I’m trying to expand my art-practice, and have been experimenting with different media. First I wanted to paint and draw, but it’s not something that’s easily done lying down, and when I sit up (which usually means propped up against surface) I’m just not relaxed enough – have to concentrate on holding my body in position, and whatever I do can’t be maintained for long. Over the last few months I have tried other possibilities for image-making. I’ve got hundreds of inch-sized sketches, tiny templates for my outfits, and have always regretted that I can’t crochet them all. Cutting out shapes is something I can do while supine! Here’s a way of playing with them, having fun and seeing where it takes me. Fun isn’t normally high on my list of things to do/achieve, but I’ve moved it way up. My explorations of inherited memory are, as I’m German, weighed down by an almost intolerable load of history, and I need a counterbalance so things don’t get on top of me. They have, rather.
My impetus for art-making tends to come from meaning, content, issues even, around which I build with materials, shapes, colours, textures. I want to turn things around a bit, engage with form for its own sake, those lines and arches which fascinate me in my outfits, esp. as I feel I’ve become a bit too precious. Having to weigh up limited energies, the pressure of trying to make the most of any viable moment, has driven me to focus on producing and presenting pristine pieces and texts – no waste, no spoils, no mistakes – well, not quite true of course, but you see what I mean…
Anyway. I’ve got a body of work and making my outfits comes easy now: I can let loose a bit. Will continue to crochet (of course, two pieces in progress), make my own memory-objects from ebay-acquisitions, and try to explore the shapes and templates I use in crochet in different ways, cutting, folding, collageing, 2D and 3D, in my inimitable slowslowslow stop-and-rest-and-go way, without a goal in mind (oh, I feel that pressure mounting – away, away!). It will be good to move aside from affect and pathos which seem to come to me so ‘naturally’, and towards a concentration on the language of forms. It’ll all come together again, won’t it?
To achieve more of a process-atmosphere I’ve turned the mdf-board which I use when I document finished work into a smallish studio-wall. Normally I have a couple of crochet-pieces pinned up for my pleasure, but they’ve been packed away for now. And there are floor-experiments. Presenting all this here feels a bit uncomfortable, given that it’s not ‘work’ yet, but I’m also excited: a back to basic moment, full of potential.
Had a little art-outing last week, and although still not at my ‘normal’ M.E.-levels I continue to feel stimulated and excited by Ellen Gallagher‘s and Saloua Raouda Choucair’s work at Tate Modern. A brief visit only as energies didn’t last, but I needed to get this one in before medical appointments monopolise my out-of-the-house-energies again: I more or less whizzed through on borrowed electro-scooter. Would have liked to linger, inspect, scrutinise, revel. Instead I ended up with my head on the counter at the staff-exit while waiting for my mini-cab. Have got the catalogues though, to peruse and ponder…
