Step 1; Inside Out.
I have decided to get support during the full process of shaping a proposal for an advertised commission as a way of learning and improving my chances.
I am almost three weeks in the mentoring process; I am currently developing a proposal with the support of Carolyn Black as a mentor.
The focus I have put in the research and development of the proposal is unprecedented; as I chose to make an example of this proposal and use it to develop my skills, the intensity of the process has forced me to look inwardly in my current practice.
This is a time to question and reassess everything I have done before and build up on it; I feel that I am pulling all my strength in one direction and this one direction is now showing me a all world of new possibilities.
The bursary has come to me at a time where all things had stopped; my art was almost asleep, resting for a while.
I had come to a time where all possibilties were dispersed through the many rejected applications and proposals I had written in the past months, laying there as my “miscarried artworks”.
I have made encounters with a wide range of art works and written artists’ words in the past month.I have discovered that “not knowing” is my best asset, that my thurst for exploration will not be extinguished and is the very essence of what makes me alive.
After all, I am still a free lance artist, standing in my practice through thick and thin over the past 15 years so there must be , somewhere within me, a strong belief that what I do best is Trust the Process.
Time to break out of my local shell, at last; responding to my need for raising a family and practicing my art, I have, over the past 17 years, become a “super local artist”.
The a-n bursary came at a time where all my local work had ceased and I was willing to aim further afield, not because the “grass is always greener…” but simply because I could no longer thrive as an artist without experiencing the new.
” A Field Guide to Getting Lost” by Rebecca Solnit, my last read, was an inspiration for reviving my thirst for new lands to explore.
A week on through my mentoring and my practice and work prospect has already changed;
I have gained a couple of contracts out of my boundaries( perhaps out of serendipity or a change of energy around me) and am shaping a proposal for an artist call with an in depth research plan.
My new year’s wishes were to secure at least one residency with a high profile organisation, get work exhibited by a gallery and perhaps return to university to carry out an practice based research.
I also set out to focus on collaborative working with artists, curators, partner organisations as a way to further my work and its impact within social and political contexts.
In order to write the bursary application, I identified the missing points in my life that stopped me getting there and hope to address them through my taylor made programme.
With the help of my an Re-view bursary I will aim to find a place in a constantly moving and challenging art scene where the competition is high and funding hard to reach, and prepare a solid base for the challenges ahead.
