Our little house on Planet Goodaboom...

We had a green molecules rain this afternoon on Planet Goodaboom, just upon our little house. I wonder if they are some kind of primitive Martian Creatures... Our hair curled up to the sky and our heads felt like millions of tiny antennae, but until now we haven´t be contacted.

Busy busy at our little home today! Much painting and writing...
Especially Kevin, who is becoming a words machine, cannot stop writing anymore, short stories, diary, travel tale... if I am his muse, as he claims, then I must say: I do my job pretty well!

Who knows where it came from but that afternoon I saw a woman´s head. Only the head. The female eyes were staring at Kevin. The mouth opened, and from the lips there extended a very long tongue which ended in an enormous crawling yellow spider. The spider scrabbled all over Kevin´s face. Then the head disappeared suddenly but came back some seconds later, and the same scenario happened again. Awful! At the end, quite annoyed that a female tongue was licking my Kevin´s face, I took a pair of scissors and cut the tongue. The spider exploded in a thousand blood tears on my face and the head disappeared for ever.
Whoever has already read Kevin´s new short story "Room without a view" , knows where my vision comes from.
Who hasn´t, should be careful if he/she has sensitive nerves...

Vive le Petit Prince!

(Le Mouton du petit Prince, by Miki...)

I have discovered today that I can put a lot of private information on my blog profile, such as my favourite movies, music, books, etc... I normally don´t´like to lock up my interests in such "drawers", but the drawers here are bottomless, and this is much more comfortable for me!
Each movie, music or book you write in your profile is a link which, when pressed, gives you a list of all the profiles who also chose it. And of course when you enter these profiles, the same happens again, they are full of links to lists of people who love some special book, music or movie. Well done, really, because in fact I think that the books and movies one loves say a lot about oneself, perhaps even more than the blog entries themselves!

The result was amazing. I listed "Le petit prince", as my favourite book. Indeed it is, without any competition. I already read it in French, Spanish, English, German and even Russian, just because it gave me the opportunity to read it again and again, just "slightly differently", giving me the wonderful feeling I have more than one favourite book! Interesting too to notice the translation differences, but well, this is another matter. I was amazed to see that 2600 people had elected this book as one of their favourite books! I couldn´t believe itI I browsed a while through their profiles, all people from very different countries, ages, professions, males, females...
I wonder... I have no idea how many members we have here, but considering the quantity of books there is in the world, I guess this qualifies as a very good result. It would interest me, by the way, which are the 10 favourites here... Somebody knows? Or knows how to find it out? I have the strange feeling the people here like much "deeper" books than the ones which are in the bestseller lists of the world... Anyway, I wonder, as I said... I would mean the world would be a better world with so many little prince fans. I believe one must have a very tender heart and soul to understand and love this book.. although, perversely, I read once that St Exupery was not the tenderest man in the world, especially to his wife!!!

So where are they all these tender, deep people... only in the Cyberspace?

A Rock Star in the Night...

Kevin furtively leaving the house this morning, at 5h30...
Trying to escape I guess...
from the Fan-atics... ?
or from his most engaged Fan, me? Yes, from me I guess.
No chance, Brother: Big Sister is watching you, always!
"
16h42... sounds like "24"!
The Rock Star apparently left the country. I just got a text from him:
"... just had to text you from here, I have one hour in Göttingen..."

Such a strange feeling for me to imagine Kevin in Göttingen Railway station. I have been there so many times myself! I spent about 15 years in Göttingen, the first ones very happy, as I was studying maths & physics at the University there. And then... then I managed to meet the wrong man and it was hell!
Anyway I liked Göttingen very much and I often took the train there to travel abroad. I want to go back there, one day, with Kevin, THE RIGHT MAN, in the footsteps of my lucky past... Probably on the way up to Norway, perhaps next year, in our Boomobile.

Fashion Show on Planet Goodaboom

I have just assisted, as judge and adviser, to a fashion show... Kev Moore, taking vestementary decisions for the gig in Germany Saturday evening... crazier and more colourful than ever, yes, let us rock and roll!
I used the opportunity to shoot some photos of him, almost against his will, because you know, "his hair was not done", and anyway he was not in a photo session mood!!!! What a prima donna, my Kevin, isn´t he? Well, I assured him that I needed the photos just for my private use, and anyway, I never see him on stage in this crazy outfit, so at least I could look at the photos while he is gigging... me the poor lonely bird!
If he knew now that I would publish them...

By the way: as you can see, he is still alive, The Heretic!!! The religious fanatics still haven´t reached Planet Goodaboom, I guess their space ships are technically not up to scratch, having still not tried to convert the extraterrestrials...

The Heretic´s Song

I am worried, deeply worried... what will they do to my Kevin, all these religious fanatics which he attacks, not very delicately, in his new song, just put online today? Highly explosive stuff, I would say... If you dare, if you don´t fear to be executed as a collaborator, judge for yourself by pressing here!

I remember exactly how it started, about one year ago, I went with Kevin for the first time to my native city, Tarbes, in the French Pyrenees. Of course I had to show him Lourdes, exactly knowing that he would find great religious inspiration there as he never misses an occasion to let us know what he thinks of religion.... And, of course he didn´t miss that fabulous occasion!!! (you can read the travel report in our Travelogue, under 2006)
As soon as we were back in my parents´s home, he started writing that song, playing and singing it for me so loud one could think that he wanted God to hear it! Whether God heard it, I don´t know, but for sure the 85 years old catholic priest living right beneath my parents did! I just guess he couldn´t understand the lyrics, because I think he would have had a heart attack! As far as I know, he is still alive, God bless him!

Anyway... I am scared. He is not. He is waiting for his executioners with deep pleasure and talons bared... Good that nobody knows what Goodaboom is!!!

Me and You, today..

Sad. Paralysed. Both.
Me, the feeling to think wrong, to do wrong. Not to be able, sometimes, to control the darkest thoughts of my brain.
I have been told, I don´t accept my happiness. It is more complicated than that. I might have lost the connection to reality, these last few days. I have been caught into a net of totally wrong hypotheses which lead me to horrible conclusions.
I know, I´m good at that, I´m a mathematician with my heart and soul, and my brain seems to find deep satisfaction in the construction of awful abstract buildings, locking me inside to see if I can find the way out..
And then, of course, I shout at You "help me out, help me out!"
You cannot help me out because you cannot see where I am.
I am too complicated, you say.
I am complex, I answer. But for me is this complexity so transparent, I can describe and logically explain each of its elements. But I feel alone within my elements which nobody else recognises...

I have just started to read a book: "The incarnation of Frida K.", a painter too. "I was born in rain, and I will die in rain", And even if I have no idea how I was born and even less how I will die, it is how I feel today. And it is how I make you feel.

Forgive me, please.

You forgive me, always.

And you do much more than that. Suddenly I feel the tenderest lips on my neck whispering the most important words of my life:
"I love you, my Miki..."

I love you too, my Kevin

Time to decide...

Planet Goodaboom, Saturday 29th September 2007



Most of you surely think that you still have got lot of time to decide what you want to give your family and friends for Christmas. At least this is the impression I have every year... with increasing tendency! I remember last year with a kind of horror... I spent two and half months before Christmas - and even two after, my clients having redeemed some gift vouchers - to paint portraits, simply because my clients had decided at the eleventh hour that a portrait would be the most appropriate gift. At the end I was totally saturated, I almost hated all these little monsters and even thought, I could never face a portrait again!
But well, in the finaI analysis, I love portraiting, and love the deep pleasure I can give people with it. So i just went on... and here I am again, with the awful impending Christmas rush at my door.

I have been portraiting for a long time, and people who received them as a gift have always thanked me and said, it was the most beautiful present that they had ever had. Today I just want to beg you, if you are thinking about giving a portrait (or any kind of painting on order) please think fast and order now! You must not forget that a portrait takes a long time, a lot of energy and inner peace. I always have to go inside the portraited person to be able to capture his/her soul, and I hate to "jump" from one to the other: it just leads to schizophrenia!
And anyway: the longer you wait, the more expensive it becomes... yes, my night rates are very expensive!

If you need some help with your decision, have a look at my portraits on Planet Goodaboom.
Don´t forget: to order a portrait from me is a very easy process, even if you live on the other side of the world. You just send me the appropriate photo, and choose the size and technique. I paint the portrait within 3 weeks (normally!), send you a photo of the portrait via email, make changes if you wish, and then send you the original via normal post. You normally pay when you get it, as I always choose to trust my clients.

I did it many many times, IT´S NOT A PROBLEM AT ALL!

And if you think, yes, it could be a good idea: you won´t regret it, I promise!

Have a nice Sunday.

Back, with Fringe and Horns!

www.goodaboom.com

Planet Goodaboom, Friday 28th September 2007



Yes, that´s me, with my new Scottish look, impossible to miss with my wild fringy hair and my sharp devilish horns, just back from one of the northerly world ends, specifically the Butt of Lewis in the Western Isles of Scotland!
Again 3 months have passed since my last entry here, not such a shame this time as we have been travelling 10 weeks in our wheeled box through remote lands, most of the time without any internet or phone connection. It might sound egotistical, just to disconnect like that for such a long time -and our families don´t miss one occasion to blame us...-, but to tell the truth, what a relief, and what a sensation of freedom!!!!
We had been thinking to put mobile internet in our Boomobile, but it seems that it will be for another time... we can always argue that it is still too expensive, and still not a reliable technology...
But of course it would have been nicer, to put our travel tale with photos and sketches gradually online, and surely much more interesting for our readers. We have just started now to put our travel tale, "10 weeks in a box" online and we can just hope it won´t have for you the taste of cold coffee! You´ll find there Kevin´s daily reports and photos and sketches from me of all the places we have been. I made only ink sketches on the site, without colours, because everything was grey, due to the incessant rain falls. I´am colouring the sketches now, at home, with pastel chalk and with the memory of how colourful it could have been.... or not! In fact, just putting down the colours I fancy, and never mind the truth !!!!

All these sketches have been made from inside the Box. In our travel I could never venture outside to draw or paint. Much too wet and much too cold. Luckily our Box has many windows and Kevin always parked it in such a way that I had a 360 ° panorama view. Thanks so much to him by the way, for his patience and his ability to manoeuvre the Boomobile, very difficult most of the time as I always insisted to go to the most isolated and least "roady" parts of the countries!
I also painted some watercolour sketches, more or less inspired -and more less than more!- by the views outside. I´ll present them gradually in my Carnets de Voyage, just need to polish them a little bit to make them presentable, and to digitalise them. Quite a lot of work!

I hope you will enjoy with us our 10 Weeks in a Box!

www.goodaboom.com

Planet Goodaboom, Tuesday 26th June 2007



Almost 3 months have passed since my last entry here, what a shame! Kev has been a little bit more vocal than me, but generally one can tell that we have both been deserting this blog platform for a long time. Well, we were travelling a lot -England, France, Spain, look and read our travelogues!-
and the rest of the time I was busy with some portraits on commission
-see one of my last works below, a wedding gift from a Norwegian girl for the wedding couple, a French woman and a Columbian man, a wonderful contrast for me!-
and working out hundreds of sketches from the travels -look at my 3D-exhibition of some sketches from our last trip in the footsteps of Don Quijote-.
And Kevin, well, the gig season started again and he is rocking a lot in the South of Spain, England and Germany.

Anyway, I am back again. I have made some changes to the home page today, kept it much simpler and clearer, the art on one side, the music on the other, hoping that some curious visitors will find their way to what was originally the reason for this site: the meeting between a musician and a painter, and the resulting communal work... which one can still see and hear in the section "Brush with Poetry".

I will try to keep writing regularly until we leave for Scotland in The Boomobile, on the 10th of July, for 10 weeks this time...

Last Sunday we were in the Street gallery again, after more than 2 months absence. A strange but wonderful feeling again, the comments, the compliments, and at the end, the sale, to a couple from Madrid, a watercolour landscape from my fantasy which I loved very much... and unfortunately, I have no photo of it! Curiously, this older Spanish woman had a a very modern taste... I think I mentioned it before, but the Spaniards are changing a lot concerning art. I have been exhibiting in the Street for about 3 years; at the beginning the Spaniards only reacted to "heavy", very classical oil paintings, but more and more they start looking for watercolour and seem to go directly to the most modern and creative, without pausing to experience the trivial, schoolish ones., seemingly skipping a stage of their "taste" evolution! It is always fascinating to see how fast the Spaniards learn, how fast they adapt to all the changes which govern their lives in these extremly cosmopolitan areas.
One year ago, I thought I would never sell a painting to a Spaniard, and now, little by little, they seem to become my best and most enthusiastic clients: what luck that I am living here!

Today Kevin started a promoting action for my portraits by the offices of our insurance company "Liberty", what a wonderful and unusual name for an insurance company! So we thought my star portrait of the young tahitian girl would hang in the right place there... let´s hope she will bring me some new clients!



Marion & Pepe: I wish you much happiness in your new life together in France!

Cutting my teeth

www.goodaboom.com

Planet Goodaboom, Sunday 1st April 2007

This is Dutch Esmee, my new child... a pretty girl, my Esmee, isn´t she? To tell the truth, I had some troubles with the birth, as Esmee´s Grandparents were not quite happy with her first teeth... Well, Esmee´s Grandfather was a dentist, specialising in prostheses, and as he says, his attention was focused on teeth aesthetics his whole life. Esmee´s first teeth looked a little bit too aggressive, as if she wanted to bite everything she found... what babies normally do, don´t they? Anyway... Esmee had to go back into mother´s belly, and mother had to work on her dental genetics. Half an hour later -a second birth is always much faster and far less painful than the first one...- Esmee was reborn, with a gentle soft mouth, and I got a gigantic bottle of red wine from Grandpa Frans!
Also: Thanks and Cheers, Frans & Henny, you are wonderful people, and I have no doubts: the best and youngest grandparents in the world!
By the way: Frans is not only a dentist, he is pianist too, and a very good one! Have a look at his website.

Frans told me when he was making teeth prostheses, there were sometimes old ladies bringing the prosthesis back and telling things like:
"The gap between the front teeth is too big!"
or
"The teeth are not white enough!"
Frans had to find a diplomatic way to tell them that, at their age, the rest of their teeth weren´t exactly snowy white either!
One wonders that old ladies are still bothered with such imperfections, but somehow, it is nice, that women fight for their beauty until the last moment!
Frans told me, that he always felt bad when they brought the "dental art work" back. So he said, he could understand my feelings when I have to retouch a portrait...
But honestly, it is not a problem. A portrait is a difficult work, and it´s normal that I might have to do some tiny changes when I think it is finished. I exactly know that a tiny detail, which bothers the eye, can spoil the whole painting because the eye of the observer always focuses on that imperfection. And in the final analysis my job is only finished and the painting only complete when the client is happy!