Author Archives: peter

About peter

'Death by Sushi' Fish can kill me. When I was very small (maybe 3 or 4 years old) my grandfather, who lost the sight of one eye from a bullet fired by a German sniper (fortunately not a very good one) during the Battle of the Somme in World War 1, wiped my face with the corner of his apron, an apron he had used to wipe his filleting knife on. He was a grocery shopkeeper who specialized in wet fish.

The Beatles A&BC Chewing Gum Ltd (first series) 7 loose cards #beatles

Faded Beatles – my life has faded with them

I unearthed a box of old stuff which was crammed with bits and pieces from my childhood. Photographs of the Beatles printed on cardboard, faded and going the colour of straw – I looked in the mirror and there was the same reflection.

Below are a few of the Beatles black & white cards. Numbers 7, 37, 45, 48, 51, 57, 60 from a series of 60. A&BC Chewing Gum Ltd cards showing John Lennon, George Harrison, Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney with printed signatures in blue.

beatles_series_1

The #Beatles – trading cards better than the real thing

I understand the joys of collecting things like stamps, trading crds etc. there is alway the pleasure of finding, buying that elusive one that will make the set. Chewing gum cards were my thing when I was small – I loved the chance element, the hope of getting what I wanted. I no longer collect things but I still love chance, which is why I now do the lottery.

The Beatles built their reputation playing clubs in Liverpool and Hamburg over a three-year period from 1960. Manager Brian Epstein moulded them into a professional act and producer George Martin enhanced their musical potential. They gained popularity in the United Kingdom after their first hit, “Love Me Do”, in late 1962. They acquired the nickname “the Fab Four” as Beatlemania grew in Britain over the following year, and by early 1964 they had become international stars, leading the “British Invasion” of the United States pop market.

In 1962 / 63 Douglas Coakley of A & BC Chewing Gum Ltd, approached Brian Epstein, The Beatles manager, and his lawyer David Jacobs, to obtain the rights to produce trading cards featuring photographs and autographs of the Beatles. A set of 60 cards was produced and issued in 1964. The photographs were provided to A&BC Chewing Gum Ltd courtesy of Nems Enterprises Ltd, Brian Epstein’s company, and appear to be mostly taken in 1963 and maybe 1962. A second series quickly followed.

I love Beatles ephemera – I hate their annoying music

As far as I am concerned they are not the massive influence on popular music they are claimed to be – mediocrity comes to mind.

beatles_series_1_backs

The backs are clean on 7, 37, 48, 51, 57(obviously age faded) and corners and edges fairly crisp and sharp.

The backs of 45 and 60 are glue damaged and age faded. Corners and edges are fairly crisp and sharp.

#Pentax SP – #Takumar 1:2/55mm lens ideal for #DSLR cameras

Takumar 1:2/55mm lenses are the perfect manual lens for DSLR cameras

Takumar 1:2/55mm lens

Pentax cameras of this era came with fantastic standard lenses. The one I purchased off ebay came with an original Takumar 1:2/55mm lens, a great lens that is flexible and precise. Takumar is the name that Asahi Optical gave to its lenses, which they used on Asahi Pentax cameras. These lenses were named after the Japanese-American portrait painter, Takuma Kajiwara.

Pentax SP 500 -Takumar 1:2/55mm lens

When the first Pentax Spotmatic was introduced to the public at the 1960 PHOTOKINA, photographic fair, in Cologne, Germany, it attracted the instant and close attention of photographers and photographic engineers alike.

The model range included the original Spotmatic, Spotmatic II and IIa, Spotmatic F, plus the SP500 and SP1000. There was also the Pentax SL, which was identical to the Spotmatic except that it did not have the built-in light meter.

To buy a Takumar 1:2/55mm lens click on the images above or here

Tarot Art prediction – it is there in the cards – #Tarot #Art

Tarot reading for Art

You can’t be aware of beforehand what will happen in the future where art is concerned but you can predict that the same old tired ideas that have been thought of before will come around again – it is predicted in the cards.
Tarot Art

Tarot Art

Card 1 (Justice) : How you feel about yourself now »
You are feeling that things will go your way, you believe in fairness and justice in all things. If you are considering partnership issues, personal or professional, dealings will go well. Perhaps you are about to sign a contract with a gallery or legal document with an agent – this will be beneficial to you. If someone has done wrong to you it will be put right and you will feel justice has been done. ( Tarot Art )

  • You can paint using any crap

    Contemporary artists have extended the boundaries of painting considerably to include; collage, different materials such as sand, cement, straw or wood for their texture. Juxtaposing images and materials, either as a collage, printing or painting is not simply a decorative process it is a complicated exercise. The mind always tries to create a narrative between images and materials. The juxtaposition of arbitrary marks, color, photographs etc. will always tease and trick the mind into rationalizing what it is trying to process and attempt to make physical world references – in other words make sense of what it is trying to analyze.

Card 2 (The Lovers) : What you most want at this moment »
The cards suggest that what you most want at this time is to know what choice to make – carry on as you are or take a risk? The risk offers excitement and change and staying as you are …. Well you know what that has to offer. Dare to love, dare to live? Dare to paint differently? ( Tarot Art )

  • Digital canvas (?)

    Since the proliferation of computers, painting could be argued to have migrated to the digital age (world). There is a massive community of artists who use computers to paint color onto a digital canvas using programs such as Adobe Photoshop, Corel Painter, Gimp and others. Does this mean that new printing techniques have now become absorbed into painting methodologies and practices?

Card 3 (The World) : Your fears »
You are afraid of taking action and lack confidence and will power, but this is a time to be positive and proactive, otherwise you will experience loss of momentum, delays and stagnation. Completion and success are only a step away, don’t give up, lose heart, lose faith in your art or change direction when you are so close to the finish line. ( Tarot Art )

  • Thrown together Art

    This meshing together of processes, unrelated imagery and the breaking down of barriers cannot be seen as a shortcut to intellectual credibility. The dedicated thought process that goes with the creative procedure should be one of intense reasoning. It is therefore unrealistic to expect the uneducated masses to use the computers prescriptive decision making to create ‘real art’. The birth of Photoshop has enabled everybody to create ‘non-intellectual’ versions of Rauschenberg (and Warhol) – this is not ART.

Card 4 (The Chariot) : What is going for you »
Drive, drive, drive, that’s what’s going for you. You certainly aren’t a quitter that’s for sure. The appearance of The Chariot tells of conflicts ending in victory, so don’t give up, battle on and you will succeed. This is a time of movement and change. Expect a journey relating to your art, and if you’ve had you’re eye on that car, it will soon be yours. ( Tarot Art )

  • Art is nothing

    “Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface. The application of the medium is commonly applied with a brush. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. These same criteria can be used to describe printing.”

Card 5 (The High Priestess) : What is going against you »
Insecurity is a devil that taunts us but only if we listen to that ‘doubting Thomas’ we all have in our heads. Ignore it. What do your instincts tell you? Perhaps you don’t like what they say? Well you could always go against your instincts, but we all know what that leads to don’t we! ( Tarot Art )

  • Oil Painting

    Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound together with a medium of drying oil. Oil paint eventually became the principal medium used for creating artworks as its advantageous properties became widely known and exploited. By the height of the Renaissance oil painting techniques had almost completely replaced tempera paints in the majority of Europe.

Card 6 (Wheel Of Fortune) : Outcome »
Expect life to change and quickly. Fate, destiny or synchronicity, call it what you like, positive change and good fortune is evident here. If you have important choices to make trust your intuition. Do you feel that events seem to be evolving without much input from you? If so trust it and go with the flow. ( Tarot Art )
Tarot Art

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#Website updated – new look for PeterBright.info – new #paintings

I have change the way peterbright.info works – take a look

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Still Life is a Still life in paint

Over the next few months a series of ‘still life paintings’ will be offered for sale. This follows on from my successful participation in a (private / invited) exhibition that was held earlier on this year in Rugby.

I have been inspired to paint, people have excited me and non-verbally encouraged me. I saw a painting by Renoir entitled ‘Onions’ at the Royal academy a few years ago…

Onions, 1881 is a painting of just six plain onions and some garlic and is a remarkable sensuous still life, their papery skins explode with colour and shape, making something from the ordinary magical and interesting. The lack of content and minimal subject matter belies the exuberant and controlled, skillfully executed gem. I wish I had painted it. Read more…

A Still Life is a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which may be either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, or shells) or man-made (drinking glasses, books, vases, jewellery, coins, pipes, and so on). With origins in the Middle Ages and Ancient Graeco-Roman art, still-life painting emerged as a distinct genre and professional specialisation in Western painting by the late 16th century, and has remained significant since then. Still life gives the artist more freedom in the arrangement of elements within a composition than do paintings of other types of subjects such as landscape or portraiture. Early still-life paintings, particularly before 1700, often contained religious and allegorical symbolism relating to the objects depicted. Some modern still life breaks the two-dimensional barrier and employs three-dimensional mixed media, and uses found objects, photography, computer graphics, as well as video and sound.

Still life. (2014, November 13). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 11:05, November 13, 2014, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Still_life&oldid=633600205

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The painting above was painted around 2002 / 03 by Peter Bright (more)

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#Fowey in #Cornwall – Pentax Espio 120mi #pentax #35mm #film – Vintage film cameras

I have never been one for bobbing about in a little sailing dingy – I prefer something with an engine. Power, speed – the age of sail has been dead for over a century. Little harbours like Fowey make me laugh – pretty little boats with pretty little sails. The perfect place to paint a commercial painting for the tourists. Hahaha. 🙂

Fowey is a small town, civil parish and cargo port at the mouth of the River Fowey in south Cornwall, England, United Kingdom – an over priced middle class refuge, full of people who can’t afford Sandbanks or a ‘Sunseeker’. 😉

These photographs above was taken using a Pentax Espio 120mi, which I obtained from a charity shop for £1.50 and is point-and-shoot, mid-range, 35mm film camera. The Espio is an autofocus unit with automatic exposure settings and a built in flash unit.

High Street, Fowey, Cornwall

High Street, Fowey, Cornwall