Viewing single post of blog The Spaces Between

“Sometimes just the act of writing down the problems straightens out your head as to what they really are.”
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Chapter 9
I have decided to make writing a regular and more integral part of my practice. I am quite a compulsive longhand writer anyway; I find the repetitive rhythm of writing by hand soothing and almost hypnotic, and it is an activity which helps me to slip into a state of ‘flow’ easily, like doodling. I am also irresistibly drawn to the shapes made by words, fonts and handwriting, and I am a compulsive list-maker, sometimes writing, re-writing, editing and copying several times over.
Today I started my day by drinking a bottle of water and sitting in the quiet early morning writing in my notebook; it was quite intense. I sometimes experience what I call ‘sensory overload’, when everything seems magnified; often I experience stronger visual contrast between light and dark, and background noises come forward and I can almost hear the surrounding silence. I am trying to be more present in the moment, limiting time spent on social media and computers and connecting with my surroundings more deeply. I am becoming more interested in background noise, the noises we don’t usually notice like the noise of the pencil on the paper, our footsteps, distant traffic. I think this somehow ties in with my interest in discarded, forgotten objects, disused spaces, graffitti, urban decay.
I am trying new things within my own artistic practice, exploring new avenues, using different materials, moving out of my sketchbook. I found some old offcuts of wood on my allotment a few weeks ago; yesterday I brushed them down, painted them (not too carefully) and photographed them against a coloured background. I enjoy manipulating my images with photo editing software; it fascinates me that one image has infinite variations.

Today I have continued with my large-scale, gestural paintings. These are changing and evolving, too; I am using layers of paint and pastel, adding and rubbing back, using my non-dominant hand to make the outcome more unpredictable, enjoying relinquishing control. I have been photographing my paintings in parts and editing the images to make new ones – almost like shards of a fragmented whole.

Counting my paintings, notebook and photographs, I am making a fair attempt at producing 100 pieces of work before going back to Uni in September.


0 Comments