Breaking Ground

PACKING

Madly gathering stuff to take – it will never fit in the car – ideas bubbling up – they all need loads of materials to try out – but I cannot take it all. Will put everything downstairs and see how much I can get in. Lots of ideas will not work but I need the overflowing in order to let things happen. The hole in the earth beckons.

IT STARTS ON FRIDAY

Only a few days before we are in Margate. Been thinking about the roots wallpaper – how like a small drawing each root was. I have gathered a bag of stones from Brighton beach and a bag from Hastings. Most of us pick up stones and wonder at the markings and colours. How to keep this wonder, to look a little longer?

Saturday – the end of a busy week… or the start of a busy week? One thing is for sure, the term "weekend" will be meaningless for Roz & I until the end of Gone to Earth.

My notebook is bulging. How to edit and select which ideas to develop? What will be my focus for Gone To Earth?

Putting things on hold, into store, seems to be something which I learn to do more & more as I leave one project to take up the reins of another and return again sometime in the future. It's great if things can be put away carefully, to be brought out again at a later date, unspoiled and ready for use. But I remember how sometimes circumstances turn our lives upside down in the blink of an eye and everything is left where it lies while we re-appraise, re-prioritise.

Just over a week to go until our residency at Crate begins. It's different preparing for this residency – we need to be very organised about what we will take with us. We won't be able to pop home for anything we've forgotten; we won't have a car to go shopping for materials in.

I'm pleased that we will have two rooms at Crate – it seems appropriate after Outside In and Under Ground that we will have one light room and one dark room to work in for Gone to Earth.

I'm still working with pollen, wax, sugar and paper after becoming interested in these materials at Under Ground.

Re-visited Margate yesterday to sort out one or two details – remind myself of the spaces we will be using, test out my connection to the Internet via Crate's WiFi and meet Lucy Kirke from Turner Contemporary to talk about our Open Day and Discussion Event.

I also managed to take a quick look at Far West, the current show in the Turner Contemporary project space on The High Street, and fit in a walk up the seafront to look at the holiday flat which we've booked for 9 nights at the end of November.

A productive day!