Devious or Desperate?

This basically represents that conundrum when you see a homeless person (or even a Big Issue seller) directly plea for money. Now that you've been put on the spot, do you merely ignore them or immediately look for any spare change you have? My case is a strange one; i remember walking past a pair of 'homeless' people in Southport, only to see them rolling their sleeping bags up, counting their money and getting in their car on the way back. I'm not saying all homeless people are like this, but it makes you think...  

The Observer

I found this shot on my camera yesterday and decided to give it some life. Ironically, I had also come across an article portraying Liverpool's past the same week which gave a brief history on the Liver Birds. Unknown to myself, there are actually four (cormorants?) Liver Birds throughout the city; the two iconic marvels as well as one perched on top of the Mersey Chambers office. The fourth -a small stone version- was originally on top of the original St John's Market building until 1964 when it was demolished- it now resides in the Liverpool Maritime Museum.

Legend has it that the male (as pictured) watches over the city and the people in it while the female looks over the sea waiting for the seamen to return and if they were to ever turn around, mate or fly away the city of Liverpool would cease to exist...

Vintage: Lara Croft

The previous posts showing my Capital of Culture project got me thinking about other past work I have created. Therefore, I searched my pictures saved to the hard drive in the hope to find some nostalgic material I had saved from extinction. Now that college has finished, I thought why not and so when I found this the memories immediately started flooding back. I remember, about 3 or 4 years ago, drawing Lara Croft from a battered copy of a Tomb Raider comic I had bought. I remember drawing it on an A3 sheet in pencil and trying to scan it into an A4 scanner (hence the missing toecap!), having to resort to scanning the drawing twice- the top half and bottom half. I then connected the two best as I could on Photoshop; this being the result. I still plan on adding colour to it at some point...

Withering City 3/3

The final piece of the series shows a bordered up house in the heart of the city centre. The first shows the eyesore at day, whilst the second shows it at night, illuminated by he countless bars and clubs surrounding it- almost giving it new life.

This concludes the project... it would be interesting to hear your views on the city- local or not- and what you find/found positive and negative about Liverpool, Capital of Culture 2008.

Withering City 2/3

Funnily enough, I passed this very wall a few weeks ago and I thought 'Where have I seen that before?' Of course, I had stood in the exact same position
roughly two years ago with my Vivitar digital camera. Amazingly, the scene is still exactly the same; the peeling wooden sign board, the rusty looking bricks and the draping vines covered in rotting leaves. Capital of Culture obviously didn't reach everywhere...

Withering City 1/3

This is a mini project I made about two and a half years ago... It contains 3 illustrations (each with at least one variation of the original) showing different areas of Liverpool. The reason behind the project was to highlight the less known, slowly deteriorating parts of the city whilst the city centre was rapidly being modified and  built up as part of the 2008 Capital of Culture scheme.

It was great seeing plans for new spectacular buildings, but the reality soon hit you in the face when, just around the corner or across the street, you were greeted by a crumbling house, a peeling row of doors or an angry looking reel of barbed wire strung across a decaying wall.