A Swiss museum made a splash by inviting the public to wear their swimwear to enjoy Paul Cezanne's iconic paintings of people bathing. u.afp.com/Sa7h

Another poll predicting all the SNP wins on the constituency vote, and zero on the list vote. Use your pro-Indy list vote more effectively by voting #SNP1SGP2

The public has been advised not to feed garden birds during the summer months because of the threat of disease.

This 👇 Source: x.com/JamesThrot/s...

Not the point I know, but with all the problems there are in the world, it just seems increasingly bizarre that these resources (people's time, creativity, work, the tech involved and all it requires) are being used to create... custom fast-food menus

"Hope is a motion of the heart fastened with courage" Today's Purple Martin card from @mariapopova.bsky.social Maria Popova's Almanac of Birds #HopeOverFear

"Hope is a motion of the heart fastened with courage" Today's Purple Martin card from @mariapopova.bsky.social Maria Popova's Almanac of Birds #HopeOverFear

"Defence should be understood not as the accumulation of military capability, but as the protection of the conditions necessary for a functioning society. ... recognising that investment in public services, in reducing inequality, and in addressing climate risk are ... central to national security."

Back at Needle Rock in Macduff today with my paints. Perfect painting weather. #pleinair #tarlair

"Art schools produce...collective cultural and artistic imagination. It is the capacity to rethink form, to work across disciplines, to engage new and challenging ideas, and to build something that did not exist before. That capacity depends entirely on community." hyperallergic.com/the-death-of...

People who are disabled, poor or on fixed incomes should be allowed nice things. Society acts as though anyone receiving assistance should be forced to make do with the bare minimum ALL the time. It’s suffering as a policy choice. It’s cruel and unnecessary.

the phrase "do it scared" has done so much for my mental health i cannot stress how lifechanging it is to realize: if you are scared of doing something (especially if it can be beneficial to you), you cannot wait for yourself to not be scared. it will always seem scary. you have to do it scared

"Love one another but make not a bond of love: let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls." From Kahlil Gibran, some of the best relationship advice ever put to words www.themarginalian.org/2026/04/27/k...

"Although her use of colour and composition seems intuitive, it’s also likely she was aware of colour theory." 🙄 Yeah just maybe possibly teeny tiny chance given when and where Eardley attended art colleges. 🙄 Rather: her work demonstrates a clear knowledge of art colour theory.

Monday Motivator: Negative Space Emerges at Age 9 As adults we can be so impatient with the time it takes us to learn.

The best possible pro-Indy election result relies (imho) not only on SNP supporters voting SGreens on the list, but on SGreens voting SNP on the constituency (where they can). Hopefully this back scratching will actually happen, otherwise Reform is likely to profit. #SNP1SGP2

Today's drawing at the old harbour in Portsoy. #drawing #pleinair #Portsoy

Ew Moleskine used genAI for their Lord of the Ring collection by mentioning they used it, then entirely removing the claim after some backlash. Incredibly shitty of them for a brand that claims human creativity. cjleo.com/blog/moleski...

The irony is that, for a chunk of people with #LongCovid, this illness has made it impossible for them to listen to music, either due to tinnitus, or due to the fact that music is too much sensorial stimulation and it is exhausting. The "treatment" below would be torture for this LC phenotype.

This is why Brexit was illegally forced through, this is why Keir Starmer says there will be no rejoinig the EU in his lifetime. The contracts for the 12 freeports and 74 SEZs are 25 years in duration.

They killed it. Actively. This is what the "time to stop playing with toys and do grown up things instead" does. I have never met an interesting person who doesn't have lego or action figures or have a prominent board game collection or something.

Something we don’t address enough is how many people, especially adults, do not have a working imagination.

Over on Whatever, I use my recent visits to film/TV companies as a framing to note how my not "cognitively offloading" any part of my creative process to "AI" is making my career more secure, not less: whatever.scalzi.com/2026/04/24/a...

My studio/gallery is open Saturdays 11 to 3 (and by appointment and when my "open" sign is on the door). At the end of Seafield Street in Portsoy. You'll also find my cards at delightful Portsoy Giftbox down the road, which is open Monday to Saturday. #portsoy #ScottishArt #aberdeenshire

As you can see, this piece of paper was indeed big enough to get the top of the Needle in this time, just. #drawing #art #pleinair

Did you know that since ‛The Vow’ in 2014, which promised more powers to Scotland, Westminster has instead stripped 24 key powers and overruled Scottish Parliament decisions on devolved matters more than 13 times? Vote #SNP1SGP2 to help Scotland win back *full* control of its own destiny.

"If this were non disabled people there would be outrage at this intrusion on people’s private life.”

The European Commission intends to suspend or terminate an ongoing €2 million grant to the Venice Biennale after the exhibition decided to allow the Russian pavilion to reopen, the EC spokesperson Thomas Regnier said.

One of the things that stuck with me from one of the many UBI pilots is how people started talking with each other more in person in the community, and the reason was because people felt they would no longer be asked for money. And so UBI increased social cohesion by making sure everyone had money.

#Finland opens world's longest car-free bridge, intended for bicycle riders, pedestrians and mobility device users, and transit riders. #Helsinki's Kruunuvuori Bridge is 1,191 metres long, and will soon be served by trams. newatlas.com/architecture...

The last time I drew the Needle's Eye rock arch at Macduff I ran out of space on my piece of paper for the top of it. Do you reckon this piece of paper will be big enough to get it all in? #drawing #pleinair

This sent me down a rabbit hole. I love it that there are so many theories about stabilimenta - that they stop birds flying into webs, encourage prey to do so, help spiders locate where the prey lands, collect water, conserve heat... Only the spiders know. journals.plos.org/plosone/arti...

There's something magical about pulling the tape off a painting on paper to reveal a crisp white border. Especially when the tape co-operates and comes off smoothly. #painting #art

Creels at the new harbour, Portsoy. Mixed media on paper, with my beloved Payne's grey acrylic ink being my starting point. #Art #Portsoy #MixedMedia

I wrote this to help people understand that universal basic income is not meant to permanently replace all jobs. It's meant to be a floor below which no one can fall, and a dividend that universally distributes a share of our economy. It's meant to provide the power to say no and freedom to choose.

Creels at the new harbour, Portsoy. Mixed media on paper, with my beloved Payne's grey acrylic ink being my starting point. #Art #Portsoy #MixedMedia

!! I have added these nonfigurative drawings and two more to brand new department at my website, ‘Concoctions’ cos it seemed an acceptable word. They’re here as originals for sale. And (to the ether) can I sell them please, thanks. www.chloecumming.com/concoctions

It continues. 🪶 🐣

this is it right here. AI violates Vonnegut's number 1 rule for writers: "Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted." AI shifts the burden of effort from the writer onto the reader/audience and that is unacceptable

One of the things comix freaks fawn over on is like a perfectly drawn office chair in the background of a Crumb panel. Because like, he didn't have to draw that chair so perfect but he did. He lavished that attention on it just for you, the reader, to discover. Just 'cuz. AI is the opposite of that.

the reason cartoonists especially hate AI is b/c comix are one of the most labor intensive art forms, it takes for fuckin EVER to do & a reader breezes over a panel that took an hour+ to draw in like 1/2 a second. the reason we love it is b/c it's so HUMAN & FALLIBLE--"a movie studio for poor kids"

Monday Motivator: Learning by Creating Your Own Version "[W]hen you create your own version of something, you both understand it and remember it better. ... [T]he illusion of clarity: the confident feeling that you understand something, when in reality your grasp is full of gaps you’ve never…

"One of the functions of art is to give people the words to know their own experience... Storytelling is a tool for knowing who we are and what we want." Ursula K. Le Guin on storytelling and the power of language to transform and redeem www.themarginalian.org/2018/01/30/u...

Studio painting made from a location sketch of creels, at pondering stage. You can tell because it still has the masking tape along the edges (which will create a white border when removed). #painting #art #ScottishArt

The president of the United States is bragging about being able to write his own signature.

Partly because for many Remainers it was also an emotional issue. They/we believed that they were Europeans, it’s a bit tough to know you can’t be that thing that’s core to your identity for another 30 years.

and it occurs to me, if someone was willing to sponsor it, I would happily rework this into billboard format. Put it up in the midst of all these ridiculous ai product billboards! spinweaveandcut.com/fall-2025-sy...

Please enjoy this amazing freeze frame from Liara’s bathtub incident last night

There's a webcam at an artificial watering hole in the Namib Desert that I often keep open in my external monitor as I work. Today, the desert has greened. I'm just filled wonder and can't stop grinning every time I look at it.

A handful of colour for tackling the creels again. #pleinair #drawing