Various Animals, and cluttered workspaces

Above is a horse head. Go, Equus! Below, a politician. At bottom, a video of the cats in action.

I'd apologize for the cluttered workspace, but saw a nice documentary by Josh Freed saying that people with clutter are actually creative, and not necessarily mentally ill. I still like to pick up once in a while, after a long bout of work.

The same night, I had shot a much longer camera video of the cats fooling around (more of the same), but this has resisted uploading. Still, you get the idea.

New Occupation for Caleche Horses?

Sadly, it seems that the building project in Griffintown is going ahead, without consulting the residents it's affecting. That's what we were marching about on the weekend. Read about it in this CBC news story here.

So after the project (and the neighbourhood!) is finished, I think the displaced caleche horses will have to find new jobs, like the above!

March for Griffintown

Had an interesting afternoon today. Walked in the March for Griffintown, which was kind of a funeral cortege for a neighbourhood. It's been rezoned and slated for development, and most of the residents are going to be expropriated so that they can build big box stores and apartment towers. Anyhow, read more about it here.


I took shots all through the march. Easiest to start by clicking on this picture above, of the "Horse Palace" (video here) on Ottawa street, and then follow the march by clicking through the pics on flickr (in the flickr photo set, they go backwards). Over the next while I'm going to try to add descriptions, and others are invited to contribute names, when possible.





I also took video, which you can watch on Youtube. 8 different snippets, several of which are below (click on my "user name" Magelly7 for the rest). This took much longer to upload than I hoped it would, thanks to recalcitrant software, and lack of computer memory. Still, it's a souvenir of a pleasant, warm Sunday afternoon in Montreal, marching (one hopes) for the betterment of a small part of the world.


Here, Patrick Hutchinson (r) and friend tune up.


The march moves off!


Progressing down rue Notre Dame.


Setting up the coffin outside city hall.

Madness in Montreal

Apologies for interrupting the usual rhythm of posting here. I've been distracted and working hard, and generally worrying about job stuff. Friend Richard was off visiting family. Not sketching tons, which is a shame.

Anyhow, last night, the city went a little crazy. Lots of horns honking and shouting. I took a trip on my bike to check it out and collected the pocket camera movie above, on Sherbrooke Street near Jeanne Mance. There were many more exciting things happening further downtown, such as rioting and burning, and police attacks, but I decided to forgo that (you can check it out [here] from a much braver correspondent). There will be lots on youtube soon, if you click on the above.

Kids were already a little belligerent as they were walking past my place on their way to the game, shouting at old folks, and being generally rowdy. I suppose they take advantage of such events (this was the last game in the first round of hockey playoffs between the Montreal Canadiens and the Boston Bruins, and the Canadiens won) to raise some hell. Rioting used to happen on Victoria Day. Anyhow, God knows what they're going to do if they actually win the cup.

To cleanse the palate, and return to business as usual, here're drawings of a horse and a couple of girls.

Galloping

Back to my own stuff again. Doing action, an animal, perspective, and trying to get it all to look right without using a reference is tough. Bit of a switch from all those people just standing around.