Oxford Brookes @ Swindon College

Life has most definitely immitated art this week. I hadn’t realised how deadly degree show deadlines are. I had no idea that I would find these last couple of weeks so stressful and that everything that could have a hiccup did have a hiccup.

The work itself is fine, I’m confident in my practice. I enjoyed installing the work and feel I’ve presented the best of my final studio work.

I hadn’t prepared myself for how long the minutiae would take and how many tiny things could go wrong and how much extra time that would need. My hours have been long and my efforts been great.

I hope I’ve done enough.

Now that the submission dates have passed, I’m planning to spend the week planning future work. There are a couple of collaborations in the pipleline and some ideas for residencies/projects bubbling under. A little bit of artistic breathing space is needed now to turn the end of the degree into the start of something new.

And then there were three…pasting tables that is. I’ve spent the day pulling together my research, annotating sketchbooks and testing the display of my main drawing.

I’m planning to use table clips – they’re stainless steel, look utilitarian and will give enough stability to the drawing as it lies flat on three pasting tables. It all ‘fits’. I folded each section to be able to work on them in sequence each day and each fold sits along the gap between the tables. I think I’m going to have to perhaps clamp the tables together to stop them moving and there now appear to be quite a few decisions to be made:

– do I cut the drawing so it sits exactly on the pasting tables or leave the entire roll intact?

– how many clips should I use?

– should I revisit the idea I had about providing magnifying glasses or is that just a ridiculous notion?

– should I title each section or the drawing as a whole

– who is providing the wall titles, me or college? how long is it going to take to get them produced?

– where am I going to park at the venue and how am I going to drop this little lot off?

– where exactly should I place the sound?

– how much sound should I play? one recording of each vertical/horizontal on a loop?

– how am I going to photograph this for my professional practice?

As ever, particularly at this stage of my studies, one action seems to provoke a long list of further actions or questions.

A done deal – 1 roll of best quality lining paper, 1 pasting table, a supply of biros, 30 days and a twinge in my lower back later – my main piece of work for the degree show is finished.

I foolishly thought that I would feel some relief and jubilation on completion of this drawing. Although not a huge physical effort, each sequence takes about 20/25 minutes, this drawing has generated more than it’s physical entity.

Every time I have drawn, I’ve been thinking about the drawing itself, drawing in general and my artistic practice. I’ve observed how the lines of the drawing, which I thought would blacken and darken the paper completely, have congregated into groups, leaving a surprising amount of white space.

As each drawing has taken place, the difference made by the repeated sequence of lines become less and less noticeable – logical really but not an outcome I’d anticipated.

I’m planning to make a square piece after the degree with a greater focus on recording each line and the accumulation. The recording I have done for this piece has been mainly around obtaining a record of time and sound. As I start to examine those times and sounds, I’m becoming more conscious of those elements of my practice. Things that began as practicalities are becoming more important.

This ritual of drawing has become a sort of meditation – a time to reflect and think as well as do. It is important for me to keep this in mind during the next couple of weeks as the final deadline looms.

Today is the last scheduled day for my daily drawing. It has been interesting to see how the lines have formed. I expected to produce a dense, black drawing over thirty days but this doesn’t seem to have happened. The lines appear to have gathered and accumulated into groups.

I make sure, as far as possible, that I start and end each line in a different place and then move the biro horizontally (50 times), or vertically (175 times) across or along each section. The more lines I’ve drawn the darker some sections have become and small, elongated gaps have formed where the biro slips into particular grooves or paths made over the month.

There are a few blobs and smudges where the biros have blotted or clogged but there are still definable lines.

I am looking forward to installing it at the degree show and have to make some decisions around either displaying it one long length (as it’s been made) across three pasting tables or to cut and display the sections separately.

I’ll also be incorporating some of the sound recordings into the space. The recordings have an ethereal, organic quality that is opposed, I think, to the production of the biro drawing.