Today would have been the 100th birthday of Alan Turing. I can only imagine the amazing work he would have done had he not died prematurely. If you aren't familiar with him he was a British mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst and computer scientist. He worked at Bletchley Park during WWII and devised a number of techniques for breaking German ciphers, including the method of the bombe, an electromechanical machine that could find settings for the Enigma machine. The horrific treatment he encountered on account of his homosexuality (which was shockingly illegal until 1967 in the UK) reminds me that human understanding really has evolved but of course it must do so much further. Go and read a little about his work today and be inspired :-)



Interesting article I read today stating his death may not have been suicide - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-18561092 "In a way we have in modern times been recreating the narrative of Turing's life, and we have recreated him as an unhappy young man who committed suicide. But the evidence is not there. "The exact circumstances of Turing's death will probably always be unclear," Prof Copeland concludes."Perhaps we should just shrug our shoulders, and focus on Turing's life and extraordinary work."*

*I must add, this does not mean, shrug your shoulders at his wrong treatment, it is only saying that as the case was so poorly carried out and evidence now lost, we may never know, so in such a case look at what we do have. I think it's also interesting that it shows a different side of his character, maybe he would not want to be seen as a tragic figure? Ok, on with reading about morphogenesis and practicing your cryptanalysis everyone. Off you go.

Portrait that Hildreth took of me in Griffith Park while I was in LA last month.

I've been meaning to write a new journal for ages of course. I had a really nice holiday for two weeks. I went to LA and then to Vancouver. It was my first time out of Europe so quite exciting and very different. There is no way I would have been able to afford such a trip if it wasn't for SG so I'm so grateful for that. It's amazing that there are people in just about every city in the world who will offer you their hospitality just because of this place. I had lots of good times and a few strange times but I really think I learned a lot about people and myself on this little trip and I really hope I can put it all into practice. That is one of the most useful things about traveling for sure.

It's quite funny to think of myself in a sunny place with palm trees and big white modern buildings. I felt like a bit of an alien but I really enjoyed how different it was in LA and the feeling of the sunshine was just amazing. It creates a completely different kind of life. Vancouver was much more like Scotland visually and in weather, just on a much bigger scale. Of course the buildings are all new there too though. The landscape was very beautiful. I got to see some amazing things while I was in LA like the Getty museum. That was one of the most wonderful modern architectural spaces I've been in. I feel like I'm writing a primary school essay about 'My Summer Holiday'. You'd think I could be a bit more imaginative.








My sweet little hostesses in LA. Venom and Callioppe

I got to practice yoga with Venom. She showed me her practice of yoga which is called Anusara and I showed her my Ashtanga practice. I wish I had someone to practice with where I live.




I noticed that the theme for LA was pretty much me meeting beautiful women.

Callioppe!

Evette!
_zia_!
Sash!
Charmaine Olivia!

Callioppe, Charmaine, Me, Venom. I had the best day with them at the Griffith Observatory.

They also made me shoot a gun, drink black coffee and eat tacos ^_^ I liked being quite amusingly out of character! I promise I practice non-violence at all other times other than shooting water balloons...








Views from the plane are one of the most fun things about travelling too. Seeing that you are about to land in a completely different landscape. It makes me think how amazing it would be to go somewhere even further and less like the Western world. I keep imagining flying over India or South America or Russia. I hope I can visit some of those places one day. I feel much more confident about long flights and being far from home after this.




Cherry!











JJoseph Wu made me this amazing little origami bird

Then I went back home and ate pancakes and did little anatomical sketches with watercolours ^_^










GoGo and I <3

Oh and I have been meaning to say thank you for getting my set with GoGo to the front page. I'm so happy with how much you guys liked the last two sets. I never expect so many nice comments! I realise I'm really lucky to get two sets up in one month, I really appreciate it. Thank you for all the happy birthday wishes too :-) xx

wolves and birds <3

Every year that passes, when I think of the next number in the sequence (according to our custom of dividing time and life into pieces), I think how I desperately don't want to be 25, 24 sounded just fine but please don't let me have to become 25!! ...then I get used to 25 and as 26 draws nearer I think how I desperately don't want to be 26, 25 was just fine but please don't let me become 26!! And so on and so on. It's all a bit silly though really. Tomorrow I'll be another number but I think it's best to ignore these things. Often I feel really gloomy and miserable on birthdays because they are that strange time when you stocktake. I don't think I'm going to be that miserable this year though, maybe I even feel a bit indifferent.

I guess I realised a few years ago that I am not the kind of person who is going to achieve or seek that many conventional, tangible things in life. I think the last thing I did that really fitted in to such an idea was getting my masters degree 4 years ago. What have I done since then? So many interesting things but not things I have anything material to show for. I think I am coming to accept that though. It would be nice if I could do work that I enjoyed and let me live a comfortable independent life but maybe that will come eventually in some form. I'm very grateful for everything I do have though.

I took some pictures in the garden a few days ago. It's so lovely at the moment.









Isn't it touching to see that plants will grow anywhere? This one found the smallest layer of soil and has managed to live in it.

Today I found a broken blackbirds egg in the garden too. I suppose a magpie or gull maybe carried off to eat and dropped it. I hope the blackbirds have more eggs in the nest and that the predator found some other sustenance somewhere. Their eggs are very beautiful. Blue with brown speckles.



Just yesterday I was watching a juvenile blackbird in the tree and felt such a strong sense of how miraculous it was that from seemingly nothing this perfect living creature had emerged and now existed in the wolrd. Covered in feathers and able to fly no less! Looking at the crushed egg on the ground I can hardly comprehend how this yellow liquid could possible become one of those living, flying creatures.




Something really nice happened lately and I was asked to contribute work for an exhibition. This is the first time I've shown anything since I graduated. It's only in the last few months that I've actually started painting again so it was really good to have the commitment of an exhibition. I had to keep things quite simple and small as I was shipping them to Vancouver but it's really allowed me to start thinking about what I want to do with my painting again. I feel like the last four years my creativity was lying quite dormant but that now I am filled with a really strong desire to make images again.



I got back the new prints I'm selling too and they look really nice. Message me if you are interested.





The cherry blossoms are still here. It was quite dark when I took these but the pale pink flowers were so beautiful against the grey sky.




I have tens of little scraps of paper so I've been paintings moths on all of them.






On Thursday I'm going on a little trip for 2 weeks which will be the first time I've been out of Europe. It didn't really hit me until today when I went to get some American dollars. I have never actually had a particular fascination with America before, I always think about places like Russia or India or historical cities in Europe but when I saw the dollars I felt so different. I realised they are such a symbolic object, so familiar even though I haven't been there. And then I was almost wishing I could be seeing the whole country or the whole coast. 2 places and 2 weeks is probably a good start though. I am a little nervous about the long flights and all the travelling but I think it will be good for me to do something like that on my own. Things have been quite stressful at home and with my relationships lately so I hope I will come back feeling really refreshed and with a good sense of perspective and about what I should do next because I am definitely at a point where I need to make some or at least one big choice.

I went out with my friend Stephanie tonight and we drank some lovely Jura whisky. She just got her doctorate. I'm so happy for her. I think I'm just about the only one of my friends now who doesn't have a PhD! Maybe I'll go back and do one when I'm 30.

I hope you are all well. Thank you so much for all the lovely messages and the comments on my member review sets. I really appreciate it. I'm sorry I'm at 1695 emails on here now so I am probably missing lots of things I should be replying to. I will try to dip into them now and then when I'm back from my holiday xx

The Cherry blossoms are in full bloom. I put some fallen ones in my room.



Good morning.

Yesterday while I was walking somewhere I heard a strange bird call that I didn't recognise, I looked up and something pale fluttering around the rooftops. It had a long tail and for a minute I wondered if it was a kestrel but quickly I realised it wasn't a british bird but some poor little escapee. It was a cockatiel! I suppose it must have got out of it's cage somehow. It's maybe a good thing to escape from a cage but I don't suppose captive birds get on very well in the wild. There are some semi-naturalised colonies of parakeets in London, escaped pets which ended up breeding in Hyde Park! I imagine usually that a bird which is very obviously coloured, unlike all our little grey and brown birds, would be liked to be eaten by a crow or a bird of prey or a gull. I did wait for a very long time trying to will the little bird to come down from the roof but he just sat up there for hours. I looked out the window at him while I attended the class I was at. By the time I finished he was gone though. I was imagining he would just fly down and I could take him home and look after him so I was disappointed it didn't all pan out like the sweet film I always with my life was.

It was one of these little fellows, isn't it sad to think of him wandering around lost in the city? I hope he might find his way somewhere nice -



When I was looking up pictures of cockatiels you see that all of them are taken in some artificially lit room against painted walls or in a cage, so different from when you look up a to see pictures of a wild bird. It's quite sad I suppose. We love little creatures so much and want to possess them but maybe it's not the right thing to do. I love birds so much and it would be amazing to be able to be friends with one but I would never want to trap them. I suppose that was why I was excited at the prospect of saving the cockatiel because it seemed to give me allowance for doing so. Although maybe there is an argument for creatures living much longer and less difficult lives in captivity that fighting for survival in the wild but captivity is captivity. I don't suppose it's really possible to know. The anthropocentric view becomes confusing I think and it's an impossible trap to escape from most of the time.

Anyway, I am here to tell you something very grave and important. GoGo and I are naked here ^_^ - http://suicidegirls.com/members/AnnaLee/albums/site/29276/ We had such a beautiful time, she is the softest, loveliest wolf in the world. It make me really happy looking back at these pictures, as with our last set, as they bring back such nice memories. (And, GoGo wearing suspenders? *thud*) Thank you for all the lovely comments so far, I just read them all and I'm so glad you guys like it!












I hope you are all well. I'm hopefully going to the sea today but I have a bit of a cold and all run down. It's like I finished my last days of work and my body decided to give up. Hope it won't last long. I'm going to go and eat lots of oranges and hot tea now for breakfast xx

P.S. Here are the cherry blossoms, it seems like it's nearly over already. I wish they lasted just a few days longer.

P.S. I have a new print for sale. A bigger one this time, it's 12x8 inches and on Fujicolour crystal archive paper. £30 and shipping is free to anywhere in the world. PayPal to annaleeprints@googlemail.com if you would like one. Just ask if you want it signed or a wee message or anything. Here it is :-) -



I've been busy at my little desk making small paintings and other things this last week.











Painting and drawing again reminds me how sad it is that I lost nearly all my taxidermy specimens, I'll tell you that story another time.... (the great taxidermy disaster of 2011!!) I have a few things left that I can use as subject matter though and maybe it can become something positive to push me to find new things. Every decomposed taxidermic specimen has a silver lining I heard.

If you haven't already seen it, I have a new set in member review which was shot by Alissa last year when we were on the SG holiday in England. She is one of the most fun, funniest and loveliest people. Thank you so much for all the lovely comments so far, I have read every one and I really appreciate it! I never know what kind of reaction to expect so I am happy it's been so positive so far :-)






And I really I hope you won't be too sick of me because GoGo and I rekindled our wolfy birdy romance in France this year and shot another set together. Look out for it on the 28th of April in member review. Here is a little peak...



I hope you are all well. I have lots I wanted to write about what I'm reading but I'll save it for next time because I have to go to my yoga class in a few minutes. Tomorrow is my last day at work at the museum. I am really excited to leave! I felt I was becoming brain dead working there. Even though it's full of beautiful things I had no stimulation in my job and I really cant cope with that. Now I only have a few hours work a week at another job which I enjoy but hopefully I can pick something else up soon because I'm broke but I'll be broke but happy as usual.

The cherry blossoms are nearly out near where I live, I'm so happy to see all the beautiful soft pink filling the city. I'll have to take some picture to show you xx

Dark garden pictures. The flowers of our labour. I'm so happy that everything is growing again. I honestly feel joy just looking at all the life around me and everything beginning to bloom. To listen to bird song after the winter of no sound is so wonderful.

I've just started reading The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir. I am completely taken by her. It seems mad that it's taken me this long to read her. I feel like someone should have told me "You must read this book!" before now. I think that every human being should at least read the introduction. I'm in awe of the way that she gathers every single strand of history, every philosophical and political discipline and with them expresses such objectivity.

I really love this excerpt by her.

In particular those who are condemned to stagnation are often pronounced happy on the pretext that happiness consists in being at rest. This notion we reject, for our perspective is that of existentialist ethics. Every subject plays his part as such specifically through exploits or projects that serve as a mode of transcendence; he achieves liberty only through a continual reaching out towards other liberties. There is no justification for present existence other than its expansion into an indefinitely open future. Every time transcendence falls back into immanence, stagnation, there is a degradation of existence into the ‘en-sois’ – the brutish life of subjection to given conditions – and of liberty into constraint and contingence. This downfall represents a moral fault if the subject consents to it; if it is inflicted upon him, it spells frustration and oppression. In both cases it is an absolute evil. Every individual concerned to justify his existence feels that his existence involves an undefined need to transcend himself, to engage in freely chosen projects.

Last week I went to see a performance of Olivier Messiaen's Quartet for the end of time. I think I have written about this piece of music on here before as I also saw a performance of it last year. It has a very interesting history and if you would like to read about it, there is a perfect essay here - http://www.therestisnoise.com/2004/04/quartet_for_the_2.html by Alex Ross. This performance was especially great because Richard Holloway read a beautiful speech as introduction to the music. I didn't know of him until that evening but he seems to be a very interesting and amazing person. You can watch the speech here - Richard Holloway: Thoughts on the End of Time It really is worth listening to. I felt so moved by his words.

In contrast to all my introspection I also spent a few days with P_mod, Dwam, Lass and GoGo which was really lovely and I am so grateful for their company and hospitality. More wonderful things brought to me as a result of this place :-)

I started writing about de Beauvoir and Messiaen and then I thought that was too "serious" to add anything else but lately I have been thinking that I should try to incorporate my rather serious and boring side with my occasional light hearted side so that I can be a more well balanced human creature. So that is why we have here a mixture of feminist literature, classical music, naked women, iron maiden records and animal impressions...!

I hope everyone is lovely and well and happy xxx

When the Day of Judgment dawns and people, great and small, come marching in to receive their heavenly rewards, the Almighty will gaze upon the mere bookworms and say to Peter, "€œLook, these need no reward. We have nothing to give them. They have loved reading."

Virginia Woolf wrote that in one of her letters. Isn't it perfect?








Also, *******Last prints for sale!!!******** I have 1-4 left of the prints below depending on the image and I'm going to send the last batch off next week so if you would like one let me know here or at annaleeprints@googlemail.com.




They are £20 each, 8x8 inches and printed on fujicolour crystal archive paper with a matte finish.

Shipping is free anywhere in the world!

I can sign them or write you a message on request.

I'm also still doing all 4 for £70 til the end of the month but I think I only 1 full set left for now.


I hope you're all well. I'll write a bigger update soon but I'm in the middle of stretching canvases today! x

P.S. Someone sent me 2 books and an extra one that they chose from my wishlist but I don't know who. Let me know if it was you so I can thank you. One was Pale Fire by Nabokov <3

Yesterday I was about to cycle home from somewhere when I saw a lovely big frog sitting right in the middle of the road. I think he was about as big as my fist. The cars kept narrowly driving on one side of him or the other and I hated the thought of him being squashed. So I stopped my bike and waited for a break in the cars so I could pick him up. Of course once I picked him up, he was trying to leap out of my hand and making an indignant squeaking noise and I realised I has no idea what to do with him. The nearest pond I could think of was about a mile away and I was getting quite wet but I felt obliged to save him by this point. It was also particularly awkward because it was dark and raining and I like some kind of little pack horse at that moment with a huge full backpack and shoulder bag on my back full of paints and books so the only place I could think to put him while I cycled to the pond was in the paper bag I had over my handlebar containing a little indigo muscari plant an a box of pistachio cakes that I had bought for my mother.

So I put him in the bag but he immediately leapt out onto the pavement and I realised that wasn't going to work. I was looking around trying to think if there might be a pond in any of the gardens nearby because where did he come from? Then I heard someone come out of one of the houses so in my head I was thinking of asking them if they knew if any of the gardens on the street which might have a pond because look, there is this frog here and he was about to be squashed by a car and I was imagining how strangely they are probably going to look at me but by the time I have imagined explaining my amphibious dilema they are right at the top of the street. I looked down at the frog and he said ribbit and jumped forward towards the gate we are standing outside. The he took one more hop through the black iron rungs and into someone's garden. I decided at this point that he had made his decision and that I shouldn't try to further intervene as I might end up doing more harm than good. I just hope he knew what he was doing and new of some secret hidden pond somewhere. I realised that this is exactly the time when they will have been coming out of hibernation so there will probably be lots of mispaced frogs and toads around the place.

This was one I found last year.



I wanted to let you know that I still have a few of my square prints. They are 8x8 inches with a matte finish and printed on fujicolour crystal archive paper and I can sign them or write you a message if you request. They are £20 per print and shipping is free. If you want to buy all four I will make a special offer of the set for £70 for this month only :-) email me at annaleeprints@googlemail.com or message me here if you're interested.

These are the ones I'm offering. You can see bigger versions here.



I'm also thinking of selling some souvenirs from my sets. Would anyone be interested in anything in particular? I am thinking of selling this corset from my Strange Creatures set first. If anyone wants to make me offer just message me.

This is the corset.

I feel happy lately. The most exciting thing that has happened recently is that after nearly 4 years since my graduation I finally have a studio to paint in again. I managed to find a really cheap space that I'm sharing with another girl while her sister is living in london for 6 months. I thought it was good to try something short to see if I actually use at first and I really love being there so hopefully I'll be able to find somewhere else through this or maybe it will be extended if she decides to stay in London longer. I'm so happy to have peace and space to work in. After I finished my degree I hardly felt I wanted to look at a paintbrush again but slowly things changed and I am getting great pleasure out of making marks and painting colours and thinking about images. I didn't stop being creative in that time but I had pretty much stopped painting and drawing. It is really nice that now it doesn't matter if I make things that don't work as no one is going to assess me and I don't have any deadlines that it make it necessary for everything to be perfect. So I feel I can work in different ways and not worry so much. I've just been learning to use watercolours which is a medium that I had never tried before and I really like the way they react but today I am going to stretch up canvases to start new oil paintings as I think that is my favorite medium.

So far I have just been playing with my photographs, doing little sketches, making books and also repairing old books at my desk but soon I'll start using the wall to make big paintings again.




There is really nice light in the studio because it's on the top floor with big high windows.



I've been trying to learn to repair old books.




Painting moths.



I learned some techniques to make books without glue or sewing too. These are just half way through but I love the way folds in paper can look.



A lot of the time I feel that my paint rags or my palette are far more beautiful and natural than anything I could create though.









Well I hope you are all well and enjoying the spring arriving if that's happening in your part of the world. I'm sure that is something to do with why I feel so much more awake lately. Thank you for all the lovely messages too x

Spleen just sent me these photographs she took backstage while I was shooting my last set with Cherry. She took them on film with her Hasselblad camera. She takes really wonderful portraits, you can see more of her work here - http://emilialombardo.com/blog/ She is one of the many amazing human beings I have met all because of taking my clothes off. I feel so lucky to know everyone I have met through this site.

Also today is International Women's Day.

x

Thank you so much for getting my set http://suicidegirls.com/girls/AnnaLee/photos/Parhelion/ to the front page! You guys are the best, I have read all the comments so far and really enjoyed doing so. I'm glad people seemed to enjoy it as I had no idea what would be made of it. I think Cherry did such amazing work with the photography. She is magical with light and colour. This was from the first time I was able to shoot with her again after 4 years of her being away in Canada so it was really exciting because I love to collaborate with her and had really missed making sets with her. We always try to do something that takes a bit of experimenting and I enjoy it so much. It was a fun time too because Dwam and Spleen were also there. Dwam braided my hair for me. A funny little side note - just before we started to shoot I had been preparing dinner for us all and then, as I was in about this position...



...I remembered we needed to heat the oven and start cooking! So I had to ask someone to put the vegetables in the oven and explain about temperature and putting in olive oil and rosemary and such-like all while tied up on the floor. It was quite a funny scene.

I had been interested in bondage as a beautiful aesthetic and in its physical sense for a while so I thought it would be interesting to try to use it as a theme for a set. Maybe you can see what I was building up to in these previous sets now?




I'm glad that people liked the introduction too, it is taken from William Blake's Proverbs of Hell from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.



As I was walking among the fires of hell, delighted with the enjoyments of Genius; which to Angels look like torment and insanity. I collected some of their Proverbs: thinking that as the sayings used in a nation, mark its character, so the Proverbs of Hell, shew the nature of Infernal wisdom better than any description of buildings or garments.
When I came home; on the abyss of the five senses, where a flat sided steep frowns over the present world. I saw a mighty Devil folded in black clouds, hovering on the sides of the rock, with corroding fires he wrote the following sentence now percieved by the minds of men, & read by them on earth.
How do you know but ev'ry Bird that cuts the airy way,
Is an immense world of delight, clos'd by your senses five?

In The Marriage of Heaven and Hell Blake created a grand image in which conventional moral structures are rejected, good and evil depolarized and a deliberately unified vision of the cosmos expressed. The material world and the world of physical desires become equally part of the divine order. Thus, a marriage of heaven and hell. I think I might be getting a bit carried away! I talk a lot of rubbish sometimes. I didn't actually have this poem in mind when we were making the set but I realised afterwards that this conclusion of the proverbs worked nicely as an expression of how I feel about the senses, desire and physical pleasure and equally about the expression of all of these things -



The head Sublime, the heart Pathos, the genitals Beauty, the hands & feet Proportion.
As the air to a bird or the sea to a fish, so is contempt to the contemptible.
The crow wish'd every thing was black, the owl, that every thing was white.
Exuberance is Beauty.
If the lion was advised by the fox. he would be cunning.
Improvement makes strait roads, but the crooked roads without Improvement, are roads of Genius.
Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires.
Where man is not, nature is barren.
Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believ'd.
Enough! or Too much.



















Here is a a beautiful drawing that etchasketch did for me from one of the pictures from the set-



While I'm not working at the moment, I have been learning to use watercolours



Practicing lots of yoga




(Looking like a funny creature)

And finding beautiful antique natural history books in the library




This finally reminds me, please add me on instagram if you have one. I'm @wadingbird on there. I hope you are all doing wonderfully xxx