In a conversation about our respective creative work with a couple of other artists on Tuesday night, I announced that I was going to take a break from writing this blog. I surprised myself a bit by saying it, but then it’s often said that the most meaningful conversations take place in the pub.
And anyway, it didn’t come completely out of the blue, it’s something that’s been on my mind – especially since that Monday, a couple of weeks ago when I took a long, hard look at my studio space – essentially, looking at how workable it is – or not, as the case may be. Such thoughts arose from a long nine hour stint of sorting, a nine hour stint of unpacking a whole load of things from boxes.
Unpacking the boxes is always exciting for me – I’ve held onto all this stuff for some reason or other, after all. And however many times I’ve seen them, most of the items unpacked from the boxes never fail to delight me. It’s through rediscovering them, that new ideas for making work often come up.
But it also creates mayhem and chaos and with just a few unpacked, the studio floor quickly becomes full, littered with books, objects, photos and clothing taken from the boxes. It’s always the way – by the time I’ve emptied just a fraction of them, there’s no spare floor space, no room to manoeuvre and making work of any sort is made completely impossible.
I’ve been in this situation a few times now; the only solution after sorting seems to be to repack things and re-stack the boxes in order to re-establish a space for making. There are times of course, when the sorting becomes a positive part of the whole creative process – when new ideas are formed.
At other times, though it’s felt like I’m quite literally shifting things from one place to another, without any clear sense of purpose. It’s what I call the hamster wheel scenario – going round and round in circles and crucially, not getting anywhere. This unpacking and repacking routine has started to feel increasingly pointless and dissatisfying.
Time at the studio is limited and precious enough as it is; I feel the need to find ways to make use of that time as effectively and as constructively as possible. My studio space needs to be made more workable and I need to have easier access to the stuff in storage. A studio visit from an artist on Thursday confirmed this; I couldn’t immediately put my hand to the glassware I wanted to show her and I felt frustrated about being disorganised in this way and even slightly unprofessional as a result. I was also included in a fun twitter exchange with some other artists at the end of this week just gone and felt equally as frustrated about not knowing where my handkerchief collection was so that I could get involved with some photo sharing.
continued …
