Vispo: The Problems Investigated / Imperfect images / Keeping it real (art on paper)

 

The Problems Investigated, RTomens, 2026

Perhaps imperfection is good even with respect to presenting artwork? Surely not. But yes, I have to convince myself it is so because my printer is kaput, which means no scanner either, which means you will have to make do with photos of my work for a while. So I look at a scanner, darkly, having shaken it about, sworn a lot and almost reached for the hammer. 

Presenting my work as an imperfect photo takes some getting used to but there is something about it that's good in another way. It's more 'real', yes? You can see that it's not a digital creation. You can see how it almost becomes shaded in the lower third. The left side edge also has a clearly visible shadow where it rises from the paper it's laid on. 

These days perhaps photographing work to put it online is the only way to prove it's physical existence, as opposed to it's digital one. Not that this should matter, really, yet the 'real' as it was before computers still has an allure, for me at least. Why? It's a very real memory, an attachment to times when everything was on paper. The other day as I walked through the very much developed King's Cross area I noted the very few old buildings left in tact near St Pancras Station. They sparked memories of going to the area to get my fanzine Xeroxed. It was a community facility, therefore very cheap. Sometimes Mark Pawson would be there. Or Stewart Home. 

That was the early 90s. Feels like a lifetime ago. For you, perhaps it's more than an actual lifetime ago. Memories now don't so much stack up as form a misty whirlwind of images which come in and go out of focus. Attaching dates to them becomes almost impossible. I've often considered what it would be like to be a witness in a murder case and have to recall what I was doing on a certain day. We've all seen films where witnesses are regarded with suspicion when they can't exactly remember their actions. Trust me, as you age, you can sympathise. I would struggle to remember what I was doing last Tuesday, never mind months ago.

I deliberately made a smaller piece in the form of The Problems Investigated because I thought it would be easier to photograph. Tomorrow I may try A4 size. The issue is trying to avoid too much blurring from camera shake, of course. 

Must go now because I'm still working on the poster for the upcoming William Burroughs 3-day event. I thought it was done but one of the organisers decided to make actual posters rather than just a image for online use, so problems ensued regarding the quality of the image for enlarging. Yes, sometimes work on paper can be a pain in the arse!

TTFN!

Vispo / Ambiguity, art and pure vispo

 

untitled, RTomens, 2026

This piece is untitled because I couldn't actually engage my brain in order to create one - too hot - and the heat-induced lethargy strikes again, from the brain to the bottom of my body, to the end, the toes I think they're called. A long hot summer here in the UK. I played with carbon paper to get the blue letters in 'untitled'. It's a messy exercise since the thin paper easily crumples and catches when moving the carriage. 

I don't know if I really like the result but...then again, being ambiguous about a creation is OK. Certainty is such a bore, darling! Sometimes I definitely do not like what I've done. In ambiguity there is...a mystery, in a way. The ambiguous zone is not clearly defined. It's the suburbs of creation, having no definite border. It's uncertainty which sparks not only doubts but questions regarding the very meaning of 'good' and 'bad', 'successful' and 'unsuccessful'. My 'good' may be one viewer's bad. My doubts may not exist in a viewer's mind. They clearly recognise it as either 'good' or'bad'. 

There's always 'mediocre', of course. Perhaps mediocre is the worst of outcomes. It's related to bland and average and no-one wants to be associated with them. They're the dull kid at school who was neither hip nor totally square. They just were, with their harmless haircut and sensible shoes. One boy I remember at secondary school was supremely average. He never got told off. Never swore. Never dressed terribly, or very well. He was neat. He was bland.

No artist sets out to create the bland but they may aim for ambiguity. I confess I'm partial to ambiguity myself. That's very different from doing my best but feeling ambiguous about the result. I know full well that many texts I use in my vispo are ambiguous. Good. I like letting you, the viewer, interpret their meaning. I also like meaningless text which is still funny or potentially profound. One that could go either way is good as far as I'm concerned. 

A piece such as the one above may be considered 'pure' vispo. No words. In that mode, to include an actual word would be a sell-out! Not that I'm normally 'puritanical' in my vispo, as you'll have noticed. I still have a great love for words, albeit in minimalist form, as opposed to actual poems (god forbid!) or fiction. Much vispo, especially in history, uses only words, but that is not my favourite style. I like the combination of legible text and abstract letter shapes, clusters, lines. Regarding that, I am definitely unambiguous. 

TTFN

Vispo: Thought does not control misfortune / The impenetrability of other people's lives

That's a profound title. I must have got it from a book because I'm incapable of profound thoughts. I almost had some the other day whilst lying in bed. I was contemplating the impenetrability of another person's life with regards to accessing how they live, think, act and it struck me as a vast territory, them on the horizon and between us mountains, perhaps deserts, even oceans, all impossible to cross. That's as far as I got.

 

Punk collage / Me & Paolozzi / Digital collage

Black Spot Fallout Threat

 

Comic strip vispo: Holy smoke, Ev!

 

RTomens, 2026

Vispo: Antisocial / Being antisocial / The self-belief of an artist

 

Antisocial, RTomens, 2026

"Don't be antisocial" someone once said to me. A girlfriend...when we were supposedly being sociable but I didn't find the company agreeable. Instead of being rude, I clammed up. Confronted with either blatant ignorance or plain stupidity I tend to clam up. Or I used to, back when I knew more than two people, socially. 

I'm not inclined towards being rude...actively. But. Yes, being quiet can be rude. I'm a temperamental artist - ha-ha! That's my excuse. No. It's not. I don't have one other than the genes I was born with...if they determine character, which I think they...might?  

It's not that I've ever felt a sense of superiority, you understand...except when in the company of common people who are not artists! Ha-ha! I must stop making those kinds of jokes...you'll take me seriously, perhaps. If anything I play my talents down. Arrogance is not a virtue, after all. Who is more annoying than the braggart blowing his (it's usually a 'him') own trumpet for all to hear. I wouldn't mind if that metaphorical trumpet signalled a talent on a par with Louis Armstrong, but it rarely does.  

Yet bragging, I'm sure, gets people places. After all, who's going to buy a timid, insecure soul? What do they project? Weakness? A lack of self-belief? To sell oneself one must be in promotional mode! Yes, it's true. I have rarely been in a position of having to sell myself, unless you count job interviews and in those, I suppose I did try to be the 'right person for the job'. Unfortunately, most of those jobs were ones I didn't want in the first place.

How does an artist sell him/herself in a world where they feel they don't belong? By 'artist' I mean creatively inclined, which immediately places someone outside normality. Because society may only embrace the successful artist, ironically. The struggling one is of no use. He/she is unappealing! Look at them,trying to make a go of...what? Being an artist? The fool! Their chances of success are virtually zero! A mug's game! So my dear ol' dad would tell me regularly, without ever saying 'mug' because that wasn't in his vocabulary. Instead he offered what he considered to be sound advice, which was to get a trade. It probably was sound advice to a working class boy. Like all sound parental advice, I ignored it.

Vispo for sale: Help! Art! Help!

 

Available here

Mind Games booklet for sale!

 

I have a few copies of my booklet, Mind Games, left over. It's available to purchase on eBay.

The Eternaut by Héctor Germán Oesterheld and Francisco Solano López.

 

A new arrival. You can read about it here. I had to show the design because books this handsome don't come along very often. Well done Fantagraphics. 

Poetry Day at the library / Visual pooetry? Those crazy kids!

Who could resist a poetry party? I could, actually, except I was invited to take part by Jim Pennington - great interview with him on the Thomas Pynchon site here . He manned the mimeograph machine, running through stencils made by anyone who wanted to take part. Below is one example. I reversed the photo to make the thought bubble readable, although I'm sure, you being so smart, had I left it you'd be able to work out the reversed word. As usual with Jim's demos, people were thrilled to watch the magic happen as their work was rolled out. God knows why but a woman wanted to sketch me and that was mimeographed too. Christ! Do I really look like that? I fear the likeness was incredible. 

The Beast was there for anyone to use and it proved popular with kids. Of course, they would love a weird machine that they'd never seen before; one which, by prodding a letter, it appeared on the paper as if by magic! I was there in a supervisory capacity rather than encouraging them to do anything creative. I could have done that, of course, but preferred to let them do their own thing.

Doing their own thing meant, for one girl, writing this...

...and so visual pooetry was born! I would use the term but it might tempt some people to suggest that, yes, my work is shit...