THE BATTLE OF WALKERLOO

Links for 2009-09-28 [del.icio.us]

2009-09-29T00:00:00-07:00

"CIA Station Chief Also Supervised Paper Soldier Collection" By Joe Holley
'Edward Ryan, 90, a retired CIA station chief who amassed one of the largest collections of paper toy soldiers in the United States, died Aug. 29 of pulmonary fibrosis at his home in Chevy Chase.' ... I shared correspondance with Edward although sadly missed the chance to meet him after an invitation last year. My loss. He was obviuosly an extra-ordinary man.

My Dream Job Dream...

2009-09-11T18:00:00.007+02:00

Whenever I'm doing physical work I find my self overlaying a fictional narrative. Of course my narratives are usually militaristic. When I'm a painter and decorater the most tedious work is stripping wallpaper. However as the steamer plate becomes my sheild and the blade scraper my sword time passes more funly, perhaps quickley. I'm a Hoplite Housecarl battling against infinite ranks of Persian immortal Norman knights..

When I began to dig over the weed thick ground for my vegatable garden the task seemed immense. However as the rectangle patches of the dug earth grew I imagined them army columns advancing across the plain. I made a quick picture trying to embody this fantastic narative and e-mailed it to friends.

8 years ago after the 9-11 attack I drew this picture after working in the garden. It desribes the horror and incapacity I felt whilst I moved rocks about the garden.

Links for 2009-08-20 [del.icio.us]

2009-08-21T00:00:00-07:00

Free Vector World Maps Collection
pre-existing vector drawings of the world, free? open? usable?

Links for 2009-08-12 [del.icio.us]

2009-08-13T00:00:00-07:00

Strange Maps
nice maps, interesting commentry. nice.

It's a Liberation not an Invasion...

2009-07-31T11:44:00.011+02:00

We've been living in France for 8 years now. When we left London we had a party and I made invites. 'It's not an invasion, it's a liberation' they declared. The drawing was loose, quick, unplanned. The photo faces were made in the 'photo booth' of my local Tube station. But I'd been drawing infantile war for a while... this was a picture I made in 1999 of imagined Normandy beach action - its post 'Private Ryan'.

Sand castles and invasion beaches, seaside photo booths and toys soldiers, childrens book style pictures and the memories of veterans.

When I draw war its without direct experience but I've been occupied by its mythology from my earliest childhood. It's the scenario for my daydreams.

In 1998 I entered a picture in an 'Open' exhibition of pictures in Hammersmith, London. It was called 'Happy Soldiers and Sad Soldiers... I've never been to War'. Beautifully attired French Hussars clashed with British Infantry, the Napoleonic detail accurate except the French wear Nike Cyrus running shoes and the British wear Adidas shell toes - classic costume (The pic above was cobbled together, the large originals are with friends). I made two copies of my ink and marker drawing, one was a mirror image, and I joined them to make a long panarama style picture. None of the soldiers in the original picture had mouths. On one of the copies I gave all the soldiers smiles and on the other anti-smiles(?)... I'm not sure what else to call a down turned mouth.

The other day I came across the work of Todd Tremeer. He's a painter who makes lucid 'televisual' watercolours. He's painted the military models in museums, I don't think he's yet drawn any of the models on sale in their shops... and check out his 'Artist's Statement'.

a Walkerloo near you...

2009-06-30T18:06:00.020+02:00

Over the summer I'm taking my pictures on campaign. The first engagement was at the 2009 re-enactment of Waterloo. The Toy soldiers equitted themselves admirably and the YouWalkerloo booths proved very popular. I shot a little video in the quieter moments... But I was otherwise fully involved explaining the stories behind the paintings and demonstrating how I intended hands and heads to be placed within them. One very little boy engaged with the painting using his toy sword... an understandible response although I did quickly and carefully intervene.

During the summer I'll be doing several events including:

18/19 July. Festival multi-époques. Boulogne-sur-mer.
25/26 July. Napoleonic Association Re-enactment. The Royal Gunpowder Mills, Waltham Abbey.
29/30/31 August. The Military Odyssey. Kent Show Ground, Detling, Kent.
3/4 October. International Napoleonic Weekend. Dorset.

Last weekend I presented the Battle of Walkerloo in a small town called Miélan where a Napoleonic bivouac had been organised, alas it was a little quiet. I deployed YouWalkerloo in a new way. As well as the toy soldier battle, using my camera and a portable photo printer I offered to take people's photo inside my paintings, I mounted the printed photo in a 'frame card' which included a brief explanation of the paintings and the Battle Of Walkerloo. The framed picture cost €5.

This was the first time I'd presented 'Walkerloo' to a French audience in France. Most people read 'Waterloo' on seeing it... sometimes they were a little hostile to an object which seemed to celebrate a national defeat. I explained my creation was the battle of Walkerloo which is not a French defeat but a series of pictures which as a game could in fact be 'played' as a French victory... hmmmm. I'm British and conversely the word Waterloo has some immediate self congratulatory nationalistic emotions attached... as for 'Walkerloo' it's a work in progress and can make me feel very proud, defensive, worried and excited. What does it do for you?

YouWalkerloo2 involes two people partaking in three characters. One is an Ensign holding the Colours, another a stout infantryman and another a recently decapitated bugler. I created the composition after reading about an incident said to have happened at the battle of Waterloo. I've since found a memoire in which it was described -

“...we halted and formed square in the middle of the plain. As we were performing this movement, a bugler of the 51st, who had been out with skirmishers, and had mistaken our square for his own, exclaimed, ‘Here I am again, safe enough...’ The words were scarcely out of his mouth, when a round shot took off his head and spattered the whole battalion with his brains, the colours and the. ensigns in charge of them coming in for an extra share. One of them, Charles Fraser, a fine gentleman in speech and manner, raised a laugh by drawling out, “How extremely disgusting!...”

An extract from 'Fifty Years Of My Life' George Thomas Keppel, Earl of Ablemarle 1799-1891 Ch.7 p.128 'A Narrow Escape'

I tell the story of the painting before I take the photos and try to express something of the excitement, glee, tragedy, horror, disgust, comedy and history that went into the creation of the paintings. We tend to smile when posing for photographs... 'say cheese...' and I also hope people will be happy with the purchase of their picture because I charge them €5. Thanks to anyone who takes part!

Walkerloo Street.

2009-06-27T12:35:00.003+02:00

The stencil artist Artiste-ouvrier has made pictures involving walkerloo soldiers. His stencils are particularly colourful and intricate. He's titled this work 'walkerloo street'. I found these photos of pictures he's made on google. He's been working with another stencil artist called 'War', Wars' stencil is the child spray painting. My favourite so far is the cuirassier on concrete. Urban Empire style-ee?... 'concrete soldiers'... I like the material contrast with paper soldiers. The Battle of Walkerloo opens a new front.

Links for 2009-06-27 [del.icio.us]

2009-06-28T00:00:00-07:00

Full text of "Fifty years of my life"
ch 6 has first hand account of burdett riots, together with description of the 'oxford blues' ,, the horse guards who were known till waterloo as the picadiliy butchers after deaths caused in their attack on the crowd here. also accounts of waterloo,,, meetings with napoleon etc.

Links for 2009-05-23 [del.icio.us]

2009-05-24T00:00:00-07:00

The Porn of War
hmmm story of how a porn site became a deposit for war home vids taken in theatre... the words have strange resonances.

Links for 2009-05-13 [del.icio.us]

2009-05-14T00:00:00-07:00

Kaiser's Bunker
indepth site on soldier suits with serious concentration on Imperial Germany.

It's already begun...

2009-04-28T00:21:00.002+02:00

The battle of Walkerloo has begun. I don't know when it started exactly.

I have created 180,000 soldiers. I pretended to be them, painted them, presented them to bankers and financiers, had them manufactured and now I sell them. I modeled for them all. I did it at home with a garden fork for a musket and a dustbin for a horse. CHARRRRGE!

Only a fraction of the soldiers are thus far committed to the action. But these have already spread throughout the world: Britain, the United States, Australia, France, Holland, Belgium, Germany, Morocco and a surprising quantity in Northern Italy... this is confirmed through receipts of sale. I don't know how many free soldiers have been downloaded and made up by hand from http://www.walkerloo.com/ but by analysing my google data I'm fairly certain they've got to Russia, South America and China... If you have any intelligence regarding their adventures, especially pictures, send it forth! It'll be a battle report, you'd be a Walkerloo war correspondent... hmmm.... I think there is precedent for this in the blog-oz-phere...?

Yesterday I pieced together the first of a new type of soldier that I've been working on over the last few weeks. Painting big felt nice. Painting felt nice. I've done hardly any lately. In the next two months I'm going to paint more. More soldiers!

It was going to be called 'You Walkerloo' but now I'm not sure. Apparently it's a 'photo-booth', I've found out that's what this type of object was called back in the day. I've always wanted to make one... and now I can think of painting nothing other...

note. the other week whilst in London i checked out the Van Dyck exhibition at the Tate ... i was gagging to take close up photos of his pictures, he had so perfected the technology for painting fancy cloth... his marks and layers were so economic in constructing the illusion of light flashing over satin, velvet, highlights on fur, shadows in folds and creases... i reckon he could knock out the cloths impressively and quickly freeing him to concentrate the majority of his man hours on the faces and hands perhaps making up less than 5% of the total canvas area... smart! ... alas i asked the guard if i could take photos of his marks, obviously no flash, but it is forbidden, he was sorry and suggested i buy postcards or a catalogue blah blah... but the postcards are all of the picture as a whole, the paintings illusion intact... myth protected. its impossible to examine his efficient strokes and marks from this they only become apparent on close inspection,,,, GRRRRR seeing his paintings made me want to paint... not being able to come away with clues as to how he painted got me narked... hmmmm these thoughts snk in and inspirations fastened together lovely when i got home... hmmmm painting for photographs, hmmmm paintings without the time consuming fleshy bits... hmmmm

This first Walkerloo 'booth' is after, long after, a 'romantic' painting by Gerricault - you can see a photo of it here Its a portrait of a 'Lietenant Dieudonne' evidently an officer in the 'Chasseurs a Cheval de la Garde Imperiale'. The soldier certainly does look 'romantic'. I think my facination with soldiers is 'romantic'... or childish. The original painting hangs in the Louvre, I've not seen it, only pictures of it in books etc.

I painted this painting to be photofied... computerized... family albumicated... Oh... and you are meant to be a part of it as well.... how nice !?!

Links for 2009-05-04 [del.icio.us]

2009-05-05T00:00:00-07:00

New Page 1
effecient drawings of modern'er' uniforms... interesting resource.