Things are a little bit more under control now half term is over and the children are back to school. The dissertation is on the home run now and the professional practice unit is looking healthy – I think! Creatively, I am experimenting with making some ‘live’ paint. I will post the results of this experiment if it works. Other than that – I have been growing some bacteria in Petri dishes, which is disgusting and fascinating at the same time. How something can arrive somewhere unseen and take up residence; like a tumour or a visible growth on the body. A previously unsullied surface pocked by the arrival of an unwelcome guest.
On a walk around a local church I stumbled across a very sad gravestone. The grave held eight children who all passed away within nine years of each other. It was tricky to read, the moss and lichens are slowly obliterating a family already long forgotten. I wonder how they felt grief then. Child mortality was so common before immunisations – did it make it any easier to bear. It was the lasting memorial of this sad family that struck me. Time and nature are slowly erasing the memory of this ordinary family. The once glossy surface of the stone is now pocked and peeling. The colour is green, grey and red from all the life that it now supports.
The idea that something natural is obliterating something natural is intriguing. Not loosing sight of the science aspect to my work, I feel that this is an evolution of my practice. I think that I am beginning to understand what it is I want to make and comment on through my work.
At last.
