Threads

I entered a bit of a time warp yesterday. It served as a timely reminder too.

I took a table at the Festive Makers’ Market at General Office, alongside my fellow studio holder Louise Blakeway. It was a bit last minute for me. Louise had a stall full of beautifully coherent paintings and prints, and I had a bit of a jumble going on… old drawings, new drawings, a series of small scale works just simply mounted. I also had a few old textile things. Some little felt brooches and some vintage fabric bundles. I sold a few things across the range, not enough to go on holiday with, but enough to cover costs, have a take-away in the evening and a lunch out somewhere nice tomorrow… I might buy some new pencils… but it was a long day for small pickings really, and I was having flashbacks!

When my sons were young, from about 1990-2005 maybe, I did loads of craft fairs alongside assorted part time and sporadic teaching in the local FE college. It all fitted in nicely, kept the wolf from the door. But yesterday reminded me why I decided to stop. At least yesterday I just moved my stuff, already made, nothing specially made for the event, from studio into the gallery through the double doors, threw a cloth over the table and set it up. Easy.

I used to spend hours speculating on what would sell, and believe me I’ve done all sorts: jewellery, bags, home textiles, collage, quilting, embroidery, clothes, painting, toys, children’s clothes… only to find the thing that everyone wanted was the thing I’d only got three of. The one hundred specially made items might as well have had a sign on them saying fuck off. (That might have sold better actually!)

I’d load it all into the back of the car with an assortment of stands and rails and display devices, lamps and clamps, a flask, and never enough food to stave off freezing cold and boredom. I had special clothes, shoes, emergency hat/scarves etc… have even resorted to wearing the stock.

Then there’s the interaction with the jolly old general public. If you smile and say good morning, some of them run like you’ve told them to fuck off. Then there are those who want to tell you that they’re not going to buy anything because they can make it themselves. Then those who take not so surreptitious photos so they basically have a pattern to go home and make it themselves. Those you REALLY want to tell to fuck off while retaining the smile you’ve stapled in at 7am.

(But I should also remember the lovely people who have interesting conversations, and buy things too!)

Anyway…It’s a tough way to make money. And if it hadn’t been easy I wouldn’t have done it. And I can’t say I’ll be doing it again, because for most of the day I wanted to run away into my studio to just draw.

I’m sat here thinking I’ll draw all day Monday. But it’ll take me most of the day to put away all the stuff I dragged out. I dumped it all unceremoniously on my big table. Louise and I then ran away into the night. I think I’d rather do an Open Studio, because although there’s the whole tidying and staging thing, at least I can still draw when it’s quiet.

So… if you are visiting a craft fair or similar running up to Christmas, have sympathy, they’re like silent buskers. Maybe offer to watch the stall of a friend while they go to the loo/Greggs/take a break/have a fag or whatever. Bring cake. Tell them it looks magical, and try to buy something, even if it’s just a card. A few cards sold can make all the difference.

The experience reminded me how far I’ve come, how things have changed, and how fortunate I am to do whatever the hell I want, to be able to make whatever I want, that organically emerges from my thought processes.

Thank you world.

I always say goodbye to the summer with a sense of relief. September and October I love. Low sun, bright blue sky and the occasional frost, the turning and falling of leaves. The old October days turn to November and the clocks go back and suddenly the days are short. It seems a brutal snap.

December has arrived and I have a cold. I don’t get them so much these days since I stopped working with children!

The damp November days have tugged at my arthritis and I start to hunker down. I’m reluctant to go out, especially in the evenings. I fear I’m turning into my mother (too late, I hear my family say). I have vague plans to travel, but at the last minute I call them off. I’ll go in the new year (maybe). At this end of the year I feel old.

My drawings don’t feel dark enough. I feel like a fake, because it all seems a bit level. I feel I need to find a way to plumb these depths and dive into the abyss. I want deeper water on the paper. I need blacker purples… blacker reds… blacker blacks…

I need to carve something into the paper, not draw on the top of it.

My lyrics are not for public consumption really. They speak of very dark places. 

This personal slump is not helped by the sense of impending doom I feel about the General Election. I protect myself from crippling disappointment by feeling as grim as I possibly can now, so that the shock isn’t so extreme.

I live in a bubble of like-minded folks, I am aware of this… and so I am wary of feeling that everything will be fine, because, let’s face it, everything is far from fine. I am European, and I am an old-fashioned socialist. I feel we should hold hands with our neighbours and work closely with them. I feel we should be kind to those less fortunate. I feel that all people regardless of socio-economic background should have opportunities to fulfil their potential. I’m not rich by any means, (it’s all relative) but my life is rich. I have what I need and am surrounded by love and kindness. I feel then, that I am in a position to spread it around. I have huge difficulty understanding the help only yourself mentality. Surely we all benefit when people reach their potential? We all benefit from having a well educated, healthy society? Surely?

So having a general election just before Christmas fills me with dread. It is a difficult time for many people. I have this knot of black dread that sits in my chest. If the conservatives win again, people will be in deepest despair… and I don’t know what I can possibly do about it. 

All I can think is that the charcoal and the ink just aren’t dark enough to express it.

I’ve been struggling a bit since the exhibition.

It’s right that each exhibition becomes a little pinnacle at which you can assess progress, and where you are and what’s important.

And then move on… maybe down a different alley, a tangent, a crossroads… I keep going down the alley, taking a wrong turn and end up where I started, but facing a different direction, and I dive down a new alley… but that peters out and I’m lost… but in the same place.

Lost.

The old ways seem tired.

The new ways seem contrived.

The current drawing I’ve already written off, but in view of the cost of the paper, I’m using it as an experimental ground for some different techniques… in an attempt to find something I want to pursue.

It’s got so bad this afternoon I just thought maybe the whole thing is a dead end and I should get back to stitching.

But I know in my heart that’s not the way either.

I’m not in the studio till Tuesday or Wednesday , so I’ll look with rested eyes then… or get someone else to look with me.

Stage 1
The charcoal is too crude, although the making of it is delicious, it doesn’t match up… If I stick with the charcoal I will have to ditch everything else.

Stage 2
With a layer of graphite… mismatched… is that a good thing or not?

Stage 3
I’ve knocked back the charcoal by scrubbing, then fixing a layer of chalk over the top. Tonally this is better but the method of getting here far too complicated and contrived and inelegant somehow, I like my method to be fairly simple. This is not simple. it feels clumsy and therefore ugly.

The film Sliding Doors holds significance in our family. It’s used in multiple ways, one: an affectionate teasing of grandma, long since gone, who was unable to grasp the concept of the dual storyline… two: the inability of anyone else to grasp a multi-layered concept… three: that moment when things could go either way, haircut or no haircut… often also called The Trousers of Time (after Terry Pratchett) where you can put your foot down one leg or another, the decision, seemingly small, can affect your life in irretrievable ways. Schrodinger’s cat sometimes makes an appearance too, maybe he gets trapped in the sliding doors?

anyway… 

There I am, currently loitering rather than following the unknown path. I am Gwynny before she has the useful cinematic device haircut. The cat before the box is opened. My foot has not yet committed to one leg or the other. But once it does… My path is determined for the next year, possibly two. The problem being, the decision is not mine to make. So I wait.

I’ll let you know.

It’s been a grim month.

I say this not to extract sympathy, as I know we all have grim months, but to sort of highlight the effect it has on my work. The recent show was titled Cause and Effect and this is why. The latest piece is dark. Even I see it (I sometimes don’t!) stark in front of me, spread out on the table. I have strayed into charcoal, which anyone who knows me or my work will see as a departure. I am a clean and tidy worker. Charcoal has been for other spaces, drawing workshops, students, working with children… but not my studio.

And yet here it is. I still have a watercolour washed ground to work on, a pale ochre. The charcoal has been rubbed into the texture of the paper (this is why it was allowed in I think) and takes to it beautifully. The shapes and clouds and lines are familiar, still reminiscent of the bodily and the visceral. The blackness sucks me in. I try to layer it up to get it blacker and blacker, fixing and drawing over and over… And then, another layer of graphite working lies on the top, reflecting the light that the charcoal absorbs.

And herein lies the reason again. Some stuff we have to absorb and live with. Some stuff we can deflect and shake off. Some stuff leaves a mark, some doesn’t.

So this grim month? Some of it will stay with me forever. Deep and black. Ground in. Some I’ve been able to shake off. Some of it has left a smudge that will fade over time.

I love the metaphorical. In drawing and in words. To live in metaphors is so very human.