Proposals in retrospect (part 2)

A projection of ideas

Proposed thoughts

I created a concept of what the pillar may have looked like if it had been loosely wrapped in tin foil. The constructed image proved interesting visually, but was not really an accurate representation of the way the material would have reacted.

Whether this idea would come to fruition or not became less of a concern, as I now regard this imaginary scene as a piece of research work all by itself.

Proposals in retrospect

26 - 30 November 2012

Week 2 of 4

Level 5 Solo Exhibition 

The space: S1 Artspace

My original thoughts about where I would place my work were that I would utilize the column in the centre of the main space. The nature of my current work led me to think I could cover the structure with a material, making the piece site specific and a response to the gallery itself.

Karin Sander

Karin Sander

h = 400cm

Karin Sander:  "What must a work of mine fulfil? I must be able to work using resources that actually exist, that are already present within the system, and that can turn the system against itself. I must be able to read things from a location, the situation, of a museum or gallery. And the work must both reveal something and also remain mysterious. It must transcend itself and gesture towards something that was not previously visible. In other words, it must render something visible that is already present but that has hitherto escaped perception, that exists in a latent state. If the work provokes amazement and perhaps amusement as well, then it is successful."

(exert from http://www.karinsander.de/index.php?id=e5)

Exhibition highlight, Berlin, November 2012

Site specific Berlin

Berlin was wonderful; exhausting, but wonderful.

I've been a little slack in compiling a reflection on what we encountered, but I desperately needed to establish what it was that interested me on the journey. Just a few things that left me feeling excited:

David Rickard's floor-board installation

We visited an exhibition space under the name LoBe. I noted that a number of the artists we spoke to seemed interested in exploring their environments through a sort of mapping or even an uncovering of what lay in the space already. David Rickard's work was your first encounter on entering the joint exhibition - narrow, metal rods placed in the gaps of the floor-boards that each went as deep beneath the floor as they were high.

I couldn't help but feel a visual connection between the miniature metal rods and this stretch of the city where a trace of the wall's presence is marked by iron poles.

The Holocaust Memorial

towering moving overwhelming heavy 

Domestic metamorphosis

Transform me.

Traces in sleep

No, I still can't sleep.

Last weekend, I stayed with my other half. We drifted off, holding one another. I was probably snoring.
I wake often in the night when we're together, usually just for a moment and then I fall back to sleep.

One night, I was woken by the 'where am I?' feeling, which I haven't been familiar with for a long time. Even though the minor confusion was fleeting, it unnerved me in a way I'd not felt before.
For that brief second, I believed that I was in my own bed and, although I felt someone else's arms around me, I was actually disinclined to accept this as reality. Instantly, I felt an indescribable loss, as my mind concluded that, however vivid it seemed, I was in fact dreaming. There were no arms holding me; it was just a trace I felt as the imaginary evaporated.

I must have roused Ash because she sighed hazily and asked if I was alright. I explained my disorientated waking.
The reasoning of my tired mind, misleading my senses, pierced my unwitting emotions. To my surprise, a tear rolled down my cheek in the darkness. Then another; then another.

"For a moment, I thought you weren't really here...", I whispered.

Restless

For whatever reason, I can't sleep.

It's so funny how everything and nothing seems to pass through my mind while somewhere between that chasm of waking and sleeping. I am most certainly awake now. But my body is still arguing. 

On Monday, I shall be in Berlin. I can't wait but I'd barely even considered that I should think about packing until yesterday. Right now, I can't think of information to share about our itinerary, but I shall write all about the five days and take an unwarranted amount of photographs. 

In light of the fact that I'm sure Berlin will be an onslaught of information and experiencing new work, I've been reflecting on what I've seen recently that I actually retained as something special. 

The image above was taken in the Saatchi Gallery at the Korean Eye exhibition - a selection of work I really enjoyed seeing. My beautiful friend Ellen stares at a literal storm in a tea-cup.

I've never quite understood the phrase but, amongst all the things we saw, this stood so humbly, yet I found it captivating. 

A scene so tranquil (tea makes everything better, doesn't it?) holds a miniature catastrophe? 

But anyway; it's too late for abstract thinking. 

And I don't even have a philosophy class next week.

Experiments in monotony

 

Crit this

I love crit. I honestly do.

However, there are the occasional weeks where I ponder why on earth I am standing in amongst a group of young adults, straining to see meaning in some raw, 'experimental' art work at 9.30am.
It's not that I don't appreciate the opportunity to see other class mates' work, and I am certainly more than grateful for the fact that my work is given the same amount of consideration.
But sometimes it just feels cruel.

I don't mean 'cruel' in a human sense - by all means, crit should absolutely be the place for brutal honesty, tears and questioning what you're doing with your life - but more in the sense that the work itself can seemingly be discussed until it's lying cold and lifeless on the ground. All of the mystery and intrigue of an art work can be interrogated away; the sheen of ambiguity is lost.

Although

It's probably when the work survives this process that you know you're discovering something worth your time.

Bryony's thoughts

 'She raised one hand and flexed its fingers and wondered, as she had sometimes before, how this thing, this machine for gripping, this fleshy spider on the end of her arm, came to be hers, entirely at her command ... The mystery was in the instant before it moved ... when her intention took effect. It was like a wave breaking.'

'Was everyone else really as alive as she was?'

'She knew it was overwhelmingly probable that everyone else had thoughts like hers. She knew this, but only in a rather arid way; she didn't really feel it.'

My first words

How to begin, how to begin...

A million others have sat here, where I am now - staring at an only slightly less than blank screen, hoping for inspiration to come; willing thoughts to pass through an empty vacuum.
Or so it would seem. For nothing is really as simple as saying what we mean, or feel, or see. What could possibly be easier, when all we need is ourselves?
But it is precisely that which can force such a stutter; an immediate mental block. Suddenly, there is a dramatic hesitation because we - maybe only I, although I can't be brought to believe that I am the only one - realise that, in fact, we should have something to say.

And what if we don't?

This engagement with ourselves, with our own thoughts, is reason enough to trust that everyone does have something to contribute, no matter what that may be. We are human. That is interesting all by itself.
But the realisation of this quality, I would venture to say, could be what truly allows us to find our voices.

I'm an artist.

But not because I make work, or read about art, or visit galleries. Or because I chose to study it.
Not even because I enjoy it.

I'm an artist because I believe that art - potentially one of the top 5 most ambiguous words in our vocabulary - is a language.

So, here I am.