the puppy makes her way into the kitchen and i get to sit and reflect about my day, a good one to be inside while the gentle drizzle waters the rhubarb and tomatoes.
after my day of recovery i was well poised this morning to make my preparations for things to come this week.
starting with the more difficult to prepare, i made myself comfortable at the dining table and set up my drawing machine to make it ready for friday’s event at the museum and art gallery in derby.
finding lines a co-produced exhibition of drawing over seen by andrea hadley johnson opens to the public with a fantastical evening of surprise drawing events alongside the works in the gallery. my invitation arrived through social media to take part in the opening event and from what i know already social media has played a large tole in putting together #findinglines.
after clearing the kitchen of the pots and containers we’ve left to amass so they annoy us i turned my attention to preparing for tomorrow. another cpd event for me, i’m going to be running a workshop on how to whittle a fox that can be used repeatidley to make a skulk of foxes. the workshop is hapening at the derbyshire forest school day, an annual networking and sharing event organised by the team who co-ordinate forest school in derbyshire. my approach for the workshop is an experimental one and this caught the eye of one member of the organising team to the point of her wanting to assist me so she can assess how the method works.
my preparations are going well, just wood preparations to do after some food. working with materials is easier than with code, i think i made the right decision about which order to do the preparations.
while this short term work is happening i also find myself having moments of considering things a little further away.
one of these is … how might i express myself in my work ?
during the days after the tradegy of the grenfell fire, i learnt of Khadija Saye. i watched a video about her. the video spoke of what she expressed through her work. as i processed the tragedy and what i had learnt in the video that question started to be asked of myself, by myself.
to be able to express one self feels like a powerful thing and one i’ve not been exploring too much in an intentional manner in my practice for a while.
reflecting about this i see that in having some time of from expressive works has given me time to play, explore and have fun. i remember a lecturers remarks during a group crit at university… “make stuff and then attach meaning to it.” at the time i wasn’t sure if this method has integrity but maybe i was just being too precious. one might argue that everything one does is connected my meaning and integrity because it all comes from oneself.
while giving myself space away from the question of what am i expressing i have made practice gains and i’ a lot happier.
perhaps the question about meaning and expression is one that i need a lot longer to answer than it takes to prepare for a workshop and celebration event.
