Two unrelated developments: Firstly, last week I went to Cambridge for a meeting with my case officer at the Arts Council, and afterwards had a brief catching-up session with my mentor Jo, who happened to be due at the Arts Council offices for a meeting herself.
The meeting went really well and I came away with more ambitious plans for 'work arising' from Festial than I went in with! It was good to see Jo, too, who has strongly encouraged me to put all my strength(!) into contacting galleries and persuading them that they really need to show my work after the end of the residency year.
Hmm, well, I've put together a rough proposal and have been contacting people like mad in the last few days so we'll see whether it leads anywhere…
The second development has been some feedback from two of the newest recipients of my Kalender mailout, the esoteric writer/researcher Nigel Pennick and historian/expert in paganism and folklore of the British Isles Ronald Hutton. They both responded positively and seemed delighted with their free gifts! A boost at this stage of the project and much appreciated.
Meanwhile, I'm researching Palm Sunday for the next festival and wondering how cold and damp St Andrew's is at the moment ….
And I'm thinking about Anselm Kiefer's Palm Sunday installation at White Cube a year ago.
A few random thoughts, subtitled 'areas of discussion over the lunchtime washing-up'.
I have moments of worry over Festial. Over the things I'm interested in. Even wondering how interested I actually am in the things I say I'm interested in.
In particular, in worrying over Festial I wonder whether I'm coming across as someone with a religious agenda (I'm not), and how relevant to contemporary life my preoccupations are. I mean, I can counter any accusations of this nature with the assertion that I'm living here in this moment with these thoughts and images running around in my head and as a contemporary artist I can choose to use anything as subject matter and it will, without any further need for justification, be contemporary art.
I think I believe this.
But the next moment I'm wondering whether photographs of Starbucks frontages projected onto the walls of St Andrew's would say 'contemporary' more persuasively than anything I'm minded to do. How far can I say 'But I'm not that kind of artist?' Is it limiting to decide what kind of artist you are without trying things you wouldn't have imagined as part of your practice? Is it possible to have conviction in this area, and to do stuff within your self-defined limitations and use those limitations creatively? I think I'm sure about something, but then I wonder how I can be so sure that I'm right. I might just be being blinkered.
I think this would all be easier to fathom if I'd received more critical feedback during the project. Without that you have to be your own critic, which inevitably has its own limitations. Trevor and I talk about Festial and he comes up with some very useful input, but of course we're both quite close to it. I know that I'm happy with some of the imagery that's emerged so far, so does it matter whether it satisfies my peers as relevant or worthy of review?
Meanwhile, I posted out 32 copies of the Candlemas Kalender this morning.
www.world-tree.co.uk/festial
imogenashwin[at]yahoo[dot]co[dot]uk
After getting into a bit of a routine – panic about what to do for festival/festival happens/panic about what to put into Kalender/Kalender happens and feels OK after all/panic about what to do for festival … well, you're getting the picture – I thought I'd better make some effort towards sorting out the bigger picture. Like, what happens when the year ends?
So, I've managed to arrange to meet my Arts Council case officer and will also hopefully get the chance to catch up with my long-lost mentor, Jo. As an aside, yesterday I discovered the sad news that Babylon Gallery in Ely is to close permanently in June. What a major loss to contemporary art in East Anglia; I can hardly believe it.
I've also applied for a short-term residency which concludes with a solo exhibition for the chosen artist – feels like a long shot but, well, might as well give it a try.
And, the Candlemas Kalender is currently at the printers' so, barring cock-ups, I'll be collecting it tomorrow afternoon! Yay! And HOPEFULLY also our expresso machine which is currently being fixed (not at the printers' I hasten to add). Even bigger YAY!!
I did the Radio Norfolk interview. And this time I managed to remember to mention the Arts Council, the Festial website and Trevor's role in the project!
It started inauspiciously when the presenter clearly had no idea whatsoever what the project was about, despite having some sort of info in front of him (couldn't read it from where I was sitting). 'So we've missed the medieval festival? Is there anything to talk about, then?' He phoned his wife to make sure she remembered to pick up his prescription (he had a shocking cold). Then I handed him the two most recent issues of Kalender and he handed them back, saying they would only confuse him further.
I returned them to him firmly, saying, no, I really think they will help. 'Do you really think so?' he asked doubtfully. ' Suddenly he became intrigued by the free gift on the Christmas issue – a (very) miniature Yule Log, to be burned and the ashes scattered to ensure fertility during the coming year. 'Ooh, I'll try this!' he chortled.
The record ended – something bland and innocuous, such as is played on local radio stations up and down the country, I suspect. The presenter hadn't been listening to it, having been talking to his wife on the phone and getting up to speed on the Festial project. 'Ah, wasn't that lovely?' he enthused to his listeners.
After all that, the interview went fine, I think. To the presenter's credit, he did get more-or-less to grips with the basics of Festial in the minute or so I was gabbling away to him, and it all seemed to flow reasonably well. I was given a copy on CD but I doubt I'll ever feel brave enough to listen to it! Must try to work out whether hits on the website have increased since Friday.
www.world-tree.co.uk/festial
I've just been invited by BBC Radio Norfolk to go into the studio on Friday afternoon for an interview about Festial's progress. This is likely to be the result of their having received the latest edition of Kalender (one of the 30 I posted to galleries/media) which by my reckoning will have arrived with them on the day they phoned me. So, that counts as a good result, promotionally speaking!
By complete coincidence, Friday is also the date of next festival I'll be marking in the project – Candlemas. That's fine, though, as I can go up to St Andrew's in the morning to do whatever I'm going to do (she said mysteriously – or is it just that further planning is required?!)
Something that I really need to do is to contact my Arts Council case officer to see if I can arrange a meeting. When I first planned Festial, I envisaged making lots of work during the year in addition to compiling and distributing Kalender. In practice, Kalender has been 'the work' in itself, and thinking of it in that way has been the only way to retain my/our sanity. That means that I don't have a physical body of work to curate into an exhibition at the end of the year, which is Phase 3 of the project according to the Arts Council funding I was awarded. There are plenty of ideas I want to develop, but having got to the ninth festival of the twelve, I need to work out what to do next.
Oh yes, I meant to mention a new improvement to the website – an aerial map showing the location of Wood Dalling with a link enabling anyone to discover how far they are from St Andrew's!
www.world-tree.co.uk/festial
imogenashwin[at]yahoo[dot]co[dot]uk
