Kaitiaki: Paroa Hotels & Motels, Poutini Coast, NZ

inanga

HOG productions.com

2009-06-01T20:09:00.000-07:00

Mother Earth

I started swirling some hills that are reminiscent of the Twelve Apostles Range near Cobden on the South Island’s West Coast. The Maori motif started creeping into the deepest gullies and the left of the painting looked like a giant quilt. And who was under the quilt? It turned out to be a face that I had painted on a double-sided picture – Wish you were here! and Woman with a Gold Garter – that was modelled on Phil with her wavy fiery hair.

The sky took on a Phi chaos in order attractor, some Deep Forest jungle twitters chimed in, and I allowed the sky to weep. The left swirl called out for a small piece of paua. The hair, cloud and rugged land merged into a homage to Papatuanuku, the earth mother in Maoritanga.

Oil paint, acrylic, gouache and paua on canvas, 2007.