Wellcome Collection Part 2: Charmed Life- The Solace of Objects.

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Infinitas Gracias: Mexican Miracle Paintings, Wellcome Collection

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"I drank to drown my sorrows, but the damned things learned how to swim."

I've wanted to go to Mexico for as long as I can remember.

Partly because I saw something on TV as a kid that said Tim Burton's work was heavily influenced by everything he saw whilst visiting the day of the dead festival. After Edward Scissorhands, he could do no wrong.

Partly because of the James Taylor song of the same name.

Partly, as I've got older, because of the culture, the colour, the architecture and the religious imagery.

And a lot because of Frida Kahlo:

Her life is fascinating, her paintings even more so.

I knew she was married to Diego Rivera, another famous Mexican artist, but I had never really seen any of his works that drew me in like Frida. 

That was until I chanced upon an exhibition of Mexican prints at the Djanogly Gallery in Nottingham (called Revolution on Paper) earlier this year and saw this:

After studying Art History for three years I thought I'd seen the full spectrum of naked women and a lot of them I love, from Ingres to Picasso, via Cabanel, Elvgren and Freud but this just made me stop and stare. It took a while to hunt down but every time I look at it I love it a bit more. The eyes and the thighs. Definitely something about the eyes and the thighs. And the hair.

Oh, and that little peek of pattern on the lower surface.

So, now I have a whole new reason to go to Mexico...

I wish I could find a good book to live in.

I have grown up listening to Melanie.* My mum always played her in the house, having loved her since her Woodstock days, and I treasure her beat-up best of vinyl like a friend.


Her covers are great, her voice makes you feel like you're in 1969, and some of her lyrics are brilliant:


A little bit of wholemeal, some raisins and cheese,
But I don't eat animals and they don't eat me.
(this song, 'I don't eat animals', singlehandedly made me vegetarian for a time).


My favourite was from a different song, one I heard so much I could even belt along to the french section, despite my inadequate language skills:


I wish I could find a good book to live in,
Wish I could find a good book,
'Cos if i could find, a real good book,
I'd never have to come out.


With this in mind, you'll understand the smile I got today when I saw this:

This house was made by artists Carson and Miller from around 5,000 antique books- almost all English Literature and published in the UK. It says on their website:


'Spines out, pages in, the work is a library turned in on itself, a space of infinite possibility where nothing may be read yet everything imagined. The work has no windows and in the absence of external stimulation, we must imagine the worlds of the books, and hear the voice in our head that talks to us when we read. Books, the stories they tell about the opportunity they offer for escape into other worlds, are a key inspiration for Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller.'


I want one of my own. 


You can see more of their work here: www.cardiffmiller.com


*Her full name is Melanie Safka but she's usually just referred to as Melanie, on albums, interviews etc.

Mary Blair

For ages I was barely aware of the ever-changing google logos. Sometimes they were nice, often they weren't, and rarely would I care enough to click off the home page to find out what they were about.

Then suddenly there was a run of some really recognisable ones, doodles that instantly caught my eye, and some really interesting interactive versions (I lost an inordinate amount of time to the in-built pacman game). I started to come around to the idea of commemorating something different every day with a little doodle. Clever. 

It's been a while since I've seen one that straight up made me smile. This morning though, I switched on my laptop and found this little beauty:

I knew this logo meant something to me, it immediately tugged at something in the furthest depths of my memory. It was more than just the colours or beautiful patterns (which I am openly obsessed with) but there was something with the expression on the face of the girl, her little hand holding the teeny paint brush with that squiggle of blue.

It turns out today is the 100^th birthday of Mary Blair, an American Artist who found fame working for Walt Disney Studies during the 40s. I was never the biggest Disney fan- I was especially never a fan of the Disney Princesses (I vividly remember watching Beauty and the Beast when I was little and only having eyes for the talking teapot and grandfather clock…) but there are some of those films that I could sit down and watch today (and have done in recent years with my niece). Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan and Dumbo were my three favourites (and The Jungle Book of course, but that goes without saying for anyone with a soul). And guess what...

Mary Blair worked heavily on all three of them. I am in love with this woman's work- it's so bright and beautiful, so of its time and carries so much of its own look. A style:

From early concept designs for Peter Pan...

To her illustration work for Simon and Schuster's 'Little Golden Book' series...

To calender designs...

To some of the most beautiful atomic-esque patterns I've seen...

To ice cream packaging...

To magical, amazing Alice.

I can't even begin to explain how many of my favourite things feature in her drawings: owls, trees, clouds, jungles, pirate ships, inuits, tipis... the list is endless.

I feel an obsession brewing here. Her style is so distinctive, so of its time and just so beautiful- I could live in a Mary Blair world.