Paul J Penton – Songwriter

Rock star, pop star, ‘holiday’, ‘material girl’ ,mother of Jesus – loaded like a six gun, slung down the side of her hip waiting to blow you off – our Madonna – is it a bastardisation, a cleverly thought out strategy to deploy the elements of religiousity to evoke Sympathy – Madonna, an icon, a statue framed in light in church after church throughout the world. A non descript shawl hanging over her head, drooping down into a dress that hangs like a theatre curtain to the floor, perfect, pure , virginal – Our Madonna the 180 degree bi-polar opposite. Videos with thrusting crotch shots, and pumping bass – conrtast with Our Mary mother of grace- angelic small fluttering birds at her right shoulder, serene, divine. The modern day Madonna clad in leather, legs spread wide. Sympathetic Crotch thrusting with the male dancer in the clip – Is she a grandmother yet? – what are her children going to be a bunch of twitching crotch thrusters? 

It’s been a long spanning career – a bridge from her youth to her middle age- very clever – re-inventions – restylings remodelled. Young girls wanting to emulate her as other have wanted to immitate the blessed virgin. Was that another clever idea? To use the title -’like a virgin’ a play on the Madonna concept. I wonder what she might have to say to Jesus when she gets to heaven and is giving an account of herself- perhaps she uses her profits for good causes – like supporting children in oprhanages in Malawi – who am I to judge?  She works hard to maintain her position, a beacon of hope for some  – as is the holy mother, a light, a figure- who may appear to those in need at certain moments in trance like vision, or apparition– or is it all in the mind- I WANT TO BELIEVE so sayeth the poster on Moulder’s wall – are there too many pop culture references here and have I completely strayed from the sense bound path? hmmmmmmmm

Growing up in the shadow of a volcanic crater one can’t help but encounter the after effects of this mutli million year spat. Try digging your garden and you encounter these moon rocks. Happily I’ll be digging with the hand trowel to get at the root of some troublesome plant and I get a ‘ting’, a jar to my hand as I reached a submerged object, a submarine sent out by Mount Leura all those years ago. They vary in size but most are the size of your palm. They’re quite light almost lighter than a sparrow, delicate and fine with that bubbly consistency, like an aero bar. They’re not much good for chucking or skimming and actually have a slightly sharpish edge in general.

Up at the quarry near the mount we used to ride our bikes around in the offal from the excavations and mostly it was fine ground powdery stuff from over excessive rape of the cliff face, but still some more solid bits – watch out for those tyres. Up there we’d make jumps out of whatever was lying around, there were also some natural hills and dales we could get around on  in what was the precursor of a BMX bike. I had the coolest thing;  a three speed  gear change as part of my hand grip- I didn’t tell everyone else what a pain it was to use because I wanted to be thought of as ‘cool’ but in the end I think I just disconnected it.  It was on my modified Repco Dragster, then with knobby tires like black teeth that bit the dirt and the road. There was the inevitable pedal squeak and the cotter pin sometimes coming loose and the pedal knocking against the frame after I upended the bike one time….

Nameless heads on nameless walls so Don eloquently put it. Oversized canvasses adorn plain walls in varnished memory of the past. Cracked fading desert lake surfaces yellowed with age and smoke and weariness of hanging for so long. But a picture is told not just in the portrait but in the scene behind the scene, If you look closely a lot of other things are being said. For whatever reason a cloud of heaviness haunts me when in a gallery. My legs becomes lead weights my head starts to droop like a wilted flower and my heart seems to be sinking to China or the South pole or some where down below. The atmosphere, the observation wears me out so quickly. Visual stimulation perhaps overloads the electrical substation in my visual cortex and weariness results.

The balls of my feet start to ache and solace is found in a faux leather bench where I stare up at a Degas or a Piccaso or something in a shapeless mass that means something to somebody. I’m not too educated you see, but I know when something appeals, when a register opens and cashes in a ‘Yes’. I understand this. Do If feel dumb sometimes wandering around these  halls and walls, that I don’t know ‘enough’ to make it make sense? I find audio guides useful, the headphones claw my ear, a fluid voice informs me of the history so I don’t feel so stupid and I get educated. The voice seems to flow through me like a velvet river, soothing and smooth, maintaining my interest, taking me further into the hidden past. Motivations seem now to leap from the paint, the choices of colours, the social scenarios, the artists keen observations preserved for me to gain insights and to marvel at. The walls now seem to come alive.