Servant Song

Ive been using oil pastels on and off for quite a few years. I love the texture they create. I also love being able to grind the colour onto the page, and the way they blend for me. I find that it is a medium that suits my motifs, style and influences.

Alot of what I paint and draw is about alienation, loneliness and sadness. What we would call diseases of the modern world. I used to think that this was something that needed to be eradicated from my life and art. At the very least, I needed to choose subjects that reflected something positive and uplifting. And, this I did... for a while.

Ive been studying the servant songs in the book of Isaiah lately. And I am feeling drawn to study them in greater depth and detail. I read somwhere once that the book of Isaiah is sometimes called the fifth Gospel. And reading those servant songs, you can certainly appreciate why early Christians coming out of the Jewish tradition would have seen it as such. It also, seems to be quite comfortable in confronting the aspects of being human that are most painful.

The servant grew up before God - A scrawny seedling
A scrubby plant in a parched field.
There was nothing attractive about him,
Nothing to cause us to take a second look
He was looked down on and passed over,
a man who suffered, who knew pain first hand

New old stuff

Theres still been plenty of drawing going on, and even some reasonably productive painting. But the last week or two have been dry in a drawing sense. I wish I could map out the weather patterns a little better. Maybe its a case of just not panicking in the dry times. But as we here in Australia know well at the moment, drought is a scary thing.

Anyway, this one is pretty old now, but I've wanted to post it for no other reason than I like it.


I saw a great documentary about on of my favourite artists, Chris O'Doherty. ( most people know him as Reg Mombassa; the guitarist of Mental as Anything, and the designer of Mambo street wear) In this documentary, he said that he never painted women, coz he could never do them justice. That was something of a revelation for me. I think I should stop trying..

This is something else I have wanted to post for a while..


yes, its the relationship motif..after I watched the movie of the mexican Artist, Frida Kahlo. ( that maybe the wrong spelling of her name) The portrayal of her relationship with her husband, and her journey as an artist, was pretty awe inspiring. These things do tend to be romanticised abit though, dont they?

Gotta go.. I think I see the dark clouds of the drawing rains coming on the horizon..