Keeping It Going

The power of objects …

‘Here today …’ was the title of a piece of work I made in memory of my late grandmother. It included a used powder compact and eyeshadow, alongside a 1930s hand mirror on a bedside cabinet. I wrote about it at the time (in 2016) and have included an extract from a blog post below:

‘It’s reminded me also that out of the dozens of items I’ve sorted through these past few days, some stand out as truly special. The hand mirror, the used make-up palettes, the vintage silk flower, which ‘Here Today…’’ is made up of, are classic examples of objects like this – they demonstrate perfectly for me the incredible power of objects, how deeply attached we can become to them and the extremely powerful emotions they can evoke.

‘Here Today’’ is composed of objects that belonged to and were actually handled by my late Nana; she left her mark on them, and while they are still here, my Nana no longer is. This small assemblage of objects conjures up for me something that I write a lot about here, a theme that is at the core of my practice – a fascination with the contrast between the permanence of objects and the fragility of life.’ (2016)

r

rip Maisy, our beloved pet cat for 17 years

Our pet cat Maisy’s water bowl has brought up similar feelings these past few weeks – a sharp realisation that although the bowl was still there, as a physical thing, Maisy no longer was. It’s been a sad time, saying farewell to a pet who brought so much pleasure to us all as a family over the years. The house was never empty, even when we were all away from it and I always found something quite comforting in that.

The link between material objects and grief is undeniable: Maisy left her mark on an otherwise, unexceptional object – a white ceramic water bowl with CAT imprinted on it. It was unmistakably hers and once she died, it became charged with the strength of our love for her. It didn’t have any use any more and accepting that, was a part of accepting that Maisy, after 17 years of being with us, no longer existed.

Last time I wrote here, I mentioned feeling pleased that I no longer had to pay for expensive storage space – I’d managed successfully, to fit everything that wasn’t needed in my studio into my garden shed. Money aside, commercial spaces clearly have their upside, however – ie. they’re watertight and don’t let the rain in! Cut to, what happened in the garden shed …

Prior to this recent heatwave, it’s been an exceptionally wet few months – the wettest May on record for decades, in fact. The shed roof hadn’t held up to not letting the rain in and one storage box in particular, was completely water logged.

I threw away everything that wasn’t salvageable – wads of paper, collected from vintage magazines over many years – newspaper cuttings, extracts from Mills & Boon books and so on, all drenched in rainwater, congealed and stuck together. Nothing could be rescued and until I found it in this state, I’d forgotten how precious the things in this particular box were. It was hard to come to terms with and for the first time ever, I shed tears over the loss of material things.

I’ve been quite philosophical about things getting broken/spoiled in the past but that’s probably because of the sheer amount of stuff I had – you can’t miss what you didn’t know you had, after all. But after years of sifting and sorting and shedding and reducing stuff, what I do have in my collections has become more precious. I know more now about what’s in the boxes and consequently, I’m more emotionally attached, more intimately connected to the objects and paraphernalia. Rather than a huge, random collection of things, I’m now looking at objects that have been carefully selected – the things I really like and more importantly, things that I see as having potential for creating new work. I was excited by a lot of the finds in a recent dive into the archive – the box containing the lamb related stuff, a case in point.

It’s hugely ironic that, in this particular case, the collections were based around the theme of ‘Poor Lamb.‘ There were some iconic images – kept for years and some going as far back as 1989 when I lived in the States. Women portrayed as ‘victims ‘ has always been a theme of interest to me and I’d drawn together many images of the various ways in which the subject could be represented. I find the word victim problematic, particularly used in the context of women, and I was looking forward to investigating it further via the assorted paraphernalia I’d collected. The presentation of women portrayed in 1950/60s magazines seemed to primarily focus on their vulnerability and powerlessness; their weakness and fragility – ‘poor lambs.’ But that’s a whole other blog post …

ruined: reduced to a state of decay, collapse, or disintegration

having been irreparably damaged or harmed

Items ‘ruined’ in another box included four sewing box lids which I’d collected for their beautiful colours and satin textures, all of them conjuring up memories of my late Nana’s wicker sewing box. I’d planned to use them as part of an ongoing body of work, ‘Nana’s Colours’ but – saturated with rain water, the original colours had totally changed and the mould that had grown, formed a film of grey over the original satin fabric. In spite of my initial disappointment at finding them in this state, something stopped me throwing them straight in the bin – there was ‘something’ about them and so, I put them to one side. And when the sun came out, I put them out in the garden to dry.

There was a defining moment when I caught a glimpse of them on the lawn and realised that things I’d thought were potentially ruined, were in fact, rather beautiful. The sewing box lids summed up the ‘beauty in decay’ principle perfectly and when I sent photos to a couple of close friends and artists who confirmed my gut feelings about them, I knew something special had come out of the leak in the shed – I’d held onto them for a reason and I’m so glad I did. I took them to my studio the next day and propped them up on a shelf in the gallery space. Giving them space transformed them and I knew for certain at that point that I’d hold onto them – the water damage had given them a new layer of preciousness.

But that’s luck – I know it won’t always turn out this way and I’m taking no chances. I took action almost immediately to retrieve stuff that isn’t waterproof from the shed and it’s already taken me several days, with more to do. The long term solution of course, is to get the current shed completely sealed and waterproofed. In the meantime, I’m enjoying the process of reacquainting myself with objects that have been packed away, out of sight for many months. I’m getting to a point where I have virtually every single object listed and while I’m proud of that achievement, I’d still love to have these things at hand. It’s a tight fit in the garden shed and a lot of physical work’s required to access things. I should probably give up on it, but I still fantasise about having a studio that would provide sufficient space to accommodate all 100+ 30 litre boxes as well as space to work in …

Collecting versus hoarding

Collecting: Possessions are part of a larger set of items. Display does not impede active living areas in home.

Hoarding: Possessions become unorganised piles preventing rooms from being used for their intended purpose.

I’ve thought a lot about the difference between collecting and hoarding over the years. It matters to me that I’m a collector, not a hoarder. Hoarding’s associated with being a ‘bad thing’ and NHS UK even has it listed as a ‘disorder.’ A lot of what I’ve read on the NHS website about what constitutes a hoarder resonates, however and I’m struck by what a fine line there is between collecting and hoarding.

There are many excellent articles on the subject – for example, a paper published by the University of Texas, Austin: ‘From Passion to Problem: How to Prevent Collecting Becoming Hoarding.’

The paper has much to say about the importance of careful selection of objects – ‘mindful collecting’ as they refer to it:

‘Mindful collecting means making each acquisition a deliberate choice rather than an impulsive or compulsive action. It involves asking yourself questions like: “Do I truly need this item?”, “Does it add meaningful value to my collection?” or “Am I acquiring this for the right reasons?”. Evaluate each piece based on its significance, uniqueness, and alignment with your collection’s goals. This level of mindfulness helps in maintaining a collection that is not merely about the quantity of items but more about their quality and significance.’

The above paragraph resonates strongly for me as I recognise many of the questions I ask myself before obtaining or purchasing anything new. Over the years, I’ve become more discerning about the stuff I hold onto and as I’ve gradually decreased the volume of it, I’ve felt less guilty and okay about the amount of things I’ve collected. What I’m left with isn’t random – every object’s been carefully thought about, with a conscious choice made about the retention of each individual item: does it stay or does it go?

I’ve written a lot here about many of the objects I’ve collected over the years – much of it in relation to the strong memories and emotions many of the items stir up, but also, in terms of the actual physical space it takes up. Collecting and holding onto stuff always has consequences in terms of needing to make space to accommodate it – and that space costs money. I’ve been feeling more freed up since the huge cull I had when I moved house three years ago, closely followed by a move to a smaller studio. I radically reduced the amount of stuff to the extent that it now fits in two places – my garden shed, primarily, and some of it in my current studio.

I’m so relieved to no longer be paying rent for a commercial storage unit, which I did in the early part of my house move. It made me feel guilty, paying out money to store stuff that I didn’t necessarily need/want any more. The stuff I’ve had in storage over the years has ostensibly provided the bulk of the raw material for the work I make – and so, I always felt able to justify it. But other things crept in; I wasn’t always on the ball and though I’m by no means anywhere near putting together a full inventory of my collections, I’m more organised than I’ve ever been. I’ve learned to embrace the objects I’ve held onto and I’m happy that I can still put my hand to some real gems from the boxes in the shed and studio.

Today’s been a typical Bank Holiday Monday weather-wise, with continuous rain falling pretty much all day. I postponed plans to do some gardening and instead, focused on my creative work – and specifically, this blog.

It’s great to have over ten years of blog posts to reflect on, seeking out consistency and regularity in terms of the various themes in my work and stumbling across posts that still resonate after many years.

I’m reposting a blog entry I came across this morning – one from 2014, which after 10 years, resonates strongly still and sums up so much of my recent thinking: the passing of time, ageing and the changes, both physically and mentally, we go through as we become older. This potentially – perhaps, inevitably – has an impact on the work we make. It feels significant that the blog post in question, was written on the eve of my birthday, exactly 10 years ago, when I was in my 50s. A decade on and issues raised then are just as relevant today, if not more so:

April 11th 2014:

There’s a strong parallel between the ageing process I wrote about in my last post and these past few days’ ongoing finds in the boxes. It’s all about history and the passing of time; so much personal history and by association, so much political, social and cultural comment contained within the objects I’m bringing out of storage.

It’s over twenty years since a lot of them were packed away; life has moved on in all sorts of ways and I have changed. How relevant are these things to me? Here, right now, in the present? How much am I able to let go?

I wrote about the items of clothing and assorted accessories in my last post – those which, in all senses of the word, just don’t fit any more. Did I really have such a small waist! Did my feet really fit into those 1950s suede stilettos? Hard answers to come to terms with in many ways, and in any case, any amount of acceptance doesn’t necessarily make things more palatable.

The items in storage have become representative of the ageing process – they’ve aged and so have I, as well as the people around me – it’s an inevitable (but not necessarily welcomed) fact of life. And there’s that fine line again – between life and death and the fragility of human existence. Loved ones might die and yet, their clothing and personal effects still remain.

Similar feelings are stirred up by a lot of the other items making up my collections – books, photos, ceramics, letters and all their associative memories. It’s the objects as emotional containers that interests me most. After all, it’s the emotional attachment I’ve formed with the collections that’s responsible for them still being around me. Something drove me to keep certain things, just as something is telling me that now is the right time to detach myself from a lot of them – to shed some of the past, to retain the very ‘best’ of what I own and consequently, to lighten the load – to focus instead on the present and the future.

But not without some careful consideration – it’s much harder, emotionally to part with things than it appears on the surface. William Morris said :

‘Have nothing (in your house) that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.’

It’s a tall order, especially if you’re prone to seeing beauty in just about everything – and the more broken, weathered and beaten up, the greater the appeal for me.

Since the frenetic sorting of the past few weeks has calmed down, I’ve had time and space to think about the very act of collecting – what it’s meant to me over the years and what it means now. One of the positive aspects of ageing is that sense of ‘knowing’ yourself – I don’t feel I need the paraphernalia around me to define who I am as I did in my student days, for example – the CND and feminist posters that let people know which side I was on as soon as they walked into my home. I’ve experienced moments of real excitement, reacquainting myself with blasts from the past, to moments of sadness about the fast pace at which life is passing me by.

My collections define me in terms of my age and my place in the world – you have to be a certain age for Sandy (in his wheelchair) David (in his cravat) and Benny in his hat to mean anything to you. Re-finding The Crossroads Motel jigsaw puzzle is a good example of finding something that excites, amuses and brings memories of my teenage/student years flooding back. But it also raises the question of what to do with a lot of these re-found items. Yes, the puzzle depicting all the Motel’s best-loved characters is amusing – it’s retro and it’s probably quite unique. But it’s also a classic example of something I really don’t know what to do with. Maybe that’s the title of my next piece of work: ‘Things I Really Don’t Know What To Do With.’

Curtsying out of 2023 into a New Year …

I updated my website yesterday, on the last day of 2023. There’s still a bit to add, but it feels positive to have started the new year with at least some of the updates in place. It always feels good to get my work out of the studio and visible in the outside world, especially to new places for me this year – in the Channel Islands at ArtHouse, Jersey and in Athens, Greece via the brilliant H-M-S Projects. I’m grateful for the opportunities that have come my way this year, thanks particularly to hardworking curators/producers Rosalind Davis, Laura Hudson and Luke Merryweather.

I made a new piece of work for the group show in Athens but otherwise, ‘Sweet Nothings’ and 10×10 were work from the past Here’s a link to the NEWS page on my website if you’re interested in reading more about where the work’s been shown in 2023:

www.katemurdochartist.com/news

I’ve managed to hang onto my Creekside, Deptford studio for now, but moving – or rather, being forced out – is still on the horizon. I’ve spent a lot of time fantasising about there being some sort of glitch in the planning process that throws up a clause, stipulating that the 70 or so artists involved in this latest cull are allowed to stay there. It’s highly unlikely that this will happen, of course, and so March looks set to see us moving on – hopefully to another space in the local area.

There’s no doubt that the ongoing uncertainty has been disruptive and affected my work output. But my resolution for 2024, though very hard to do, is to be more accepting of what’s on the cards. That said, this will be the third time that I’ve been forced to make a studio move because of property developers taking over prime locations in the Deptford/New Cross area in SE London. It’s an absolute travesty that the current building, a beautiful Art Deco building housing some 70+ artists, is to be reduced to rubble to make way for yet another block of soulless, high priced flats. But there we have it – there’s little any of us can do to prevent this happening. For now, it’s a waiting game – hoping that the promise of alternative accommodation will come through for us and we can regroup as a community of artists. Another regular fantasy of mine is to imagine having a studio space on a permanent/for life basis. Imagine just how brilliant that would be!