Awareness is a curious thing.
One of the short stories we are reading for the Swedish course is a translation of Julio Cortàzar’s Axolotl. Having not read an English translation it took two readings for me to be confident that I had not misunderstood it entirely. Alongside the story is a small black and white picture of an axolotl – the image is quite captivating. On Wednesday I went to Mejan to drop off my request for workshop induction courses and noticed the poster for the ‘welcome party’, in the top right corner is an image of another axolotl. All of a sudden I found myself wondering about the connections and significances between quite separate appearances of this strange creature. Encountering something unusual twice, and in different contexts, alerted me to it, heightened my awareness and I began to wonder if the axolotl might be a sign or motif … of what, I do not know!
My first week at Mejan gave me some sense of the year to come – a blend of fantastic opportunities and possibilities, along with a need for concentrated focus and structure. The introductory day gave me the sense of becoming part of a well-established and historic institution; the school’s principle continuing the tradition of calling, by name, each member of the new classes up on stage to receive a round of applause. This was followed by the academic and administrative staff introducing themselves. Then everyone went outside for a group photo. It was an old-fashioned large format camera, and perhaps it was this that gave me sense that standing there and being photographed was some kind of entry into the history of Swedish art. I was really pleased to meet another artist from last year’s Artistic Research course, she is on a fascinating and very theoretical sounding course. We are both also continuing with the next research course at ‘the other’ art school! A tour of school’s workshops and facilities in the afternoon made me envy students embarking on the five year combined BA and MA course but also think about how equally easily one can also be simply distracted by possibilities.
The next day there was a lunch for project programme students – there are a lot of us! Many of the others have previously studied at the school and are returning after years of working independently. As I looked around the table I was pleased to see a good range of ages! Purely by chance my ‘supervisor’ sat beside me, by even more chance the person on her other side was her other student! It was good to meet her, especially as she was leaving for the UK that afternoon and would be away for two weeks! (We have now arranged our first proper meeting for the 24th.) This day made me realise that I am there as a professional artist, and not a student – and this might well be a very significant aspect of my learning and development during the year. Perhaps what I need to acquire (refine?) is a more professional approach and attitude to my practice, to be less ‘backward about coming forward’ as they say. I do not mean that I want be develop arrogance or bravado, more that I want to develop my practice into something in which has a more pronounced of cohesion. To somehow develop it’s integrity and place in the world. Why does this sense of being a ‘real’ artist always seem to be just out of reach?
Having said that this elusive sense of being professional (on my own terms) feel more ‘almost within my grasp’ than it has done previously.
There is a line in Wim Wenders’ film on Pina Bausch about having the courage to ‘let the crazy out’. It struck a chord with me, it is perhaps this courage that I seek, that I want to find within me, that will give my practice the core and integrity that it sometimes lacks. I wonder if I need the opposite of ‘blind courage’, and if that need is why I seek knowledge and understanding – not for its external worth but rather for the possibilities that it opens up internally?
