Earlier this month 15 Scents of Our Time candles were housed at Mugen Tea House – a café in Sheffield. It marked a shift in context in comparison to my residency in Access Space, which by its nature afforded a degree of experimentation within the space itself. I treated my show at Mugen Tea House as a straight exhibition, delivering 15 fully formed candles to the venue where they remained for the duration.
This meant that I approached the candle making process a little differently. Gone was the sense of urgency required to make candles within an allotted time in favour of a more considered approach prior to the exhibition. This resulted in candles that in essence were more competent, but perhaps lost a certain urgency that previously aligned the candles to the fervent nature of breaking news.
While there is no correct or incorrect approach to my candle making process, I believe finding a balance between active response and competent construction is key. Ultimately I want Scents of Our Time to deliver on two grounds: Providing an alternative and subversive perception of candle making and revealing the capacity candle making has for narrative. A combination of considered aesthetics and active responses to news stories should ensure this.
I suppose the important thing now is to keep going, keep refining the process and attempt to find that balance.
