leave the wise

COSH

2009-08-31T01:22:00.000-07:00

Bands on film

Fool Moon

2009-08-05T17:14:00.000-07:00

Tonight -
Between then
And now.

The face of the moon,
It’s haunted pallor,
Convinces of mysteries
That lurk between branches,
Between sections of sky
The trees hang leaves
That blow in the cellar
That opened too soon.

A hurricane’s eye.

A man lost at sea
Sees the same moon
As a group of people
Camping in the woods
And the group of people
See the same moon
As the man lost at sea.

And some people walk by.

The sheet of night
Blinks between branches
And clouds
The moon sends a smile,
With a reminder
This is where we met
When you last saw my face
While driving for miles

And now
Between branches
I wish you goodnight.

Heart

2009-07-31T06:52:00.000-07:00

I photographed a friend's wedding. This is my favourite image from the day.

Ink

2009-07-29T08:24:00.000-07:00

A poster was required at the rocknroll public library.
Of course, it's hand drawn in marker pen in the spirit of '77.

Click me

2009-07-13T03:50:00.000-07:00

Hot off the press

2009-05-29T08:50:00.000-07:00

CV

2009-05-29T04:09:00.001-07:00

http://leavethewise.blogspot.com/2009_02_01_archive.html
Read it and weep

Playing Cards

2009-05-27T06:15:00.001-07:00

Josh and I made some "Playing Cards"

They are designed to be a starting point for musicians and composers.

Defining 3 musical elements gives a framework for experimentation -

Form, Feel, Tempo

We reckon they work.

Who would live in a house like this?

2009-05-27T06:00:00.000-07:00

Period property situated walking distance from station, needs modernisation.

The Incredibly Untalented Anna Brooks

2009-05-27T05:46:00.000-07:00

Introducing, the Incredibly Untalented.... ANNA BROOKS

Watch her dance as if unaided

Marvel

Be Amazed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLf3HBKZcI4

Listen to your Mother

2009-05-27T05:44:00.001-07:00

Group studio project
Modern Old Wives Tales
Pictures of

New Religion

2009-05-27T05:41:00.000-07:00

Our Father
Who art in the Shed
Bring me peace and wisdom
Let me release my stress
Make me good and strong
Amen

harsh realities of war :(

2009-05-25T03:32:00.000-07:00

Found this page from a ripped up poetry anthology at 2am outside McDonalds in Hereford.

Inappropriate

2009-05-19T05:03:00.000-07:00

Mark III
-Inappropriate application of clip-art
-Subject matter housed within falsely italicised comic sans.

Feel Cards

2009-05-15T05:50:00.000-07:00

Musical starting points work in progress idea development

The People Have Spoken

2009-05-11T04:16:00.000-07:00

With a view to considering my audience more,
these are the photos of mine people favourited on flickr.

D I S C O

2009-05-08T02:36:00.000-07:00

Footage recorded on mobile phone.
Sound collage of material recorded from 2001-2009.
Recorded and played by me. iMovie.

Here we are now..

2009-05-08T02:34:00.001-07:00

Oh well, whatever, never mind.

2009-05-07T09:04:00.001-07:00

Lightbulb

2009-05-07T08:33:00.000-07:00

Idea of the week-
Record sleeve artwork cropped by circular window from inner.

Inappropriate Type (Esther)

2009-05-07T08:20:00.000-07:00

Redid my ransom note type project.

Showed Bob today.
He said that you can't communicate selfishly.
He talked about a smile in the mind
and the possibility of a fine-art approach to design that still communicates and answers the brief.
I saw myself as a lone voice babbling from the void
wondering why nobody was listening.

Late night

2009-05-07T08:18:00.000-07:00

Got back late on the night bus full of caffeine and colours.
Doodled this in the wee small hours. I obviously should have been asleep.

Spiral path

2009-05-07T08:15:00.000-07:00

Bought a 50p pocket money toy from E.Molesy.
Compact Spirograph.
Test run-

By the Left

2009-05-07T03:08:00.000-07:00

That left turn thing was the worst idea I've ever had in the history of bad ideas I've had.

Chuckie Egg Technotronix

2009-05-06T07:19:00.000-07:00

Diddling about on garageband, pixen and iMovie to create this video joy.

10 PRINT HELLO
20 PRINT CHUCKIE EGG IS AWESOME
30 GOTO 20

RUN

Bears and Booze

2009-05-01T05:07:00.000-07:00

Drew these last year with my letraset pens. I like those pens.

It's Fun to Sponge!

2009-05-01T05:00:00.000-07:00

Sponge day. I missed the first one in Aldgate so tried to catch up on Sunday.
This was stupid as the banks were all shut. And any cafes etc. And no people.
I took some photos and wandered, considering the psychogeography (Word of the Month - April 09)

I got well into this 'flaneurie' business.
So I did what you do when you're into something and created a flickr group.
http://www.flickr.com/groups/1075074@N22/
Surrey Young Flaneurs Club.

Membership free.

oh joy!

2009-05-01T04:56:00.000-07:00

So I made the joyPod.
I've been prattling about this for a bit.
It's an old black iPod nano in a customised silicon case.
It has a short black in-ear headphone replacing the standard white apple type.
It is loaded with 80 tracks.
All of them are joy division songs.

Dance to the radio...

Um

2009-04-30T06:14:00.001-07:00

Received between 1100 and 1400 hrs today.

No address, hand delivered, through my letterbox.

?

You/ve gone wrong.

2009-04-23T09:03:00.000-07:00

I like taking photos of bands. Sometimes it goes wrong because you've got a film camera and no flash.
This happened in these two examples. An underexposed void gives you a lot of potential for photomontage.

Never turn right

2009-04-23T08:58:00.000-07:00

Idea for conceptual graphics project -
Everywhere you have to go, get there by only turning left or going straight on. If you have to go right, walk round the block, or at least rotate 270 degrees.

If you do this arbitrary thing within the framework of your normal day, your day will be different.

'roids

2009-04-22T07:55:00.000-07:00

More selected better photos on flickr:
(some Polaroid, mainly other)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mydadsjacket/

Watch out for meerkats...

2009-04-22T07:40:00.000-07:00

Let's get these phone photos out the way.
Signage and signifiers.
Light and form.
Things that made me smile.
How to have fun on your own.
Chairman LMAO.

Our two eyes are not enough

2009-04-22T07:10:00.000-07:00

Been photographing things on my phone for a while. I don't carry a camera a lot of the time and it's always in my pocket.

My unwavering love of art.

2009-04-22T06:52:00.000-07:00

I went to "The Revolution Continues" at the new Saatchi space last year. Everything was super fantastic so I photographed myself on my phone in front of the paintings.

Last year's man

2009-04-22T06:37:00.001-07:00

This emotional colour project went quite well last year.
Last year went quite fast.

Portrait: [ ]

2009-04-22T06:28:00.000-07:00

We've been handed a new photography brief on portraiture. Reminded me of pausing DVDs at emotional moments and photographing the screen. I did these for a project last year and didn't use them. Like them as a diptych.

First post

2009-04-22T04:57:00.000-07:00

This blog is now open.

Expect retrospectives and work in progress.

Here's something I like today -

http://www.andynortnik.com/cowboy-cowgirl-clipart.htm

CV

2009-02-09T04:06:00.000-08:00

CV

Omar Majeed -
Born to Laith and Diana Majeed at Leighton Hospital in Cheshire, 1984. Snippets of half memories rebuilt by family photographs and moving pictures from a now-broken camcorder. Moved to Hereford aged two-and-a-half. Number 23 was called Morouge. A three bedroom detached house on a street of three bedroom detached houses. Lying on the linoleum and painting on sugar paper. A Volvo named after Spot the Dog’s mother. Dorothy and Roy next door, Steve on the other side. Frank. All these men and their vegetable gardens. Paul up the road who would invite himself to play roller basketball or shoot things on the computer. Sticking photos in a scrapbook. A den cut into a hedge leading down the side of the house. Jonathan, Transformers and hiding in the garden. Learning to cycle a blue BMX at the park. A bad experience with a jack-in-the-box at playgroup.

Rising fives. The bridge into school, learning to knot ties and tie shoelaces step by step. Making paper robots with paint and PVA. Books with pictures and few words. Learning to shape letters, sentences. Nadia is born in Hereford County hospital, 1988. “How do you like your new sister?” “Fine.”

Milk and a Jaffa Cake every morning. Walking through the park with Granny. SATs. Kiss chase. The smell of conifers and playing football with a tennis ball. Grass stains on grey. At the LEA swimming pool name tags make one jumper different from another. Carpeted coach seats. Getting in early to collect conkers. A quarter-ounce of cola-cubes. Assembly. Sing Hosanna, sing banana. See the headmaster. He had a buzzer outside his room made by a year five. Amber, please wait. Green come in. Nice man, lived up our road. Good Christian, bad wig. A giant chessboard with no pieces in the playground. Not talking about Iraqi relatives. Visiting Scottish relatives. Mystery books. A pitiful stamp collection. Corridors. Packed lunches. Visiting the class above to read their books now. Friends’ birthday parties. Learning to swear. School plays written by teachers. Recorder practice. Staged photographs with a side parting and missing teeth against a mottled beige background. Chubby cheeks. Making a house out of sofa cushions, sheets and clothes pegs. Scratching melodies from violin strings. Those yellow Y-fronts found at cub-camp that nobody would own up to. Racing raindrops on French windows. Sleepover philosophizing. Sonic the Hedgehog. Crazy golf. The zoo. Cycling on the road. Playing football for a team. Looking at insects close up. Eurocamp. Judo. Swimming. Children’s’ poetry anthologies. The youth orchestra tuck-shop. Skiing holidays. Lee jeans and a Sweater Shop jumper. Gravel under my skin. A place on a writing weekend in a youth hostel in the hills. French Club. Judo. Ghosts. Naming goldfish after hobbits. White shirts and marker pens on the last day, an autograph book of good wishes and goodbyes.

Gradually losing touch with people for the first time at the age of eleven. Arriving at Hereford Cathedral School with a scholarship. Wondering what clothes to wear when I’m not in uniform. Breaking the plastic saltcellar in the canteen. Trying not to look awkward in communal showers. Posters. Different sets for maths. Pop music and kissing at parties. Playing on the Playstation. Being too short and not very good at rugby. A first kiss. A second kiss at the same party. Falling out with friends over girls. Running with the dog. Recording Peel sessions on Minidisc. Climbing trees. Getting in a fight once and being kicked in the balls. Listening to music on headphones. Seeing your friends drunk. Making compilation tapes. Swapping music with friends, talking about music. Making up bands and songs that don’t really exist. Leaving the Scouts. Trying to speak to people on the phone. Starting to skateboard, first at Joe’s then in car parks. Staying up to watch films. An undercut and a half-grown moustache. Flirting. Shaving. Masturbating. PGL and Panda Lemonade and Green Day. The first taste of hash on a park bench. Being sick in a kitchen sink after drinking spirits from a Super-Soaker. Army Cadets. Scoring a sixteenth of hash from a friend. Baggy Jeans on wear-what-you-like day. Being made to do Latin over Classics. Choosing Science over Art. Getting stuck with German and returning to French. Making choices knowing they will affect the course of my life. Choosing Maths, Music and IT as my GCSE options. Mock GCSEs. A pattern of success despite an appalling work ethic. Shooting toys with air rifles. Reading a lot. Making up birthdays for bouncers. Trying to keep a diary. Drawing in a notepad. Volunteering at the hospital. Hiking. Black tie events. Two local football teams and a new tracksuit. Eavesdropping on public transport. Poetry as obsessive and inefficient self-examination. Prizes for same poetry. Prizes for achievement in English. A prize as voted by my peers. Gatecrashing a party and playing table-tennis with someone’s drunk dad. Playing golf. Trying to remove my double nipple with nail scissors. Having a band for about a month. Writing one good song. Hours spent in front of the computer making ‘music’ on my own. Taking pictures without a good reason. Playing albums and making coffee at a photography shop. Black tie parties in village halls. Cycling a lot for a while. The secret road. A burnt out car in a pond. Long walks around the outside of factories and through fields. Awkward relationships with fleeting moments of joy. Visiting people at work but not working yet. Buying an eighth of an ounce of skunk now and again and learning to skin up. Getting high in the countryside and feeling fuzzy the next day. Liking girls but them not liking me in that way. Playing with video cameras at Rural Media. Swimming outdoors. Spending time in the darkroom. Mugs of tea. The Gambia, a new landscape on Larium. The Fear. The Simpsons. Washing my hands and trying to read the Koran. Albert Camus. Being thin. Wearing a gown to chapel and staring at the stained glass. Looking at the tree in the car park through the study window every morning. Contributing thoughtful pieces of writing and black and white photographs for the school paper. Being asked to lay out same paper. Turning the school paper into an unfunny post-modern joke. Recreational trespass. Birthday parties that still include videos and basketball. Relaxing in the bath with codeine and vodka. Art AS-level, German Expressionism, Life drawing. Maths A-level, cake day, Kierkegaard and Prog Rock. Biology and dissection anxiety. English literature, tedium and inspiration. Chemisty I don’t remember. Music Technology – the only person who lasted until the end and somehow in the peace of solitude made some good music. After lesson chats with my English teacher about Beckett and Buddhism. Opening a vein and being scared of blood. Playing squash. Getting Duke of Edinburgh Gold, walking with friends in the hills and it feeling happy and free. A sixth form study filled with my best friends in the world and stuff we like from magazines and music playing always and tea and games of Chinese chequers and people coming to visit. Miserableism and the growing void. My body drawing in on itself. One decent drawing to show for it all.
School finishes finally and I end up with two A’s and a B in A levels I don’t care about and a further two A’s and a D in my AS’s. Applications and an Architecture interview at Cambridge and a place at Bath University. Quitting a cushy job in a call centre for catering in the hospital for long hours. Milk and two sugars. Washing up. Reading Dostoevsky in my lunchbreaks on the bench watching the sixth-form kids go past. Sitting in the car and listening to Dylan cassettes. Being in love and working for a week and happy but the happiness flecked with madness and then floating away. The smell of death. A lingering gloom. The wrong medication. A mental breakdown. A slow recovery. Regular meetings with psychiatrists, psychologists and community psychiatric nurses.
Enrolling in the local art college on a HND Photography course. Hereford College of Art and Design, or HCAD for short. Starting quietly. Doing a bit of work. Meeting some people. Getting stuck in. Going off on one without anyone noticing. Experimenting with drugs. Going on jaunts. Invoking madness as a creative impulse. Self-publishing. Overworking the photocopier. Justifiable vandalism. Sleeping in my car. Disappearing off places. Helping people out. Hanging out a lot drinking tea or soup and talking and being friends with people. Living alone briefly. Failing to cope. Befriending the librarians. Networking without realising that’s what I’m doing. Flying kites, seeing bands. Meeting girls for coffee and feeling like I am finally entertaining. Taking photographs of everything and being told it’s relevant and interesting. Technical issues. Sloppiness. Acquiring new skills. Looking at other people’s work. Blagging. Watching films. Going to the pub. Getting a proper girlfriend at last. Moving on to a different one.
Finishing after two years with a foundation degree in Photography accredited by the University of Gloucester. Going to university properly. Leaving Hereford behind. A new town. A new place to live. The same girl. Video games and newspapers on Sundays on the lawn. Mildew and rats and designed spaces. Disorder, ennui and a strange kind of contentment. A walk down the hill to uni. English and Journalism at Kingston. Reading books and talking about them. Not reading books and talking about them. Writing haphazard experimental essays. Writing occasionally for pleasure. Writing the news. Learning feature writing. Rediscovering my voice. Going out. Pretending to be normal. Melting down again.
Another stay in hospital, first voluntarily then under section. I had escaped through the fire alarm and stolen a bicycle. I was found and convinced to return. Plastic cutlery and a smoking room the colour of shit. Apocalyptic visions and delusions of grandeur. Time travel and the shifting of dimensions. Art therapy and music therapy and talking therapy. Cooking and gardening. Relapse plans. Triggers. Breathing exercises. Being released into the world again and not knowing how to be anymore. Another year of my life down the pan, sleeping and eating and volunteering four hours a week at the cider museum. Claiming money from the government. Playing six a side football. A trophy for most improved player. The temporary reintroduction of routine as a safety net against the gigantic chaos I see.
Back to uni. Different course. Try Graphic Design and Photography. It interests me and I feel like I can do it. Finding out what it is, what I can do within it. Resocialising, putting things behind me. Taking stock. Trying again. Setbacks and difficulties but a half-broken persistence and a wonky but wide-eyed excitement for visual ideas that gets me in every day. Taking photographs means something again. I find myself learning new skills too. Hope I can keep it together enough to get this one under my belt. I could do this everyday somewhere, somehow. When I find the right people or the right people find me. I set sail on this; a cracked song of the gone by. The floor of my bedsit, belly-down in Kingston with just one year left, a few words down and a glimpse of a distant shore.