The Ride Journal - Bonk!

The Ride Journal - Bonk!

A piece I did a month or two back for the wonderful cycling journal The Ride, created by the brothers Diprose and launched last night in London at Look Mum No Hands!

Sadly, due to work commitments and a doggedly persistant chesty cough, I wasn't able to make it along. Damn!

This was for a piece about what cyclists term the 'bonk', a condition caused by the depletion of glycogen stores in the liver and muscles, which manifests itself by precipitous fatigue and loss of energy. Milder instances can be remedied by brief rest and the ingestion of food or drinks containing carbohydrates. The condition can usually be avoided by ensuring that glycogen levels are high when the exercise begins, maintaining glycogen levels during exercise by eating or drinking carbohydrate-rich substances, or by reducing exercise intensity.

The term "bonk" for cycling fatigue is presumably derived from the original meaning "to hit", and dates back at least half a century. A recent DVD issued by the British Transport Films Collection contains several old films, one of which entitled "Cyclists Special", a colour film produced in 1955, tells the story of a party of cyclists touring the English countryside. At one point they stop for refreshments and the film's commentator states that if they didn't rest and eat they would get "the bonk".

Here, the author is helped along his way not by rest or an energy bar, but by the heartening rasp of his cycling companion breaking wind as he overtakes!

The Ride is available to order online or from many good cycle shops. It was very favourably reviewed in yesterday's Independent newspaper!

The Seventh Seal/ Det Sjunde Inseglet

The Seventh Seal/ Det Sjunde Inseglet

This was something I've just done for a zine being put together by good friend and great illustrator/ printmaker Mat Pringle.
Mat asked a number of artists, including my good self, to contribute an image showing, or inspired by, their favourite film - I chose Ingmar Bergman's 1957 classic The Seventh Seal (Det Sjunde Inseglet). No, its NOT Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey!

Here I have shown the returning and world-weary crusader Antonius Block (an unfeasibly blond Max Von Sydow) confronting the black-cloaked figure of Death (Döden in Swedish), played with great menace and humour by Bengt Ekerot. Block challenges the Grim Reaper to a game. "You play chess, do you not?" inquires the Knight. Death replies "How do you know that?"

I don't often work in just black & white, but I think it both mirrors the film and conveys well its stark supernatural message.

Burns' Night - 25 January

Burns' Night - 25 January

A Burns supper is a celebration of the life and poetry of the poet Robert Burns, author of many Scots poems. The suppers are normally held on or near the poet's birthday, 25 January, sometimes also known as Robert Burns Day or Burns' Night (Burns Nicht), although they may in principle be held at any time of the year.

Burns suppers are most common in Scotland and Northern Ireland, but occur wherever there are Burns clubs, Scottish Societies, expatriate Scots, or aficionados of Burns' poetry. There is a particularly strong tradition of them in southern New Zealand's main city Dunedin (the Scots Gaelic name for Edinburgh incidentally) of which Burns' nephew Thomas Burns was a founding father.

Robert Burns (25 January 1759 – 21 July 1796) (also known as Rabbie Burns, Scotland's favourite son, the Ploughman Poet, Robden of Solway Firth, the Bard of Ayrshire and in Scotland as simply The Bard) was a Scottish poet and lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide. He is the best known of the poets who have written in the Scots language, although much of his writing is also in English and a "light" Scots dialect, accessible to an audience beyond Scotland. He also wrote in standard English, and in these his political or civil commentary is often at its most blunt.

As well as making original compositions, Burns also collected folk songs from across Scotland, often revising or adapting them. His poem (and song) Auld Lang Syne is often sung at Hogmanay celebrations (New Year's Eve), and Scots Wha Hae served for a long time as an unofficial national anthem of the country. Other poems and songs of Burns that remain well-known across the world today include A Red, Red Rose; A Man's A Man for A'That; To a Louse; To a Mouse: The Battle of Sherramuir; Tam o'Shanter, and Ae Fond Kiss.

A Burns' Night supper usually consists of a Haggis, served up with great ceremony, and accompanied by neeps and tatties (boiled swede and mashed potato). Some believe that a haggis is a dish containing sheep's 'pluck (heart, liver and lungs), minced wth onion, oatmeal, suet, spices and salt, mixed with stock and traditionally simmered for up to three hours, but it is in fact a wild creature found in the Highland hills. There are in fact two types; one with a longer left leg and the other with a longer right one. This makes them perfectly suited for running 'round and around mountains, but sadly means that the two sub-species cannot interbreed without falling off the mountains to their doom.

Here I have shown young Rabbie tickling the chin of an unsuspecting Haggis, whom he flatters and entraps with his famous 'Address to a Haggis'. Looking on in the bottom right-hand corner is the field-mouse Burns described as a 'wee, sleekit, cow'rin, tim'rous beastie'!

Happy Burns' Night!

City of Glasgow Coat-of-Arms

What with Burns' Night this coming Tuesday my mind has turned to Bonnie Scotland and all things 'albannach' (Scottish in Scotch Gaelic).

Last week I was waiting for Nick outside a pub called the Wheatsheaf on Rathbone Place (Oxford St), just across the road from where we was working and where my friend Hele used to work part-time all those years ago when we were engineering students at Imperial. I noticed that the windows of this mock-tudor watering hole had stained glass windows, featuring, what it transpired were, the arms of various Scottish cities.

The shield for Glasgow (meaning 'Green Hollow' in Middle gaelic) fascinated me the most. Here above is my interpretation. Heraldically it is described as follows;
Argent; on a mount in base Vert, an oak tree Proper, the stem at the base thereof surmounted by a salmon on its back, also Proper, with a signet ring in its mouth Or; on the top of the tree a redbreast and in the sinister fess point an ancient hand bell, both also Proper.
(Argent means silver or white, Or means gold or yellow, Vert is green and Proper means painted as it appears in life).

A popular rhyme in the city describes the coat-of-arms

Here is the Bird that never flew
Here is the Tree that never grew
Here is the Bell that never rang
Here is the Fish that never swam

Glasgow's Coat of Arms dates back to 1866 when the Lord Lyon first granted the city its patent. The emblems depicted within the armorial bearings go back much further in history, representing legendary incidents in the life of the city's founder and patron saint, St Kentigern, or as he was more affectionately known, St Mungo, meaning "the dear one".

The Bell is believed to represent the one given to St Mungo by the Pope. Until the 16th century St Mungo's Bell played an important role in the life of the city, tolled regularly as a reminder to the inhabitants to pray for his soul. A replacement was purchased in 1641 and now lies in the People's Palace. Inscribed on it is the city's motto: "Lord let Glasgow flourish through the preaching of thy word and praising thy name." - often shortened to: "Let Glasgow Flourish". The fate of the original bell is unknown.

The Tree - although depicted as an oak - represents the hazel branch which the young St Mungo miraculously set alight when the holy fire of the monastery at Culross was mischievously extinguished by the other boys.

The Bird represents a robin brought back to life by the young saint after St Serf's disciples had accidentally killed it and blamed Mungo.

The Fish refers to the story of Queen Langeoreth, whose husband King Rydderach Hael, suspected her of infidelity. Knowing she had given her gold wedding ring to her lover, King Hael took the ring from the knight as he slept and threw it into the River Clyde. Challenging her to produce the ring, Langeoreth sought help from the knight who, through his confession to St Mungo, was instructed by the saint to take a salmon from the river. To the king's amazement, the ring was discovered in the salmon's mouth. A great story, but a pretty hazy moral. Cuckolding your husband's fine so long as you've a saint on hand to cover your tracks!

Twitter Ye Not

A piece about how figures in history might have twittered or tweeted or whatever, had they the chance, inclination and technology.

Here, the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth I on 15 January 1559. Sir Walter Raleigh looks on, getting in a crafty tweet mid-bow.

I have been pretty accurate with the setting and costumes, although a contemporarily miniature marking the day shows Goode Queen Bess with her long red hair down. But I thought folks mightn't recognise it as her, without her later high-cut poodle perm!

A very desirable slipware Owl

http://garrett-life.blogspot.com/2011/01/christmas-owl.html

Burn's Night supper - Name Cards

These are a few (there are 19 in toto) of the name cards I was asked to create for a(n early) Burn's Night celebration to-night at my friend Angela's house.

Sadly due to poor health Nick and I cannot make it, which is a real bummer. But the place cards will!

I took the Royal Standard of Scotland, a red Lion on a yellow background, as the inspiration for the colours.