The "Dungbeetle and Sisyphus" project is still in the making, well,
there has been very little making so far, more a slow fermentation.
Hopefully I will make my human-sized dungball this week, it will be a
large bale of hay covered in manure. Lovely. I may have found the way
to deter any further options of having a personal life.
Unfortunately I probably won't be able to go straight for the filming in
the location that I really would like to use, that will need to be better prepared,
i.e. I will need suitable transport that can move my huge ball of...
well, I don't need to spell it out I am sure...
So I am planning to make my prop on Thursday in a hopefully 'co-operative'
horse stables and document that part to begin with (the making).
Perhaps I will be able to roll it around a bit in the adjacent country/town scape = test..
It's my birthdays on Wednesday, I think it's quite fun to start the new year with dungball rolling..
Then what?
Better admin skills are needed; i.e. more disciplin! & I am considering to adopt an alias.
Speaking with Greg from The Art Organization (TAO) in Liverpool I was reminded that a
friend and I, years ago, started to construct our aliases.
An alias could be useful, when I have ideas that I just have to make or else they will clog
my pores; but which I don’t want to take responsibility for at this time… I am tempted.
Art in Liverpool:
I am quite impressed at the moment. There is a nice dynamic around and I am seeing
quite a lot of what seems like inter-group-team-playing.. Perhaps we've cracked it...
I think there is a real chance that quite a significant number of artists have decided to
get into that boat and row together for faster progress...
Although I do know of at least 8 people who will leave as soon as the
Capital of Culture Year is over.. Perhaps some Art Vultures..? Is that term even fair?
I will think about it and report back.
So, I have been invited by the Royal Standard to take up residence and am delighted.
I like the feel that hovers around the group, there is a distinct air of promise around
them. Oh and now I am part of it.
My first venture into group activity in a long time. Not before in my art practice,
not voluntarily. I just wasn't quite ripe before now.
But right now it seems like the perfect choice.
I am open to all currents.
Conclusion: Positive.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Friday, May 16, 2008
Saturday, April 26, 2008
A day for 30s.... the day I earnt £30 and got a parking ticket to pay £30
... now that was today.
What do I gain from the experience? A pat on the shoulder for having tried my best.
That doesn't quite seem satisfying.
A brief meeting with film-maker gained me a confirmation that he is up for filming for nothing much more than the covering of the actual expenses of doing so. Oh thank all heavens for that.
Now I am short of one assistant and then the camera can roll...
I think we will schedule the weekend for mid-late May or mid-June, alternatively.
All my applications came back rejected. I am an artistic reject. Let's see if I can't turn that round by 180 degrees in the next 12 months. Can I become the equivalent of hot-cake instead?
My other collaborator said this: Turn towards the light...
And so I shall. As spiritual as that sounds. But what is wrong with spirit?
Now I have 30 days to make the structures for exhibition in St Luke's and perhaps I can find a follow on exhibition for them, too.
The 7 Giants will stand tall and proud, strong a watchful in the ruin of St Lukes which was severely damaged in WW2. The church remains a memorial to lives lost, fates suffered. Not that its presence often stops anybody in their tracks anymore to contemplate the past and it's lingering echos into this presence..
But there it stands nevertheless, a memorial.
In it I will place 7 bird hides / forester's hides, standing tall on elongated legs. watchful. Whether they are friend or foe remains open. 7 giants on tall legs viewing over the space. 7 because that is the great number of fables, tales and belief.7 to indicate the quality of my thoughts and search for expression.
My project is not a statement, not a conclusion or answer but a search for truth, abstract notions of truth of who we are, us, these humans. My art work really is better described as a journey not a conclusion. To ask what my work is about is to ask "What has moved you in the past year, 10 years or in fact since you became aware of anything moving you at all." And just how does one give an answer, a concrete solid answer with brevity..? It's always that is in the art work, it's not the isolated moment that is in it. A life philosophy becoming visual, tangible, solid. A sharing of intimate concerns and searches, that is what the art is. Of course I have no expectation that it is that to you, to the audience. But I hope it shows. A section of the inside of my thoughts, on exhibition in St Luke's. From the 30th of May for 2 weeks only..
My spelling makes me laugh: a wether is a castrated ram... (wether = ram; whether ..)
What do I gain from the experience? A pat on the shoulder for having tried my best.
That doesn't quite seem satisfying.
A brief meeting with film-maker gained me a confirmation that he is up for filming for nothing much more than the covering of the actual expenses of doing so. Oh thank all heavens for that.
Now I am short of one assistant and then the camera can roll...
I think we will schedule the weekend for mid-late May or mid-June, alternatively.
All my applications came back rejected. I am an artistic reject. Let's see if I can't turn that round by 180 degrees in the next 12 months. Can I become the equivalent of hot-cake instead?
My other collaborator said this: Turn towards the light...
And so I shall. As spiritual as that sounds. But what is wrong with spirit?
Now I have 30 days to make the structures for exhibition in St Luke's and perhaps I can find a follow on exhibition for them, too.
The 7 Giants will stand tall and proud, strong a watchful in the ruin of St Lukes which was severely damaged in WW2. The church remains a memorial to lives lost, fates suffered. Not that its presence often stops anybody in their tracks anymore to contemplate the past and it's lingering echos into this presence..
But there it stands nevertheless, a memorial.
In it I will place 7 bird hides / forester's hides, standing tall on elongated legs. watchful. Whether they are friend or foe remains open. 7 giants on tall legs viewing over the space. 7 because that is the great number of fables, tales and belief.7 to indicate the quality of my thoughts and search for expression.
My project is not a statement, not a conclusion or answer but a search for truth, abstract notions of truth of who we are, us, these humans. My art work really is better described as a journey not a conclusion. To ask what my work is about is to ask "What has moved you in the past year, 10 years or in fact since you became aware of anything moving you at all." And just how does one give an answer, a concrete solid answer with brevity..? It's always that is in the art work, it's not the isolated moment that is in it. A life philosophy becoming visual, tangible, solid. A sharing of intimate concerns and searches, that is what the art is. Of course I have no expectation that it is that to you, to the audience. But I hope it shows. A section of the inside of my thoughts, on exhibition in St Luke's. From the 30th of May for 2 weeks only..
My spelling makes me laugh: a wether is a castrated ram... (wether = ram; whether ..)
Monday, April 21, 2008
Friday, April 18, 2008
someone else's words that move me, words that do the speaking for me, words that somehow catch the essence of tonight
Enrico Lunghi
wrote this for the 52. Venice Biennale
"So here I am in an indistinct place filled with strange sensualities. I abandon myself to feelings that are welling up into my consciousness after obscure stays in the depths of memory. Shameful desires reverberate in the indefinable scents that surround me.
And yet the approach was vague, around the back of a courtyard full of promises. Venice makes so many of them, and keeps so few. Then, without warning, a corridor indirectly puts me on the threshold of a sense of deja-vu. Here, a fan breathes air that has come from afar. The colours and materials also seem to have become stranded in the present. Sounds, again, remind me of elsewhere, of evenings, of other evenings.
I move forward. I can feel my heart pounding. My skin brushes against an atmosphere charged with possible touches. The rhythms interlace like lovers' sighs. Outside, the daylight, the water, the boats. Maybe I don't even see them, but it is enough that I am imagining them.
I let myself be carried along by the passing time. I open up all the pores of my being to what is reaching me from outside. I trust in what I am, in what I want, now, in this place. On the other side of the wall, across the windows, work follows its course, as does the day, and the water, too. Lives pass. But it's on the other side.
Then, as desire at last pushes me further, I find myself in front of two door leaves. there, the presence of the other, although inaccessible, becomes palpable. Like memory of a sweating body from an unforgettable film. I remain, for an undefined moment, the perpetual desirer, while the disturbance that permeates the walls moves away like the foghorn of a ship leaving the misty quayside.
Now, another, different story begins, for me and me alone.
wrote this for the 52. Venice Biennale
"So here I am in an indistinct place filled with strange sensualities. I abandon myself to feelings that are welling up into my consciousness after obscure stays in the depths of memory. Shameful desires reverberate in the indefinable scents that surround me.
And yet the approach was vague, around the back of a courtyard full of promises. Venice makes so many of them, and keeps so few. Then, without warning, a corridor indirectly puts me on the threshold of a sense of deja-vu. Here, a fan breathes air that has come from afar. The colours and materials also seem to have become stranded in the present. Sounds, again, remind me of elsewhere, of evenings, of other evenings.
I move forward. I can feel my heart pounding. My skin brushes against an atmosphere charged with possible touches. The rhythms interlace like lovers' sighs. Outside, the daylight, the water, the boats. Maybe I don't even see them, but it is enough that I am imagining them.
I let myself be carried along by the passing time. I open up all the pores of my being to what is reaching me from outside. I trust in what I am, in what I want, now, in this place. On the other side of the wall, across the windows, work follows its course, as does the day, and the water, too. Lives pass. But it's on the other side.
Then, as desire at last pushes me further, I find myself in front of two door leaves. there, the presence of the other, although inaccessible, becomes palpable. Like memory of a sweating body from an unforgettable film. I remain, for an undefined moment, the perpetual desirer, while the disturbance that permeates the walls moves away like the foghorn of a ship leaving the misty quayside.
Now, another, different story begins, for me and me alone.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
“The Dungbeetle and Sisyphus”
A narrative, humorous and maybe semi-tragic tale and live art performance piece that resonates with some poetry and Cumbria’s faded clay industry.
The project takes a sincere/humorous look at the life of a dungbeetle placed in parallel with the mythological, eternally punishing, futile and hopeless fate of Sisyphus. (Alluding to questions about meaning in life, but light-hearted in presentation. The ball of clay, the act of rolling it as life’s task and purpose/dharma.)
(Sisyphus : punished in Hades for his misdeeds in life by being condemned to the eternal, futile, hopeless task of rolling a large stone to the top of a hill, from which it always rolled down again.)
Live Art / sculpture: The artist will be the dungbeetle, will be Sisyphus and roll a giant-human-sized ball of clay (dung) around sites in Cumbria and conduct interviews with passer-byes.
Films :
Performance: (live art, as described)
Interviews : involving local volunteers (chance street passer-byes & recruited ones), telling their versions of Sisyphus, mythologically correct and flawed, volunteers will be encouraged to elaborate… (I have conducted tests and people are surprisingly easily engaged in telling tales and reminiscing on further interpretations.)
Motivations other than existing interests:
Lost industry- changing industry / lost identity-changing identity.
The lost and changed clay industry of Cumbria.
The project takes a sincere/humorous look at the life of a dungbeetle placed in parallel with the mythological, eternally punishing, futile and hopeless fate of Sisyphus. (Alluding to questions about meaning in life, but light-hearted in presentation. The ball of clay, the act of rolling it as life’s task and purpose/dharma.)
(Sisyphus : punished in Hades for his misdeeds in life by being condemned to the eternal, futile, hopeless task of rolling a large stone to the top of a hill, from which it always rolled down again.)
Live Art / sculpture: The artist will be the dungbeetle, will be Sisyphus and roll a giant-human-sized ball of clay (dung) around sites in Cumbria and conduct interviews with passer-byes.
Films :
Performance: (live art, as described)
Interviews : involving local volunteers (chance street passer-byes & recruited ones), telling their versions of Sisyphus, mythologically correct and flawed, volunteers will be encouraged to elaborate… (I have conducted tests and people are surprisingly easily engaged in telling tales and reminiscing on further interpretations.)
Motivations other than existing interests:
Lost industry- changing industry / lost identity-changing identity.
The lost and changed clay industry of Cumbria.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Istanbul
Memories of january are lingering in the air, just as I should be working on an important application form...
Below is the "New Mosque"
Below is the "New Mosque"
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Friday, March 28, 2008
the sections..
... yesterday I read a photographer's interview in which he pointed out that only 20% of his time is spent taking photographs, the rest on administration and research... Well. it is much the same with making art work. At the moment I am in one of those uncomfortable transition periods where projects are coming along, but where there is no sign of their realization yet. So at the moment satisfaction levels are very low, but inspiration is beginning to ferment, a little more sugar and ideas should rise ready to become solid and tangible..
One problem is that I have produced so little in the past 6 months that now the internal need to leap and explode into action has grown disproportionate to time, finances and energy available.
I will make one more list and throw the coals into the fires and get some of these projects going. The urgency is only increasing daily.
The hunger for making art.
Relationships should nourish one's energy resources not deplete them, should they not.
Well I am in the final throes of making my way back up from the depths of life's muddles, this week sees 2 more deadlines for projects that I really want to be involved in and then I can begin to make direct plans for the "A Dungbeetle and Sisyphus". And get my camera out for "Idioms" and advertise for Artist Assistants for May, and plan my performance for Cologne.
Come back in a while, I will edit this entry and it will be more eloquent.
In the meantime I recommend that you take a look at: http://cressidakocienski.blogspot.com/
That will give you inspiration and things to think about.
One problem is that I have produced so little in the past 6 months that now the internal need to leap and explode into action has grown disproportionate to time, finances and energy available.
I will make one more list and throw the coals into the fires and get some of these projects going. The urgency is only increasing daily.
The hunger for making art.
Relationships should nourish one's energy resources not deplete them, should they not.
Well I am in the final throes of making my way back up from the depths of life's muddles, this week sees 2 more deadlines for projects that I really want to be involved in and then I can begin to make direct plans for the "A Dungbeetle and Sisyphus". And get my camera out for "Idioms" and advertise for Artist Assistants for May, and plan my performance for Cologne.
Come back in a while, I will edit this entry and it will be more eloquent.
In the meantime I recommend that you take a look at: http://cressidakocienski.blogspot.com/
That will give you inspiration and things to think about.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Happy Easter
...
my procrastination activities taste good...
(made when I should have been filling in an uncomfortable funding application form.)
my procrastination activities taste good...
(made when I should have been filling in an uncomfortable funding application form.)
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Rollercoasting, skating and cycling... with integrity.
Now this was a roller coaster of a fortnight!
Interviews for postgraduate programs at both the Royal College and at Goldsmiths, art worries, stage fright in relation to the invitation to make work for St. Luke's / Bombed out church in Liverpool.
Thinking, thinking, and rethinking, finally being met with an epiphany whilst in the bath last night. "If the mountain isn't coming to me then I will just go to the mountain" Or something like that...
So I shall let you in, into my cryptic thinking in the next days. In the meantime I will try and formulate it all and edit it into a manageable size.
The bad news: the RCA sent me a rejection letter on deceptively hight quality stationery.
The enormous, massive relief: Golsmiths invited me unconditionally to come and study on their Masters Program from this autumn.
Unconditionally has to be my favorite word, if I would be offered same terms in romance then life would be complete.
Unconditionally is just such a character and life affirming attitude. And most gratefully received.
Enjoy your Easter Holidays, with or without beautifully hand colored eggs. Unfortunately boiled eggs make me nauseous.. What a shame.
Good Day and Good Easter. Aim high...
(Perhaps I need to curtail my life-coaching advices.. Before I turn into Eckhart Toll, or some other such similar lifestyle Guru. But I can't help myself: Don't be lazy!)
Interviews for postgraduate programs at both the Royal College and at Goldsmiths, art worries, stage fright in relation to the invitation to make work for St. Luke's / Bombed out church in Liverpool.
Thinking, thinking, and rethinking, finally being met with an epiphany whilst in the bath last night. "If the mountain isn't coming to me then I will just go to the mountain" Or something like that...
So I shall let you in, into my cryptic thinking in the next days. In the meantime I will try and formulate it all and edit it into a manageable size.
The bad news: the RCA sent me a rejection letter on deceptively hight quality stationery.
The enormous, massive relief: Golsmiths invited me unconditionally to come and study on their Masters Program from this autumn.
Unconditionally has to be my favorite word, if I would be offered same terms in romance then life would be complete.
Unconditionally is just such a character and life affirming attitude. And most gratefully received.
Enjoy your Easter Holidays, with or without beautifully hand colored eggs. Unfortunately boiled eggs make me nauseous.. What a shame.
Good Day and Good Easter. Aim high...
(Perhaps I need to curtail my life-coaching advices.. Before I turn into Eckhart Toll, or some other such similar lifestyle Guru. But I can't help myself: Don't be lazy!)
Saturday, March 15, 2008
.. empires underneath tables..
...children underneath tables should definitely be left alone.
I always thought that.
I always thought that.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
one I wrote earlier...
.. you must know that the Muse is most easily caught in the small hours of the night, then there are negotiations to hold before she will submit her charms and leave us with some inspiration. She is getting moody these days, perhaps the long working hours no longer suit her...
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Friday, March 7, 2008
habitats
... the distance between lovers is not always the measure of miles between their geographical locations.. the distance between lovers is not explained by different cultural heritage.. the difference of countries is nothing much more than the difference there always is inherent between all coupled units.
I am trying to say that place is only an outward signifier of inward geography.
Friday, February 29, 2008
Artists and their Daggers
... why is it that within a group of 12 plus minus a few, every other artist has a backstabbing device aimed at the rear surface of a fellow artist? ...
.
.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Friday, February 1, 2008
interface overload...
In a state of application overload... with myspace, facebook, blogger this and that, artreview.com, artist newsletter's artist's interface, flickr, youtube, axisweb.com and I am sure there are more that I forgot...
.........
And does the man have to do that, the one with the ear and the other one: so serious, whilst slowly turning blue....?
Do they have to do that? Really? Oh, I wish they would go away.
.........
And does the man have to do that, the one with the ear and the other one: so serious, whilst slowly turning blue....?
Do they have to do that? Really? Oh, I wish they would go away.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
drizzle and rocks
... drizzly weather outside and small rocks on my heart weighing it down a bit ...
Other than that:
...taking winter photographs of a nearby forest, before the crazy weather jump-starts a far too early spring..
...buying a flower today and making a stack of drawings to sell...
...remembering freedom and seagulls...
... absence of eloquent and organized thoughts...
Other than that:
...taking winter photographs of a nearby forest, before the crazy weather jump-starts a far too early spring..
...buying a flower today and making a stack of drawings to sell...
...remembering freedom and seagulls...
... absence of eloquent and organized thoughts...