33. Anna Couani's 'review' - inviting Jane Skelton into the garden

 

review

Anna Couani

review of the latest work

attached to the places we’ve been

‘from the car window’

became a drypoint print

was more ordinary

because it was ordinary

not like the amazing collection of

art and artefacts from around the world

sinking like a ship

on the shores of Jaffa

so much stuff is special

review of the flowers image

still to be produced

in photo polymer

but so special, each vase

one from mum who collected

loved Wedgewood like all her generation

small pieces that she acquired at sales

in the David Jones store near her work

during lunch hours

and one vintage vase from my friend

the one thing he didn’t smash to pieces

has blobs of colour on it, not blood

and nothing like his amazing miniatures

and the recent vase – from Antigone’s dresser

glowing bluish all those years

every time you stepped into her kitchen

glowing at you

so squarish and glassy

often housing a single flower

review of the invented wood block image

repainted but yet to be reprinted 

since the first botched attempt

botched by my impatience

to get a result

kind of nice though in its own watery way

now sitting quietly in its registration

window, like a window 

onto an imaginary yet realistic scene

conventional with its hibiscus

and its daylight moon

along with un-Australian mountains

what was I thinking?

review of the upcoming lino block

starting with a leafless tree

unsure whether it’s a reduction relief block

or to become a multi-plate print

the background colour already printed

glowing like a light

graded yellow to orange

like the ‘from a car window’ print

and ‘leafless tree’ is hackneyed

but that wasn’t the intention because

it’s only one of the possible layers

unlike the ‘hibiscus with mountains’ print

but the colour yellow glows like mad

as though it contains light

the struggle – how to stop it from disappearing

and you said, “if you can’t write the long thing,

write a short thing”

open up the book of Akhmatova poetry

start with that

and it becomes a prompt to avoid

- snowy streets in another world

like our photographer friends in Iceland posting stark images

of wooden churches in snowy landscapes

a boat stranded on a beach in the snow

a woolly white horse close up

so then you start rambling on in a long poem

pulling stuff out of nowhere

as though all these things are not special

Anna Couani is a Sydney writer and visual artist who runs The Shop Gallery in Glebe with her husband, sculptor Hilik Mirankar. Her musical compositions are at:

https://annacouani1.bandcamp.com/