Dim and darker days -

"Dusk of Autumn"
digitally manipulated fractal flame & digital drawing by Mick Mather

"... it was one of those perfect autumnal days
which occur more frequently in memory than in life ..."
- P. D. James

Down the way -

"Carriage Driver"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... because I could not stop for death,
he kindly stopped for me;
the carriage held but just ourselves
and immortality ..."
- Emily Dickinson

Changes -

"Considering a Change to an Autumn Plaid"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... no tartan socks, ‘kay?
Now that would be an unforgivable crime of fashion …"
- The Fashion Police

NEW from The Chairs Series -

"Old Ladder Back"
digital collage by Mick Mather
"... and in a chair well-known
my mother sat, and did not tire
with reading all alone ...
if I should make the slightest sound
to show that I'm awake,
she'd rise, and lap the blankets round,
my pillow softly shake;
kiss me, and turn my face to the wall,
and then sing Rousseau's Dream to me,
till fast asleep I fall ..."
- William Allingham

Thumbtack city -

"Pin Up Girl"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"When twilight drops her curtain down
and pins it with a star,
remember that you have a friend
though she may wander far."
- Anonymous

Illustration Friday: Pattern -

"Pattern"
manipulated digital drawing by Mick Mather

"... champion the right to be yourself;
dare to be different and to set your own pattern;
live your own life
and follow your own star ...."
- Wilfred Peterson

Thursday Challenge: Bottles -

"Bottles"
manipulated digital photograph by Mick Mather

"Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all the others were making ships." - Charles Simic

The woods are lovely -

"Last Exit Before the Deep Dark Woods"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... enter these enchanted woods,
you who dare ..."
- George Meredith

Not quite out of season -

"Winter Wheat"
fractal flame collage & digital drawing by Mick Mather
Oh, I have walked in Kansas
Through many a harvest field,
And piled the sheaves of glory there
And down the wild rows reeled:

Each sheaf a little yellow sun,
A heap of hot-rayed gold;
Each binder like Creation's hand
To mold suns, as of old.
- Vachel Lindsay

Mr. Holmes has retired -

"A Damaged Literacy of Bees"
manipulated fractal flame & digital drawing by Mick Mather

"Hallo," Holmes said. "See here, Russell, it must be more than complaisance applied to the saving graces."
"How do you mean?"
"It's quite apparent that there's more than a shift of a mannered semantic. I see a complete paradigm shift of the literacy," he asserted.
"I don't mean to be repetitive, Holmes, but..."
"Observe the cells, Russell, especially the cells," he went on, "they've abandoned the hexagon. See how they've been squared away? Even the botched wax sealing aspires to the new shape."
"Of course!" his illuminated partner agreed, "including a haphazard attempt at checker boarding."
"Exactly," said Holmes over peaked hands, "elementary to a new literacy."
"I should think it much too early for assigning new text to a single, dead hive," Russell posited.
"Quite so," Holmes relinquished after many minutes of thought. "We shall keep our eyes sharp, then."

NEW from The Chairs Series -

"Old Ghosts of the Boardroom"
digital collage by Mick Mather
"... the ghosts of the tribe
crouch in the nights beside the ghost of a fire,
they try to remember the sunlight,
light has died out of their skies ..."
- Robinson Jeffers

Polar lights -

"Reflecting Light From the Northern Sky"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... the stars are putting on their glittering belts ...

they throw around their shoulders cloaks that flash

like a great shadow’s last embellishment ..."
- Wallace Stevens

Illustration Friday: Infinite -

"Infinite"
digitally manipulated fractal flame collage by Mick Mather

"And time itself? Time was a never-ending medium that stretched into the future and the past - except there was no future and no past, but an infinite number of brackets, extending either way, each bracket enclosing its single phase of the Universe." - Clifford D. Simak

Thursday Challenge: Fresh -

"Fresh"
manipulated digital photograph by Mick Mather

"Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves." - John Muir

Shades -

"Me and My Shadow"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... I don't need a friend who changes when I change
and who nods when I nod;
my shadow does that much better ..."
- Plutarch

Late summer rain -

"Waiting for the Rain"
digital collage by Mick Mather
"... how often have I lain beneath rain on a strange roof,
thinking of home ..."
- William Faulkner

Somewhere in time -

"Miss Kaye"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... born too early, born too late?
an abode too far, far away?
found at last a face from the past,
love lost, finding naught but the ache ..."

An old work horse -

"Taking A Break"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... tires were so bald on the truck that the air was showin' through ..."
- Chris LeDoux

Wondering -

"Kate"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... she never sees herself as beautiful,
nor exotically sensual, not sexual,
but she is ..."
- anonymous

Illustration Friday: Welcome -

"Welcome Committee"
digital collage by Mick Mather

"... Tis sweet to hear the watchdog's honest bark
Bay deep-mouth'd welcome as we draw near home ..."
- Lord Byron

Thursday Challenge: Flight -

"As the Crow Flies"
photograph by Mick Mather

"... as the many-winter'd crow that leads the clanging rookery home ..."
- Lord Alfred Tennyson

Closing in on the equinox -

"Kissed by the Morning Sun"
digital collage by Mick Mather

Some of us are beginning to feel the ping of changing seasons. In this image, the scant sunshine of a new day is a metaphor that stands in for the shortening day while the looming darkness below is a portent of the long dark time ... winter.

Drawing -

"Miniature Lighter"
digitally manipulated drawing by Mick Mather

Something simple and quick - from the old sketchbook to the Secret Visual Laboratory - to close out the Labor Day weekend.

Room at the top of the stairs -

"Warley House"
digital collage by Mick Mather

Another addition to the series of architecturally-based works here. It's very loosely based upon John Braine's novel, "Room at the Top", whose film adaptation is considered to be the first of the British New Wave films. Noire, street, gritty and dark.

NEW from The Trinity Series -

"Trinity #21 - Sands Road Readymade"
manipulated digital photograph & digital drawing by Mick Mather

I'm thinking about a proposal to a local park where a partnership might fund some work on a trio of fir trunks. All that's required is adjusting the height on two of the pieces and some sculpting. This will likely be a project for next spring but it's on the radar.

Middle class hose job -

"Stimulus Package III (The Girls Go Shopping Version)"
digital collage by Mick Mather

Before the "Grand Liberal Larceny" that has ushered in 6 months of avarice and greed - disguised as "hope" and "change" - an idea that made a lot of sense to me as regards stimulating the economy was to suspend the Federal Income Tax for a year. This idea would've fairly put money into every pocket while being a legitimate stimulus with nowhere near the massive debt that "Washington" has now created. Todays post is a simple reflection of average people continuing to go about the business of their daily lives while priming the pump to provide much needed cash flow for the backbone of American entrepreneurship - small business.

Illustration Friday: Strong -

"Testing the Strength of the Nets"
digitally manipulated fractal flame & digital drawing by Mick Mather

Commander John J. Adams:
What is the Id?
Dr. Edward Morbius:
Id, Id, Id, Id, Id! It's a... It's an obsolete term. I'm afraid once used to describe the elementary basis of the subconscious mind.
Commander John J. Adams:
Monsters from the Id...

Let me tell what you've won! -

"A Brand New Car"
digital collage by Mick Mather

Once again I was just fooling around with the digital drawing program, an old car and the super secret array over at the Secret Visual Laboratory. After tumbling dry, here we have it. :)

Freewheeling -

"Cattails Separating Two Roads to Nowhere"
fractal flame collage & digital drawing by Mick Mather

Today's post began with an old fractal flame that was loaded into my favorite digital drawing software to add some lines and shapes while employing a bit of manipulation-born trickery. Once satisfied with the collaged fractal and digital drawing, into the super secret array it went. I have to admit that I've been less than inspired lately and have gone back to a favorite method of working through such a slump - add something/anything to the blank, white canvas and toss abandon to the wind! I rather like the way this turned out.

Coming along quietly?

"Panty Raid"
digital collage by Mick Mather

Last winter I happened across an article centered on a roundup of street prostitutes. The way these women danced, pranced and mugged for the cameras has left its impression.