Yes I know, no blog post for months and you come back with more bloody Latin! Well tough, I know it's been a mild winter but I still like to hibernate. So, having missed passing on a greeting for all the usual festivals I wish you a fruitful Lupercalia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lupercalia feel free to run naked through the streets if you wish!
First news of the day is that Tavistock's Bank Square Arts Market is returning next month, March and April will be held indoors at the Pannier Market first Sunday of each month. First Saturday in May will be outside on Bedford Square as part of Tavistock's music and arts festival, June through to September at Bank Square itself and then back indoors for the rest of the year, details all here https://www.facebook.com/pages/Bank-Square-Arts-Market/131560983607495 . I'll be exhibiting from May through September and then at one of the Christmas events so notes in diaries now. And now, more Latin ... You've probably read the 'Resurgam' page and wondered when I was going to get round to finishing it. Well, no it's not finished yet, but I have spent a solid week or so on it and made some significant progress which you can see below. The major development is that having not been happy with the letterform I was using for the inscription (in spite of the fact that it was taken from a photograph of the actual object that currently adorns St Andrews) I discovered from a contemporary photograph that the original 'RESURGAM' sign erected during wartime looked completely different. Obviously hand lettered it used a font somewhere between the London Underground's 'Johnston' signage and 'Gill Sans' but with differences to both. Either way I hope you'll agree that it's a considerable improvement and adds a genuinely evocative feel to the piece. To the extent that it's reminding me somewhat of the work of some of my favourite war artists (you won't be able to see it in this photo but there's a small deliberate nod to Paul Nash in there). There's still some way to go but here it is, almost ready for gilding.
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Strewth! It can't be that I haven't blogged for nearly two months can it? I was convinced I'd posted in mid October (not that I can actually remember what I think I posted about so I suppose that proves I didn't). Sorry about that folks. My new year's resolution will be ... to stop apologising for not blogging more often. So what have I been up to that was so important and time consuming? Procrastinating, obviously. Anyway to business.
Continuing the 'Time' theme (see what I've done here?) I finally made it to Royal William Yard to see (most of) the rest of BAS7 at which the standout was (extremely uncontroversially) Christian Marclay's 'The Clock'. This is a piece that comes weighted and freighted with awards, adulation and that most damning and meaningless of descriptions 'masterpiece'. Perversely then I lowered my expectations accordingly and was rewarded by being blown away by one of the most complex, involving, moving and downright fun pieces of work I've seen in years. If you want a review then Peter Bradshaw's 'Guardian' piece pretty much mirrors some of my own reactions. What I'd really like to know is what the class of really rather young primary school kids entering as I was leaving made of it? How many of them had ever seen a film actually projected before? How many could actually tell the time? If you haven't seen it yet you have two weeks(ish) in which to do so and I urge you to. And if you have already seen some of it you'll need no prompting from me to go and see some more. Is it just me or has Christmas started later this year? We're into the fourth week of November and I don't think I've heard 'Roy Wood and Wizzard once yet. Come to that I don't seem to remember noticing any Chrimbo stuff in the shops before Halloween, must be the recession, or retailers finally taking notice that starting the festive season too early really gets up people's noses. Anyway as Thanksgiving is nearly upon us (or at least upon Americans) I now feel perfectly justified in plugging a mate's work and pushing my own so here goes. One of the most beautiful books of landscape photography you will ever see 'Y Ser Yn EU Tynerwch' (The Stars in Their Tenderness) from Gareth Roberts. I was at art school with Gareth (which is a whole other story, or possibly a book in fact) and this is a book of 'nightscapes' of Snowdonia taken with what we (ex)photographers call 'a proper camera' on 'proper film' ie they ain't digital. Yes, it's in Welsh, go ahead be cosmopolitan, you leave French Vogue lying about where people can see it don't you? Available from Amazon or better still direct from the publishers Gwasg Carreg Gwalch. Treat yourself it's a steal at that price. And so to plugging my own work. Bank Square Arts Market in Tavistock now has its own Facebook Page here and will be holding two Christmas Markets. The first next Sunday 27th November and the following Sunday 4th December. These will be held indoors (in the warm) at Tavistock Pannier Market (behind the Town Hall) and Bob's Cafe will be open, so make a day of it, open from 10.00am 'til 4.00pm. I'll be there for both Sundays and thepicturepalace Christmas cards featuring the inimitable Will Hay will be available. There'll be framed prints and new work for sale as well. In keeping with the season I'll be bringing the three wise men (or the three kings if your prefer). You can find one of them below (give yourself a prize if you guess who the other two are). Yep, I know, another Latin title, you can take the boy out of grammar school but you can't take the ... etc, etc, etc... (and ten points to Gryffindor if you know the film in which 'etc, etc, etc. ..' is a significant line of dialogue). So, to business. Bank Square Artist's Market went well, in fact so well that I actually made a sale, don't get too excited, it was only a print, nevertheless it was a sale! Unfortunately I failed to book a pitch in time for the next one on Saturday October 15th however, if there's a cancellation or a no-show, I'll be there. Also planned are two Sunday markets in the run up to Christmas which are due to be held in the Pannier Market itself, I'll keep you posted on those.
RESURGAM also seemed to go well and wasn't the painful ordeal that I thought it might be (although it was preceded by a sleepless night of the 'what have I let myself in for?' variety). Public response was pretty encouraging and thanks to the marquee also hosting a photographic exhibition by a well known BBC Radio Devon presenter there were plenty of people passing through. Never underestimate the power of local radio, I was interviewed on Radio Cornwall once, at 8.15 on a Sunday morning for their Cornish language programme, I was still being asked about it months later. I made more progress on the painting itself than I expected and still had time to chat (I actually think i may have acquired a fan in the shape of the lady who started flicking through thepicturepalace catalogue saying she had to get back to work in five minutes and was still there, chuckling, after fifteen). More news on RESURGAM on its own page as I continue to work on it but you can see how far I got at the bottom of the page. I also found time to go and look at some art myself this week. I made the rounds of some of the British Art Show 7 venues, at least those at the top end of town, I'm saving the Royal William Yard and Plymouth Arts Centre for later. And the big surprise is, that I found myself looking at the paintings with more than usual interest (for me) and the photographic, sculpture and installation work with a somewhat more jaded eye than in the past. So, the verdict so far, George Shaw is a more interesting artist artist than I have previously thought (although anyone who paints with Humbrol enamel must be fairly interesting to start with) and worth his Turner Prize nomination. Michael Fullerton is also worth watching. Brian Griffiths' big bear at PCAD is not only fun but has a genuine presence (and I want to go inside it please). Sarah Lucas' work is head and shoulders above the rest of the sculpture on display at the City Museum and Art Gallery, a definite case of less being more compared to the over-engineered quality of some of the other pieces. Part two in a week or two's time but verdict so far is that they could have had a much stronger show with more works from fewer artists and that Plymouth could really do with a purpose built (or properly adapted) large scale space for contemporary shows like these. Kudos to the Museum & Art Gallery for acting as a venue but it reminded me somewhat of the Saatchi Gallery's days at County Hall. I'm now wondering what the space at Royal William Yard is like as a venue. Ho hum, more musings next time... I'll explain the title of this post in a minute but first on the agenda is this Saturday's Tavistock Artist's Market, Bank Square, 9.00am - 4.00pm https://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=205979346134810 I'll be there with a new painting based on 'Johnny Frenchman' http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0038660/ a few improvements to the stall and, hopefully, some better sales patter than last time! Come by the stall and help me look busy even if you're not in the market for a monochrome masterpiece (and even better if you are, don't forget your chequebook).
And so to 'Resurgam', which, for those of you who lack a classical education or aren't Argyle fans, means 'I shall rise again'. It is inscribed above the doorway of St Andrew's church on Royal Parade and was first placed there following one of the raids in the infamous Plymouth Blitz of 1941. I'm using it as the title for an event in the Marquee on Plymouth's Piazza (down by the big screen, next to Debenhams) on Friday 23rd September starting about 9.00am and I'll be there all day. This is an experiment for me and will involve something that normally I would run a mile from, namely painting in public (and a diptych no less, not one but two canvases on the go at once). So, if you are in town that day drop in, say hello and I'll try to be civil if I'm in the middle of a fiddly bit. http://fringe.gotanyrice.com/resurgam I'm still working on selecting the imagery I'll be using but the photograph below will almost certainly play a part. This foray into potential public humiliation is just one of the events featuring as part of the BAS 7 Plymouth Fringe https://www.facebook.com/#!/plymouthfringe http://fringe.gotanyrice.com/ running alongside the official programme for The British Art Show 7 http://www.britishartshow.co.uk/venues/plymouth which opens officially on Saturday 17th September (it's a shame you're all going to be in Tavistock that day isn't it?). And finally yet another obituary, this time Richard Hamilton, an artist who truly was so different, so appealing. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-14901992 As Sam Pepys probably never said. And so starts another belated blog entry, why do I always seem to start with an apology? This time I have an excuse, well several actually as I've been trying to get this written for the past week but have, thus far, been thwarted at every turn. Firstly by the router going 'phut' (although not in so many words, it was more sort of, 'nah, I can't be arsed') so a big thanks to Thompson and BT, possibly the worse proprietary hardware & ISP combination in the country. That's the second of their much vaunted 'home hubs' that have gone down on me (and not in a good way) in four years (both just as they're out of warranty). And yet another thank you to BT whose broadband service has been somewhat intermittent all summer (and don't tell me every teenager in the village is using all the bandwidth to download porn all day, they can do that in term time too you know!). Other circumstances beyond my control include a cat needing an operation, visiting in-laws and an innate talent for procrastination that I don't seem to be able to do much about (I keep meaning to, but you know how it is?).
So Tavistock Artists Market was fun (which I somehow wasn't expecting, don't know why), there were plenty of visitors in spite of the morning rain and I made a number of new contacts and met several people I'd only spoken to on the phone. Did I sell anything? erm, no, not a sausage but I did a roaring trade in business cards so next time who knows? I was fortunate to be on a stall next to Nikki Harwood aka The Cow Lady http://www.thecowlady.co.uk/ who has a wealth of experience at these kind of events and who had a good selling day, which was enough encouragement in itself for me to book a pitch for the next market on September 17th. Just across the way was Ian Heard who owns and runs Faraway Island http://www.farawayislands.com/ a bespoke scanning and giclee printing service and who is one the few marine and maritime artists whose work I actually like (no, I'm just saying that). So, lessons learned for next time, there will be lights, there will be bigger, more obvious labels, there will be a bloody great sign saying 'ORIGINAL PAINTINGS' for all those people who walked right up close and asked 'are these photographs?' and I will come out of my shell earlier and make an effort to talk to even more people. See you then. And finally, another reminder that British Art Show 7 opens in Plymouth in less than three weeks http://www.britishartshow.co.uk/ and here's the site for Fringe events http://fringe.gotanyrice.com/ and the public Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/plymouthfringe. There's also still time to get involved in the BAS 7/Americas Cup Art Boot fair http://artsmatrix.plymouthart.ac.uk/index.php?q=node/449 deadline for submissions has been extended to Sept 5th. Think that'll do for now, picture of thepicturepalace emporium below. Don't worry folks, I haven't suddenly discovered the joys of Tommy Trinder (although 'The Bells go Down' http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0035671/ and 'Fiddlers Three' http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0036820/ are on my list of possible future victims). I refer of course to the forthcoming splendour that will be Tavistock Artists Market this Saturday 20th August 9.00am - 4.00pm an event that is so important that it now has its own Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=110746439024790. Bank Square (for those that don't know) is on Market Street, just behind West Street next to the textile shop and is normally used as a car park during the week (hint, if you use Google maps to find it search for Market St, Tavistock rather than Bank Square).
Which brings me to the revelation that should you choose to visit on Saturday there will be bargains! I'll be selling all the work that I bring with me (pretty much every thing that's currently up on the 'Gallery' page plus one two more) at a 30% Discount that means you could pick up a 'Demi Paradise' painting for only £315.00 (as opposed to the normal web advertised £450.00) or take home a Will Hay for only £245.00. There will also be framed 7" x 5" prints for a miserly £4.00 and framed and mounted 8" x 6" prints for a mere £9.00. Something for everybody! And if you'd like to discuss a commission I'll be more than happy to oblige. So come along, you can't miss me, I'll be the one in Black & White. There are three new works just added to the 'Gallery' page which will all be on show, as will the picture below (in its finished form). And if you don't know who Bonar Colleano was, shame on you http://uk.imdb.com/name/nm0171713/ I'm going to start this post with something that I usually save for the end, another artist's death. In this case John Hoyland's. And the quote that titles this post is from Barnett Newman via this Guardian obituary of Hoyland http://bit.ly/oafTU3. I can't say that I was ever a huge fan of Hoyland (or Newman come to that) but inadvertantly he had a profound influence on my development as an artist. The reason for this was a BBC 'Arena' programme called '6 Days in September', it aired in 1979 not long after I started my Foundation course and it was while watching it that I realised I was never going to be the kind of artist Hoyland was. Not that I had any particular beef with him, his work or his working method. I came to the conclusion that what he was doing was not what I wanted to do, that both the process he went through and the outcome he was looking for were of no great relevance to me. In other words I had no desire to be a Painter with a capital P or indeed an Artist with a capital A. I was an image maker, rather than an existential seeker after truth. And, truth be told, I found the whole business of Painterliness rather tiresomely narcissistic. Ironically narcissism was a charge that was frequently levelled at me during my time as a BA student. This was during what you might call my 'Cindy Sherman' phase when I was using myself as a model for photographic work (see the picture at the top of the 'Biography & FAQs' page for a rather obvious example). The 'accusers' were invariably Painters with a capital P, some of whom had obviously also seen the Arena film about Hoyland and had come to the opposite conclusion about the kind of Artist with a capital A that they aspired to be. There was, of course, more than a touch of 'pot and kettle' about the argument and lets face it, whatever kind of work you produce, a Fine Art degree course is absolutely to best place to practise narcissism, in fact it's pretty much a prerequisite for acceptance in the first place!
Which brings me to the second point of this post, the issue of nostalgia, particularly as it affects what I choose to depict and how I choose to depict it. This is something I was intending to write about anyway, the Newman quote appearing in the Hoyland piece just put the serendipitous icing on the cake (and it provides a much better title than 'Nostalgia isn't wasn't it used to be' or some such variation). So, am I an artist that deals in nostalgia, am I a pedlar of cosy visions of a past that never was? To the wider world I honestly don't kow. I can't dictate anyone else's reaction to what I produce, nor would I want to. Like every other artist once the work is made public it becomes something other than what it was conceived as or originally envisaged, part of a wider meta narrative of individual reponses and cultural pigeonholing that I have no control over. Personally, yes nostalgia is a part of the images I produce but perhaps not for the reasons others may assume. I am in no way homesick for the war years, nor do I deplore the fact that 'they don't make them like that anymore'. I'm profoundly grateful to have missed out on the fear, deprivation and sheer grind of those times. I'm a child of the Cold War, when the world might end tomorrow but it was considerably less likely to drop incendiaries on me night after night while I slept. Any nostalgia I feel for the source material I choose to translate into paint is linked not to the time of its creation but to time I first saw it and the reaction I had at the time. It's prompted by the profound disconnect I experienced when I switched on the TV halfway through 'Tawny Pipit' and watched the 'Internationale' being sung around an English village green. It's the erudition, compassion and playfulness of Leslie Howard as a swashbuckling, Nazi hating archaeologist, the Smith that predated Indiana Jones. They may have been artefacts from a past era but their impact was fresh. It's worth remembering that the films of Powell and Pressburger were only just being rediscovered by a wide audience after years of neglect (for which Martin Scorsese deserves a knighthood). I believe 'I Know Where I'm Going' and ' ... Colonel Blimp' had never been broadcast on British television before the early 80s and neither had 'Tawny Pipit' and 'Went the Day Well'. I'd seen 'First of the Few' several times as a child but never 'Pimpernel Smith', 'In Which We Serve' but never 'Western Approaches'. This was pretty much all new material to me (and to my comtemporaries) and it showed that we didn't know the past nearly as well as we thought we did, it added layers and complications to the simplistic narrative that we'd previously absorbed. It was comparable to the shock of my mum telling me that as a teenager she'd preferred Joe Loss to Glenn Miller because his band 'swung harder'. So, there you go, I hope that all made sense. Don't forget Tavistock Artists Market on Saturday Aug 20th. I'll be there, pretty much all the stuff you can see on the site will be for sale (at lower than website prices!). And here's a taster of one the new pictures I'll be showing, just a phone snap at the moment, I'll post high res pictures of new work in the next few days. It has been a month since my last entry. All I have to say in mitigation is that very little has been happening worthy of your attention. Very little paint has been spilled in anger and the world has kept on turning in its inexorable way without any significant intervention from yours truly. That being said stuff is about to happen and hopefully things will get more interesting over the next couple of months. So first things first.
Tavistock now has an Artists Market, a monthly event held in Bank Square (on the small 'pay and display' car park by the overpriced fabric shop behind West Street). The first was held last Saturday and was a success in spite of the weather so I have taken a stall at the next which be on Saturday August 20th and if that goes well I'll back in September and October as well. I'm planning to show quite a few works featured on this site and will also have some framed and mounted sketches on sale in the £30 - £50 region. Prices for other paintings will also be reduced for the occasion. So, unique and affordable, what more can I say? Come along and grab a bargain, it opens 9.00am and goes on until 3.00pm. Don't forget to bring your chequebook! In other news the venues and artists for the Plymouth leg of British Art Show 7 have been announced and can be found here http://plymouthbas7.org/ there also a page on the site for Plymouth Fringe artists and events http://plymouthbas7.org/fringe/ Loads of good stuff there, don't miss it. I still haven't finalised a venue for showing my work but you'll be the first to know when I do. Meanwhile in the outside world there has been both news and bad. The good, Ai Wei Wei is a (comparatively) free man again and Rupert Murdoch (or at least some of his minions) may not be for for much longer (Dennis Potter thou shouldst be living at this hour, you'd be enjoying it!). And the bad, the death of Lucian Freud, which is quite simply a loss. Finally, I know I said that very little paint has hit the canvas but I have completed a commission which I'm quite pleased with. It's called 'To Thine Own Self Be True' and it's very obviously after Magritte's 1937 portrait of Edward James (ironically Magritte's original title is 'La Reproduction Interdite'). Excruciating puns! Just a quickie this inspired by the BBC's latest attempt to position Fiona Bruce as the twenty-first century's Joan Bakewell ('The thinking man's crumpet' © 'Late Night Line Up some time in the 60s) with added greed. The programme in question is 'Fake or Fortune' the latest in a line of programmes to consider art almost exclusively from a monetary perspective, there's a precis of the story here for those that can't be arsed to sit through the entire thing http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-13785393 If you do want to see the whole thing, here it is http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0125bz7/Fake_or_Fortune_Monet/ (UK viewers only I'm afraid, but don't worry if you're in the US it'll probably turn up on BBC America soon). Somewhere in there is a potentially very funny satire on the art world (by which I mean the art business) and its sometimes tangential relation to reality and experience. Unfortunately the programme is presented as a straightforward 'David vs Goliath' struggle, with the plucky Brit outgunned by the beastly, secretive foreigners. Essentially it's a demolition job on the practice of 'connoisseurship' as applied to attributing paintings to particular artists and establishing whether something is actually what it appears to be.
Normally I'd be perfectly happy to go along with this premise, I've no great faith in the idea of connoisseurship and no sympathy at all with those who practise it behind closed doors for financial purposes. In this case however I'm prepared to make an exception because from the start, the programme fails to address one simple glaring fact and continues to ignore it throughout. Namely, that the 'Monet' in question looks nothing like a Monet. And ultimately this is its undoing. David's painting (yes, his name is indeed David, and how fortunate for the producers to have a protagonist who looks and sounds like a straight Christopher Isherwood), Monet or not, is quite simply not Monet-like enough for the Parisiens of the Wildenstein Institute, self-appointed keepers of the Monet flame (and associated marketing opportunities). Which of course opens up a whole range of questions that are not addressed by the outraged Fiona and her ever so English cohorts. Next week, a bit of a kerfuffle over a 'Winslow Homer' including (after Cairo this week) a probably superfluous trip to the Bahamas. For a programme that's so keen on digital technologies they don't seem to put much faith in email! Anyway 7.00pm Sunday BBC1, I might have a look if it doesn't clash with the cricket. Apologies if I appear at first to have slipped into early onset anectdotage but all will become clear(ish) by the end of the post.
I once had a job as an illustrator (all right 'community programme' scheme placement) with the local history/research project in Falmouth. As was the way of these things some of us were there because we had relevant skills and an interest in the subject, others because the Job Centre wanted them off the books and needed to put them somewhere. Anyway, having spent two days (yes, two whole days!) roughing out a very complex compostion to illustrate the famous 'Falmouth Mutiny of 1810' (Google it, Wikipedia etc, it may or may not be there, it certainly wasn't that famous by the mid 80's even in Falmouth). I was transferring the rough sketch to a piece of illustration board (by the time honoured method of covering the back with a thick layer of 6B pencil and then tracing from the front) when I heard, 'That's cheating, I thought you could draw!' coming from the very large and usually taciturn would-be child-minder who'd been parked with us for the last few weeks. No amount of arguing on my part could convince her, in spite of the fact that it was my initial drawing I was transferring, that I was not somehow 'cheating' and could not in fact draw. Therefore, I had obtained this highly valued government sponsored stipend through a deception and must be reported the Job Centre and dismissed immediately. Setting aside the fact that the accuser in this particular case was thick as two short planks and delusional to boot, this is a surprisingly common attitude. One which I ascribe to the fact that nobody these days is taught how to draw. Don't get me wrong, I'm not on a rant about the decline of the life room in Art Schools or the apparent inability of those 'modern' artists to produce an acceptable likeness of anyone or anything (that's why they do those abstracts isn't it?). I mean that drawing has long since ceased to be seen as a desirable or useful accomplishment and therefore is no longer taught or valued as such. As a result the number of people who appreciate exactly, or even vaguely, how time consuming and downright difficult it can be has diminished to the point of almost non existence. Instead it has become something that one can either 'do' or not, the gift of that strange being known as talent who bestows her bounty on the chosen few and leaves the rest bereft. Therefore heaven help the artist who actually knows a thing or two about the craft and chooses to take the odd short cut (two days I spent on that sketch, did I tell you? Over thirty separate figures in authentic early nineteenth century costume and the buildings architecturally correct down to the drainpipes, all rendered from an aerial perspective). Why, well basically it destroys the 'talent' myth and shows that drawing is a craft like any other and can therefore be learned, which requires patience and concentration and hard work. Unfortunately this is an attitude that also affects some 'experts' who should know better, a case in point being the reception given to David Hockney's book 'Secret Knowledge' http://amzn.to/jnM5aD which posited that artists had long used optical devices to aid them in the production of their work and that the use such devices (coupled with other innovations) crucially altered the 'look' of Western European art. The glee with which both some members of the 'art world' and some 'proper' scientists leapt on Hockney's thesis and proceeded, to their satisfaction at least, to 'debunk' it was not pretty to behold. The attacks seemd to be twofold, I won't bother detailing them here but the two 1 star reviews on Amazon seem to sum up the two camps quite succinctly http://amzn.to/kZBI1E Essentially, Hockney is a talentless hack who can't draw and is jealous of the old masters and must therefore denigrate them, or Hockney is not a scientist and makes claims that are not backed up by the research (setting aside the fact that 'the research' had not and was not being done before Hockney's book). I'm not particularly interested in the specific rebuttals of Hockney's claims or indeed in the specific claims themselves (he cites particular passages in particular pictures), that's for researchers with the requisite skills, time, equipment and funding. What bothers me more is the way the central ideas behind Hockney's book were and are being sidelined. Namely that artists have known about and used lenses and optical devices in the production of their work for centuries and secondly and most importantly. It doesn't fucking matter! The paintings are still the same and the artists made the marks that make the paintings. In other words, it's not cheating. And finally, to the point of this post. Yes, I can draw (trust me, I've spent years doing it throughout my life and I have the mental and physical scars to prove it) and yes, I cheat. And as an exercise in loosening up my painting style (and making things quicker) I'm going to start cheating even more by eliminating drawing altogether for a week or two and painting directly onto a printed image. So here's the start of experiment number 1, a frame from 'Tawny Pipit' as put through an edge filter (and printed directly onto a textured 'canvas' paper which, traditionalist that I am, I will stretch before using). |
Dave EvansWork in progress and other stuff that happens. Archives
March 2016
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