LAST FEW DAYS
03.10.09
Well… I go home to Nottingham tomorrow after a rather productive week I feel. I was not expecting the work with the butchers to be so interesting and I hope this has proved to me that I can work in this type of setting in the UK too. I am not so sure that I will become a full time butcher though, (more training needed perhaps). I have a few thoughts about performances that I can do with the meat substance in the future. Maybe this idea needs to incubate for a while.
Before I started Invitations d’artistes, there was some confusion as to when I would be paid for this project, however it seems that mid October should be the date. There has been a lot of shift in this project, from my original idea of Seven Collaborations/ Seven day play where I would work with a different profession in the community of Sacy. However there was only the butcher and I had to travel a few miles to find the other professions- a seamstress and the dairy farmer.
I had not planned to do any farm filming however it was too much of a good opportunity to turn down when the farmer invited myself and two American Wwoofers Callie and Betsy to see where the milking takes place. The sound fascinated me the most. Firstly the way the farmer speaks to the herd of cattle and then the pumping noise of the machine, sucking the milk from the udders.
Since working here in July my work has moved on a lot and the residency has given me the time, space and opportunity to follow my ideas through. When I return to Nottingham I will be faced with the looming prospect of unemployment, although supply teaching may be my only real source of income for the next few months. Trying to come out of the minus financially which will (I hope) allow me to have a studio by January. Of course there is a hundred and one applications to wade through aswell. The possibility of showing the films I have made here and working on my sound library is also top of my agenda. Thanks for reading.
