A Portrait of an Artist as a Very Late Starter

I am excited and petrified.  I heard this week that I have been short listed for something I really want to do.  This is wonderful.  However, I have to do a 15 minute presentation as part of the final selection process and this fact, when I read it, filled me with fear!

I have calmed down a bit since then.  I have no problem with speaking in public or in engaging with discussion in public.  It is a different matter when it comes to expressing my own ideas, work and working practice.  The presentation will be the opportunity to begin the clarifying of my own thought process and ideas relating to my own work.  If I am successful; this opportunity will open up new pathways and opportunities.  I have been aware for some time that I have reached the point with my practice where I would really benefit from some engagement with serious academic thinking and interaction with other practitioners.

Engaging with debate and ideas is an important part of being an artist as is visiting galleries and museums to see exhibitions. I was excited by the discussion I joined at The Tetley in June of this year with artists discussing their work showing in the gallery space.  Recently, I have booked a place on two seminars, one is a day exploring the issues of contemporary artists in rural contexts, the other a few hours next week, in Wakefield run by Axis is called Artist Validate Thyself and will explore issues of how artists are validated by other artists and peers, how they are often misrepresented by galleries and other issues.  I am looking forward to them both as an opportunity to engage fully for some brief hours with the business of being an artist after a month of working hard for the anti fracking cause.

I finished a couple of books.  I was thoroughly absorbed by the process; the ideas, imagery and text are an extension of my current work; placing them into a three dimensional book form is something I will continue with when I can.  The books are currently residing in a gallery in Staithes.

I have selected work for an upcoming solo show in York; it is an experimental series of paintings I did based on the process of painting itself and using the colours and textures of the passing seasons as another time based reference.  It is a relief not to have to worry about what I will be showing and I think they will look great installed in against the newly painted grey walls of the space.  The paintings comprise one piece, which I would not break up by selling a single painting from the series of twelve.  I had giclee prints made of each painting, something I would not normally do, so I hope I sell some!

So, after this weekend, which is mostly dedicated to the fight against fracking, I will be taking some time out to concentrate on my own work and development.  I am looking forward to it.

I’m back!  It has been a long time.  I’m panicking.

I spoke last time about the work with the ballot box; it is something that absorbed me completely during the days I had free to work on it.  I completely immersed myself in the project; I had other ideas I wanted to add to it but time meant I had to keep it simple and in the end, I think it was for the best.  This was made and exhibited way back in Spring.  It is proving even harder to find time for studio work since then.

I have never made an installation piece of my own work before and producing a print work of nearly 19 m long was a physical challenge.  To see the piece installed was thought provoking, as was the content.  I was satisfied that it was finished but not satisfied that this was an end point in itself; it has started a series of questions about the nature of my work, the nature of print, the nature of painting.

Fast forward to the present: since the ballot box piece was finished, I called it “The Mud and the Sheen”, I have been intensively involved in anti fracking activities, working hard with Frack Free Ryedale to prevent Third Energy from achieving their goal to get planning permission to frack in a village near where I live.  I have found it extremely difficult to have enough clear “head space”, left for my own work, so I gave up for a bit and fretted.  And fretted some more.  In the end, I decided upon another list, to enable me to get things back into perspective and allow myself the time to get into the studio. In no particular order:

• Use the evenings for Fracking admin – emails, writing objections, research
• At least 3 days per week in the studio, keeping it flexible as things to do with fracking pop up at unexpected times
• Other days for domestic stuff, garden, friends, family
• Enjoy life, stop seeing it all as a series of jobs that need to be done
• Draw
• Draw
• Read
• Draw

Title: The Mud and the Sheen*

The narrowness of the strip of Chinese paper comprising this print emerging from the ballot box resembles toilet tissue; the analogy between politics and our ablutions appealed to me. . .

We are rooted in the mud and filth, yet always aspire to the stars, to better things.  In trying to achieve this, we should always be mindful of the unseen, the un-included, of those worse off than ourselves.  Life is nothing without repetition; it provides the framework from which we take off into the unknown joy of it all.

*Quote from Timothy J Clark’s essay, Jackson Pollock’s Abstraction, Reconstructing Modernism, Art in New York, Paris and Montreal, 1945-1964.  Ed: Serge Guilbaut, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusettes, London, England.

This piece comprises a decommissioned ballot box that I have etched with Nitromors.  A nineteen meter lenght of Chinese paper, about twelve centimeters wide with a variety of print; Screen, relief and mono.  Simple imagery referencing the force feeding of suffragettes, quotes about democracy from a variety of authors, tally marks, asemic writing and my own thoughts.  I am planning on exploring these formats and ideas further.

In the end, at the beginning of the week, I cut my roll of Chinese paper with a fine hacksaw blade; it worked, although the remainder of the roll is a little squashed by the pressure I had to apply to hold it while I hacksawed like mad at the other end.  The edge is a little bit fluffy, but I think this will hardly notice once I have worked on the paper.  At one stage I had to stop sawing because there was an ominous smell of smoldering paper; it had not occurred to me that the friction might set the whole lot alight!  I tried it in the slot of the ballot box today.  I had a measurement of 12.5 cm in my head.  The roll of toilet paper I used as a mock up is actually 10 cm wide, so where did I get 12.5 cm from?  I was horrified!  Fortunately, my roll fits comfortably, so perhaps I had measured the slot width instead.  Anyhow, it don’t matter cos it fits and it will work.  Huzzah!

3c today.  I have been skulking indoors for most of the week, emotionally worn down by the pressure caused by working for the anti fracking cause.  I found I couldn’t concentrate on anything, apart from a crochet project I started just after Christmas, which will be presents for family at the next festivities!  Hardly fine art, but it was soothing; something about repetitious action is deeply consoling.

In my worried and miserable state I gave myself a talking to yesterday and as a result, with lots of struggle, I was up early this morning and after talking to a few villagers about attending an important meeting tomorrow evening, I was ready for some work in the studio.

I lasted 2 hours.  It is so cold and damp, nothing is drying and I cannot be still for too long before I become numb and seize up.  However, I managed to add another layer to two studies on paper I have been working on.  I also collected some things together to enable me to continue working at home, where it is warmer.  I have some lino to work on, and a couple of sketch books.  I found a small empty sketch book that I am going to use to jot down the ideas for this project as I progress.  A kind of visual diary cum recipe book.  I will need to start work in earnest next week.

I have made some designs to send to Thermofax Screens, I want to combine relief printmaking techniques with drawing and silk screen and create one very long narrow piece that will emerge from my ballot box and loop up and down from the ceiling.

I can feel my enthusiasm returning; just being in my studio for a short while gives me renewed strength and sense of purpose.