This recent cold snap reminded me of these photographs I had yet to share taken in Ireland this past Christmas. The sun was setting and the fog was rolling in from the ether, causing my camera to struggle to focus on anything in particular, softening the gaze as if the clouds fell that day.
Although a dumping of snow or ice is yet to grace the landscapes of Ireland, I was treated to another phenomenon – freezing fog. I’ve never experienced fog like it – completely enveloping all the eye could see in a matter of minutes, swirling around the fields and transforming objects and buildings into milky soft nothingness, as my camera struggled to capture anything in detail it felt as though I was living in an oil painting.
The third and final cluster of images created in response to JMW Turner’s Vesuvius in Eruption. Leaning into what the photograph was telling this bunch took a different turn to its predecessors.
A second assortiment of mixed media photography created for this weeks JMW kick About over on Red’s Kingdom. The goal being to turn my photography of Rural Ireland into ruinous oil paintings.
This weeks fortnightly creative prompt over on Red’s Kingdom is the painting – Vesuvius in Eruption by Joseph Mallord William Turner. I was awestruck by the colours of turners painting, especially the light and darkness and contemplated about how the land after Mount Vesuvius would have been teamed in nothing but dark ash and charred to a crisp. The suffocating poison smoke billowing into the air, the wispy remains of trees and how the lava would have cemented over the landscape. I decided to seep through the surplus of landscape photography I have of of rural Ireland and gave a whirl of harmonising in apocalyptic darker hues to turn my photography into the style of ruinous oil paintings. Here is some mixed media images created by digitally painting over my photography of those images of rural Ireland.
A second darker and more ominous cluster of images from the trailing dirt road in a nestled and secluded spot in Ireland. More ominous indeed, as a recent shower saturated the flora and darkened the landscape in a midnight blue, the sun rays only slightly visible when peaking through certain patches and glittering selected treetops and overgrowth.
A recent trip back home saw me exploring new landscapes, one being a road covered in quick sand like mud, my usual companion prince – our golden lab now pretty much fully blind and with arthritis creeping in decided to abandon me and wobble back home, I can’t blame him, as this particular area of shrub where these photos were taken is pretty hazardous. Even with my lanky legs up to the knee in my wellies the shite was still pretty close to spilling in over the top. I’m glad I continued as the greenery of this solemn place creating untouched tunnels of overgrowth.
This weeks kick about over on Red’s Kingdom is the drawings of Mervyn Peake. I decided to do some really rough 2 minute scribbles of some landscapes. I forgot how nice it is to feel a pencil in your hand and hear the scribbles as they form.
A third and final set of photographs from a journey into an abandoned and forgotten house deep in the countryside and shrouded in nature. I enjoy exploring places like this, although slightly melancholic to see the remnants of people left behind clouded in dust and mildew – the trophies and knitwear full of dust bunnies, the good china left to dip in rotten cabinets. I always how spaces would have looked when it was full of life.
More shots taken from the exploration to the house in Roosters Rest. I would imagine in its hay day this house was probably stylish. Warm woods are implanted throughout with midcentury credenzas and dressers dressing up the bedrooms now being seized by nature. Fireplaces and doors are painted bright colours and those thin patterned curtains providing an ominous ooze of colour from the blinding greens and yellows outside.
Gentle Giant 