Glyndwr University

Finally finished installing the 8 TV screen installation, I have had some really encouraging feedback about the films I have made over the past six months. I have yet to upload them to my blog! A severe lack of cash and my 3.2mp phone camera will have to do for now as I gave up my posh phone with camera apps in a bid to save money for the show! I had a nightmare with vistaprint in the week, I ordered my 4 large banners for the show, which came rattlin’ around in a flimsy box with absolutely no protection, they had been squashed in transportation, which sent me into a rage!!! Would you believe the call centre is in the Caribbean!!! An extra 4 were sent yesterday from the Netherlands and I can say they were packaged in the exact same way, with no poster tubes, again rattlin’ around in a flimsy box, but this time not squashed!! Needless to say I wont be using this company again! Assessments start this Wednesday so with the bank holiday we have one day to put the finishing touches in place! I have included my artist statement for Negotiated Study 2

“The shape or identity of an object or person may change several times within a given video clip. Rock videos represent a full breakdown in the sense of a rationality coherent world. Few of the videos offer a linear narrative; most will jolt the viewer with a rapid succession of images – often less than two seconds long – that have little obvious relation to each other.” (Gergen: 1991)

Loss of identity has been a primary focus of the studio work. Using personal film footage to create a television installation of eight screens is a representation of the confusion felt around the loss of identity. I have felt raw, exposed and afraid of the work I have produced but can now separate myself from the past. It could be described as a personal exorcism.

The photographic work is part of my journey over the past three years which acts as a visual reference a reminder of the various emotional states I have passed through. I continue to search for medium in which I can truly express myself. The video work is part of an ongoing project which has encouraged me to step out of my comfort zone in order to push forward within my studio practice. A chapter of my life is rapidly coming to an end and I have documented this process by using digital media.

I have been inspired by the work of Martin Creed, Susan Hiller and Sarah Lucus, I am drawn to the visual language and a new format is emerging through my work. I make conscious connections, aiming to extract meaning from from fragmented moments, coincidences and synchronicities experienced in the present. There are of course those transparent moments that equate to the whole sum.

“The whole is other than the some of its parts. It is more correct to say that the whole is something else than the sum of its parts, because summing up is a meaningless procedure, whereas the whole-part relationship is meaningful.”

(Koffka: 1935)

There is a strong connection to the language of dreams and the surrealist ethos, this is ever present and feeds the imagination, I work intuitively which encourages self -expression. The journey is only the beginning; I am not travelling through this life just to reach the end.

Finally turned a corner yesterday with Premiere Pro, think shapes and worry about content later. I have a lot of interaction with my tutors on this course but there is still a level of privacy to my work which is holding me back. Emyrs Williams suggested taking a step back from the video work, I feel it is done to death, a period I can look back on wincing!! I feel sick and excitable at the forth-coming show. I have been assigned two helpers, Tasha is very quick to make the bodged paint job of my studio space look 10 times better & Dion is helping me with visualising the tv/dvd installation I am about to attempt! (Thanks for loaning me the dvds to burn film on because I bought cds instead!!!) I am writing this from Pentraeth when I should be in the studios!! Postcards for show have been ordered, oversized strangeness with writing and map on the reverse side…… gotta crack on!!

Metaphors are useful at this point! I have rowed out to sea and have lost me ore’s! So I can’t runaway I am just stuck here drifting….. till I arrive at shore which should take a short while longer! Assessment looms and organisational skills are required! A short spell in London thinking and working on my videos may have helped but I am a long way off!

Writing parts of my dissertation recently on a crossing back from Dublin, I began to ponder the writers’ of the past. Escapism and long haul voyages to far off distant lands, the healing quality, gliding along cool calm waters…. in the style of the old fashioned writer’s dream… Ireland was a great distraction technique for my escape. I roamed Dublin for 4 days completely straight. Visited galleries, drank coffee and tried to pay attention to the now and what I was experiencing, instead of creating some great future mind movie I am so good at doing.

The Culture Box was housing Wendy Stephens and I got to briefly chat with the artist about her time spent recently in Bali where she had been practising life drawing. Certainly the colours she had used together in her work spoke of culture abroad. ‘Letting go with lines‘ is learning about how to surrender to a process and to really experience it, along with Eckhart Tolle in my ears I really was trying to remain in the now!

Something in our conversation reminded me of the poem Andre Breton had written somewhere in the middle of the surrealist manifesto. (I find myself harping back to that poem more and more of late) I disclosed my idea of an installation about a surrealist fridge and what could be inside it? Perhaps that was dangerous I thought on leaving, why did I feel the need to reveal my aching desire towards a fridge????

Another show to mention was Luke Fowlers ‘Pilgrimage from scattered points’ about the English film composer Cornelius Cardew and The Scratch Orchestra (1968-1973) his work documents the rise of anti-establishment organisations. I sat and watched the Scratch Orchestra talk about the music and relaying the struggles of that period. I noted the part about the skinheads not causing any trouble. Experimental music to this day, is a privilege to those who can appreciate it.

(Erm here comes the www.badsekta.com linkage / mass big-up!!!)

The Lab on Foley St, ‘Out on the sea was a boat full of people singing’ & other stories’ By Michelle Browne, certainly made me feel more comfortable about riding that tandem with this crazy circus dude that lives up in the mountains in Rhosgadfan – (It’s gotta be done J!)

Another quick mention, The Monster Truck Gallery – ‘Life Vividly Lived Part two’. I loved that space and how the photographs had been hung… but the best part was the last comment left in the book, which read ‘for the love of god please rub the pencil markings off the wall before opening night’ Sara Baume – whoever you are, you sold that show to me! I also note that you keep a blog about pencils! (errrrr joke!) I know of a young boy learning to talk right now, and when you hold up a pencil to him guess what he says???!!! “Peensil Peensil”

Daunting this neg 2 research project business. I am like an old goat waiting to be kicked off the starting block! D-scape – Aphex Twin will explain my state of mind of late. I have been recording myself in videos, some short, some long. Something is coming out……….

http://www.youtube.com/user/Moopsy143?feature=mhum…