Central Saint Martins, UAL

It’s late Thursday night, another week has whizzed by. It’s been a good one though. I haven’t quite achieved everything on my schedule, but there’s progress – I actually have a schedule! I have been good, keeping my diary/sketchbook up-to-date and in it I have made quite a few decisions regarding achievements I hope to accomplish this term. I’m not too worried at the moment though cause I’ve kind of set it out in two week chunks based on the 1st two weeks of term and what I managed to do. This is the end of week one of two, and although I haven’t got as far as I’d hoped there are other additional snippets to add that I have learnt about and done that I hadn’t planned or anticipated.

Like, I hadn’t realised how complicated it was to make a linen support, or that an expandable stretcher was needed – well best to use anyway.

So, yes I have been in the depths of our workshops a lot, building myself 4 stretchers, 2 for canvas, and 2 were for linen… with the help of the painting technician we’ve tried to stretch one linen on my home-made stretchers but looking at it today I’m not hopeful, it’s looking a bit baggy. I’ve also bought a piece of perspex and ordered some aluminium. I just need to sort out exactly what portraits I’m painting and finish preparing surfaces and I’ll be off the starting blocks. Oh and next week’s treat is making rabbit-skin glue.

My main plan for my body of work this term is to keep all variables fixed except surface and medium of which I’m experimenting with. I keep dithering about just using the same portrait too, but I think it’ll be rather boring if I do, so I’m going to use different ones, that way I can push myself even further.

I’ve also been taking photo’s unnoticed on the tube and noticed but anonymously in the street. I’m sure that with these and some of fellow students again, I’ll have lots to choose from.

We’ve been having dissertation presentation tutorials this week too. Mine was today. It went pretty ok. I planned to record the input I got, but in the heat of the moment I forgot to and couldn’t very well part way through, it would have been rude then. I like to write notes during the sessions, but if I do that on my own turn I miss what’s being said next. I often come away overwhelmed and forget details, so this is why I thought recording it might have helped! Never mind.

I did get some good suggestions so hopefully when I follow them up I’ll be able to crack on and get a good draft handed in in two weeks.

In and around all this I made more progress on my paintings, finishing them all, for now at least.

Oh, and I’m trying to find more studio space!!!! It was inevitable I guess.

7 days in and I have only just come up for air… It’s been pretty full on actually. There was no need to worry about studio space, I didn’t need to move and was able to get started painting right away. I sorted out a coping strategy for the first week – I had some unfinished works hanging around from Zurich and decided that I would get on and do these. It has meant that I haven’t been dithering around looking for focus and wasting time – as it’s so easy to do when you just get back and you’re trying to get geared up. It’s been good to just start painting and free my mind to think while doing so, free to plan the steps I need to take next.

I started as I mean to go on – getting my documentation going, it’s more a reflective diary, which holds my thought processes as I’m going along as well as capturing images of my work in progress, handouts and anything else that seems relevant to me at the time. I used to try and keep work and thinking separate but there was so much overlap and it felt very strained, now I just go for one book with it altogether.

So that was last week, I’m a bit behind as I’d planned to get the three paintings finished. A bit ambitious I know, but probably do-able if I hadn’t skipped Friday to go sailing. This week started with an all day tutorial/critique yesterday, it is always really good to get to know the tutor and group dynamics. It’s always a long day, trying to stay focussed and give the people at the end of the day the same enthusiasm as those at the beginning of the day.

My crit was mixed. As I was in the process of creating work I have effectively moved on from, I had to explain what I was doing and where my thinking was going: that I want to explore process and surface more this term, experiment with medium thickness and application; consider using Perspex more, glass, aluminium, nylon – in fact any surface that is reflective and/or transparent. The conversation seemed to focus on my application of colour and use of ground, and I didn’t fully understand what the tutor was implying – am I doing it wrong? Is it possible to be wrong? How do I figure this out and make informed decisions to rectify or work with it? I have some experimenting to do and see what comes of that, then further discussion in a 1-2-1 session in a couple of weeks…. Although known to me I’ve never worked with this tutor before, so there will be some getting used to I’m sure. The main thing is to keep pushing, keep trying to move forward, not to feel pushed back myself.

Well, well, well, its October already! And it’s all go! go! go! I had a great time in France last week, lots of cheese, wine, fresh air, cycling, canoeing, relaxing …. just what I needed. This week has flown in. Went into Uni on Monday to meet up with a fellow student and check out studio space in preparation for the big start. With Uni being in the heart of London, just off Oxford St in fact, space is at a premium and always an issue at the start of each year. It’s tough because everyone wants space, but it’s not always utilized to the full. So those who do make the most of it often feel frustrated that they are squeezed into an allotted amount while others are never in and there’s are lying empty. But c’est la vie! The important thing is not to let anything get in the way of a great year and if that means compromise then that’s the name of the game.

I think I’ve had a bit of an epiphany this week, and I am starting back really relaxed. The other thing my friend and I did on Monday was chat through and about each other’s dissertation, what we’ve done so far. I’ve really missed these kinds of discussions with it being the holidays.

I initially felt very inadequate and “oh, woe is me”. But after a further chat with a non-art friend on Tuesday I decided this wasn’t the way to be. If I don’t believe I can do it then I won’t be able to. “Whether you think you can or you can’t, either way you are right” (Henry Ford)

It got me thinking and now I’ve turned over a new leaf. I am on a campaign of self-belief and self-actualization.

It’s paying off already. I spent Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday on my dissertation and made a lot of progress. I’m stoked.

Thursday was enrolment day. It was great to see everyone again, though I only managed to speak to a fraction of them. It has been a while, what with having spent half of last year on exchange in Zurich!

I took some tools in and some work ready for starting in earnest on Monday. We have ‘studio allocation’ on Tuesday so I may have to move again, but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. I also went along with another friend to the Royal Academy to see Anish Kapoor’s exhibition. Loved it! Loved the colour and the form and it’s so amazing to see the works in the flesh.

The next few days are going to be a bit up in the air but I’m really glad to be back and raring to go.

A question – does anyone know a blind person who would be interested in having his or her portrait painted – A fellow student is having a hard time sourcing a subject, as he doesn’t personally know anyone who is blind.