Spring!

This is us celebrating the arrival of spring in Seattle (it's been a little cold...and it's hard to gambol in mukluks...ah, well)

Stars and stripes and spring

Being on the opposite side of the world where it's autumn I have always struggled with these seasonal themes.

what if spring were static?

Spring came early here. The white petals of the pear trees have mostly fallen. The pinks and purples of cherry and iris, the golden yellow of forsythia, are sparse now. Daffodils are gone. Red tulips are drooping. Greens range from lime to olive to emerald to forest. Dark brown tree trunks are more prominent.

Early this morning the sky was blue, but it quickly filled up with shades of grey. When I gazed out my east-facing window, taking note of these colors, an undulating band of blue, with just a little pink, remained above the massing clouds.

The window of my house is mullioned, so what I see is a grid of vertical rectangles—white painted strips of wood in between. As I stood there thinking what to put in this collage, it struck me that while spring moves ever on, petals falling even as I watched, any one moment is a frozen slice of Time. "What if spring were static?" I wondered. "What if I could push 'pause'?" As if in tune with my thoughts, the Talking Heads' song "Heaven" came on the radio: "Oh heaven/ Heaven is a place/ A place where nothing/ Nothing ever happens."

So the ingredients of this collage, while reflecting the transient spring colors, are from photos of fairly permanent objects: fabric, feathers, resin, shell, glass, pottery, stone.

Theme of the Week: Springtime

This week's theme: Springtime.

I think we can now safely say we're in Springtime. Depends where you are in the world of course.
It seems brighter here, spring holidays beckon. Easter eggs in the stores and gambling lambs
on the hillsides....(they really should wait until they're older to bet.)

Well, that's the end of my stint as theme-master and that's my final theme.
It's been great doing this during the month of March and thanks to everyone.

Ron.

Radio Facefor is 'On the Air'.

Radio Facefor is launched and 'On the Air'.

Their Jingle:
"Radio Facefor is On the Air
It's hard to care
Radio Facefor is On the Air
Listen over there
Radio Facefor is On the Air"

Miles Malleson's Radio Toupee.

Inspired to do this after hearing actor and writer Mark Gatiss describe the bad wig of Miles Malleson (one of his favourite character actors) as a 'Radio Toupee'.

Feed My Sheep

Triple Screen Scream

Transmission

In 1941 George Orwell obtained "war work" when he was taken on full time by the BBC's Eastern Service.  There is no hard evidence but it is alleged Orwell had designs on a secretary at the BBC and was unfaithful to his wife Eileen.

Interesting fact:  110 light-years away from earth — the edge of a radio ‘sphere’ which contains many star systems  — our very first radio broadcasts are beginning to arrive.

The Rolling News Channel

"why don't you come up some time and see me?"

I made this collage last summer--inspired by the expression: "I'm not a [-----], but I play one on TV."  Sometimes, I think, television is a way of perceiving our alternative personae.

Background is from one of the etchings in Piranesi's Invenzioni Capric di Carceri (1761). Dinosaur is a relative of Tyrannosaurus rex, as depicted by paleoartist Luis V. Rey. Woman is actor-writer Mae West, in costume for her 1928 Broadway play "Diamond Lil"--filmed as She Done Him Wrong (1933).

The title, of course, is Mae West's exquisitely lascivious line from that film (often misquoted with "some time" at the end). She inserts a tiny pause after "and" and then emphasizes the word "see." It was named by the American Film Institute as one of the 100 most memorable movie quotations of all time.

I associate Mae West with watching TV in the '60s. I've seen several of her flicks on the small screen, as well as her appearances on "The Red Skelton Show" and "Mister Ed."

There's an App for This

 

(Done a while back, but seems to skew into this lovely theme...)

Theme of the Week: Broadcasting

Hello and the theme of the week is something which is increasingly difficult to escape these days - Broadcasting.

"Broadcasting is the distribution of audio and video content to a dispersed audience via any audio visual medium." - thus was said by a Wiki Wise One.

So telephones, radio - old time and new, the tv/telly/goggle box and the hip new interweb all seem to fit in.

This post is closing down now.
Thank you and good night.

Ron

"Is this a Jagger which I see before me..."

Midsummer Night's Dream

"full fathom five thy father lies..."

"When shall we three meet again In thunder, lightning, or in rain?"

Comedy of Errors (All that Glisters is Not Gold).

All The World's A Stage

Alas Poor Yorick!

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

As spoken by Juliet.  Romeo and Juliet (II,ii,1-2)

Background:  end paper from vintage book, real hand colored photograph - circa 1930s - of a woman, rose carefully cut out of an antique postcard.

Richard The Third

Something is Rotten in the state of Denmark...

Monkey Bard

This is not a new piece but, given the theme, I just had to share this creation of mine.

2 B or Not Two Bees?

Sorry I had to get this terrible pun out of the way first before I could concentrate on the Bard in a serious fashion!

Theme of the Week: Shakespeare

Here we are at that time referred to by the Soothsayer in Julius Caesar Act I Scene II……as the Ides of March. So appropriately enough this week's theme is 'Shakespeare'.

So anything Bill Shakespoke related is welcomed - plays, characters, quotes, words and modern takes on the Stratford Upon Avon Scribe.

Exeunt Monocassettius stage left.

Real Home Cooking

The New Carpet

Ludovic and the Rats Were Taken Aback When Striker Carlton Cole Suddenly Appeared in Their Home

Jerry Mouse's Home Makeover Party (Cutaway Diagram)

When My Dream Boat Comes Home

home invasion

I'm afraid your theme for the week kind of hit a nerve, Ron. My "home sweet home" has been more like "home dark home" for quite some time now.

What Has More Germs Than A Toilet Seat?

• Kitchen faucets have more germs than toilet handles.
• Kitchen sponges and sinks have more germs than a toilet seat.

Figure of woman is from a painting by Walt Kuhn entitled "Melinda or Lady with Feathers" (I cut the feathers off of her head) 1946.  Kitchen and toilet found in a Better Homes & Gardens magazine of the 1930s.  Cat found ? somewhere.

Oh, Bob, I Just Love Our New Mobile Home!

Owl Stretching Time

I know this is stretching the remit of the theme a bit but I'm sure you won't mind.

Hefty Hobbies At Home

Theme of the Week: Home Sweet Home

Hello, from Monocassette Mansions. This week's theme is 'Home Sweet Home'.

Some say there's no place like it.
It could be a home town and/or the place you call home.
Or perhaps a version of yer own or someone's else's ideal home.

all the best,
Ron.

Coming of Age

upcoming resource for us collage addicts

Hoping, of course, that all the "brief" essays are indeed brief, this book looks like a potentially terrific resource.

the age of rhubarb

I know y'all are going to think this is cheating--that I just stuck a title including "age" on an abstract collage, but hear me out... Ever since Ron announced the theme for this week, I've had this phrase rattling around in my head: "The Age of Rhubarb." And I started to form impressions of what the Age of Rhubarb would look like. I decided it was before the time of humans on Earth, before the time of any animals, when huge red sulfur-fixing (not photosynthetic) plants covered the Earth, and there was all this red dust in the atmosphere. The moon was in more than one fragment, and bits of alien technical gear were drifting into Earth's gravitational field.

It was driving me crazy, imagining this Age of Rhubarb and thinking it didn't really count for the theme, because it wasn't a real age. So finally this morning I gave up, and spent hours going through clippings looking for what would illustrate the Age of Rhubarb. And so here it is... =laugh=

More Space Age Nonsense

Fruit and Flowers Cultivated During The Age of The Amazons

Space Age Noah

Coeds in the Machine Age

Being Middle-Aged in The Middle Ages

Space Age Chickens

Celestria, Famed Dark Ages Visionary, Glimpsed The Age of Enlightenment

Second Ice Age

Theme of the Week: Ages

Hello everyone and thanks to Michael for the chance to host the month of March's themes. This week's theme to start the ball rolling is 'Ages'.

Could be the Stone Age, Bronze Age, Ice Age, Jet Age, Jazz Age etc… or one of your own. Anything you like really which qualifies as a period of time.
Anyway, time to go - I've been going on for ages!

All the best - Ron.