April

Loosely based on Gaia- or a musical version of.

...after about a dozen snowman markers

dotwork

'Samding'- Tibetan, translates as meditating mountain

At the top of Namo Buddha

Inside the beautiful monastery, surrounded by thangka art

Heres a right jumble of recent things... The final few walls of 'Vela'. And a few sketches from Namo Buddha monastery....  

Ive given in and got a facebook page for a few easier updates. 

Vela Restaurant (Wall 1), sketches and adventure plans

Really nice brief for this one... i had to come up with a design that was Bollywood/ Indian inspired and would suit an Indian restaurant and Bollywood karaoke bar. Nice and simple to paint too.. although painting with gold varnish with loud karaoke in the background made my head feel a little funny after awhile.

'Vela' restaurant is in DurbarMarg, it's worth heading there for the momos, even if karaoke isn't your thing. The next couple of walls should get coloured in next week, after Holi! 

And some unrelated sketches... i drew these in my head when sitting around the fire up in the mountains, but it's only just made it out of my head and onto paper. Probably be another year before i end up painting it up properly!

I'm trying to 'paint my way' to Thailand from Kathmandu by travelling overland (no more nasty polluting sky dragons!)... and firstly earn enough to afford the ridiculous Tibet permit... if anyone wants anything coloured in or painted along the way I'd be more than happy to!
I'm vaguely planning a route through Tibet, train around the north to Chengdu, and then down to Yunnan, to Laos, and then through North Thailand.. It's still a bit of a dream until the Tibetan border opens again and i find out if it is possible.. But, i'm going to keep dreaming and send some good thoughts to the universe and hope things work out!

everything flows and nothing stays still

Maitighar, Kathmandu

Trying to work a 12ft long paintbrush.

I ended up dripping paint everywhere, painting a motorbike and generally being a clumsy idiot today. Too much sun! I'm not used to painting with what felt like a giant arm. It did make me think how Mr Tickle would be awesome at mural painting. 

The start of Kolor Kathmandu

Just started painting at Maitighar, Kathmandu,  for Kolor Kathmandu. (- check these guys out and give them some love)

I am loving painting in the sunshine!!! And somehow painting on the side of a busy noisy smelly roundabout feels really chilled. I had a bunch of bananas for breakfast and i think the sugar and serotonin overload helped with the happiness boost! That, and the really cute smiley dog that hung out with us for the day.

I started with the bottom half- nice and easy to reach and hazard free apart from tripping over the odd brick and occasionally being spat on by the child watching from the rooftop...
Big thankyou to Kavinnah and Sramdip for helping out!

I should explain the ideas a bit i guess.. The Nepali district it's based on is Dolkha and the picture is inspired by a folk story... The story is about a lady, who when washing down by the river, trips and falls over the waterfall. Her dead body is washed downstream, and eventually ends up separating and dissolving into part of the river, part of the earth and part of the mountains. These elements all continue to grow over time with part of her inside them. It's trying to convey how everything is interconnected, and we are all part of the earth more than we realise, in the same way that the earth is part of us.
I thought this was appropriate for a city that sometimes seems to forget about the environment around it.

And in a simpler sense, i thought the city could do with an extra tree, even if it is just a painted one.

Found things.

I found an old card i made a while ago floating around on someone's tumblr. Thought I'd stick it up here before I lost it again. The internet is wonderful for finding lost images! Thank you to whoever blogged it.

I'm playing with trash and junk at the moment, picking up lots of rubbish from the streets much to the puzzlement of other pedestrians. My favourites finds are the old NCELL recharge cards and passport photos. Kathmandu has a pretty good selection of litter to play with.

This is all in preparation for a day of 'trash art' on Friday. If you happen to be reading this and are in Kathmandu, please come along! Details below...

January's Sketchbook. (Nepal)

You can probably guess from the backgrounds in the photos that i decided to venture off to the mountains for a while... It's unbelievably good to be back! 

 I'm working with a community and educational development NGO, but am still finding enough time to do a bit of colouring in. Most of these are obviously mountain related. I might have a go at some city and figure drawings soon... But i might not, I've given up planning drawings too much. I prefer to watch them appear in their own way. That might be because i don't often tend to have a pencil, a rubber and everything needed for planning and preparing when i start drawing. I quite like the simplicity of just a pen and paper.

I'm reading an awesome book at the moment about hallucinations, (Oliver Sacks- 'Hallucinations') which will hopefully subconsciously inspire some future drawings. 

 If anyone wants a print of any pictures below, i'll scan the drawings in properly. Message me if you do :)

View from Nagarkot. I used old Chinese symbols within the drawing in the hope that i might remember them.

Sleeping mountain giants.

(Inspired by) Varuna- Hindu God of the sky, water, celestial ocean, all forms of water, and the guardian of directions. 

I drank too much scotch on the plane, got a little bored so did the usual escapism of pretended i was riding a dragon for a while. The lady next to me played Bejewelled for 8 hours straight, only stopping occasionally for feeding times.