rolling my dung, in four acts

A sisyphean day of 30s… having freelance work at the FACT centre to earn £30 only to find a parking ticket to pay £30..

… now that was today. What do I gain from the experience? A pat on the shoulder for having tried my best. That doesn't quite seem satisfying.

A brief meeting with film-maker gained me a confirmation that he is up for filming for nothing much more than the covering of the actual expenses of doing so. Oh thank all heavens for that. Now I am short of one assistant and then the camera can roll… I think we will schedule the weekend for mid-late May or mid-June, alternatively.

All my applications came back rejected. I am an artistic reject. Let's see if I can't turn that round by 180 degrees in the next 12 months. Can I become the equivalent of hot-cake instead? My other collaborator said this: Turn towards the light… And so I shall. As spiritual as that sounds. But what is wrong with spirit? Now I have 30 days to make the structures for exhibition in St Luke's and perhaps I can find a follow on exhibition for them, too.

The 7 Giants will stand tall and proud, strong a watchful in the ruin of St Lukes which was severely damaged in WW2. The church remains a memorial to lives lost, fates suffered. Not that its presence often stops anybody in their tracks anymore to contemplate the past and it's lingering echos into this presence.. But there it stands nevertheless, a memorial. In it I will place 7 bird hides / forester's hides, standing tall on elongated legs. watchful. Whether they are friend or foe remains open. 7 giants on tall legs viewing over the space. 7 because that is the great number of fables, tales and belief.7 to indicate the quality of my thoughts and search for expression.

My project is not a statement, not a conclusion or answer but a search for truth, abstract notions of truth of who we are, us, these humans. My art work really is better described as a journey not a conclusion. To ask what my work is about is to ask "What has moved you in the past year, 10 years or in fact since you became aware of anything moving you at all." And just how does one give an answer, a concrete solid answer with brevity..? It's "always" that is in the art work, it's not the isolated moment that is in it.

A life philosophy becoming visual, tangible, solid. A sharing of intimate concerns and searches, that is what the art is. Of course I have no expectation that it is that to you, to the audience. But I hope it shows. A section of the inside of my thoughts, on exhibition in St Luke's. From the 30th of May for 2 weeks only..

My spelling makes me laugh: a wether is a castrated ram… (wether = ram; whether ..)

I am still busy collecting cardboard. Like a womble…

Tonight I sat here looking through old images that I took to draw from and I got carried away altering them, getting ideas from them. I sometimes feel like an ideas-factory. Let's just hope it's a good, stylish, chic, italian one, not a cheap chinese one with slave laborers..

I found out about a great website. I think this is where I clearly have a few adulterated genes in me… I started getting very excited when I heard about this site… A website selling hardware like nuts and bolts.

Cheaper than those dreadful chain DIY stores.. Oh, I shouldn't be mean, one of those is currently my life-saver.. Oh dear..

So re-phrasing : I very much love the chain-DIY store, it is my life-saver, yet, my wallet loves the online store more.

I hope that is suitably diplomatic?

If you want the name for the site then please contact me somehow. I can't type it here, because it sounds dreadfully dubious.. (Just apply your imagination as to how dodgy a site for nuts and bolts could accidentally have been named…So as I would prefer not to end up in someone's bad books for advertising a site that sounds like it contains nudity… but doesn't.. well, you get the picture. Contact me and I will give you the online-diy-store details).

So here in this post is a photo I took of myself for my drawing practice. The image has nothing to do with my current main project, but could easily evolve into one of my next 'sideline-projects'.

Good night.

taking stock in case I am confusing everyone:

I am working on:

'Dungbeetle and Sisyphus'

'Giants' for St Luke's, Liverpool

'Devotional Choreography' for Bridewell Gallery, Liverpool

and am working with Steve Boyland on a variation of Devotional Choreography "Khoreia".

And I am devising a new project based on Idioms.

Yes, it's a lot to co-ordinate and sometimes I feel fuzzy.

Now I have 7 huge stores collecting their cardboard for me..

It occurs to me that I could easily accumulate enough to build a warm shelter in which I could live when I move to London.

Tomorrow is a big cardboard collection day. I decided to collect a bulk load before starting the constructions.

So this thursday I will go down to London and spend a few days between galleries and friends. I have been barred from my usual habitat down there which makes the prospect of living in cardboard dwellings all the more tempting..

I am looking for an assistant to work with me from next week. On 4 long afternoons a week. (5-6 hour sessions) It would be acrazy amount of work to try and construct all of my cardboard hides/watchtowers on my own.

Listening to the theme tune of my teenage years: Tom Petty's "Learning to Fly"..

The progress today: I have been to several DIY shops, sellers of technological gadgetry and a bed-supplier. And all are enthusiastically promising to save all their corrugated cardboard for me to collect weekly until I have enough to build all 7 large forester's houses on stilts.. I struggle to explain them in English.

You will see soon..

The exhibition for St Luke's has now been confirmed for the 30th of May, I am trying to negotiate a starting date of 3-4 days earlier than that. But there is some time yet. But for now the dates will be 30th of May to 13th of June. Just 2 weeks, not 3 as I originally hoped. So much work and then just 2 weeks.. In future I will have to make sure to negotiate a certain effort to exhibition period ratio!!! But this is good. A solo show in the centre of Liverpool in a venue that is busy and accessible to all types and shapes and sizes of people.

Bingo!