The show is just about up. We are off to tweak it in a minute. The gallery floor did have to be reinforced with a prodigious amount of timber. It still bounces a little and every time you walk past Mariele's mountain ranges the sky ripples ominously. Yesterday I finally got out of the gallery and saw a little bit of San Francisco, hopefully I will see a little more today. Annika, Mariele and I visited CCA yesterday where, of course, they knew the curator who had recently come from Berlin. We were having a tour of the show there when suddenly the guide bent double and started talking in a gravelly voice. I thought she might be chanelling spirits or having a fit but it turned out to be some sort of performance. In a moment she righted herself and carried on as if nothing had happened.
Earlier, in the street, I had been passed by a woman carrying an invisible cat. It kept scratching her.
My eyes are piggy and red and the first film is done, though I'm a bit unsure about one section with a crawling sock. The pal – ntsc conversion program seemed to work ok too but I'll find out this morning for sure. If it doesn't do its job I haven't really got a plan b. After work we all met up with Mariele for a Thai meal. David is extremely nervous about filling her tanks with water. He made the mistake of looking under his gallery floor and was not too reassured by what he found. We may be all under it soon trying to prop it up with bits of wood and old sculptures.
The show opens Thursday – one more film to make. I'm considering secretly filming in the hotel, my room already looks like a mad inventor's workshop. Luckily my frantic tipping has lead to a good relationship with the house keeper, she keeps leaving me little notes.
Yesterday was a bit of a daze again my head pounded (still does) I got loads done though. Tall spindly creatures shimmied little pink nail brushes fought to the death and I built a freeway in the gallery. I felt a bit guilty because everyone else was doing the mundane stuff, deciding the hang, changing the colours on the walls, tripping over my growing pile of detritus and not swearing. I'm hoping to get the first film finished today before Mariele arrives.
Oh and someone found my wallet at Heathrow and posted it home, with the money inside!
Today is the morning after. I think that I was awake for 24 hours yesterday so I got quite a lot done but cannot remember any of it clearly. I had my pocket picked at Heathrow, losing all my cash. I flew to San Francisco and went out drinking with Annika , Johanna, Ian and David Cunningham. We ended up in a rooftop bar overlooking the city (actually we ended up in the hotel bar).
The Gallery looks great though David thinks its a mess. Everything is waiting to be unpacked including two massive wooden cases containing Mariele's vitrines.
I start making stuff today around 12, my head hurts
Just before I travel I always feel an anxiety that borders on illness. A short period of pallid sweatiness is usually followed by an embarrassing amount of twitching and bouncing. This wasn’t helped this morning by my friends’ insistence on joking loudly about bird strikes and watery landings. Once I’ve begun however this feeling is soon replaced by boredom. This was how I spent most of my four-hour journey from Ipswich to the Holiday Inn at Heathrow. Now I’m sitting in my plush hotel room with a bag full of junk and electronics thinking about getting through customs tomorrow. On the underground I met a young man who worked for some sort of clandestine Christian agency. He said he had flown on 77 planes last year, collected sick bags and was about to ferry his boss over to the US for Obama’s inauguration. He seemed worried that I made odd little films.
Tomorrow I’ll be in San Francisco
