Council Tax can fuck off !!!

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Autumn / Winter Competition 2018

once again its got to that time of year when the supermarkets are flooding the shelves with pumpkins and all manner of plastic ghoul themed crap destined for landfill as soon as novemebr hits … and then of course the obsessive compulsive acquire'ers go into overdrive … on whats left of the high stree,t and of course on line!  Tinsel … I a sure boxes and boxes of the stuff are already clogging p shipping routes the world over … its a madness really and a far cry from its original point of intent !

I am sure that you are already aware that in my little home studios , productions are getting streamlined for the ' festive rush ' and indeed my own little workshops are feeling rather like santa's  this year , brimming with Dinosaurs and all manner of Palaeo things that I would have loved as a kid ….

and this year the Christmas / winter competitions should of course incorporate a little bit of a dinosaur giveaway !!

Lifesized handsculpted bass relief wall art 

so , as well a our usual like and share competition ( Like a artbyvaleriopage facebook post and share the shop page while tagging a friend - between October 31st 2018 and December 28th 2018 for your chance to win )  Holiday packages at both 'Artby Valerio's Art B&B in Amsterdam' and of course the' Artby Valerio's Art B&B in Cornwall' up for grabs … this year I will be doing a few little extra sketchbook pages that will be available through charity auction … as well as a dinosaur giveaway a little closer to Christmas …

so get your likes an shares out … tag friends and family tht might be interested in these awesome limited edition/ hand made/ hand signed originality driven giveaways from 'Artby Valerio's - The Arts Hole x '

original handrawn ' sketchbook pages ' framed accompanied by the limited release' got wood' illustrations 

Plymouth Art Weekender and the notion of a general strike ????

this s I suppose a little after thought from ' the Cornish art scene ' previous post !

so we have just had the so called Plymouth art weekender …..

and here is the thing ,so I was going on about silly little art collectives spread out all over the counties and each one full of ' handmade silver ' and 'decorative ceramics' or worse !!

the handmade silver as intricate and pleasing to the eye as some of it is , its all wholesale silver from fucking india or god knows where …. even though these two counties in particular sit on some substantial silver ore deposits , indeed you can wander over the mineral spoils of many of the old tin mines and find all manner of geological debris … including reasonable quantities of Galena ….

the ceramicists are all buying special ' artists quality ' materials, again whole sale from china or whatever just straight off of Etsy … exactly the same as the indian / Mexican silver !!

its bizarre to me quite what we manage to call a functioning economy in this country !!!

o.k so all of this cheap wholesale ' material ' is being shipped n from abroad , and the revenue that is noted as ' overheads ' are all directed out of the country … can any one see the flaw here ??
we have set things up very nicely for the agent of those commodities … but the producer of the original raw material ? or the practitioner that alters that raw material ??

this is exactly how the so called Plymouth art weekender works !!

look at the signage !!! PLYMOUTH ART WEEKENDER  …. and it is festooned with supporting logos of similarly scaled arrogance !!

the arts council / lottery funded / Plymouth city council / the royal academy ….. on and on it goes !! a load of government endorsed / government funded / government censored / government promoted bourgeois crap just posing as culture behind some logos

its a fuckin savage vantage for an independent anything these days … and as the age of madness rolls from the Reagan / thatcher years and on to bush / blair years  and straight through to where we are now …. right now !! the Trump / Theresa era of this particular farce ! as we are all strangled by overpriced property and a bad economic projection , as wages disintegrate and the value of the sterling remains utterly laughable  …. and yet the addiction to the syllabus is seemingly contagious....  !!

stop fucking complying with this shit …. if the council … any council are offering ' funding for the arts ' right now … then why cant we afford suitable social housing ?! why cant we afford suitable social provision ?? why the last time I had a doctors appointment to have a large shard of glass taken out of my foot was I brow beaten over the inevitable cost of such a procedure ….. so artists … all of those of you grappling with the notion as the perpetual identity crisis that it is , do a fucking art thing !!! personally I cant find the time to apply for the huge varying scale of all of these ' helpful resources' ( and from my experience from the field its always someones daughter or niece or cousin that gets ushered through these processes leaving fuck all for serious venture )

but if you do have the time to sit and sift through the extra government forms , or if you know someone that knows someone that can help you get that little bit of funding ( first of all take a good fucking look at yourself _) and then take that government money and go and build some tiny houses /get out there and engage with people in a way that they wouldn't ordinarily expect …. throw a ' happening ' … because if you are taking ' government ' money in this age of disgraceful austerity … and you are getting your posters done and buying some cheap chardonnay for the ' grand opening ' …. you are a fucking asshole , and if your calling yourself ' artists ' …. and Theresa may is calling herself a prime minister … then I am just going to sit here and play with dinosaurs and intentionally not comply with a single fucking facet of this public masturbate 'o' thon

as I have said before for me using art as a vocation was my means of general strike … and I have been considering myself in that state more or less since blair and bushes mad max middle east operations …. you see architecture and urban planning are absolutely worth protesting ( I can attest to that first and ) - education , both the quality and the price are absolutely contestable , the price of simple rental accommodation !! privatisation of public sector … the systematic deteriation of those sectors to enable the principle idea of private fucking enterprise taking over in the first place

and now the arts … yes even the arts , in its white washed asshole paradigm of arrogance that it currently exudes ! as mentioned in my previous post about the Cornish art scene .. the street artists really did a thing ! arrogant asshole galleries that were so high on their own money laundering pretense or private investments … weren't exhibiting any of the ' vandalism ' at the time … and so people without a venue option , displayed their work anyway …. some of them were just competently done pretty pictures ( some of which were very intricate ) a public c.v if you like  just wanting to get a commission for some mural in some bar , restaurant or hotel … but others were doing something extra ordinary … and this is where banksy and the now completely institutionalised ' street artists ' originated … as a protest movement … not just about the stilted and nepotistic gallery scene .. but about the greyness of the environment , the constant surveillance , the rise of the police state and the impending doom of us all …..

so now even the arts are worthy of protest , but lets be clear … only the corporate edged , government endorsed horse shit that is peddled ….  there is still actual art out there … its getting harder and harder to find , that cannot be denied …. but like a treasure hunt , the more erroneous journeys can often be the more rewarding …. so get out there and find your self the sunray Kelly's of the world, and tell everyone else to fuck off x

'ArtBy' Valerio & The Arts Hole - Outside' the Box '

you know its beyond ironic to me that the city of Plymouth is investing in its museum and art gallery at the moment ( you know how many people there are in this city that are living in actual poverty )

not only in this disgraceful age of austerity is Derriford hospital falling to pieces and filling what could otherwise be bed/ward space with fucking sainsbury's and domino's pizza ?? but the city is building a very expensive Box to cram all of the imperialistic ideals into as grand a façade as possible as quickly and cheaply as possible ( again no hint of intended irony there )

and once again I site myself in a position of prominence to tackle some of that style of pompous arseholery  ... taking on a small home studio for 5 months in this city that keeps trying to kill me !

Art By Valerio - absolutely outside the box !!!  0% Government 0%Corporate completely independent and uncensored 100% ABV  x x x


Art By Valerio & The Arts Hole Pop up Initiative

The Arts Hole POP UP Exhibition option sprang up in an otherwise disused space around the summer of 2006 at the height of the credit crunch in a sleepy coastal backwater in south East Cornwall , some have even accredited this resourceful act as one of the clear pioneering acts f the now internationally embraced and ever popular pop up initiatives that can be found city to city the world over !

originally designed as an act of protest against soaring property prices / stagnant wages and the Iraq invasion during a so called labour government at the time …

the Arts Hole went into Collaboration with the Tiffany Gallery East Looe Cornwall in the winter of 2008 which coined a friendship that lasts to this day

2011 the arts hole urban expansion was initiated, eventually coining the name ' The Valerio Institute of Alternative Learning '

2015 the arts hole franchise expansion to the Netherlands incorporating many student protest elements

2017 the arts hole on tour - sailing exhibition of arts and design principles

2018 the arts hole upstiairs - home spun charm while I have charmingly spun home x

''siting the ever popular ' Signature Style ' that is the artists own progressively developing style, within the Cornish ' Art Scene ' at the time, this artists prominence and notoriety has only broadened during his extensive career to encapsulate a portfolio of such diversity as to truly set him apart from his contemporaries - an internationally well respected and established, broadly underground creative ''

Arts Hole pop up galleries and studios (2006) are a community orientated creative industries company - an exhibition description for the trading entity known as ' Artby Valerio ' (1998) and can always be found via the traditional online means just google ' Artby Valerio and get in touch or keep up to date with the latest pop up schedules and exhibition dates

.

The Cornish ' Art Scene '

the Cornish art scene is by and large reflective of so many elements of our current state of disarray  that it is amazing to me that is it is not more openly discussed !

Once upon a time - when most people still actually worked for a living, a bunch of faces deep etched by the daily Elememts they toiled in , on a rugged and windswept yet beautiful , far lung fringe of this land, opted to wile away times not spent toiling or drinking ….. on a few renderings ! Quite often composed out of left over tins of antifoul or homemade watercolours - this for me . is where the real guts of the ' Cornish Art Scene ' began !

and Cornwall remained for many years - a bit of a nostalgic throwback for decades after this actually - Humble / Rugged / Quant / Raw and Real x

That is of course until around the late 1960's and through the seventies , at this point legislation overtook production in this country full stop !

The ' Tourist Boom ' really began to take hold as the notion of recreationalism and ' obsessive compulsive acquisition ' really became a corner stone of a once proud ' ish ' economy .  ! but the little seaside getaways were now beginning to be replaced by cheap foreign holidays instead  !

but even so rents were reasonable and a sleepy yet ratifying existence could still be eeked out here, that is of course until the artificial inflation of the property market in the greater London area began to spill its poison out into the surrounding counties and like some untended infection ran rampant!

Fringe communities stared to spring up in greater and greater numbers ! Beatniks , Poets , Artsists and Hippies of all kinds would live in and travel around this last little avenue of freedom in these far flung places of cornwall, wales and scotland… away from the ministrations of our ever expanding yet increasingly inept administrations - looking for a more low cost / creative orientated way to live …. connected to the land and environment ! and in doing so really reinvigorated the Cornish art scene with a little innovation and recourceful ness...I recall moving to the area in the early 1980's and there really was still a rebellious / salty / piractical / farmer character to the place ...

this in turn encouraged the new waves of burgeoning Bourgeoise classes from Reagan and Thatchers delapidated and economically depleted  urban areas  ….. to come and ' Find out ' what was going on in Cornwall ( after all Bo Ho communities have always been where te party is … I know these days its all been rebranded into some weird amalgamative cross over between ' High Tea ' and ' Mad max but I do still think that between the bare lightbulbs - and upcycled palette bar installation - its still easy to see the genuine article over the bank balance orientated bullshit )

so these Hipsters ( Yuppies at the time ) unable to slow the degeneration of the boroughs they invested in - began to ' invest ' in the holiday home fairytale from Margaret thatchers nonsensical ' property ladder ' voodoo … which in turn of course , drove up prices and reduced the scale of attraction, and by default the flow of paradigm contesting art and artists that had been swarming to the region

Towards the end of the 1980's the ' Art Scene ' indeed much , was in Dire straits - most of the small independent Artists Studios had closed or relocated to the far more embracing and liberally minded Artists Communities in Europe and Further afield

Compounded by this was the infiltration of the Yuppy ilk from the London Class of Economics! came up with a con !

for about a decade you could find where once there was an actual working studio - a retailer of cheap Chinese and Taiwanese ' art ' ( mass produced in factories by unnamed unknown factory workers ...en mass ! ) in every Cornish town were these cheaper distributors of even cheaper wares posing as ' Cornish art ' by ' Cornish artists '

but it was a total scam and a lot of tourists got burned with this !

Fortunately this practice became so rife as to become blatant and people actually started noticing that instead of a Cornish fishing trawler in the painting … that if you looked closely it was actually a Chinese junk … in more ways than one !

so for a short while people did actually start questioning what they wee buying !

What was left of the original lobster pot hut , independent artists studios that had managed to survive the previous decades were constantly having to fight with their audiences - offering assurances of originality ( but like buying glass in venice … it can be pretty hard to be sure )

So Larger and Larger ' Collectives ' started to form …. these days try walking from one end of cornwall to the other and you cant travel five miles without tripping over some half baked collective or other ( we actually seem to be doing exactly the same with festivals at the moment too )

Roll on to Present Day

and all of these collectives are filled with ( at least it seems to me anyway ) a load of inept early retiring civil servamts and failed hairdressers from the home counties, that like nothing more than to sit around in edinburugh woollen mill garments that are at least two sizes too big for them …. and according to their ' artists statement ' they occaisionally take fido out for a couple of hours in some light drizzle so that they can chanel all of that ' raw energy ' and inspiration through some shitty ceramics process … or the smearing of a lot of tones of beige about !

if I could get it to convey appropriately …. I would fart loudly here ! but the point is lost a little in this written medium of choice

Of Course amongst all of these menopausal women posing as actual artisans simply because they had revenue to buy a house here ( all terribly dubious you understand ) you will find the now well established and royaly endorsed whistlefish - that for legal reasons cant call themselves an actal gallery anymore x and like jimmy Saville … the less said about that the better x ( a bit like a budget Tate - a load of corporate and government assholes that don't really know much about anything but how to manipulate fools … and in turn markets )
so now instead of Taiwanese paintings filling vacant overpriced premises , you will find on every Cornish highstreet one of these mcdonalds art distributors ….

and that's the situation as she stands !!its gone from bad to worse to dire … and I don't see any sign of improvement at all …. anywhere !!

Monday Fucking Morning !!! the natural habitat for bankers , politicians, estate agents , percentage people and busy bodies of all kinds !

Fuck These People !! all day long with the open end of a rusty rake !!!

so I rented a piece of shit property from some delusional imperialist weirdos , and as always I open my home and humble studio to the public , this serves several age old purposes

1. I GET TO LIVE AND WORK PEACABLY IN AN ENVIRONMENT I HAVE TAILORED TO SUIT ME ! in doing so , I am off the streets and not rousing rebellion in any obvious or dangerous sense ! it also renders product from time … this in case the Margaret thatcher degree in commerce through agency has brainwashed you completely is the origin of all economies , a producer or practitioner takes a raw material and renders from it a product or service !! this then has commercial viability from which all other markets spring !! its the original human endeavour !!

2. through the public presentation and engagement of said product or service , audiences can be met and engaged with , topical issues brought to discussion , and resolves manifested !!

and yet in just doing what I humbly choose to do in this maddening age of the charlatan , I am often indisposed by the most rudimentary arrogances and suppositions of self importance ! indeed the organizations institutions  and individuals that are supposed to encourage and incentivise enterprise and innovation , have simply become some grotesque parasitic tick ! draining the very life blood out of the things they were set up to protect !

so I rented this thing , so I could live and work in a place ( reluctantly I might add ) where previous experiences of admin ineptitude have left a great deal to be desired ! from a collective of peculiarities and women institute type importance ! I fix up the building ( doomed anyway to some half baked planning application for yet more student accommodation that will be surplus to requirement ) fill it with art … put out a little cardboard signage for the sake of the city wide open studio events !

and lo and behold !! you cant put that there , … you cant do that , … that's not allowed …. its against the rules !!

trust me , my experiments over the past 15 years with the applicable value of the rules … and the dubious character of the individuals that would nepatistically uphold them ! has left me more than proficiently versed in the terms of conduct for my particular trade … even in administrations as obviously retarded as the ones we tend to tolerate here in this country at the moment !

so they stole my signs !! the RAOB actually went to the trouble to try to insist upon me of all people !! what the formal procedure should be!

this as anyone familiar with my particular code of conduct can imagine ….did not go so well …


and after an exaggerated tirade there and then denouncing the validity of such petty quasi little organizations I conceded to consider the formal procedure !

and this here would be the written response to the ' committee ' for appraisal …. they wanted a proposal in writing for consideration , but I figure putting this here as a matter of public record is good enough !



FAO committee memebers of the RAOB North Hill Plymouth September 10th 2018

Firstly in the interest of decorum I would offer apology for being so abrupt yesterday in dealing with your chairman and associate on the premises in the evening of Sunday 11th September 2018 , however there is some inevitability in reaction when the individual is drawn unessicarily into confrontation versus a collective during what should otherwise be a more gainful pursuit even on a sunday evening  !

once again its first thing on a Monday morning and I , instead of engaging in bespoke productions , completing elements of commissioned trade to be conducted in whats left of this sterile economy ! I am having to allocate my valuable time ( billable at about £ 2500 per week ) conceding to write my completely defensible position out for yet another ethereal council !!

over the past 15 years I seem to have managed to turn a valid political protest into a commercially viable vocation , despite recessions / elections / credit crunches / austerity and even Brexit !!

and this is in part why I cannot simply comply and adhere to imposed strictures or ' standard procedure '. As all ' standard procedure ' have seemingly become so mired in bureaucratic procedure to have rendered functionality questionable at best ! and I would just like to highlight this incident as a fine example of just that !

It is hard enough to drum up any semblance of sensible and consistent trade in this economically emaciated corner of Brexit Britain !, and yet despite many appealing offers for alternative opportunities this is where, for myriad reasons I have chosen to site myself for the temporary time being ! and it would be all the more tolerable given the opportunity to simply live and work away in peace ! …. but this is Plymouth After all !!

I will openly state that it is always my preference , when and where possible, to maintain as amiable a disposition as circumstance will allow !

so in the interest of good diplomacy , and utter transparency I will offer these points for your consideration in lieu of your ' insistence for proposal ' ( both of which demand the same level of concentration and application …. however you just managed to get my back up here about this )

POINT 1

Introductions :

the names stated on the tenancy agreement - ie the individuals co habiting the uppermost floor of the premises in question:  41 north hill Plymouth

a standard tenants agreement has been formulated agreed to and signed through appointed representative ( nova homes )

tenant 1 of European origin but legal resident and full time employee for over ten years !

tenant 2 ( me ) international artist and designer of considerable repute concerning subjects beyond the areas of assumed expertise !

POINT 2

Agency :

I personally detest this countries reliance on outsourced agency and the inherent cowardice that can be found through such squirrely mediations !!

WE LIVE UPSTAIRS FOR GOODNESS SAKE !

should you take exception or offense to an issue or have a point to be raised ! come and talk to us about it ! and we can rely on agency mediation in the event that interparty negotiation should break down or fail !

it is a sad shame that dealing with people face to face has become such an unusual practice in tis day and age !! the age of the charlatan !!

POINT 3

Atelier :

an artists Residence can by default be a legally utilisable studio space ! ……

and again by default ! can be legally used to garner custom / receive the public / promote productions and exhibit works completed and or in progress !

for which ' nominal ' and ' temporary ' ( non fixed / non permanent ) signages can be ' reasonably' employed !! ( in accordance with dimension limitations / illuminated or otherwise  specifications / siting specifications R.E emergency access and egress and the implications for health and safety practice requirements !

for the DURATION or a predetermined , temporary exhibition or open studio

POINT 4

Signages Specific :

please feel free to peruse the available legislation guidelines for

- A boards / Standees / Flags and Flyers

- public exhibitions

- public exhibitions/ events  on private land

-Temporary public notices

- Art installations in public and private spaces

I think that you will find that city wide cultural promotions will also correspond to specific exemptions and exception clauses within this area of by -law

Note 1

should the incompetent council that is supposed to be acting as commissioned custodian to this city ( who I have had the misfortune of having to deal with in court in the past ) wish to raise issues … then pleas by all means pass all related matters  to myself  !

Note 2

should any of my ' promotional materials ' contravene or inhibit an expressed event for a specific demographic , then this can be handled on a case by case basis ! , and I will be more than happy to make occasional concessions and allowances i.e  I wont display any skull or death reference materials in the event of a scheduled funeral function etc


PROPOSED COURSE OF ACTION !

Option 1

signages to be returned and left alone unless prior mediation has at least been attempted ! or concession granted ! ( as stipulated above in Note Addendum 2 )

for the short term duration of the city wide open studios throughout the autumn 2018 including ' drawn to the valley open studio and artists exhibitions / Devon Artist Network open studios event / and the Plymouth Art Weekender : including and extending to additional independent short term exhibit adjustments and scheduling

hopefully culminating in a fairly symbiotic co habitation arrangement !

alternatively …..

OPTION 2

we remain at loggerheads ! we can continue to purposefully disagree over petty recriminations !

i.e everytime I put out a sign or banner or happen to be engaging in production in the communal outside spaces ( which of course as act of production or protest I will be compelled to continue to do ) . you then counter with some insistence or confrontational habit , only serving to inflame my reactionary tendency and to inspire me to escalate the presence of said protest or production to ensure inconveniences caused !! e.g …. you don't like a little A board or some flags ! well how about ' persons unkown ' spraypainting a load of anti royal slogans and profanity all over the exterior of the dman building …. really hard to pin liabilities on persons unknown … regardless of scale of supposition !! trust me what ever you want to get your knickers in a twist about …. I have a hernia for you …. so sit down shut up and stop causing trouble !!

This would only serve to inflame discord, harbour resentments and ultimately inhibit a much needed focus for topical discussion points, a melee of free flowing creativity …. and a much needed community engaging asset … that isn't owned / sponsored / manipulated through inept government or poor policy or greedy machinations , a genuine rarity these days …. the days of the charlatan !



I hope that you will take this under consideration when considering future courses of action !!

respectfully , although not completely without disdain at this stage

Aaron ( Artby ) Valerio

Urrrgghh .... This Fucking Place !!!!

Plymouth !!

well what can be said … every time I think about writing about this cancerous hole in the ground that has been aggressively stuffed with a rough concrete fist ! …. I wince !! then I despair !! then I swear that I am leaving and never coming back ! … then I do … and the whole circle begins again !! regardless of what assholes 'in charge' … regardless of vocational pursuit / romantic interest or whatever the fucking weather is doing … this place and the people that have run it for the past few decades …. blow the proverbial fat one !!

and now they want to spend 600Million on a brand new city centre rejuvenation scheme   …. well I am sorry if I don't have a great deal of faith in the organizations that have brought us such calamities as the drakes shopping mall , the life centre , that horrible tower of Sauron they have just built to house all of the students that are no longer applying for places since they hiked the price of tuition through the roof ….. which is having a catastrophic knock on effect with all the poor suckers that git stuck with the false promise of the buy to let mortgage ….. which in turn has affected the overall rental market in the city ….

we don't have any shops left … just a few corporate coffee outlets , and a few estate agents ( all offering great incentives on buy to let …..???!! ) and the supermarkets that keep the general population drip fed on a chemical poison that will just about fuel them through some 8 hour monotony !! of course vocational monotony is all that's left … since the banks and the governments in their pockets collapsed the economies !!

unfortunately this as I am writing it … although was entitled ' Plymouth ' I think this actually represents most urban areas in the country right now !

Plymouth However really does offer a shining Salute to the foulness of the shitstorm we have inflicted on ourselves … all for the sake of another mans greed !! the age of insanity … the age of the charlatan indeed !!

so apparently the Brexit bus left the boot open … and Plymouth city council managed to make off with 600million pounds worth of that fictitious budget … and they are going to pay themselves very well … while they strategize and formulate the where and whys of stuffing another cinema / mall / student accommodation …. into what could have otherwise been a very pleasant place to live and work !!!

Pleasure / Thrills and Happiness ... and Spaceforce

I think that something that really steered me towards the arts at an early age was the individuals capacity to create a semblance , even a minor infusion of order ...into what would otherwise be mere chaos !

I think that stimuli has a great deal to do with reactionary tendency …. but the core individual / the physical and psychological capacity to endure scales of tumult .. or as I said , stimuli of any nature be that positive or negative …. and to focus the reaction through a rational and constructive process really is the main accomplishment , of all of our so called, often self professed accomplishments … that's the one that's really worth a mention !

I used t find that during times of high stress and anxiety , that to sit in a quiet space , breathing deeply and ' grounding ' myself through the meditative process of pushing lines or pigments around on a blank page or canvas was really the most PLEASURABLE experience, I could transcend any situation and through the creative process … end up with a rendering , a composed thought ! of course the inclination can very easily be the opposite .. to loose your shit and kick a door off the hinges and go ranting and raving around the place like some nut ! ( and I confess to be guilty of both behavioural attributes )many years later I took to the commercial application of this tendency ( as I have said before people will buy fucking beanie babies for Christ sake ,... so it only made sense that I should supplement my income at the time through the process ) of course then this unending recession took place and we have pretty much been living with this austerity crap ever since …. as a result many of the companies I used to work for went out of business ! and so my income supplement became my main income ….

and it was during a little gallery stint during this burgeoning economic downturn that a veteran friend of mine said something quite profound … he suggested that ' you can always work your way out of the shit '

just by doing that which comes natural … the engaging in that simple meditative process renders product ! over time , given suitable application that products quality will improve ! so you are quite literally investing in yourself when times are hard … in the Knowledge that market cycles fluctuate …so even if times are tough … keep painting ! keep writing … keep gardening, keep it going!! and you will end up with at the very least an amassed store of commodity!!!

the losing your shit option does always have an immediate release appeal !!but after more broken meta tarsals than I can re-call the rational mind says breath deeply , eat an orange , smoke a joint and drink a coffee … and plough your head into the creative process ….

now THRILLS … Thrills are as much a part of the stimuli process as any thing else, Thrills are a good thing , indeed if and when they are genuinely garnered !

Now I used to enjoy Roller Coasters .. and indeed if I find myself in the proximity I can still be inclined to find a little childlike thrill in the engagement of such whimsey! some people like booze , cocaine , sex … even shopping , and I read a study that indicated that with the scale of online interactions that we do these days that even seeing the little red notification or message icon releases the same neuro chemicals as any artificially imposed thrill !!…. me well I like to spend a Monday morning languishing !! naked with company as and when its pertinent ! casting a mental image of all the assholes in Charring Cross pouring into the city to spend hours and hours convicted in the treasonous ' business as always ' bullshit that has effectively rendered the last 30 years worth of nonsense …. other than that all I really need is a blank medium and a means of making a mark on it …. simple wants I guess ! to stand back and look at a 'completed' rendering … well that is a pleasurable thrill … and well selling ( or indeed trading a yacht for )a piece that you have laboured over …. that would be a very ratifying thrill ! …

Happiness … Happiness , well now that to me is a bit of an ethereal notion … a nice idea !! but in real terms its not very practical .. if you think of the old adage ' the devil makes work for idle hands ' ( indeed everytime that Sinbad the Sailor became ' Happy ' or ' Content ' he would lapse into periods of extreme indulgence and laziness )

I think that there is such a thing as Happiness … although its overall principle has become a little rash ( lets compare the humble seaside holiday to the garish hideousness of las vegas of walt Disney world ) and like the thrill of a roller coaster or hearing your favourite human express sentiments of love

a genuine conversation with  someone willing to listen or a gaudy semi reassuring text or tweet from some Fairweather acquaintance

there are real experiences in this world … some of them run you a little close to the bone , you can run a boat aground ! you can fall in and out of love ! climb and or fall out of a tree …. you can find the trills they would sell you for a disproportionate percentage of your labours ! in the humble .. the warm morning embrace of your lover , the walks through untainted landscapes and deserted beaches and coastlines

you could take all of that .. and instead of trying to market it on Instagram as some vague way of ratifying an otherwise completely predictable life … you could write some music about it .. write a poem … draw a picture or do a painting … design a piece of the landscape that needs improving ( and god knows if you look up from your phone for just like two minutes on a bus commute you will see what I mean )

its all in the doing .. that's where I think that Happiness lives … through comfortable and reassuring pleasures against the unpredictable ness of life   ….ratifying thrills of substance ….. and the genuine living of a very finite life !

' Space Force ' ……..!!!!!!????? so we seem to have just traded the doing , for the mere buying- ( I think if we could we would even forgo the element of choice) … I think that humanity has become so confused that we would simply consume( Pleasurable ) ( Thrills ) in Lieu of the pursuit of a genuine yet periodical ' Happiness '

but I really hope that there is still hope x