Konfirmation systemizing: Revaluing Autistic Thinking – Autism Research Centre residency

A Sunday very shortlist

Portsmouth 21st July

Awake and up early – we had to shut the window last night due to chimney smoke – who and why they would need a fire in their house in this weather but at midday received Good news for the project today,

1. Date for documentary interview filming with Prof Simon BC in Cambridge confirmed

2. Moved and watered plants in garden after news came

3. Ignored Casino Royale on TV 17 minutes before news came

4. Eating apple pie when the news came

Thank you for following this blog – it will continue as we evaluate the project and apply to take the project further for Konfirm 2 but I am now continuing to blog here:

www.a-n.co.uk/p/3612518

I have spent 3 years logging my every move and my engagement as an artist within the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad – the project was awarded Cultural Olympiad branding and I had unique access in the South East of England to artists projects and perfomers

I have mapped my personal life, ups and downs decent into illness and the death of my mother alongside endless travel and engagement with London 2012 projects.

The final artifact will be a geological map complete with stratigraphy and complex timelines – later an Ibook complete with these crossections and study of fossils (at least 5000 collected items – almost a hoarder)

This is the blog for reviewing all the 1000 day logs as we investigate for the first time and then drawing the map from all the fragments that have been incidentally collected.

‘Look up but do not Fall’

Portsmouth – Bristol – Portsmouth July 11th

Poem written from the landscap viewed from the Train on route to ACE:SW in Bristol

Roll me
Downslope
Thru chalk
To ditch
Embedded flints field
Of polished bronze

Roll me
Thru fern filled wood
Of hesitant grey
where I live to shout
Welcome

To long lost love

Once ice cold
Tundra capped and
Held in potential
Until heated retreat

Roll me
Thru corn
Ripe for picking
With insect & crow call
Heard in the midst
Or defective in yaw
As I spin
Dirt sky
Dirt sky
Dirt sky
Till face down
I breath in richness
And look inward
At the fall
To cry
‘Survival’
Relishing her
Thin air
And hollow words

so

Rise son
Collect
Orchids
For their return
found Precious
Touch stone
A million year
Story gone Unheard
tumbled Streamward
Washed clean
Gaining
Acceptance
On my cluttered
Window sill

but

You I admire
Resilient book

borrowed
From a twice daily refreshed beach library

You I admire

now residing without number
Forever in my heart

Un-trained poet

Portsmouth – Brighton – Portsmouth July 10th

2 poems written on way to ACE:SE event

We fly
Thru
Fast fields
Tracks
Springing into view
Like tracer
90 degree avenues
As unsettled
Crows rise
At our passing
Sustained
With mirth

Sing to me
Tales of corrugated soils
Spun from note birds
Semi quavers
Set at distance and level
Written
In position
On 6 power line staves

and 2 poems written on returning after

Leave me
To wonder
Streets
paved with mould
As your shadow
Falls
Hesitant
On bird or beast
Complete
In their haste
To leave me
& wonder
Why?

Sun
Low red
Burns zero sized
Holes in my retina
As we cross
Her boarders
Where the hare’s play
Trespass
On the hour
Ever hour
Till midnight

‘I am a chair therefore I am a chair’

Portsmouth – Brighton – Portsmouth July 9th

Still resting and finding it hard to deal with ‘outside’ at the moment – sometimes its hard to push outside of you when the inside is unwilling – I repeat mantra ‘artist 247’ 10x on waking and 19x before bed – shifting minor continents and repossessing my confidence.

Now begins evaluation time – systemizing and bringing together.

Friday: Busy day helping to support the Accentuate South East symposium at Brighton University we had set up – Culture shifting one year on from the games: I was also Chairing the Public art debate with some great guests with an artist, CEO of IXIS, an officer from The British Council and National Director of AA2A.

I had a problem – where do I start my panel intro – I wanted it to be light but reflect the seriousness of the day and the weighty (not literally) panel. Also my aspergers causes havoc when I refer to anything – It has to be literal – I have a problem being referred to as a ‘Chair’ – yes I know its a title but like in Sunday school always being told ‘I am a door’ it just confuses the learning and situation – literalism. So suddenly sitting there in the audience in the first sessions not quite in a panic as there were a few hours left to write something it came to me – why not confess that – The session was ‘Disabled artists forging a carear…’ so had a problem with literally ‘forging’ too esp in the current climate of papers reporting on disabled people and austerity ..

Sat and wrote the 20 things I wanted to say – ordered them and placed in a ‘visual memory journey’ – something I was taught to foster buy a psychologist who saw I had a talent for this – as a dyslexic I have a duff STM but great LTM – so you input as pictures – I also have synaesthesia which helps as I can do the ‘journey’ in the dark and feel the memory objects I place – brilliant trick for sequencing and gave me confidence important to someone with hidden disability ( and yes low self esteem counts as the disability – not my aspergers or dyslexia)

So I started talk with ‘welcome – I have a problem….etc’ and people laughed so started relaxed (on the whole aspies should not tell jokes – i.e. ‘what do you call 2 crows in a tree – attempted murder’ – see told you.

Panel went well – though we were subject to some cuting in timing as we were the last of the day and by that time a deficit had accumulated from all the others..

Then a brief note from the return Journey

My Sun
Washes
In fragments
Across
Pink
Blue
& bow
While
Clouds
Whisper away
to nothing
A half
Turned smile
is My reward
for
Looking and
catching
Her gaze