July this year is most definitely summery, and hotter than some like it but these bright dry mornings mean that I rise to the occasion of Qigong exercises before breakfast, trying not to think but just to observe. The hovering hawk, the swifts screaming high overhead and a robin that sits nearby as if wondering what I am doing in his or her garden.
I spotted this Shieldbug laying her eggs on a potted Calendula. Some days later they hatched – the leaf taken off for the camera but put back in the pot for the young to grow up. Now that is organic gardening with a touch of Jainism! There are 10 native Shieldbugs in the UK and the red-legged forest Shieldbug even predates caterpillars and other insects. Here’s hoping these are those!
I’ve also managed some time away and during those enforced sedentary hours on the train prefer to look out of the window rather than at my iPhone screen. Sometimes I take out the pocketable Ricoh GRiii and snap at what rushes past, what is within view. It’s not just a way of passing time but constantly honing the photographer’s eye …
Post camera photo edits also help to exercise the artist’s eye of this untrained novice, toe-dipping in abstract art.
But only just recently have I come across in-camera jpeg settings for the Ricoh GRiii termed ‘Recipes‘ – basically delicious way of transforming photos, many inspired by film stocks and analog aesthetics. Naturally there is a Ricoh Recipes App for it as well as many enthusiasts tweaking and publishing theirs.
My interest too has also once again been snagged by the ‘Morning Pages‘ trend, first proposed by Julia Cameron’s “The Artist’s way” as a method for re-discovering our creative selves.
Just three pages daily, of longhand thought streaming, uncritical, unconsidered, unplanned and unreviewed. I’ve bought the journal in readiness but it sits there pristine in a fleshy pink cover. Resistance is partly due to the fact that these days hand cramp effects my writing. Painful yes and I’m going to have to learn to love scruffy as well as scribble!
PoetryPix 