Yesterday was great, the beginning of a new and exciting project. I arrived at Wimbledon College of Art in the afternoon and was met by Michael Pavelka, Course Director of MA Drawing, which is based in the Centre for Drawing. The course is unusual in its focus on students developing their own individual relationship with drawing processes and methodologies, embracing what drawing is in different contexts. MA Drawing brings together a range of practices and disciplines including architecture, engineering, cartography, writing, design, the sciences, art, performance and dance. Its intention to identify commonalities between drawing across a diverse range of activities is really exciting to me, it attempts to unpick what ‘drawing’ really is in terms of real experiences beyond the university.
The afternoon was spent orientating myself in my new surroundings, locating the library, canteen, photocopier and art shop, and meeting some very friendly and helpful staff. I quickly felt very comfortable there. I’ll be working in the CfD for the next two weeks. It’s a beautiful space; light, warm (a blessing in the current snowy weather), and spacious. I’ve written in previous blog posts that I intend to respond to the physical environment of the project space, so yesterday I spent some time looking, photographing and analysing the room and what I found interesting. Since my work focuses on the drawn line, I often see lines everywhere (I suspect there’s an overdeveloped part of my brain that blocks out detail in favour of lines, shapes, geometric forms etc). Consequently I spent a long time photographing the parquet floor, finding especially fascinating a place in the centre of the room where two different wooden patterns are joined – resulting in the lines inscribed on the floor changing trajectory. It felt like a physical embodiment of a series of drawings I’d made last year, Praxis (Interrupted), where repeated lines shift in direction and start to describe a dimensional exploration of the papers’ surface. I think that this might be something I continue to look at on Monday when I return to the project space for my first full day there. I also spent time taking photographs of the bright, rectangular ceiling lights, and the light from the project space as it poured out onto the snow covered windowsill outside, shaped by the lines of the window frames. Having seen the influence of the exceptionally bright artificial lights in the space I’ll also be looking at how the natural daylight moves into and around the space during the day – which might be one of my tasks for Monday too. It’s going to be a busy day!
