Time to start MAKING…….
Over the last month, I have been so consumed by thoughts of repetition and collecting that I have inadvertently (if only temporarily) disregarded the physical making element of the work. I have recently realised that there is only so much you can do and develop in your mind without putting some of it into practice. So last week I sketched out a few ideas.
Before doing this I had forgotten the benefits of putting pencil to paper. I am reminded that the fundamental process of sketching out a mental image unravels and clarifies certain issues that are otherwise so easily overlooked. By translating imaginary images into palpable ones, the visual elements of an installation come to light, and by thinking about the piece in more tangible terms I am able to better pinpoint what it is that I am trying to communicate. I have found that the activity of drawing also generates other lines of enquiry and brings to the surface gaps or grey areas that need to be solved or thought about in more depth.
One problem that has surfaced through doing this has in fact been brewing at the back of my mind for a while. Fred Mann originally bought it up and then Michael Landy touched upon the same thing when he looked at my work on the 24th February. This being the amount of significance I place on ‘process’, and if the collections should be a ‘by-product’ of an action or activity. The content of the work and what it says to the viewer dramatically differs depending on whether I am using an object for its semiotic values or whether I am presenting it as evidence of an activity. At this stage I am struggling to blend the two. The question for me now is whether I should concentrate on process or concept?
In reflection of this, I plan to temporarily separate the work into two categories until I establish which option I want to pursue. A number of my next installations will communicate a process, using objects that are a by-product of an action. And then the other installations will attempt to utilise the semiotic values of an object to convey a concept.
