I took a whole day off. Completely off…
And my god, I am a workaholic it seems.. Because by the end of yesterday I was almost twitching with the need to do something…
Today I am back to being relaxed, the rain stopped. And I am quite excited and refreshed after my 24 hour break with complete rest (except the wheelclamping experience which rendered me broke..),
I want to make a few short films this week and ‘up’ my speed and output ability.. It’s not about finished projects and quality but just about seeing how many film sketches I could make..
So I will start with the ‘limited-journey’ project.. Another one of the claustrophobic resolutions to a movement intended but not quite allowed, restricted by externeal factors… weight, space, logistics.
I am quite drawn to these kind of visual metaphor non-journeys, it relates to some personal matters. And some matters I see around myself in social/political/economic sphere.
So off I go.. there is work to do..
Plato is sitting next to my bed, reading out loud "Theaetetus".. A quest for knowledge and thruth..
And my neighbours are sanding their floor..which is my ceiling.. It’s time to move…
It seems that I will be crazy busy until the end of next year. 2-3 installations in India in August. One project that I want to try and bring back for the Liverpool Biennale. Another project that seems to crystallize with these exquisite musicians. Then I also need to return to my drawing practice because it is becoming exceptionally rusty. And I don't know. Ah, yes. A show in a ruin, a bombed out church in Liverpool. This should happen in september. (3 small wooden huts with work inside… it's an open air venue, secured by the church walls, but there is no roof..)
And and and and and and and…
I am calculating wether I need to try and get a place at the Royal College of Art or possibly Goldsmiths (postgraduate courses)in order to save myself a few years worth of struggle.. And also to safeguard myself for my future. An RCA / RA next to one's name appears to be a good insurance against carreer lows… well..
But it's all just thinking, thinking and planning… In the meantime I am so busy and enjoy it a lot.
The 52nd Venice Biennale panicked me slightly. So many artists.. So much competition. So many whose work is just more polished. But then also a fair few whose work is pretty flat and obvious.. But still the rat race part of it all made me a bit uncomfortable.. And the concern over what the value of my work can possibly be… I saw too many pieces that were akin to my own, by content or choice of symbolism. But then perhaps it is ok to be part of a Zeitgeist… hmmmm… Still it makes me squirm. Until I saw all these related pieces, I thought that I was deeply unfashionable.. Which I am obviously not.
For the most part I just want to remain in a position in which I can simply make my work, have an audience and find myself in some publications.
art art bloddy art.
I best get back to some work and look into the Tower of Babel… It interests me as an image.. The gathering and distribution of knowledge throughout the ages.. The loss of a common language as alleged by this story about the destruction of the Babylonian tower and the fragmentation of the people by taking their common language from them..
What a strange god that would be.. Complete absence of benevolence, and if this story were true then it would be the root cause of all conflict and war… What a horrible god this would be..I think.
Although give me enough time and I will find ways to also completely agree with such a god. But that another time.
…it is not all doom… actually……I just remembered where my project took it’s roots and actually it is more than it appeared in it’s latest re-incarnation.
It all started when I looked at Plato’s cave 4 years ago… (The origin of drawing being the incentive back then..) Then I searched for the origin of knowledge which is obviously a stupid thing to do, but very interesting to arrive in Babylonia and Alexandria and in southern Spain with the Muslims who saved knowledge that would have been eaten by the rats otherwise… (..none of this in this order..)
Remember they transformed southern Spain into the hub of education when most of Northern Europe lay in the dark ages…
This all was where it started.
Thank heaven’s my work is not as flat as I suddenly thought it is…
Now give me funding.
I want to do more research on the origin of knowledge and the clustering of it in different locations and along different routes at certain times throughout history. I feel that it is an investigation that relates to contemporary culture which appears to have become a culture of surface, one of having rather than being (yes, that’s a quote from Guy Deborge.. clearly miss-spellt)..
It feels like a relative revival of the Dark Ages ruled by crusades and propaganda. Fear and ignorance which people appear to willingly subscibe to and a condition they seem to embrace… However at every age there were glimmers of hope, beacons of humanity and moral….
I would like to use some time investigating the historical movements of knowledge gathering and distribution across the maps of the world…
My initial visual output I will probably concentrate on and around the fable of Babylon, the associated loss of the unifying human language and with that the fable-beginning of misunderstanding and fractioning being perhaps a root cause of war..
At the moment I envisage a sculptural and film expression/ outcome.. I just require some space to think in and work in. The exact route that the project will take will depend somewhat on the available space and resources, but essentially I can provide myself everything in order to make something. But of course the more additional resources are available the more this concept and manifestation can grow.
Access to information resources, with that the internet and well stocked libraries, are vital to me. Some opportunities for quality conversations, too.
Most I really would love to have enough time to really immerse myself in the research and experimenting with possibilities for a resulting exhibition..
I have such a strong back ground in drawing practice, which I haven’t connected with for a fairly long time, I would like to pick up on that again; in fact I feel a neccessity and deep urge to…
Venetian Infusion !
Well steeped, strong and no additives.
Just a quick note to announce my return from the place of black squid sauce and stripy blue and white sweat-shirts..
More about these Biennale Pre-view days when I have got used to that I am no longer travelling everywhere by boat or blister inducing ally-way walks…
