penetration, 1994, mixed media on board

world aids day

for derek

the queen is dead

a place to write

channeling derek...

(original journal entry)

saturday 26 september, 1992

swallows sweep low around the house, my black floaters swim low across the landscape.

john adam's "wound dresser" makes me feel quite weepy.  there are moments in this unequal battle against the hiv when one is overcame, then someone arrives to rescue you.

this morning my american airman wrote from his airbase, he and his friend are off to ireland, he's at the delightful age of co-incidence.  i wrote last week about wittgenstein who he could not find in the base library but he had bought a second-hand book on klimt and stumbled across the portrait of margaret in the white dress.

then three young gardeners stopped by, they were from holland and had made for prospect on the way to great dixter, they spent over an hour here and were amused by the formal garden in front of the house and the informal one at the back.

i played the wound dresser again, this time no tears, there are now more swallows than floaters circling the house.  the garden has never looked better, there are enough flowers splashed here and there, all is neat and tidy so the circles show well, the rain has kept everything green and healthy, the hosepipe ban which could do in the plants that have not established themselves had no effect, everything has seeded:  valerian, poppies, cornflower, teazle, mallow, even the large thistles though the slugs eat them as fast as they grow.

my american airman is called cary doucette, little sweetie, he is in love with another airman who shares his bed behind very tightly drawn curtains.

channeling derek...

saturday august 19, 1989

... last night i dreamed many dreams.  in one a clay man crumbled into dust at my touch at the entrance to the great library between the tigris and euphrates.

wednesday august 19, 1992

... oh, drip, drip, drip

... i decided to make blue without images- they hinder the imagination and beg a narrative and suffocate with arbitrary charm, the admirable austerity of the void.

on seeing red

... in the hospital they drop stinging belladonna in the eye to open the pupils, and then take photos by flashlight.  is this that moment in hiroshima?  did i live to tell the tale?  for a fraction of a second there is a sky blue circle, and then the world reassembles itself in magenta.

is it wednesday already?

here it is hump day and i haven't even posted about our weekend- it's been one of those weeks

here it is in photos and links

(yeah, i'm being lazy)

channeling derek...

tuesday, july 11 1989

...spent the morning reading "matthew", and "wisdom":

our name will be forgotten in time

and no-one will remember our works

our life will pass away like the traces of a cloud

and be scattered like mist

this is chased by the rays of the sun

and overcome by its heat

for our allotted time is the passing of a shadow

and will run like sparks through the stubble

saturday, july 11, 1992

... to set up a focal point that robs everyone of focus is a treason that the arts can perform quite easily in their concrete bunkers.  it would have been much better for our "community" if the arts had to involve themselves directly.  to call pasolini, or myself for that matter, "gay artists" is foolish and limiting.  one day maybe we will dispense with boundaries and categories.  i was never gay, queer maybe, difficult certainly, with good reason...

chorma:  shadow is the queen of colour

when what is black is mixed with the light of the sun and fire, the result is always red.

we are going to see the documentary "derek" tomorrow evening 

channeling derek...

friday june 23, 1989

... at midday i left for dungeness with julian to water the garden.  as i turned on the hose julian said there was a four hundred pound  fine or two months imprisonment. fuck it! i thought, my flowers also have a right to live.  jon says the weather is "chemical".

tuesday june 23, 1992

... hb went for a long walk and found a caterpillar, but the surprise of the day has been a merlin- a small delicate hawk, rather rare- that hovers a few feet above us without a fear and catches lizards and mice.  it seems to spend most of the day hunting round the house.

white lies

... if you spin a colour wheel fast enough it turns white, but if you mix the pigments, however much you try, you will only get a dirty grey

it's about time...

i was pleasantly surprised to find this article about derek in the sunday nytimes arts and leisure section

it's about time he gets some recognition here in the u.s. and i'm very happy that tilda is leading the cause to make it so

derek taught me what it means to be queer and made me the artist i am today

-cary