A little doodle to celebrate Emeline qPankhurst and her courage. I drew her on a black paper.

I used white ink to materialise her stepping in the light, leaving the darkness of the background her born a female would dictate her to dwell into.

She gradually captured the meager window of freedom she was given and boldly transformed it, multiplying it and defracting it into a myriad of beams, like millions of diamonds and droplets of enlightening wisdom and perseverance that inspired others, waves rippling onto the steady but muddy and stale waters of patriarchy.

A true light to cast upon this half of the population that was only forced into silence, various types of enslavement, domination, duress, humiliation, occasionally celebrated for its beauty, but never brains or ideas, or intelligence, by the unchallenged domination of the other half.

Before her, many other women campaigned for votes and equal rights for women. Think Manon Roland and Olympe de Gouges, among others.

Olympe had not been given the opportunity for her Voice to echo within the minds and hearts of good willing souls, men or women. Her fantastic Declaration of the Woman and the Female Citizen’s rights, (written immediately after the Declaration of Man’s rights had been crafted by men of the Peuple who conveniently forgot they were born , married too, loved by, supported and generally encouraged by Women), faded too quickly into oblivion, as she narrowingly escaped the guillotine.

Although her addition to the Declaration of Man’s rights is a masterpiece, it took years before it was brought to light . It is not, to my knowledge, studied in schools, or in history classes

It has been engraved on the entrance walk of the Senate in Paris, though the French political class seem to never have read it in order to respect and follow its principles, as women are still regularly attacked in mean and vile ways by those men elected to represent ALL citizens.

Emeline and her sisterhood of suffragettes took a stand, probably because English society could not fathom sending a gentry lady to the guillotine, even if her plea was irritating to the ears those males.

She fought, they fought. They chained themselves on the fences of the Parliament.

But as she was educated (privately), and rich, and a child of the best society, the crème de la crème, she was eventually listened to

And she won the 1st round of the battle.

Vote.

It was revolutionary in a men’s world.

Apparently, requiring that basic rights be given to all citizen, regardless of sex, status or sexual preferences still is.

Recent sad laws or events show yet again that the need of toxic masculinity to dominate those different to them, in a way (being a female) or another (not being hetero, for instance) is very much a worrying thing.

But let not lose faith, for even giant terrifying dinosaurs and ferocious T Rexes, unequipped for modern times, eventually went extinct.

• Luncheon on Grass
• Spell – Queen of Sheba
• The Johnny Depp trial and why it matters
• More guns with my breakfast, Hollywood, pls.
• Johnny Depp ink drawing

Hello 2021!

How nice to finally meet you.

It’s been such an agony to wait for you to arrive.

How delightful to make your acquaintance.

We all expect you to behave, spread joy, have respect for the elderly, give hand and don’t make a nuisance of yourself. Your predecessor didn’t score high in our hearts.

Better be on the lookout to be a friend rather than a foe.

Best foot forward, and work smart for the best, for hope does not get one into action, really.

Hop along!

Goodbye 2020

I shall not miss you. 2021 cannot b as tough as you’ve been, my father cannot die again of cancer, and all the rest is only repetition, but I’m ok with that.

Take these flowers to lay them in your bed as you rest forverver in our memory, and let go of us.

Sincerely,

PS no need to produce offsprings in your spitting image.

… of smartphone addiction.

Continuing the theme of curious smartphone tech addiction.

The other day, I took ink and paper and Count Orlok emerged from the depths of the page.

I remember watching Nosferatu, a symphony of horror (by F.W  Murnau, 1922) as a cinephile teenager, when I was 16 or 17. Like most of the German expressionist movies, it is a masterpiece, an influential sublime piece of the 7th art. Maybe it was a little less phantasmagoric or dreamlike than The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari or The Golem, yet it has an enduring appeal, made of horror, accuracy and raw aesthetic due to the absence of elaborate decor or superfluous artifice. These gloomy times we go through could certainly fit in the allegory of the disease spreading everywhere embedded in this film.

Incidentally, Count Orlok, the main character stemming directly from Bram Stocker’s Dracula, was played by the actor Max Schreck, whose surname in German means “Terror”. How apt. He is indeed terrifying.

Klaus Kinski would later, in Werner Herzog’s movie Nosferatu the Vampyre, revive the character, with an undeniable success.

The silent B&W movie of 1922 nonetheless, with the iconic stills taken from as equally iconic scenes, remains a powerful horror one to this day. And this is the image I keep from the movie, along with the final one, where Orlok turns into smoke, struck by the fatal sunlight.

Have you seen it?

Of a textile creation on my Insta feed inspired me. After I asked, the creator said it was ok for me to draw and paint it in my own style and colours.

And so I did.

Turns out, it was the first time someone made a watercolour of one of her creations, she was happy went I sent the pic of my creation. Cheers.

And here is the finished drawing.

We remember them. I remember my grand-father, gassed, shot, left for dead, amputated. He endured 4 years of war, Verdun and the Chemin des Dames.

He could never forget, he had nightmares, he relived the horrors of the trenches every night until he died, from complications in his once gassed lungs.

I never got to meet him, neither did my siblings or my cousins. He is celebrated and remembered.

Poppies and corn flowers cover the blood-soaked trenches in the Spring.

In peace.

F

Because, why not?

As a fan of films noirs, the tandem Bogie-Bacall is a favourite of mine. And those times call for creativity. So I took my ink and this emerged from my imagination.

Stay safe, folks.

This is what happens when I watch Bohemian Rhapsody for the 7th time, I end up drawing stuff in my sketch book…