Redirection and Network Timeout

It is interesting returning to your old and own culture, with a refreshed pair of eyes. Before I left for China, myself and my partner had decided that after I returned, we would move out of London. It has been six years since I left Edinburgh for London, and I have loved it, but it is an expensive city, and when you work part-time, attempting to develop your career as an artist, money is tight. Money was not the only issue; quality of life, a sense of community, travelling times and openess of people. Over the last few years, I have enjoyed getting to know the Manchester scene, and due to cheaper rental, closeness to home, and having a few friends here already we have decided to make this city our next home. We are currently staying Cheshire with my partners parents, it is so quiet and relaxed here in the countryside, I am starting to consider never returning to an urban environment again.

Whist being on the residency, I was very interested in watching how people interacted. I read a lot about work/social life relations, and how these are much more intertwined. I thought initially that I would tire of this, but I think due to this attachment, I became close to many people (as close as you can when you don’t speak the language). Most of the people I met lived within walking distance, worked within walking distance – there was a real community. A ‘micro’ community as I called it within one of my map drawings. The constant bumping into each other became a supportive, reassuring mechanism.

On the last night when I walked to a dumpling shopwith Helen Kaplinsky, a British curator who is now on the residency, I bumped into Peng Bo another artist I had met before, and had given me a lovely drawing. He joined us for dinner. Later we met with other artists in the bar.

My social life in London happened when I arranged it after a 1 hour train ride. I first lived centrally in a house with friends, where we each had a room and no living room. As we wanted more space, I lived with my partner, and worked from home in a flat further out of town. Social life, as everyone knows in London, is hard to keep up without a load of cash or time,

Tonight I sat on the sofa watching Eastenders. In the last year, I have become an avid fan, also because I didn’t have the cash or time to have my own social life as much as I would have liked.

I felt a real sense of community in HuangJeping, and I think that really helped my work. Sometimes in London, even when I was on my MA, the environment, travelling so far, and so many people did not support my practice, I was left feeling tired and overwhelmed. I often think of the days on my BA in Dundee. Life was simple getting from A to B. Home. College. Gym. Lunch. College. Cinema. Home. College. Lunch. Gym. Dancing. Home. All within a small radius. All walkable.

YanYan told me that many people stay in HuangJuePing, live, work and sleep there- a micro community. Am I best functioning in this kind of community? It is definitely one that I am yearning for it feels. I hope living in a northern town provides what I am looking for. I love London and always will, but there are many aspects I can’t keep up with. I am down to earth girl at heart, who just wants to have the space and time to make work, that’s all.

I have hit life in UK back with a bump, and although I am enjoying the food and company, I have all the job/home/studios issues to sort out as expected.

I arrived back to Chongqing from Xian on the 9th July, where I met Helen, the next resident practitioner at 501, so we had a good chat about logistics etc of navigating the residency. True to form, a lunch hosted by YanYan’s friend turned out to be a banquet for around twelve people including students, a soldier, a Texan man, a lively chinese/italian/american lady and a range of wives. Never a dull moment in HuangJuePing. The last evening we spent with a few European artists, and stayed with YanYan. In the morning Shu Wen cooked us a lovely breakfast and we took the plane to Hong Kong for one night, and then next morning a very bumpy flight, with an even bumpier landing back to Heathrow. After many hours travelling, we arrived back at Manchester airport ready for a long sleep.

So far since returning, I have been cleaning clothes, looking for work, following up possible job leads, and trying to get all my China affairs into order. I managed to transport all my drawings safely in hand luggage with no extra cost, so I need to get some good shots of these for my website and applications. I am also heading down to London at the end of next week to give an artists talk at the Camden Arts Centre, which focuses on recording and disseminating your practice, as well as a lightning paper at the INTERFACE conference at UCL. So I really need to get going on preparing for these. I will also be doing a little freelance work while down, having a group crit with fellow artists, and I need to start thinking about writing my evaluation for the Arts Council. I have a group show in October (three artists – myself, Hannah Westwood and Harriet Hill), and I need to have some meetings to start on research.

I am hopefully seeing a studio at Mirabel Studios in Manchester next week, so I hope its a winner, as I would like to get into a space asap. So much to get on with, so many ideas, it is a good position to be in..

(The photographs are from the Muslim mosque in Xian, China)

I am feeling sad that it is only two nights back until we head back to the UK.

This trip has been really important for me, with more than regards to having an opportunity to make work and have a show. It may sound odd but I feel like I have rebuilt a relationship with Asia. After living in Japan for 18 months, in a very rural area, for most of my time there I swung from a love/hate relationship with living in an Asian country, leaving on very much hating it. Sure, the old feelings of being stared at, feeling overweight, and hostesses giggling with nervousness when a foreigner walks in the restaurant gets tiresome, but I think I would like to come back for another project, especially Japan. With regards to undertaking a residency, I think it is wise to choose a country where you can speak a good grasp of the language, so I think I am going to research into Japan, Italy and France for residency opportunities.

We have seen some fantastic sites since we left Chongqing. We stopped off in Chengdu for a couple of days where we enjoyed the slower way of life, teahouses, and traditional streets and took a trip to the panda reserve. We then took an 18 hour journey by sleeper train to Xian, which was an adventure to say the least, and we arrived here to a thunderstorm, little sleep and hungry tummies. Xian is a wealth of history, a walled city that follows the same Ming layout as Beijing. We have also been learning about town planning in different ages in China at various museums, and we also visited the terracotta warriors today. It is a mind-blowing mausoleum that reminds of you of the importance of physicality, memorials, craftsmanship, and that a project that is worth doing takes a long time, and may need to involve many people.

We have just one night left in Xian before we head back to Chongqing to stay with YanYan, and then fly back to HK and home. Life awaits us there, I need to find more teaching work, and we need to find an apartment in Manchester. We will be staying with my partners parents temporarily, which will be another culture shock for sure. Although they are lovely, as this month has proved, I am stubbornly independent girl at heart, and want to get everything sorted asap when we get home. Two days of holiday/de-installing the exhibition in China, and funny strangeness left though, so I will be enjoying them. Here are pictures of some of the things I have seen.

Today is my last day in Chongqing (apart from when we stop off for one day and night before we fly to Hong Kong). We spent the day packing, and then we went to the train ticket office to buy train tickets to Chengdu, had a look around YangJaPing, and we took the monorail into town. It is a fantastic view of the city high above the river on the side of the mountain.

Tonight Dave and I had dinner with YanYan at his apartment, it was a lovely meal, and over the past month he has been a fantastic host. We are getting ready to head to Chengdu tomorrow, and begin our travelling adventure – I will still keep posting from time to time.

The pictures are from yesterdays studio visits to Oliver Gosling, Bao Le and Yan (German Artist).