darts and music

an evening
out with the lads....

grand turk

In port in Saint Malo. this quite beautiful ship a reconstruction of a Napolionic Wars British sailing ship.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Answer to Shahin


You asked me, why?
I replied!
because you have never felt my heart beat under your hand
because you have never seen your smile reflected in my eyes.
You asked me, when?
I replied!
When the bird nests in the orchard of my soul
When the flower delivers its fruit in the autumn of the year.
You asked me, where?
I replied!
Where the rainbow starts its journey upwards
Where the sea stands still and memorises the names written in the sands.
You asked me, how?
I replied!
With the help of God/Allah or any other name you give Him/Her
With honour and passion in my heart and the desire to give you all I have.

Homage to a great Arab Poet.

Ho(m)mage to the Arab poet
Mohammed Al-Maghut
1936-2006

He looked like a Connemara sheep farmer,
he wrote like a Celtic warrior,
He looked like a fisherman of the lakes and seas,
he wrote like the wave on the beach.

Words were his wealth, his home, his wife,
his children, his love life and his food.

Who are we to ask, why?
he is the one who needs to question our answer.

Fools who build on sand
make mountains of gold which
will one day fall and crush us all.
real wealth is in the heart, in the word, in the soul.

DEMO-CRAZY

DEMO-CRAZY

Italy slipping back into the past.

Open letter

A letter to a friend who is angry with religion.

The first thing to say is that the Pope is a not a communicator for the masses he is a scholar, like yourself, but you do communicare well. He has the disadvantage of being GERMAN, is an ugly bugger with a face and look which perfectly matches the first part of his name I.E. RAT . He is not a RATionalist. He is a grey man put in place to bring the church back from the place which JP 2 had brought it with his gay( in the old sense) open and loving pontificate.....

All religions are based on the human aligning with the dogma.....and not the dogma making allowances for the human. But Jesus himself said to the pharasees that ( the law was made for man not man for the law....)

The Popes problem is that he, in relationship to homosexuality, believes that it is a learned response and that one is not born Gay...I do not of course accept this thesis.
When you understand this you understand his problem.... but given the number of gay clergy and paedophiles hiding within the church not just as we speak but for the whole history of the church it is difficult to accept his out and out negative attitude to gays and other 'NoN Normal' people. I have often said that there is too much religion in the world and not enough faith and Jesus himself said that THE MOST IMPORTANT COMMANDMENT WAS TO 'Love your neighbour as yourself' and also 'Judge not least ye be judged'. Yet these men of GOD who love not but who judge others whether they be long bearded imams, tonsured monks or bible thumping red necked bible belt millionaire American preachers in crystal cathedrals spit in the face of love each time they open their mouths.

'The love that dare not speak its name'
The pope was trying to say that without the part of divinity and the respect of the soul in each of us creation itself is in danger, through the selfish misuse of the resources in the world. This is true for me as I see the divine in all people even the evil ones who do their best to destroy. I had this discussion with a Muslim recently and he cannot see past the dogma....this always makes me sad, he does not understand that the dogma and the clergy of his religion would hang him because he is homosexual.

Interpret the laws of each religion and it is that which destroys kills mutilates and makes null the simple idea love so dear to the heart of the heavenly Father/Mother.
I do not accept the 'masculinity' of the sacred person. God is the one spoken of in the poems of love and passion, the beloved the beautiful and the open one, not the grey beard hard vengeful unloving bastard who sends us to hell for a whim.

It is 'religion' and not loving faith which causes division, war, hate and disrespect. How can a man feel these things towards another if he can see the divine in him. This is probably what the 'fool on parade' was trying to say or should have been saying....

Aethophobia... hatred of people who have no faith... is widespread within each religion, thank God the Benedictine's and Franciscans exist within the church, that the Sufism exist within Islam and that the Buddhists exist too.

Saint Benedict was poisoned by his followers, Saint Francis was put aside by the community he founded and the Sufi are persecuted within Islam. I feel often that people become saints despite their actions as opposed to because of them.

So you see for me the framework within I practice my religion is just that, it is a trellis up which my vine might grow, open and aired and not a solid closed box with no windows or opening on the outside. So many people have their eyes closed wide shut and are afraid to look God in the eyes and see the love that exists within the totality of life. They hear the noise and not the symphony.

TIGER TIGER

THE CHINESE NEW YEAR AND THIS TIGER IS SHINING BRIGHT IN THE FORESTS OF THE NIGHT. HIS EYES FULL OF FIRE.... WILD UNCAGED AND FREE.

DEATH OF STAR/PAPERAZZI

THE IMAGE MAKER
THE IMAGE TAKER
THE IMAGE
IMAGE
OF
WHAT
OF WHOM
THE IMAGE THIEF?
KID A
KID A+
KID A-
LOST IN CYBER SPACE...

SPIRIT OF THE GREEN MOVEMENT IN IRAN

This painting is inspired by the struggle of the Iranian people and relates the fact that you may imprison the body but never the mind and soul of a people. The moving 'towards the light' is an indication to all dictators that one day the truth will be known and the culprits will be seen for what they are. It is dedicated to the men women and children of Iran and other places in the world where intolerence is the norm. Secondly and particularly it is dedicated to those who have a different vision of love, like us all here and who suffer capital punishment for the most beautiful of feelings.

Spirit of Iran

A young man lies in prison cell
The darkness is broken by coming day
He stirs his aching body Grabs the wall and pulls himself upwards
Towards the light.

His eyes gleam in the brightness
His soul warms in the day
His crime, a folly, to those who hold him
His soul takes flight leaving his prison behind
Towards the light.

He sees the madness of his tormentors
He see the prison they are in
They cannot fly but rest attached to dogmas
that hold them fast and never let them fly
Towards the light.

Who is in prison? No, not he......

An Irish poet and friend of the people of Iran
whos only weapons are his words.

NEW YEAR NEW LIFE NEW WORK

THIS TABLEAU IS A TRIBUTE TO DJANGO REINHEARDT AND ALL THE GUITARISTS WHO WERE INFLUENCED BY HIM UP TO TODAY. SOME SAY 'MOTERHEAD' I SAY WHY NOT WE ARE ALL INFLUENCED BY SOMEONE SOMETHING...EACH WORD HAS ITS MEANING AND EACH MEANING AN INTERPRETATION. CAN YOU SEE ANYTHING????
AND REMEMBER OVER ANALYSIS LEADS TO PARALYSIS. THERE IS A CERTAIN PERSON CALED "A DE A" WHO KNOWS THIS WELL AND FOR WHOM I HAVE A GREAT AFFECTION.

BEEN AWAY A LONG TIME

WELL. HERE WE ARE AGAIN; A LOT OF WATER HAS FLOWN UNDER THE BRIDGES OF PARIS SINCE I WAS ON HERE LAST BUT LIFE IS LIKE THAT. IF THINGS REMAINED STATIC IT WOULD NOT BE GOOD FOR ANYONE.

SO WHAT HAVE I BEEN DOING? WELL WORKING PAINTING AND WRITING. ITS A LONELY ACTIVITY THE AULD WRITING AND PAINTIN' BUT I HAVE MET SOME GREAT PEOPLE OVER THE LAST WHILE. I HAVE TRAVELLED A LOT TOO. WELL EVERYTHING IS RELATIVE. I HAVE DISCOVERED THE BEAUTIES OF NAPLES. MILAN. MODENA AND BERGAMO IN ITALY AND WANT TO GO BACK AS SOON AS I HAVE THE CASH/ DOSH/ MONEY OR WHATEVER.

I HAVE AN EXHIBITION OF MY PAINTINGS AND DRAWINGS ON AT THE MOMENT AT THE Sociéte Générle BANK IN THE CENTRE OF SAINT MALO. THE PLACE DE PILORI. FUNNEY THING ITS WHERE THEY USED TO HANG AND PUNISH FELLONS AND MURDERS IN THE OLD DAYS AND EXHIBIT THEIR BODIES UNTIL THEY ROTTED...... I HOPE MY WATERCOLOURS DONT SUFFER THE SAME FATE BUT THEY WILL BE HANGING FOR A MONTH..

AVENUE MOZART, Paris

The view from a flat in the avenue Mozart, in Paris. I like it, what do you think????

WORLD CUP RUGBY

Here with the first thing you see when you arrive in Paris by the TGV, a statue to the World cup for Rugby.

ZENZA the RUSSIAN POET and ARTIST

My Russian Friend asked to see a photo of my other daughter the older of the two, well here she is, she does not drink pints of Guinness as a rule, but she likes to grab a drop or two from my glass for Saint-Patricks Day.

AM I AN ARTIST????

The question as to weather I am or not an artist is one which I cannot answer but it seems that no one ever bothers to look at these messages I place on the world wide web. Am I a voice crying in the wilderness? Who benifits from my work?

THE SUMMER CONCERTS

BRALL was back and the music was good. I did many studies of the musicians and the singers during the rehersals and several on the night itself.

PORTRAIT

My friend, also called ERIC who plays the Bodhran, a traditional Irish instrument. This portrait is not bad by all accounts.

HOLY COMMUNION

My darling daughter Lucy made her first holy Communion last sunday and was as beautiful as a picture, even more so. I'm sure you would agree!

The morning after the nignt before.....

Well let's change the script! Hope that all of you out there who call in regularly find the below effort worthy of contemplation. The festival of books called 'Etonnant Voyageur' is over now and the weather was certainly astonishing for those not used to our little costal storms. The Belem was in port and looking good.

SUNDAY MORNING

I wish I could say it's a beautiful Sunday morning but ... there you go. It is, shall we say, GREY but look on the bright side, it's not raining, yet...

I often say to people, -if you don't like the weather here, like in Ireland, just wait 10 mins. The sun is always shinning it's just the clouds are in the way.

At mass this morning, yes, I go... the second reading from St. John apocalypse has a sentence interesting in the extreme, 22 17, The Spirit and the Bride, L'Esprit et L'Epouse disent...

The old argument about God's sex comes to mind. God as the beloved, the wife, The father and why not the mother,the lover, the partner, the confident, the best pal. How far removed from the authoritarian,vengeful old fellow sitting up in the heavens with the white beard ready to squash the life out of us if we don't do what we're told I like the feeling of intimicy that this notion gives me. What do you think?????

A friend of mine has a blog called The Sanguine Fan, have a decco as we say in Dublin, or a look if you'd prefer.