Still at the kitchen table… but have made some serious headway towards departing from it very soon. Last week we signed the contract for our new studio space, harrah! So all set to move in on the 25th February and get settled in well before the little one makes an appearance. I’ll be sharing with three other artists, one of whom I was happily studio neighbour to for a few years at Digswell and the other two I know pretty well already also. So we’re all massively excited by this new space of our very own and it’s very local to me which is going to be so helpful when I’m juggling work and baby.
I’m still busy with the funding applications, but feel confident that the budget is now workable and complete. For the rest of the application it’s a case of trimming down and polishing, but feel it’s definitely ‘getting there’.
So anyway, back to it.
After last weeks attack of the January blues, I’ve made some progress and am putting a little bit of that negativity and sulking behind me.
I guess sometimes you just have to take a fresh look at things. Getting down about it does seem to kind of serve a purpose, of forcing a fresh look (once I’d stopped feeling sorry for myself). So this week has been from that new perspective. Namely, allowing myself to feel a confidence in this project and my ability to carry it out.
After tackling the budget again in smaller chunks I could actually see it coming together and finally the figures have started matching up. So with a deep breath and a clearer head it’s becoming more manageable. I’ve even started filling out my ACE online application. Filling in those boxes does seem to give a strange kind of pleasure (must be those little ticks you get when you’ve completed a section!)
Also, I managed to finally get a meeting with Keith, the NHDC Museum Archaeologist and Sian, the Museum Curator yesterday. This was a really valuable meeting and a definite boast to the projects planning. They were extremely helpful and generous in their support of the project and I can’t wait to be working alongside them. Keith is just an incredible source of knowledge and working with him will be so valuable to the research. He was really enthusiastic about the collaborative element between Archaeology and Contemporary Fine Art and seemed to really embrace my vision for the project.
As well as this I’ve been invited to show my work ‘The Island’ as part of a group show curated by Rosemary Shirley at PM Gallery in May. This is an unexpected and extremely welcomed opportunity to show this piece again after the MA show. Considering much of my plans for this upcoming Outskirts Project stem from the work, it feels amazing to be getting it to an audience again.
So a thoroughly productive and enjoyable week and a weekend visit to London Art Fair in store. Feels like 2012 is a little more on track!
It’s over a whole month since I last added a post, opps! But this is only a reflection of the progress I’ve made this month, notably… not a lot, which is really disappointing.
I was feeling so positive about things last time I wrote and confident about moving this project forward, but a combination of post Christmas blues, a few set backs and dwindling confidence seems to of left me in completely the opposite frame of mind.
It’s just plain scary trying to do this alone at my kitchen table and I’m really starting to feel the isolation of being home, with no studio, no regular visits to Uni, and very little contact with other artists. Surrounded by application forms, a half completed budget, endless scribbled notes in the notebook and numerous information documents arranged rather haphazardly on my laptop. This feels a million miles away from being creative. And I’ve got a head ache!
There it is then…. my rubbish January post.
I apologise.
