The Zen Boardroom

The brief: "Being mindful of the chaos outside as we work with calm in the boardroom."

My third visit to Jambo's offices. A year since I painted two rooms in their building in Manchester I'm back in Truro installing a huge Zen Wave Garden mural in their boardroom and an Accounts/Contracts/IT themed mural in the accounts department.

Using low odour spray paint and a fume extractor means I can paint indoors as the company works around me.

Be Unrivalled!

A few weeks ago Unrivalled Legacy were having a stand at the BodyPower Expo at Birmingham NEC Centre.
Unrivalled Legacy is a great fitness and bodybuilding label based right here in St Agnes, Cornwall.

To stand out agahey got me in to paint the stand with strong lines and powerful

Big lad inne!

Strong lines and images associated with power.

The lightning bolt is a great symbol of energy.

Create Your Own Legacy! and Be Unrivalled are the companies tag lines.

The Unrivalled Legacy team at the stall in Birmingham.

Time Lapse of Aggie Surf Shop Wall

I saw this last week. Markie from Aggie Surf Shop made this video when I painted the wall at the shop but I don't seem to have posted it on here.

It's a great video that shows the length of time it takes to actually paint a wall, and also how engaging it is for passers-by.

Cosmic wall at aggie surfshop from marcus lascelles on Vimeo.

The finished piece.

Treliske Lowen Ward Murals

Recently I created some artwork on the walls of some new rooms which are for teenage cancer patients to use while they receive treatment at Royal Cornwall Hospital Treliske.

They are part of the Lowen Ward's  £400,000 refurbishment and were funded by Young people's cancer charities Tanya's Courage Trust and LARF.

The wards were mainly brown before and very dull which, as you can imagine, is not the ideal kind of environment a young person undergoing treatments such as chemotherapy wants to be in for long periods of time.

I tried to produce artwork that would generate a natural feeling mixed with some imagination stimuli.

Singer and songwriter James Morrison (right) rocked up to open the new rooms.

The Butterfly Effect, Lanson

Volunteers from Barefoot had made this amazing ceramic butterfly to go outside the town hall in Launceston. 
They called me in me to come and assist them in creating something to go around it.
Each cloud was coloured and transformed from the usual plain white by the volunteers.

The finished image shows the diversity and creativity of the people which is underlying every scene of Launceston.

Barefoot continue to do great work in engaging local people with creative community projects that serve to enhance the town for the pleasure of residents and visitors alike, and are fantastic people to work with. I can thoroughly recommend getting involved on an art project with these guys!

Oh Mama! What an entrance!!

Mama Africa bar and nightclub in Falmouth opened last week and is the new sister venue of the infamous Aussie club of same name.

The UK has China White and Stringfellows, and Australia has Mama Africa!

Shortly after the Mama Africa crew's boat pulled in to Falmout harbour earlier this month, laden with Aussie and African Liquor, my phone rang: "G'day Cosmic! Can ya draw all over the walls of our new entrance mate? Good on ya! That's bonza!"

They know how to throw a party too. So go there now and check the place out!

Another wall to find in Newquay!

Lanson Jungle

A hugely positive community project with Barefoot and people from Lanson (spelled Launceston) who work towards making their town brighter and more colourful.

The Barefoot team have dedicated the wall to Phil Lewitt. Unfortuately I never had the pleasure to meet Phil. By all accounts a local legend.

I approached this in much the same way as I do with all the Drawingonthings workshops, and drew as much inspiration as possible from everyone there and enlisted the help of everyone present to colour in! There were so many capable people at this project, ex fine-art teachers included (that's you Nev!) that we had the whole thing done in two days!

Ideas and painting by everyone present, aged from 1 to 82 years! A pleasurable experience. Thanks Lanson!

Sketching ideas straight on the wall (Drawing on Things style!)

Newquay Youth Centre Open Day, yesterday.

The white part of the wall is the start of where the larger art will begin throughout the room, so this is a consultation with young people who love living in Newquay and use Newquay Youth Centre or, for some, who only found out about the centre yesterday during the open day.

The art project is to express the many enjoyable and positive things about living in Newquay.

To get the ideas flowing I suggested ways that everybody could begin doodling, despite how well they thought they could draw, and the drawing didn't stop all day!

About 30 new artists added ideas, shapes and colours to the wall, including some of the newspaper photographers (who couldn't resist when I offered them the chance!).

The artwork for the main part of the wall will be done by me in September or October. And by looking at some of the ideas coming through yesterday, this will be a very creative project indeed!

Edit: Here is a link to a post with pics of the artwork completed by me, based on these sketches, ready for when the young people return to use the youth centre (after the summer holidays) later this week.

'Tree Milestone' skate park wall

Okay, good workshop this one. Super-fast consultation last week at Mount Hawke skatepark with the group that were all set to paint this wall at their local park. It was the sort of design meeting where someone mentions a tree and it all snowballs from there.

Today I turned up at the park and helped them put their idea on the wall.
The village is called Threemilestone. It's three miles away from Truro, or something like that. One of the local mums, Kelly (an active member of the parish council) is working wonders to get all kinds of things done in this park to make it more of a user-friendly environment for the community, and getting this art wall built at the skate park area is just one of them.

An art wall is a dedicated wall for art, street art or graffiti. Some places have them free-standing which is so effective.

CN4C (Cornwall Neighbourhoods For Change)'s Simon and Sian work closely with Kelly and support her plans to make the area a more positive and vibrant place. So, when they heard of her idea for the wall, they called me in to run this Drawing On Things workshop.

Cornwall College Cosmic Corridor Collaboration

The corridor to The Treg, which leads from the canteen, needed brightening up. "Call Cosmic!" someone yelled.







The Treg is the common room at Cornwall College St Austell campus. To find it you have to navigate a short cellar-like route of corridors with plain white walls, a complete contrast of the atmosphere to be found once you are there.

This place has doors leading out to a garden, pool taples, ping-pong, advice and services, info on parties and is place to chill out during breaks from studies and lectures. In other words, the most important area of the college!



I visited the college during the first part of the term to meet students, and staff, to ask them what images they thought I should aim for. It soon became clear that I would have help from both students and members of staff.
During the consultation it became apparent that The Treg might one day move location so another part of the college, so we decided to do the artwork on boards which could be hung in the corridor and moved with the Treg if it ever changed location.



So, during the consultation we painted an octopus, a dragon and the student union logo made up of fish and waves on a large decorated board hanging on the wall inside the Treg itself. I was starting to understand that there would be some very interesting ideas to work with on this project.

I left some sheets of paper blutacked to the wall to collect more ideas and returned this week (during half term) and, with the help of students and staff created the images to be hung in the corridor.

I will add another post with pics when they are hung.

Last chance Truro

The large flower and garage doors in Truro may soon be removed.

Jane Adele Flowers have moved premises to the sunny surf-laden shores of Porthtowan.
Their old building is ready for new tennants. So, it is most probably the last chance to get a peek at this stuff.

Media Poppy

M-Mad Media in Launceston, Cornwall last week: "Call Cosmic! We need a huge poppy on the wall to represent the creativity springing forth from this place!"



M-Mad Media Centre in Launceston's is a community media studio developing projects with and by young people and is a vibrant hub of creativity in an otherwise very ordinary looking cornish industrial estate.

The 'bosses' (although I am pretty sure they wouldn't describe themselves as such) Krystyna (pictured above) and husband Pete have done a fantastic job to put this studio together, mostly funded by themselves!
There is a fully operational recording studio, all kinds of film and editing equipment and a blue screen for the young people to access for their projects for personal creativity, commissions or for work towards arts awards.

It was a real pleasure to visit the studio, witness a production taking place and create this peice of work for them.

For more info: contact M-Mad Studio.

Invinci-Ball Artwork!

Surfers Against Sewage have a Cosmicphone in their office too.
Last week, Just minutes before the SAS Ball 2010 was due to begin, there was an emergency. People were about to descend on the eco park at Porthtowan to party, quite literally, like superheroes and... there was no art in the whole place!

"Only one thing for it..." thought Hugo Tagholm, Chief Commissioner of Gotham Beach and Director of the St Agnes based environmental pressure group, Surfers Against Sewage.

"...This is a job for Cosmic Images!" he yelled, and reached for a red 1960s dial phone which was inside, what can only be described as an up-turned fish bowl, on top of a plinth.

A silver letter "C" with a small "i" in it was the only 'number' on the dial, (it was where the "9" would've been on a regular phone)... TBC

FINISHED ARTWORK PICS TO FOLLOW (when i find the wall and TAKE SOME!!)

"SAS represents all recreational water users in the UK, from surfers and sailors, through to bodyboarders and windsurfers. The campaigns protect the coastal environment for all to enjoy, and promote a clean and safe water environment for people to enjoy and practice a wide variety of sports that rely on these marine resources." - www.sas.org.uk

A drawingonthings workshop sponsored by Cornwall Fire Brigade.

Dracaena Youth Centre, Falmouth. Sunday 11th July 2010

MP Sarah Newton, Cornwall's Chief Fire Officer Des Tidbury, and almost 100 young people from 5yrs upwards took part in covering this wall with graffiti (not all at once) to help share the important message of road safety during a massive fun day at the youth centre in Falmouth last Sunday.

Other activities included an alternative petting zoo (with tarantulas and lizards), a funfair, bbq, football tournament, skate, bmx and scooter comp, and archery.

All the young people that took part on the wall took the theme seriously and all of the slogans are theirs. I wrote a few, but I was being dictated to. Graffiti artist 'SIN' turned up and did a peice with a road safety message too.

The result was very successful and enjoyable day for everybody involved, as well as carrying a very important message.