Even with my new shelves I still had books left over. I had cleaned up my studio space a lot but I still needed more storage space. I was discussing my problem with the tutors on the course and they told me I could have an old cabinet down stairs. I decided to clean it up by sanding it down and I was then thinking of painting it white, to fit in with the rest of my studio space. I thought that would draw more attention to the books in and around the cabinet.
After the making of my 1st book I soon found myself surrounded by a mountain of books. I needed to think about new ways in which to house them, as I don’t think that the studio floor was practical for everyone else, so I soon decided on shelves.
I wanted to show all the books off individually but keep the feeling of unity, like they are part of something bigger. I wanted to entice the viewers when they looked up at the books on the shelves, as if they were in a library and could feel comfortable, pulling a book down and opening them up. I don’t like the idea that books are precious objects never to be touched, my work needs to be interacted with.
After a long time of trying to work out the order in which I felt worked best. This is what I came up with. I feel that each book stands out yet complements the one next to it or below it.
I have been thinking things over about my feelings towards books and how there is a deep, underlined emotional response towards the way I look at books or at least there was when I was younger. As I have got older I have started to read more and feel like I have accomplished something when I get to the end of a book.
With this in mind, I have found myself looking at books in a more of a practical way. After all since I have been on this 3 year journey, I have accepted parts of who I am; my dyslexia being one of them and this has made me learn to be a lot more critical with myself. Early on into my first year I confronted myself and accepted, that I was going to have to do a lot of reading in this stage of my life and I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but I knew that it needed to be done if I was to have any chance, of making it through the next 3 years. So I started to buy books that were short, only 150 or so pages and read them. This was to try and get into the habit of reading and become more comfortable around books and building myself up to the dreaded dissertation, (that I am happy to say was handed in last term) I feel that this plan helped me and I see books in a very different light, to what I did about 5 years ago.
So how have I changed the way I work considering books. I now understand there purpose and get the feeling of a book. I can even understand when people say “that new book smell” and over the last few years I have started to understand that turning the page. But we all have different feelings to the way a book should be treated. Some of us are very strict and feel that they should be kept in mint condition. Others think it is ok to jot notes down in the margin. I am happy to ‘dog ear’ a page and use it as a bookmark as to where I am.
I personally think it is ok to fold a page of a book and this got me thinking about how the book was not in perfect condition anymore and had become damaged in the process. This sparked off a new idea and I decided to destroy a book. The idea was to literally cut it in half.
This was the end result. Simple yet effective. The destroying of this book would set me onto a new path with my project.
These photographs are some edits that I did over the weekend; they are of a fly over in London. I have played around with the colour and the sharpness of the photos as well as darkening the corners of the image. The reason I did this was because I wanted to draw the viewer’s eye down the path and focus the attention on the graffiti on the wall. I felt that the wall with the rubbish, that had been dumped there held a statement about the way the city is treated, as well as the way the city can treat you. London can be a place that dreams are made. It can also be a place that engulfs you and twists your perception of what is right and what is wrong. If you spend enough time in the city like in most places you begin to go through the motions not really looking or paying attention to what is happening to you. As I was editing this image I found myself thinking more about the city and what it was that draws me in like a moth to a flame.
These edits are of a market in London. There is something about this photo that I love, it felt like the image could have been taken anywhere in the world. I love moments like this, it makes me feel like I have been lost in a completely different place and time with no real sense of a local environment that I can become accustomed to. It leaves the imagination to run free.
If you see the date in the Diary (The Red Book) you will understand the inspiration that got me thinking about this idea. This work was created out of me thinking about how much I hated reading at school. I will always remember how I hated having to read out things, or reading parts of books out loud in front of the class.
The work is meant to resemble white chalk on a blackboard with sentences. I remember thinking as a child that I never really got the point of why the teacher used to write things down on the board, then go off on a tangent, talking about things that were loosely connected to what was written on the board. By the time a teacher had finished answering all the questions of the class that always went off topic, it just seemed like a waste of time.
I mean, surely I wasn’t the only one who didn’t get the point of the board. When the teacher use to read everything that was on it. I guess I just found it easier to listen to what the teacher said.
