Art is not created by an act of the artist; it is the artist breath of life that brings the work in contact with the external world by deciphering and interpreting their own inner manifestations and thus forever entangles the artist spirit with the art – dale

The last of the car wash series

I would like to respectfully acknowledge Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nation who are the Traditional Owners and Custodians of the land I currently reside.

The use of traditional Australian Aboriginal painting techniques and symbols have opened a new vista to artistic expression for me when combined with deep space images.

Using traditional symbols, the image depicts the future dreaming of man leaving the cradle of humanity. The concentric circles represent the ‘campsites’ or colonies as man takes to the stars. Undulating patterns mirroring trials and tribulations persist in following the journey. The U shapes of mankind identify a new civilization emerging in the stars.

The background image is a Hubble Space Telescope shot of the Orion Nebula.

Created using the GIMP opensource image editing software

For more information on Aboriginal Painting or to view real Aboriginal artists work please visit:
www.aboriginalartonline.com/index.php
www.aboriginalart.org/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Aboriginal_art

Note: I am not of Aboriginal descent and do not claim to understand the complexities and full symbolism of traditional Aboriginal art. I hope that by learning more about the Aboriginal culture and art I can gain a greater appreciation and understanding.

I have started experimenting with combining my love of art, especially indigenous art, with my photography. Using the GIMP, I edited one of my old photos of a butterfly garden decoration. I removed the background to the butterfly and tweeks the image curves to produce an image with nice stark contrasting lines and no background.

Using a multitude of layers, I slowly experimented with various paint brushes and tools to produce the effects I wanted. The final image background was produced by painting a green, blue and dab of white background. I then used the filter>artistic>cubism selection to create the chunky effect,

The rest was a slow and patient application of dots with the paint brush tool.

This was a test run to see what types of effects I could create. All in all, I like the concept and have a few other ideas up my sleeve. If you have any ideas or want to share your work … give me a comment below.

Out of respect for my better half, I have added another photo to replace the spider that was occupying numero uno spot on this site (see her comments under the spider below).

The maple tree in my backyard is looking brilliant in reds, oranges and yellows. I was putting my daughter in bed last night and noticed the lights from her windows illuminating the tree. Funny that I tried to take a few shots during the day but none turned out as nice as this 15 second night time exposure.

Here's the maple tree in the backyard. It's looking really spectacular!

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My daughter before one of her ice skating competitions. I slipped in a recent Astronomy Picture Of the Day photo of the Cone Nebula and the Snowflake Cluster for effect.

From the APOD website:
Strange shapes and textures can be found in the neighborhood of the Cone Nebula. These patterns result from the tumultuous unrest that accompanies the formation of the open cluster of stars known as NGC 2264, the Snowflake cluster. To better understand this process, a detailed image of this region was taken in two colors of infrared light by the orbiting Spitzer Space Telescope. Bright stars from the Snowflake cluster dot the field. These stars soon heat up and destroy the gas and dust mountains in which they formed. One such dust mountain is the famous Cone Nebula, visible in the above image on the left, pointing toward a bright star near the center of the field. The entire NGC 2264 region is located about 2,500 light years away toward the constellation of the Unicorn (Monoceros).

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