March

March by nikigirl featuring vintage style jewelry

Rose-tinted heaven

Rose-tinted heaven

Found some of my old polyvore images from earlier in the year that I never got to publish on here, despite it being close to 1 'o' clock in the morning, I thought - why not? I need a good old clear out of my drafts, or "ghost posts" as I prefer to call them. Here are some creations that I never found the words for.

2 Years Later...

My most recent Polyvore design

2 Years ago today I started this blog, beginning with images (coincidentally, images that I started using when I first opened my Polyvore account, at around the same time) from my GCSE Art and Design course. It started as a blog about art, concerning the creation of different types of artwork that I'd learnt about, but now my blog is much more about myself, somehow, and how this increasingly is shown through my art.

So basically, where as the the art did all the talking previously, now I do the talking, and the art is simply a more visual explanation for my thoughts.

I'd like to think that I've learnt a lot, since that 16 year old, bored after GCSEs (although admittedly I am very bored after leaving school, and genuinely cannot wait to get my results, go to university and start learning again, but that's just me I think) who had little direction in life other than some mediocre artwork and a random blog. Not that the art has really improved dramatically, although it has evolved somewhat (I primarily use Polyvore rather than GIMP to make images, and rather than photo manipulation I tend to use internet images and "arrange" them into bigger pieces rather than create the components themselves from scratch if you know what I mean).

This post is a pretty big milestone then, certainly, I know there are much older blogs around, but as far as Blogspot is concerned, the average lifespan of a blog seems to be under 2 years, so I think it's an achievement that I have continued to update this, if only for its consistency rather than for any extraordinary content, after all I'm not trying to change the world, I just want some way to record the things that I do and that I find interesting, I'm not fussed about having 100s of followers, although of course I like the idea that at least someone is reading what I write.

At this point I'd like to thank my actual followers (currently at around 15 I think?) for putting up with this nonsense, in the hope that they find something (if only occasionally) worth reading on here. As a side note, I have had over 3,900 views on this blog, which is far more than if I had decided to never publish it!

So here we are, I'm not world famous, I'm not a celebrated blogger or by any means a talented artist, I'm not a budding author or even an exceptional writer, but I am I believe, much closer than I was 2 years ago to finding myself, though if there's one thing I can be accused of, it's forgetting the past in favour of obsessing over the future, as opposed to say, living in the moment. (Ironic for a potential History student, right?)

For example, I tend to forget or overlook the things I've already achieved, the work I've done, however small, and instead I worry about what the future holds, where will my life go next etc. (to be fair, until I get my A2 results I don't even know where I'm going to be living in 2 months!) This however, is no way to live, there needs to be more of a balance I think, between positive reflection and active (but not anxious) anticipation of the future. That can be my target for the next year, until this blog's next milestone ;)

Maroon 5's song Payphone actually sums up the above scenario pretty well;

"You turned your back on tomorrow
Cause you forgot yesterday..."

The only way to the future is to remind ourselves of the best parts of the past -

"Who controls the past, controls the future: who controls the present controls the past"

- George Orwell, 1984

Who would have thought Maroon 5 and George Orwell would ever have belonged in the same sentence? Only on this blog!

A tree, a real life representation of Carl Jung's tree of self actualization....just kidding -

(A photograph I took on a shady walkway in Calpe, Alicante, if this picture is rotated it makes a really nice desktop background!)

Memories

Memories

I really like photos of people not looking at the camera, especially if they're looking into the distance, or taken from an interesting angle...I also have an obsession with putting clocks in the background of everything, and overlaying virtually every image I make with some sort of book/ photo montage?

The words "World", "adventure", and "travel" are also particularly relevant as I've just booked my summer holiday! A nice week somewhere sunny with a load of my closest friends - just what I need after finishing my final exams - and a great way to start what I hope will be a great summer :)

I also like putting mis-match frames around the different images, makes the whole thing look a lot less mainstream ;)

Speaking of summer, I've also paid for my end-of-school prom (!) which is only a few months away, which seems insane considering I can still remember my Year 11 prom so clearly...so I guess the title of this post may be "Memories" (well, it suits the image!) but really at the moment I'm focused a lot more on the future; which isn't always a bad thing.

Day Dreamer

Day Dreamer by nikigirl

I may see in colour, but I still dream in black & white.

Can you miss being somewhere before you've even left?

The term nostalgia describes a yearning for the past, often in idealized form.

Sometimes I want to live in the past, literally.

Pride and Prejudice

Pride and Prejudice by nikigirl on polyvore.com

Autumn Days

So my life at the moment is pretty much a waiting game. It's like the moment you reach a roundabout, and you're looking in both directions to see if you can move forwards, and the seconds of looking around, at everything, everywhere, seem to take an age. And then you go too slowly and stall. Or maybe that's just my terrible driving!

Still waiting on 2 universities, one of them will get back to me in about 14 days (not that I'm counting, but I am) and the other could take up to 2 1/2 months - or at least they have done, in the past. It seems I'm in need of a bit more patience, but it is difficult to acquire these days. I feel as if I'm living in a hurried sort of present, the sort that looks forward constantly, never quite managing to live in the moment but always straining, trying, desperately to look into what is still a very unknown future.

How very sombre. In other news the sun is shining here and I expect it might well be the warmest November on record - not that I'm complaining, it's great, makes all of the waiting and anticipation, this limbo, a bit more bearable...

Autumn Days by nikigirl on polyvore.com

Tea, and other such Time

No point lying, I'm so much more into Polyvore instead of GIMP right now as far as image-editing and composing is concern which is really strange considering I actually joined Polyvore 2 years ago and only really started using it now... such is life, I suppose.

In other news, this week has been a continuation of stressful driving lessons, homework and coursework deadlines combined with the fact that I'm still waiting to hear back from universities, my mock A2s are in a month oh, and my job no longer exists so I have virtually no disposable income :(

Bad times indeed. BUT, I must remember the tone of my last post, and remain positive - things can't stay this way forever, the only thing that stays the same is that things always change! Although I titled this image "Tea time" I'd like to now draw inspiration from W.H.Auden;

But all the clocks in the city,

Began to whirr and chime:

'O let not Time deceive you,

You cannot conquer Time.


Today of course, time has a particularly special significance, not only is the date 11.11.11 but it's also Remberance Day, so let us not only remember those that fell in service of their country, but also those that were left to remember, especially during those first few Armstice Days when happiness to some, would have seemed like a different era, a lifetime away, a mere memory...

Play

Play by nikigirl featuring heart jewelry