Staffordshire University

I have heard the creating of art compared with giving birth. A comparison that sounds good at first glance but that really does not stand up to scrutiny. As far as I know, no woman, after going through pregnancy and child birth has ever heard a midwife say

‘nope, that doesn’t work for me, Maybe you should start again?’

or

‘Why don’t you try adding an extra leg?’.

I can’t sleep tonight, despite being so tired that my eyes keep closing without consulting me first. Yet although my body wants to close down for the night, my mind has other ideas. If it is not doing re-runs of todays events its off gathering random thoughts from dark places.

Meanwhile a small voice is whispering doubts into my ear.

Why am I putting myself through this? Is it worth it? Whatever made me think I could do this?

They are, or course, rhetorical questions that I will have forgotten about next week or perhaps even tomorrow. But for tonight, after a bad day, they keep me awake and wondering why I didn’t chose to study something that has clear cut answers and does not rely on the subjective judgements of others.

If there is such a thing. (Only this evening someone told me that 2 +2 is not necessarily 4 as I had always belived, but can sometimes be 3.)

I am still stressing about the ‘It’s not a bit like the Waltons’ piece. Or rather I have returned to stressing about it after a brief delusion that I had reached a resolution and produced something I was pleased with. Having previously suffered from this particular delusion, I should have known better.

This week has been our Interim exhibition and there has been some very interesting work shown. I have really enjoyed seeing the various directions taken by my colleagues and speculating on the possible shape of our final exhibition.

Today was my groups seminar. Although I was nervous about showing the latest incarnation of the ‘Walthons’, I was also convinced that I had ‘cracked it’ so to speak.

It received, what I can only describe as a ‘mixed reception’. The comments from my peers were generally positive . Sometimes in the past I have had a problem with ‘activting’ my work. It has needed me to explain or to give some kind of background information. This was not the case today. I was pleased with the responses and interested in the new or extrapolated readings, possibilities that I had not been aware of. Especially as at least two of the audience had no previous knowledge of my work so were looking at it with fresh eyes.

So far so good. Just as I began to relax…

I can’t remember either of the two tutors present saying even one positive thing. Every comment was about completely changing what I had done. One of them has previously been interested in my use of text and especially lists. Today one of them dismissed the text completely and wanted it got rid of entirely. Gone was all the previous discussions of ‘integration’ and the talk was all of ‘sculptural form’. I feel utterly demoralised.

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“So what’s important to you? The object or the text? How wedded are you to the combination?’ … or words to that effect … spoken by a fellow student during a self directed seminar.

Damn!

I have to make a decision?

I have to make a decision.

The text of course.

An immediate response easily made because the meaning (meaning? my meaning? the viewers meaning?), resides in the words that were being projected on to and behind the object.

So the object is extraneous?

Maybe.

Yes.

No!

The object is…

something else?

Are there two pieces of work here that I am trying to combine? Like a marriage that should work according to the facts but hasn’t take the individuals feelings into account.

I’m rambling.

I think.

Or maybe I think? Out loud? Out line? On line?

I don’t like lines very much. At least not straight ones, except when…but that’s another story.

Back to this story.

I suspect this is fundamentally about my practise. About what it is, or might become. Am I an installation artist? An artist who works with text? with sculpture?

Am I an artist?

What is an artist?

Does it matter what I call myself? How I am defined?

How I am defined? or how my work is defined? An interesting slip of the pen.

Again, back to the subject. This work. A work that keeps growing and shrinking and gobbling up ideas both serious and whimsical.

It began with the parts of a rocking crib laid out on the floor in my studio space. Moving them around like a jigsaw puzzle I fell in love with the shapes and the texture and the possibilities of shadow.

Then came the phrase. A title. ‘It ‘s not a bit like the Waltons’. A wry comment. Tongue in cheek? It’s not like East Enders either. Family life. Families.

Next came the list. There is almost always a list! Social comment?

At Christmas I projected the list on to the crib.

Maybe something. More work definitely needed.

Arranging and rearranging the seperate parts has been fascinating and intriguing. The way they related to each other. The spaces in and out and in between. How together, they create a brand new whole.

Now, I project the words and I am left with a restless feeling. A split in my intentions.

Social comment?

Pleasure in the …. objectness? … of the sculpture?

Which leads me back to the seminar I mentioned at the beginning. We talked of instructions and leaflets. Of multiples available to be taken away by visitors.

I designed and printed a leaflet.

Next week is our Interim10 exhibition, which is what I have been working towards. Yesterday I brought my leaflet to another seminar.

And the sculpture.

Two pieces

which now need to be intergrated once more….

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