Keeping It Going

Life v Art: a postscript to my last blog post …

Reconcilation: reuniting, reunion, bringing back together again, pacification, resolution, appeasement, placating

I’ve read Anne Truitt’s ‘Daybook’ a lot over the past few years – it’s very much a ‘go to’ book for me. It resonates a great deal and is particularly relevant to my last post here which I wrote just a day or two ago …

‘Experience tells me that it’s best to just give into things – give up on plans to make any work until the proverbial storm has passed. But that’s all much more easily said than done, as so many artists know – that perpetual nagging feeling about wanting to be making work, versus the feeling that you ought to be somewhere else – a tension around what we should be doing, as opposed to what we want to do.’

Anne Truitt speaks for many artists – women artists and mothers, particularly. It’s an easy to read, accessible book, Truitt telling it like it is in all things associated with life and art – and the effort required to find a balance between the two – to excel at both, even.

Anne Morrow Lindbergh describes Truitt’s ‘Daybook’ as ‘a remarkable record of a woman’s reconciliation of art, motherhood, memories of childhood, and present-day demands.’

The word ‘reconciliation’ mentioned in Morrow’s quote (on the book’s front cover) resonated more than ever in a week of trying to bring together so many different strands of life – wanting to make work, to keep being an artist, alongside being as supportive daughter as I can to a currently unwell, elderly parent. Generally, to find a balance – to try and maintain an artistic practice at the same time as keeping up with everyday demands.

Life has truly got in the way of being able to make any work lately, both in terms of physically making it and having the headspace to even think about it. Hospital visits and helping in the organisation of subsequent care at home has taken up pretty much all of the past six weeks – a lot of time that would otherwise, have been spent in the studio. Experience tells me that it’s best to just give into things – give up on plans to make any work until the proverbial storm has passed. But that’s all much more easily said than done, as so many artists know – that perpetual nagging feeling about wanting to be making work, versus the feeling that you ought to be somewhere else – a tension around what we should be doing, as opposed to what we want to do. I received a really encouraging text from an artist friend this week. She knows I’ve had a lot on my plate recently and reassured me: ‘The best work happens alongside your real life and is a part of it, not something that happens by following a template.’

And Paul Cezanne had this to say:

‘Life is art. Art is life. I never separate it.’

Which leads me to thinking about the run up to ‘Hidden,’ a group show in which I have my work, ‘Us Too’ included. The work is composed of a group of ready made ceramic figurines, representing older women. Their mouths have been covered with Elastoplast – ‘silencing them and their calls for help’ as I wrote in the description I sent to Amy Oliver, curator of The House of Smalls art gallery in Stockbridge, Edinburgh.

Packing up my work came in the very midst of regular daily visits to a hospital ward for elderly women and it felt very much a case of life reflecting art/art reflecting life; I saw many of the women on the ward reflected in the silenced, repressed figurines I’d parcelled up and sent to Amy. And though I can’t be certain of it, my impression was that those women on the ward with no advocacy, whether consciously or not, were more likely to be ignored and have their needs listened to. This is an observation, not a criticism (I have nothing but admiration for NHS staff working under such pressure), but my experiences on a geriatric ward for women over a two week period, meant I couldn’t help but think about older women in society at large and how they are so frequently ignored, marginalised and overlooked.

‘Hidden’ is a group show which includes the work of 60 women artists. Launched to coincide with White Ribbon Day (on November, 25), it features work responding to issues around domestic violence. If you happen to be in the Edinburgh area between now and December 22nd, do try and get along to see it.

For more information about ‘Hidden’ please click on the link below:

https://www.thehouseofsmalls.art/hidden