Spectra - for seven nights in August in London

If you're in central London this week, you can see a new art installation which is on view for just seven nights.  Spectra is a column of intense white light punctuating the London sky from dusk until dawn for seven nights.

It's located in Victoria Tower Gardens, adjacent to the Palace of Westminster.  The installation has been created by Japanese artist Ryoji Ikeda.

spectra by Ryoji Ikeda, 2014,
view from Lambeth Bridge by Olivia Rutherford.
Commissioned and presented by Artangel,
co-commissioned by 14-18 NOW and the Mayor of London.

It appeared for the first time last night at 10pm - during the course of the national memorial service at Westminster Abbey - as part of the national commemorations marking the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War. It will fade from view for the last time as the sun rises in London on Monday 11 August.

The work is produced and presented by Artangel, and co-commissioned by the Mayor of London and 14-18 NOW, WW1 Centenary Art Commissions.  A series of artworks have been commissioned by 14-18 NOW for each of the UK’s four nations. Each work takes different forms of light or candles as their inspiration."

Last night it became the the symbolic candle lit at the door or in the window as the nationwide LIGHTS OUT initiative  too effect last night when people were supposed to switch off their lights in memory of all those that died in the First World War.

The light that spectra throws up into the night sky is a unifying point. It echoes how the First World War affected all Londoners, but also how they and the rest of the country came together, standing united during those dark days. As we mark the centenary and remember the devastation that the war brought to individuals and communities throughout our nation, this beacon reminds us of their heroism, but also of hope
Boris Johnson, Mayor of London

spectra by Ryoji Ikeda, 2014,
view from Waterloo Bridge by Jonathan Perugia.
Commissioned and presented by Artangel,
co-commissioned by 14-18 NOW and the Mayor of London.

LIGHTS OUT responds to a remark made by British statesman Viscount Grey on the outbreak of the First World War in 1914:

“The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our life-time”

The source of spectra’s column of monumental light, visible across London, emanates from 49 high-powered static searchlights installed at Victoria Tower Gardens, adjacent to the River Thames, behind the House of Lords.

The work can be experienced throughout London by simply looking up to the sky

If you take time out to visit the Victoria Tower Gardens and walk within the installation, you can also experience an accompanying sound composition of pure sine waves.

• Victoria Park Gardens are a public park located on the north bank of the River Thames. They are adjacent to the Victoria Tower on the south-west corner of the Palace of Westminster and extends to Lambeth Bridge. 
• The nearest London Underground stations are Westminster and Pimlico.
• Victoria Tower Gardens will be open 24 hours and spectra will be visible at night, between sunset and sunrise.  
• Entry to the Victoria Tower Gardens is FREE but large numbers are expected and capacity will be managed

The installation has also been supported by the National Lottery through Arts Council England and the Heritage Lottery Fund. Presented with the kind support of The Royal Parks.

About the artist

This is the link to spectra on the artist's website

Ryoji Ikeda was born in Gifu, Japan in 1966. He lives and works in Paris. Ikeda is a leading electronic composer and visual artist, whose work focuses on the essential characteristics of sound itself and that of visuals as light by means of both mathematical precision and mathematical aesthetics. Ikeda has gained a reputation as one of the few international artists working across both visual and sonic media. He elaborately orchestrates sound, visuals, materials, physical phenomena and mathematical notions into immersive live performances and installations. Alongside pure musical activity, Ikeda has been working on a number of long-term projects including the series 'spectra' since 2001. spectra is a large-scale installation employing intense white light as a sculptural material and so transforming public locations in Amsterdam, Paris, Barcelona, Hobart and Nagoya.

888,246 poppies - Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red

Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red is the name of the art installation in the moat at the Tower of London which will be officially unveiled tomorrow. 888,246 ceramic poppies spill out into the Moat and encircle the Tower of London.  Each poppy symbolises a British military fatality during the war.

The Tower of London's longest serving Yeoman Warder planted the first poppy
in this major centenary commemoration on 17 July 2014
Photo: © Richard Lea-Hair/Historical Royal Palaces

The installation has been created by ceramic artist Paul Cummins. He's be assisted by stage designer Tom Piper.

YS Crawford Butler
planted the very first poppy on 17 July 2014
Photo: © Richard Lea-Hair/Historical Royal Palaces

It will be officially unveiled tomorrow - on 5th August to mark one hundred years since the first full day of Britain’s involvement in the First World War. The last poppy will symbolically be planted on 11 November 2014

The intention is that the scale of the installation should appropriately reflect the scale of loss of life in the First World War - and that it should provide an inspiring setting for learning activities, as well as providing a location for personal reflection.

You can see the impact of the hundreds of thousands of poppies in articles in a number of papers. These are the best ones:

• Huffington Post - Tower Of London World War 1 Poppy 'Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red' Memorial
• Metro - Tower Of London marks WWI centenary with dramatic art installation
• Artnet - Thousands of Ceramic Poppies Commemorate WWI in London
• Mashable - In Pictures, a Poppy for Every Fallen Allied WWI Soldier

This year you can buy a ceramic poppy rather than a buttonhole poppy if you'd like to commemorate the war dead.  You can register interest in buying a poppy here

• The poppies are available to buy for £25 (+p&p) from 5 August 2014. 
• 10% from each poppy, plus all net proceeds will be shared equally amongst six service charities. 
• The charities chosen are 
• Confederation of Service Charities (COBSEO), 
• Combat Stress, 
• Coming Home, 
• Help for Heroes, 
• Royal British Legion and 
• SSAFA (formerly the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association).

The title of the installation comes from a poem by an unknown solider

The Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red By Anon – Unknown Soldier

The blood swept lands and seas of red,
Where angels dare to tread.
As I put my hand to reach,
As God cried a tear of pain as the angels fell,
Again and again.

As the tears of mine fell to the ground
To sleep with the flowers of red
As any be dead

My children see and work through fields of my
Own with corn and wheat,
Blessed by love so far from pain of my resting
Fields so far from my love.

It be time to put my hand up and end this pain
Of living hell, to see the people around me
Fall someone angel as the mist falls around
And the rain so thick with black thunder I hear
Over the clouds, to sleep forever and kiss
The flower of my people gone before time
To sleep and cry no more

I put my hand up and see the land of red,
This is my time to go over,
I may not come back
So sleep, kiss the boys for me

In praise of the older artist - Mary Anderson Grierson

It would appear that one of the perks of working for the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew for a long time is you get a bench outside the Palm House on your retirement or death. I came across a bench for Mary Anderson Grierson on Tuesday and looked her up when I got back home.

Hylocereus Undatus, night blooming cereus, 1985

pencil, ink and color wash

56 x 34 cm. (22 x 13.4 in.)

by the late Mary Anderson Grierson

Her obituary - she died age 99 - in the Telegraph provides all sorts of incentives for those of less tender years who aspire to do well as a botanical artist.


First of all she only started to work as a 'proper' botanical artist in middle age - at the age of 48.

Prior to this she worked, during the war, on analysing analysing and interpreting aerial photographs. It was during the war that she started painting wild flowers for pleasure.

After the war she worked for Hunting Aerosurveys producing contour maps which naturally required a lot of precision. They sent her to do a course in pen and ink drawing course at the Field Studies Centre at Flatford Mill.  She subsequently did a number of courses there with painter and illustrator John Nash, younger brother of the great war artist Paul Nash.  He was much interested in nature and drawing the countryside.

Mary Grierson then applied for a post organising exhibitions at Kew in 1960. However, having seen her portfolio of drawings they decided she'd be much better employed as an Artist in the Herbarium. Thus it was that she embarked on the second half of her life - as a professional botanical artist - having had no tuition except in skills related to drawing and painting.

In 1966 she received her first gold medal for flower painting from the Royal Horticultural Society. She subsequently received another four plus the Veitch Memorial Medal of the RHS, and later their Victoria Medal of Honour.

While working for Kew she was also commissioned to illustrate a series of volumes on Orchidaceae - published in 1973. She also illustrated The Country Life of Orchids, An English Florilegium, and a number of monographs including one on Hellebores.

She continued to work after she retired in 1972, age 60, and was then much in demand. She managed to fit in quite a few projects!

• She began painting species of plants in Hawaii in 1973 - leading to the publication of A Hawaiian florilegium: botanical portraits from paradise in 1996. (The lovely thing about projects after you retire is you don't have to rush to finish them in order to make your mark!)
• She was commissioned to produce illustrations for "Hedgerows of England" and "Coastal Plants of England". She proceeded to travel the length and breadth of the country to find the plants. The subsequent associated exhibitions were sell-outs.
• She produced a major series of tulip drawings for the Van Tubergen Nurseries at Haarlem. These were subsequently bought by the Library at Kew in 1992
• plus she continued to produce illustrations for Curtis's Botanical Magazine.

You can see a number of her illustrations which sold at auction on the Internet. Her work is now included in the collections of The British Museum, The Natural History Museum, as well as at Kew.
For me, the uplifting bit about this story is that she achieved much of this after reaching 60 - having only turned professional age 48. Which just goes to show that a whole new world can open up to you as you get older - if you are open to the possibilities of what life has to offer - and hone your skills in drawing and painting!

References:

• The Telegraph - Obituaries - Mary Grierson - this includes a slideshow of some of her botanical drawings and paintings
• The Independent - Mary Grierson: Floral artist celebrated as one of the most distinguished in her field

Derwent Art Prize 2014 - Two People's Choice Awards

The Derwent Art Prize offers two opportunities for the public to vote for the People's Choice Award in relation to the artwork selected for exhibition and - this year for the first time - all entries as well.  More about how to vote below.

Yesterday the Derwent Art Prize website published two galleries of images

• People's Choice Award 2014 - all works entered in the competition - all 25 pages of them which, with a 100 entries on each page, means they had about 2,500 entries!
• People's Choice Award - The Exhibition 2014 - All Works  There are 79 pencil artworks in total

Why not pretend to be a selector and take a look at all of them and and see what you think of both the pencil artworks which were entered and the works that were selected.

Would you have chosen a different set of c.80 works for the exhibition?  Which works would you have selected?

Each of the works also provide buttons which enable you to:

• post to your facebook account
• tweet an image
• post an image on your Google+ account.

Selected artists

I'll be commenting further on the selected artists in a future post.

Some of the selected artworks in the Exhibition for the Derwent Art Prize 2014

Prizes

The prizes split in two. The first set are those determined by the judges.  These are

• First Prize -  £6,000
• Second Prize -  £3,500
• Third Prize -  £1,000
• Young Artist Award for artists under 25 years - £500
• UK Coloured Pencil Society Award for Excellence - £250

Then there's the TWO People Choices Awards which are chosen by the public this year.  As a development from last year, the competition organisers have made all the entries available for selection for this prize.

Thus we now have:

• People’s Choice Award of £700 - from works selected for the exhibition and judged by visitors to the exhibition and visitors to the website.
• People’s Choice Award of £700 - selected from all 2014 entries and judged by visitors to the website

I'm wondering if the 80th place in the exhibition might be for the People's Choice Award as judged by visitors to the website.

I'm also wondering what precautions have been put in place to prevent unfair interference with the voting.

The panel of judges for the main prizes are:

• Kate Macfarlane, Co-Founder and Co-Director of the Drawing Room, 
• Josh Spero, Editor of Spears Magazine and Art Critic for Tatler UK, and 
• Professor Anita Taylor, artist, Co-Founder and Director of Jerwood Drawing Prize and Dean of Bath School of Art and Design.

How to vote for the People's Choice Award

You can vote for TWO People's Choice awards.

It's not terribly obvious how you can vote for the People's Choice award - until you click on an image and realise that they each have a big green "Vote for this image in the People's Choice Award" button.

You've got a lot of images to review so make sure you don't click on the first image that you like!

The Derwent Art Prize Exhibition

The pencil artworks selected for exhibition will be seen in London and Cumbria. They'll be seen first at the Mall Galleries in London between the 15th – 20th September 2014. The second exhibition will be at The Pencil Museum in Keswick, Cumbria in December 2014.

28 July 2014 - Who's made a mark?

I've had three weeks off from blogging.

• The first week was because I had a bit of a shock health wise, ended up in hospital facing a battery of tests and decided to take it easy for a few days.
• Followed by finishing up the final layouts for the book - which was rather more difficult than I'd been expecting.
• Then I decided I needed a week off. I fitted in some long walks plus some drawing and sketching but a lot of it was taken up with trying to put things back where they were supposed to be "after the book" - and a surprise flood.

Throughout I managed to post a few things to Facebook so this is going to be an update for those who don't follow me on Facebook - plus a few extras in terms of blog posts by me.

Two charcoal drawings by Maggie Hargreaves

Winner of The John Ruskin Prize 2014
(see Art Competitions below)

Artists and Art Blogs

Artists Passing on

• David Prentice died on May 7th this year. He painted some sublime landscape paintings. An exhibition of his paintings of the Malverns "A Last Look at the Malverns" could be recently seen at the John Davies Gallery. Unsurprisingly it was a virtual sell out. However you can see the exhibition catalogue online http://www.johndaviesgallery.com/prentice/. This was his obituary in The Guardian. 

The cover of A Last Look at the Malverns by David Prentice (1936-2014)

courtesy of John Davies Gallery, Moreton in the Marsh

• Inbetween everything else I've been doing my forms for the Florum exhibition in Kent in September. I was very sad to hear of the recent death of one of the regular exhibitors Wendy Cranston FSBA SWA. I have admired and loved her wonderful gouache paintings of fruit, vegetables and flowers for some years. This post Review: Florum 2012 includes a great view of six of her paintings in the Florum exhibition in 2012. 



Botanical artwork in gouache by the late Wendy Cranston

Art History

• Jonathan Jones asks "Is JMW Turner Britain's greatest artist?". Personally I think different people will have different perspectives but few would surely doubt to be included in a shortlist of top UK artists. You can watch a slideshow of 392 of Turner's paintings on the BBC website
• Picasso, Matisse and me is a fascinating video of excerpts from a filmed interview with Francoise Gilot - talking about Matisse, his work and his relationship with Picasso - plus an article which provides a transcript of the whole interview

Botanical Art

• This my post about the RHS Exhibitions: Guidance and Regulations for submitting Botanical Art & Botanical Photography
• For those who can get to the Elan Valley in Wales between now and August, you have the opportunity to see an excellent exhibition of drawings and paintings inspired by nature and botanical subjects by Claire K Ward SBA. 

Colour

• Wolf Kahn shares his thoughts on style, color, and what it means to be an abstract expressionist in this article Abstract Expressionist Wolf Kahn: Spontaneous Tendencies. It originally appeared in the November 2005 issue of The Artist’s Magazine.

Drawing 

• What is drawing? Does this mesh with your definition of what is drawing?  This is an article with images by the Victoria and Albert Museum

The term drawing is applied to works that vary greatly in technique. It has been understood in different ways at different times and is difficult to define.

• This article Why drawing needs to be a curriculum essential is by Anita Taylor who is director of the Jerwood Drawing Prize and the new dean of Bath School of Art and Design. She proposes that 

drawing has creative, expressive and educational value; it remains fundamental to translating and analysing the world

• I'm a speaker on a panel at Draw In! a weekend symposium to celebrate the value of drawing at the Belfast School of Art on 30th August. See http://draw-in.co.uk/ for more details.

Portraiture

• Stuart Pearson Wright is a really interesting artist - I love his portrait drawings. He's also very articulate about and interesting in his exploration of different ways of painting people - and himself.  This is a video of his recent Ted Talk entitled Representation and Verfremdungseffekt in Portraiture : Stuart P Wright at TEDx HousesofParliament
• Another excellent blog post by James Gurney - this time about sketching animals from life - 
Answers to your questions about sketching animals

Art Business & Marketing

art fairs

• Buy! Sell! Liquidate! How ArtRank is shaking up the art market - how software is having an impact on art markets and the valuation of artists' work

auctions

• Who would have thought a headline would ever include these two as partners in a joint endeavour? Sotheby's and eBay team up to stream high-end auctions online. The view is that this is an attempt to capture the eBay customers who bid for collectibles on the site already.

copyright

• Beware the company that snaffles images without permission from a well connected artist like Ester Roi or any artist who has a lot of friends on Facebook.  This Malysian company later paid up when presented with an invoice. So the moral of the story is don't just accept that your artwork might be copied and used elsewhere - send an invoice!

I’m very pleased to announce that I have reached a satisfactory settlement with CP Stationery, the company that used three of my images on their products without permission. They apologized profusely and were quick to send the agreed payment.

This victory would not have been possible without the massive intervention from so many of you. If anybody still doubts the power of social media, this case can provide a strong argument. Thank you for your amazing support and for taking the time to express your outrage here, on your page, and on the company’s page. (Ester Roi - Facebook Page)

• Julia Halperin reports in Artist resale rights gain support in US Congress that the Royalty bill could be passed by the end of the year, or become part of copyright bill

websites and social media

• On 8th August 2014 I'm doing a session on how to get your artwork online and make the most of social media as part of an all-day "techie stuff for artists" workshop at the Mall Galleries. I gather the workshop is now booked up - but if you fancy the idea of How to photograph your work and get it online (topic covered by other speakers include how to photograph your art and copyright for artists) be sure to let the Mall Galleries know!

Art Competitions

Art Fund Prize for Museum of the Year

• Very well done to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) for winning Art Fund Prize for Museum of the Year - and the the £100,000 Art Fund Prize.  Plus a Sheepish snap won the Museum of the Year photography competition - somewhat of a reversal for Henry Moore!

BP Portrait Award 2014 Exhibition

I did a lot of video interviews this year - as did the people running this major portrait competition in the UK!  Portraits by 55 artists were selected from some 2,300 entries.

The face of Man with a Plaid Blanket by Thomas Ganter

• My first post was about the ceremony to announce the prizes BP Portrait Award 2014 - Video of presentation to prizewinners
• A video interview with Thomas Ganter, Winner of the BP Portrait Award 2014 is the first interview with prizewinners.
• An insight into what makes a prizewinning artist in the BP Portrait Award BP Portrait Award competition. Plus video interviews with the two artists who won £10,000 and £8,000 respectively Richard Twose and David Jon Kassan - video interviews with BP Portrait Award prizewinners 2014
• A review of the BP Portrait Award 2014 Exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery can be seen on my blog post BP Portrait Award 2014 Exhibition - review and video. This includes a link to the video I took which takes you on a walk through the exhibition - A walk around the BP Portrait Award 2014 Exhibition
• Video - What the Artist saw is about the BP Portrait Award judging process and features two artists - one of whom was successful and one who was not.
• I have to say my new iPad Mini makes videoing exhibitions and prizewinners so much easier plus it gets much results than my proper mini camcorder. Watch out for more video reviews in future!

BP Portrait Award 2014 Exhibition 

Making A Mark Videos 5:58

Thomas Ganter Winner of BP Portrait Award 2014 

Making A Mark Videos 4:04

Richard Twose Interview - BP Portrait Award 2014 (2nd prize) 

Making A Mark Videos 4:33

David Jon Kassan Interview - BP Portrait Award 2014 (3rd prize) 

Making A Mark Videos 5:16

BP Portrait Award 2014 - Presentation 

Making A Mark Videos 6:45

BP Travel Award

I've got two posts on the BP Travel Award

• this is this year's winner Edward Sutcliffe wins BP Travel Award 2014
• and my interview with last year's winner, Sophie Ploeg (Sophie Ploeg), follows later this week - but you can see the video interview below.

Sophie Ploeg and the BP Travel Award 2013 Exhibition 

Making A Mark Videos 3:07

Jerwood Drawing Prize 

• The call for entries for the Jerwood Drawing Prize 2014 closed in June

The John Ruskin Prize

• Bury artist Maggie Hargreaves was announced as the winner of the The John Ruskin Prize 2014: Recording Britain Now at the end of June. The Prize in its second year invited artists across the UK to submit fresh visions of Britain’s urban, rural and social environment.
• You can read more about her artwork on her website eg The Company of Trees. This is her blog Maggie Hargreaves. The two works were Slowly Creeping (2011) , 150x212 cm, charcoal on paper and Changing Space II (2009), 150x220 cm, charcoal on paper

The level of detail and large scale of these drawings invites viewers to enter the space depicted and spend time exploring it. Concurrently, as the drawings are approached, the image dissolves and the materiality and process are established; the artifice of the image construction is revealed as a piece of paper with handmade marks, pinned to the gallery wall. Drawing and erasing with charcoal reflects the transient shifting nature of the relationship between people and the surrounding living environment.

• The exhibition for  is currently showing at Sheffield's Millennium Gallery featuring 23 shortlisted artists (from 600+ entries) until 12th October 2014.  Artwork by the selected artists varies from traditional techniques to contemporary visions of Britain.
• The theme and condition for the third John Ruskin Prize will be announced in October.

Packing Room Prize

• It's always interesting to see what wins "The Packing Room Prize" re. The Archibald Prize awarded by the Art Gallery of New South Wales. This year the portrait is of 'Sir Les Patterson' one of the messier inventions of John Barry Humphries, AO, CBE - Australian comedian, satirist, artist, and author. Tim Storrier was the 2012 winner of the Archibald Prize

Call for Entries

• There's an opportunity to have your work displayed for sale at the world’s very first purpose-built public art gallery. In celebration of the 60th Anniversary of the Friends of Dulwich Picture Gallery, there is an open call for entries for artwork for a special exhibition in the Gallery’s temporary exhibition spaces.

Art Exhibitions

Global exhibitions

In Grounded: the great art treasures that no longer go out on the road, The Guardian explains the various reasons why art no longer travels - and stays at home. They range from inherent fragility or value to weight!

Exhibitions in London

• Making Colour Exhibition opened at the National Gallery with a couple of posts from me to date. I'm going to do one more now I have a bit more time.
• Making Colour and painting with poison
• Cochineal and Carmine

Art Society Exhibitions

• The Pastel Society - 115th Annual Exhibition was held in June at the Mall Galleries
• Still Alive: The Contemporary Still Life - an exhibition of contemporary still life paintings by members of the Federation of British Artists will be held at the Mall Galleries, London from 5 to 23 August 2014, 10am to 5pm (closed Sundays). 

Art Galleries

• The Guardian indicates that Damien Hirst's 'Saatchi gallery' set to open in spring 2015. The gallery is due to house Hirst's own collection of contemporary art. It looks a bit like an attempt to out-Saatchi Saatchi to me.

Art Materials & Supplies

Art media

• Here's news which will start watercolour artists wailing around the world - but particularly in the USA! Kolinsky Sable is made from hair from a weasel -- not a sable - but the The Siberian weasel, Mustela sibirica, is listed under Appendix III of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) - and hence imports are banned unless certain conditions are met supported by paperwork. I found blog posts and articles as follows
•  Kolinsky sable brushes banned on Gurney Journey.  
• W/N Sabel Brushes Can Not Get Through Customs - Forums - Artist Daily
• Arcane Paintworks: Importing Kolinsky Sable
• a more detailed comment quoting Dick Blick from the end of last year Wargames and Railroads: Dick Blick talks about the Kolinsky situation
• The Guardian asked its readers "Why are oil paintings valued more than watercolours?" and these are the replies it got
• The New York Times has a article where different Creative Types From Manolo Blahnik to Milton Glaser on Their Favorite Writing and Drawing...
• The European Chemicals Agency is currently consulting on a proposed ban on Cadmium in artists' paints in Europe.Will Cadmium be banned in artists' paints in Europe? is a review of the proposal to ban the use of Cadmium in artists' paints in Europe.
• Three years ago I was doing a series of posts for the travelling artist. This one - Top tips for travelling artists - oil painters about travelling with oil paints - was recently picked up by Art Business News Magazine. 

Art Suppliers

• Pencils4artists has supplied a handy sized version of the Luminance Colour Chart on its website 
• Great Art has now its catalogue online at http://ecatalogue.greatart.co.uk but I'm not very impressed with the search capability or navigation. That said this is a frequent problem with catalogues going online so we'll just have to see how they tackle it and they already have the scope to take orders with their existing website. Being able to find what you want and then go through a very simple process to order it is the "make or break" element to eventual usage of a site so it's very critical to get it right.  GA are still doing much better than Atlantis Art Materials and Art Supplies which is still running an extremely antiquated site and a 2012 catalogue.

Art Schools and Education

• More about the fire at the Macintosh Building at the Glasgow School of Art - The Mac after the Fire - an Archive, an Appeal and guess WHO!

and finally......

Giants came to Liverpool last weekend in the form of colossal puppets. This is the article by the Guardian about Royal de Luxe's Merseyside spectacular which was an emotional tribute to lives lost in the first world war

PS I'm 3 "likes" away from 2,500 likes for my Making A Mark Facebook Page - will you be the 2,500th?