Beauty, Illustrated

It's Lisi from The Beauty File and I'd like to introduce

you to Melbourne's own, Nevin Hirik.

The paintbrush: her instrument.

The canvas: her linen storyboard where dreams come alive....

Remember, 2009

Dreams to Remember, 2009

Three, 2003

Dreams to Remember VI, 2009

Theme of the Uprooting II, 2006

I Will Wait to See You Again, 2008

In Nevin's studio...

I had the opportunity to interview the lovely artist.

She shared her inspirations, experiences and favorite music.

Enjoy!

1. What inspires you? Art? Music? Literature? Other artists?

Life!! Everything really. Literature, film, dance, history, traveling, stories, my life, your life, pain, happiness, one word in the movie, a line in the book, Art itself, and Music, of course.

2. What colors do you feel most comfortable using? Are there certain shades that you are drawn to?

Not really. Every painting has its own story and the colours come with the painting naturally, I don’t plan this before the painting. Funny thing is if I want a painting with lots of red it ends up blue, if I want it blue it ends up red. So the best thing is not planning it, it tells me what it wants!

3. Your work truly invokes a dreamlike state and your use of layering is incredible. How long does it take you to create your work?

Thank you. It really depends on the painting, also my mood. I am a full time artist. Sometimes I am locked in my studio and paint days and nights, and I get burned out, physically and mentally, I get so tired. And then I have a break. Then back to the studio again. One solo show a year. And some mixed small shows. I can’t have more than one solo show a year; really I don’t know how people paint like that.

4. Do you paint with music playing in the background? What is on your play list right now?

I do. I can’t think of my studio without music. I love listening to music when I am painting. I listen to lots of different music.

I listen to lots of world music, classic, opera, hip-hop, Blues, Gypsy, Jazz. Lots of good music. I listen to lots of silly music in private life, but in the studio I listen to good music:

Eleni Karaindrou, Zulya, Portishead, Djivan Gasparyan, Elliot Goldenthal, Arto Tuncboyaciyan, David Hirschfelder, Elvira Uzunian, Kim Kashkashian, Robert Levin, Fazil Say, Nick Cave, Rashid Behbudov and Erkan Ogur.

5. What experiences/people from your own life are reflected in your collection?

I sometimes call my paintings a mirror. Every single private story behind these pictures also belongs to you. I am not unique, none of us are. We are all human. We share all the stories.

You can see my stories in my paintings. I am a migrant. I came to Australia from Turkey when I was 23 years old. There is a girl in my painting carry her house in her hand; another one has got the tree inside the house. So this is my experience, but it is also others stories too. For me it represent more than private stories. Thousands of people are homeless now, countries simply can’t share the earth with other nations.

Painting is the language I choose. And I love sharing this with others, that is the best part.

Visit Nevin's blog to view all of her work here

To contact Nevin, email her at: nevin@nevinhirik.com

top photo: silence is everywhere, 2008

(Guest Post by Lisi at the Beauty File.)

The Week's End

Tomorrow will be so much better...Thank you for your kind words of support this week. Love you all so much.

(Photos: Rusted Wound, inanutshell, and the incomparable Rosie Hardy.)

End of an Era

The death of Irving Penn marks the end of the era of seminal midcentury fashion photographers, according to a fantastic Los Angeles Times story by Emili Vesilind in today's Image section.



Emili writes:  "Penn, along with Richard Avedon, who died in 2004, practically invented modern fashion photography -- a place where art meets commerce -- in the mid-20th century."



The influence of both photographers -- and a group of mavericks who followed -- figures prominently on the pages of fashion magazines and books to this day.
{More details here in Emili's story}

{Also, an LAT slideshow of Penn photos here}

I hope you're having a lovely Sunday.  I'm reading the Sunday papers and sipping chai tea. Very relaxing.

Next, I have to do the laundry. Sigh. Another laundry crisis...
xo

(Photo credits: top and bottom photos by Avedon, middle photo by Penn.)

Missed Connections

Artist Sophie Blackall has created the most clever blog...


... illustrating posts on the Craigslist Missed Connections sites...



"Messages in bottles, smoke signals, letters written in the sand; the modern equivalents are the funny, sad, beautiful, hopeful, hopeless, poetic posts on Missed Connections websites," she writes....



"Every day hundreds of strangers reach out to other strangers on the strength of a glance, a smile or a blue hat. Their messages have the lifespan of a butterfly. I'm trying to pin a few of them down."

Lovely!

Sophie's blog Missed Connections {here}.

And...her magnificent inspiration board.

It Never Rains in Southern California

Hello everyone! This seemed like a fitting video for a day filled with rain in Los Angeles. (It also reminds me of Lisi's beautiful twilight post.) Before I moved to California, one of my friends warned me that it pours here in the winter -- sometimes for days. Another problem: No one knows how to drive in the rain. It's better just to stay in and listen to the rain on the roof.

But today I was out braving the weather, driving from Beverly Hills to Hollywood for two movie screenings. First one: A Single Man, with Colin Firth. (Wait till you see Julianne Moore's house in the movie. It's gorgeous 60s chic -- Tom Ford style!) The second movie: A Serious Man, a la the Coen brothers. A Serious Man was very funny but a Single Man made me cry. Now I'm too tired to go to bed.

Tomorrow: Sunshine.
xo


PS: Here's a little more detail about A Single Man on Woolfe & Wilde.

Twilight

{sensitive space}

happy tuesday lovely readers!
l.l. here from The Beauty File blog.
this week I bring you an awe-inspiring group of photos by
the incredibly talented flickr photostreamer, futureancient.

prepare to be mesmerized...

{dawnman}

{*}

{enchantment}

{soft music under the stars}

{homeward bound}

{ancient note}

{eternal}

all photos via futureancient flickr stream