working the shells

a short month, so a short review ? we’ll find out shortly.  with external projects in various stages of beginning and waiting to finish my main practice focus for the month has been to re-iterate my practice website.

informed by my on going experience at the derby silk mill museum of making, i came into february with the intention to place all in one place the nature of my multidiscipline practice.  i’ve maintained my own site for several years  and over the years have had a lot of different looking sites.  this iteration talks much more neatly about my portfolio of interests both at work and in play.

at the beginning i had great ambition and i can admit now that what was on paper at times did seem unachievable, simply because there was so much to do.

i’m happy to report my small amounts of work done often strategy has got me to a point where the site is about 75% complete as i write today.

 

the hospital project i’m working on with the silk mill has had an interesting bonus feature appear.  the arts organisation on site at the hospitals in derby is celebrating it’s 10th year anniversary and the arm at the london road community hospital have chosen the museum in miniature project to represent their work during this time.  the exhibition will feature 10 objects with selected stories from the the wards visits before christmas.  i’ve had a lot of joy working with assistant curator eilish to take photos of 8 of the objects for the exhibition.  the feedback from eilish and chris at the museum has been over whelmingly positive.

https://twitter.com/andrewsugars/status/831861099175751681

(apologies for not being able to fully embed the tweet with timelapse experiment from the photo shoot.)

the third image related endeavour this month has been to prepare for my week as a featured blogger on the a-n instagram feed.  i found the opportunity an interesting challenge and look forward to how the week unfolds.

 

 

this post has been written either side of eating dinner. it’s a post about recording something of the last few days.

the cold of the previous post has peaked and today i’m in a lot better health.  rather like playing 52 card pick up, i feel like i’m putting me back together.

something i’m noticing is the impact of feelings on my life.

how i feel directly impacts upon my ability to do work within my practice.  working outside of it with others on other projects i feel amazing about completing the work.  so what’s different within the practice ?  my reflections today lead me to believe it’s a case of belief.

connected to belief is how i feel about myself.  for sometime now i’ve been adjusting to a different mindset about what i do.  i was reminded of this last night when visiting quad in derby to listen to will hurt give a talk about his practice.  i’ll return to that presently.

i had worked shown in quad in 2010, part of a group show entitled future focus.

i pause a moment and collect my thoughts.

thoughts happen so quickly, often too quickly to be able to contained to write them, to make sense of them.  feelings are slower and because of this affect how i feel, think and do.

i’ve eaten now and the earlier wave of enthusiasm gives way to tired contentment.

picking up the earlier thread of will hurt, i’m pleased with myself for getting to hear him speak.  listening to other artists is something i’ve been neglecting to do.  listening to his practice journey thus far reminded me of how non linear my practice seems to be, yet clearly is linear as everything i do next is connected to the previous.   once again this is where how i feel returns to the enquiry as it’s what drives what comes next.  there is a danger with this though.  i get part way through realising the feeling and the thought hits me that the intellectual position of the thing is not very strong.  this affects my belief about how it looks.

something in my mind recalls the conversations i was having on the a-n platform during my degree.  they were about the state of art education.  listening to will last night he’s so on the money.  he was able to show exactly what pieces of writing or images were the starting points the next leg of his journey.

i’m becoming more able to accept who i am.

wow ! a random statement ?  maybe not.  let me hold your hand … walk with me.

i have a disability.  the potential i demonstrate falls short in certain circumstances.  this for a long time was unmanaged by myself.  it meant for almost everything i did an inner monologue told me that someone else would do it better.  this inner monologue is becoming less frequent and less loud as of late i begin to do things i really enjoy and see success and peer support for.  i’ve learnt that inner monologue is know as imposter syndrome.

as a motorcycle racer works with his team to find the optimum set up to achieve the fastest lap time, i work with myself to find out who i am so i can work at realising my full potential.

i think seeing a friend from school on linkedin today has made me realise that i should be proud about what i have done and what i’m still to do.

i have an idea that i’m going to trail for a while.  its connected to writing of proposals and ideas.  when i speak to someone i’m able to connect to my feeling about what i’m talking about and this passion helps to drive forward the conversation.  in writing i’m going to trial writing as though i was speaking to someone i know.

like the racer,  i strive to improve what i do.

let’s stop walking for a moment.

yes the nature of practice is to do and put back in what is learnt through doing.  however when did i make it competitive with myself ?

i stand here and now and from what i see, see that my practice doesn’t need to be a competition.

it’s an enquiry, a journey of curiosity, a melee of feeling.