I know artists use their sketch books in many different ways. Mine contains writing as well as quick sketches, detailed visual plans of ideas, photographs and half baked ideas thought about in the wee small hours, some of which I’m convinced are genius at 4 in the morning, and bound to make my fortune, which turn out to be mindless drivel by 9.30. However, my sketch books are the repository (or depository – my dictionary tells me they are the same thing, but I’m not convinced) of all my thoughts.
A couple of ideas have been meandering through these books for about 6 months, waiting for me to have the time to try them out.
The first is the making of paper clothing. This concept seems, in my book, to be fully formed and sensible. I have explained why I want them, how they fit with my thinking and what they will look like. As far as the book is concerned they are a Great Idea. Pfft. Are they my a^&e! I made some and they are rubbish. They are perfect in every way I intended, but they don’t work in reality. I’m holding them and they are a nonsense. I hate them. They don’t work. Bloody Tosh!
The second is mutant clothing. You take all sorts of identifiable bits of clothing and stitch the bits that fit next to each other, together. Easy! Looks great in my book. You should see the drawings… I’d show you, but I’m embarrassed that I thought this such a Fabulous Concept. More nonsense, and I’ve ruined a couple of quite decent items in trying to make it work. What a waste of an afternoon!
Frustration has set in. The sketch books that lie to me have been cast across the room. I’ve got other things to sew and make and draw and write and sing, but these were the things I had set aside time to work on. I’m so disappointed. I’m off to put the kettle on again.
(just added some photos)
Just a quick one today with a couple of photos. I like working with these old clothes and threadbare household textiles. There is a feeling that they might fall apart in your hands as you stitch them. I’ve come to love the softness and the whiteness tinged with yellow, or stained. I think perhaps I’m intervening… or interfering?
If the long school holidays do one thing for an artist who supplements their income by teaching, it’s that they give time for the play I mentioned in a previous post. You can carry one train of thought from one day to the next, without it being derailed too much. However, as the end of August looms, I find I start to panic. There are things I need to do before I go back. Things with my family, my home, and of course my art work. I need to set things up so that I’m kept going through the autumn. Clear the decks for the weeks to come. I have to be back at work on 5th Sept, so I’m a woman in a hurry!
So…
I’ve had a busy businessy sort of week: I’ve put in a proposal for a residency; arranged a photo shoot; a recording session; framed and delivered work for exhibition; decided on dates for next year’s Life and Other Art exhibition; made preliminary approaches to a couple of musicians I was unable to book this year, paid a couple of research visits to a place I’m thinking of doing an installation/ residency.
In between all this we’ve decorated my son’s bedroom, and erected the ubiquitous flat-pack desk so he can start his A level studies with a fresh space.
I’ve been thinking about what to plant in the garden next to the shed for the photo shoot as everything that looked glorious in June now looks like a brown dead patch of twigs.
I must do some practical ironing, not just little bits of fabric and useless but attractive items of children’s clothing from charity shops.
Been life drawing.
Finished a piece of tricky embroidery that’s taken about 6 weeks.
Written some lyrics I’d like to become a waltz.
Had a bit of a display brainwave…
Some weeks are like that aren’t they?
Lullaby. Lyrics, not poem:
Swaddle the baby
Tuck in the child tight
Don’t let him suffer
Don’t let him fight
Put him to sleep
Switch on the alarm
Hear every breath
So he can’t come to harm
Stand beside her
Hands bind her
Sing him to sleep
Stitch his fear
Inside his skin
Sing him to sleep
Sing him to sleep
Zip him up cosy
Wind round the scarf
Mittens on strings
Wrap round his heart
Don’t let him out
In the cold or the night
Don’t let him struggle
However he might
Stand beside her
Hands bind her
Sing him to sleep
Stitch his fear
Inside his skin
Sing him to sleep
Sing him to sleep
Stitch him a quilt for wherever he goes
A portable mother to comfort the woes
Stand beside her
Hands bind her
Sing him to sleep
Stitch his fear
Inside his skin
Sing him to sleep
Sing him to sleep
Over the last few days I’ve come to ask myself what is the difference between work and play? Much of my work stems from play: with materials, ideas, words, the happy accident.
What has made me think more seriously about this is the song. I have had so much fun with it. Producing sound has made me rethink the whole display possibilities of my visual work. Mostly I have items of clothing, household textiles and all of them embroidered, many with text… or potential lyrics. How will it fit together, how will it be seen and heard? It feels like an integral part of my art practice, it has grown from it. The collaborative element has allowed me to do things I would not have been able to do alone. The words may have been written, then stitched, perhaps even spoken. They would not have been sung, there wouldn’t be music. They would have been a little bit “up themselves” and pretentious and I may well have discarded them as “Arty Bollocks”
So I find myself looking at Play. With a capital P. I have played with my own toys, by myself, imaginatively. Now I’m starting to look in other people’s toy boxes and play socially. I wonder where Piaget would put that in the scheme of things?
