..A DAY AT THE RACES.....

........last Fridays roll call went something like this...........

Oscar Freire - punctured lung and broken rib ; Maarten Wynants - percolated lung and two broken ribs ; Woet Poels - bruised lung , torn kidney , torn spleen , three broken ribs ; Imanol Ervita -bruised lungs , ripped knee ; Ametz Txurruka - broken collar bone ; Gorka Verdugo - a hole in his leg big enough to post a letter in.........Griepel coming in second on a sprint stage with a dislocated shoulder , ripped elbow and knee , split thumb...........the tuesday before , Tjallingii finished the third stage - 197 kms - only to discover that he had fractured a hip............................

No , not some terrorist attack , just the fall out from the first six days or so of the Tour de France.............just another day at the races  . As we speak , Murray has lost again at Wimbledon to vast media coverage , Button and Hamilton fail again at Silverstone to vast media coverage , whilst over in France Wiggins and the Sky team are blitzing the field . No British rider has ever won Le Tour , and Wiggins is only the fifth British rider to wear the yellow jersey . Team Sky currently hold
first and third places , with a more than reasonable chance of winning.......and with still the best part of another two weeks to go , anything can happen..........maybe even a mention in the media without the spectre of doping............

..........a rest day today , Tuesday , and then off again tomorrow.......just another day at the races.

....THREE STEPS TO HEAVEN.......

.....Well , ok , maybe not heaven but three stages towards an MA degree with the Art Department at MMU , and three pieces of work towards the first stage.......
As I have mentioned previously , I am re-visiting four buildings that I have worked on in Manchester with a view to investigating alternative pasts , alternative futures and the nature of the buildings themselves through a form of drawn architectural notation.......three pieces were completed for the first stage , together with a lot of written work and I sunsequently ended up with a pass / distinction so I suppose something must be making sense.......
Anyway , here they are again...........

The Vault Of Forbidden Books / the House of the Book Lover ......

The Liner Notes - Oldham street / the House of the Music Lover

......and finally The Tea Rooms / The House of the Book Lover............

The next two pieces , the ones that I am working on at the moment are ' The Kite-Flying Platform / The House of the Book Lover ' , and  ' Tosca- Live from Oldham Street / The House of the Music Lover. ' ......

.........and after that we will probably be leaving those two houses for a while , and be visiting The House of the Art Lover and The House of The Dominatrix.........

Watch this space.........

....SONGS OF INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE.......

....Some twelve months ago I posted an item on the work of artist Teresa Wilson and an installation that she had done in Macclesfield for the art festival........twelve months on and she has done another one.......

Based on a poem from William Blake's ' Songs of Innocence and Experience ' , ' The Ecchoing Green ' is an installation at King Edward St Chapel in Macclesfield. The Chapel itself is an independent chapel and a really atmospheric building in its own right, dating from 1690 and with galleries to the upper level. Dark and moody , especially on a grey overcast day , the building lends itself to a claustrophobic installation - overhung inside with branches and the sound of crows...........

The first thirty seconds or so of any such installation are charged with meaning and emotion, as one is taken from one reality to another.........

........except that as I walked in and turned right into the body of the chapel my appreciation of the installation was fatally compromised by a figure to my right who lurched up out of the half-gloom , grabbed my arm and and with her mouth full mumbled " Shorry I wash eating a bananah for mgy lunch yore sposed to read this it will ecxplain it " , thrusting a piece of paper into my hand..............the crows and the figures seemed somewhat diminished after this encounter.

I like site specific installations , the theatricality , the opportunity to control an audiences response , but to my mind this can only be achieved by having full control over the environment and by definition peoples' perceptions. I am perfectly capable of forming my own responses , which may - or may not - be enhanced by an explanation of the artist's intent . In this instance , however , the experience was lost , for me at least.

...HERE COMES SUMMER.....

.......and after a few months of anticpation the big event of this summer of sport is nearly upon us, eagerly awaited as for once the UK is up there with the best and with a good chance of coming home with the spoils........yes , its time for Le Tour again.......

Bradley Wiggins has just won the Criterium du Dauphine for the second year running , to go alongside his win this year in the Paris - Nice , Team Sky are looking well organised - and then there is Cavendish , World Champion and the holder of the green jersey. Three weeks of drama unfolding as they race through France .....whats not to like ?  This year they are both finishing and starting stages in Pau , about 45mins from us , so a chance to get to see them again..........

...TEA FOR TWO......

......And after quite a few late nights I finally delivered all the work for the first stage assessment of my MA course...........

Is it any good ? I have no idea - I have never done anything like this before , although Liz and Cath who did the framing ( thankyou LCT ) seemed to think the works were ok.

Anyway . this is the third piece , based loosly on the Tea Rooms I did for the boys at Richmond House in Manchester - Tea For Two.

This one is for Miss Georgia , Miss Edie-Mae , Miss Erin and Miss Heidi , and one day girls we'll all go for afternoon tea.

...THE LAST WALTZ..........

Levon Helm , drummer / singer / mandolin player , died on April 19th last......

From  ' The Basement Tapes ' , on through ' Music from Big Pink ' and ' The Band '  -

the album that seemed to arrive from somewhere else altogether in 1969  -  on through the tours with Dylan , on through the Scorcese film ' The Last Waltz ' .....on through fires , on through throat cancer , on through his last recordings ' Dirt Farmer ' and ' Electric Dirt' ........... for the best part of getting on for nearly fifty years now Levon Helm brought me joy.............................from somewhere timeless , always remembered for the music and those photographs................. 

............and now he is gone , along with Rick Danko and Richard Manuel......

Levon Helm , thank you for the music .....R.I.P

..BLUE MONDAY....

......Blue Monday , New Order and a certain building on Oldham Street in Manchester.......

At the start of my current MA course, when looking at selecting four buildings with which I was familiar with in order to investigate them further , Dry Bar on Oldham Street became a natural choice for the ' House Of The Music Lover ' ; I already had plans and elevations of the premises through having worked on the building for some eighteen months for the current owner with a view to converting it into a 28 bedroom hotel, and it seemed a natural fit with the other buildings I was looking at.

I was interested , therefore , as part of my studies , to sit in on a lecture by Sally Stone of the MMU School of Architecture discussing the creative and dynamic approach by Ben Kelly with regard to the design of both Dry Bar and the Hacienda. This view seemed quite at odds with that of the clients , New Order , whose side of the saga is recorded at length by Peter Hook in his wonderful book ' How Not To Run A Club '. The view of Academia - cutting edge design - versus the more pragmatic view of the client - financial over-runs and mismanagement that dragged Factory down into spiralling debt and a scheme that didn't answer the brief . I suppose my sympathies lie more with Peter Hook , and I am still not quite sure how you justify the reputation of a designer who does his own thing at the client's expense.

My own work on the MA course on this particular project started by looking at the facade of the premises  - my idea was to keep the existing facade as a free-standing ' screen ' and to set a new plain facade some 1500mm back ; this then allows me to explore the idea of ' Liner Notes ' , referencing the information and photos that are tucked away inside album sleeves or inside CD jackets  - all in keeping with the idea of re-developing the building as 'House For A Music Lover '.   I also took great enjoyment in borrowing the tomb from Joy Divisions ' Closer ' sleeve and interring the current owner - who refuses to pay us for our work -
in a vault below the basement................

........anyway , here is Work in Progress

Blue Monday indeed - and congratulations to Manchester City on shutting up United fans for once.