Skirting Board Sunset

This was just a very quick experiment I did with a mini projector as we had one around the house. I intended to project the image on a window with darkness outside but quickly realised that that wouldn't work because of the reflection of the projector light (some things are so obvious with hindsight). I was looking around the house trying to think of poetic places to position the projected image of the contact lens, perhaps somewhere which would hint at it being the sun or moon or a planet. I've used or looked at the living room floor in several projects (first year sellotape sculpture, second year written piece) so probably felt a draw towards it - the wall above is also the only bit of blank wall in there to project onto. I started playing around with the angle of the projector and pretending the sun-like shape was setting. I really like how the image stretches when it reaches the floor, as well as the colours on the different surfaces. 

The main thing I took from this was the juxtaposition of the monumental and the mundane... the sentence 'A small sun sets on a skirting board horizon', which I captioned the work on Instagram, involves the enormous, incomprehensible notion of the sun with a really banal/familiar, domestic feature. There is a really curious mix of scales and relationships within this. The connection between the sun and light, with the contact lens and its function as a vision machine is also compelling; when the sun goes down there is less light / without the contact lens there is less sight.

I wanted the sun to rise again in the gif, maybe to create a sense of hope, but moreso because then it would loop back to the beginning. This repetition is a very poetic feature of the gif, and I am interested in using them for that purpose - to convey my sense that growth and decay, and life and death are cyclical.

I've just realised how funny it is that I'm looking at sunsets because, although a bit of a cliche image, I always think of sunsets when I think about how I try to make people notice everyday things, I have a very clear memory of being in the car with some friends when we were about 13. there was an incredible sunset as we left school, the sky was so colourful with pink and orange and yellow and I found it so incredibly awe inspiring; none of my friends cared however, they saw it too but they didn't see in it what I saw or felt in it what I felt. Sunsets or bright moons or blue skies always place me, they make me think about my position in the Universe, and therefore all the deeper mysteries that go along with that. I wondered, and to this day still wonder, what it takes for those friends to feel that same intensity, to match my silent euphoria - what in life makes them feel how I do when I see an incredible sky? I think about this often because it reminds me that everyone thinks in different ways and has sensitivities to different things.

In the Beginning There Was the Word

I was sitting in bed on Christmas Day listening to the service at Westminster Abbey on Radio 4... and I began thinking about how my religious upbringing might influence the way I speak/think about things. S many times, the Archbishop spoke of light and darkness, and used abstract concepts or metaphors. There's a lot of this in the Bible and having gone to very religious schools, I think maybe it has had an effect. I think you could note some similarities in the way I caption and title my works to how things are spoken about in the Bible, pairing the abstract with the everyday and trying to explain huge things with smaller everyday things. The monumental with the mundane.

I googled a few passages in which light is spoken about in the Bible...

I've been thinking recently about how religion, especially after hearing people talk of 'paradise' and 'hellfire', is so powerful and these abstract concepts are so compelling because they are so vague; it is up to the individual's imagination to picture paradise, and theirs will be unique too them - their very own tailored paradise. Referring to concepts such as darkness and light in my work might have the same effect - they can be interpreted very differently and it is up to the viewer what they get out of the work.

I also thought about the line in 'The Sound of Music' song about Maria, "how do you hold a moonbeam in your hand". There is a formula to why that is a poetic sentence - because it is mixing something intangible with something extremely familiar - the juxtaposition is stark. I am also reminded of the art medal we made 'Remnants of a Supernova Fitting Comfortably in the Palm' as it refers to holding something vast and entirely out of reach. One last point about the moonbeam is the futility of that sentence - hopelessness is poetic.

Assessment Display

I found some photos of my studio assessment set up from last year and have realised that I never analysed them or logged them on here. I thought it might be worthwhile to give me some ideas for my upcoming assessment as I am yet to decide how to display my work. I'm still fond of the clean, minimal, black and white look, with labels as if part of a museum collection. I am aiming to approach it like a little exhibition to best show off how i have refined my ideas or to strongly indicate how a final outcome might be realised. In these photos I really like the mixture of different media - 2D images, found and made objects and the projector. I think I have a similar collection of things to present in these different ways this time, and am looking forward to curating them and bringing them together.

I am planning on making these 'media' cards again, with the links to my pinterest, instagram, website etc and the artist statement. I think this is a logical way of doing it and in keeping with the overall aesthetic. I could present them on the desk on a sheet of paper but I think this, like the title as gallery protocol, sets the tone of it being a display. 

Making Cyanotypes

I tried making cyanotypes for the first time with paper I bought from an online photography store- not the best quality but I bought a big pack so I could experiment before perhaps buying better stuff. I had some acetates of the lenses printed ready so that I could make this this holiday and have some work when I get back to uni. I really like the idea of including the sun in the medium, so that there are levels of meaning, and the materials and process are fitting with my intentions and interests. It seems to me really poetic to make images using light, and of objects that once helped someone to see. It is as if the light reactivates the now obsolete and 'dead' lens.

The process was fun - and very easy! I need to do more experimentation with timings to figure out the right colour blue: I wanted to wait for the sun but made do with a cloudy day and wasn't entirely sure what length of exposure I would need for this. Oddly, I left one of these images outside for 0 minutes, and another outside for 20 and they have come out the same colour. I also would like to try different acetate images as I think maybe I might have made the acetates too dark so on the cyanotypes (such as the one above) there is not much detail to be made out. Overall, i really like the effect -I think they have potential to be taken further; I'd love to make a really big version, with that rich blue filling most of the page.

Saatchi Gallery

This week I made a quick trip to the Saatchi as I was in the area - I never have very high hopes for what I will see there anymore; I know I have mentioned in a previous blog post how I find it a little depressing how people go there as somewhere trendy to meet people and barely look at the work. I also find that the spaces are so large, and therefore the works are so large, that they are quite different to my work - they are often rather bold and brash (and often political) sculptures or paintings that are quite opposite to my taste. I did find this was once again the case but the gallery was almost empty and I enjoyed the opportunity to spend time with each work, and pick up on smaller things that I can use as inspiration for my own practice. I have got into the habit this year, especially since Venice, of observing how a work is presented even if I don't like it; I'm conscious that I need to start making my pieces more 'professional' and think about how they might be shown in a gallery space, so going to bigger galleries is helpful in this respect.

Olivia Bax - 'Model For More', 2014

Similar to the sculptures of Rudolf Polanzky that I wrote about recently, this sculpture made me wonder whether there was a separation between the stand and the form on top or whether it is all one piece. Again, I like the minimal metal stand for its elegance and practicality.

Amba Sayal-Bennett

I don't recall ever seeing overhead projectors in major gallery spaces before. I admit I had little interest in the work itself but was more focused on the display. It was almost reassuring to see that this was 'good enough' for a major gallery, to have projectors just on the floor with all the cables exposed. I rather like overhead projectors for their straightforward function; in this case the acetate image is just as much on display as the projected one as well, the projector is inextricable part of the work unlike modern digital projectors. 

Dis/Order - 'Eternal/Muternal Beauty', 2015

I was surprised to find that this was actually my favourite work in the gallery - surprised because it is neon and glaring, and is to do with some kind of cell mutation. I actually really liked how whimsical it was, it made me smile which was a change from all the heavily political works in the adjoining rooms. The presentation was also intriguing, the neon objects were the only things lit in the dark space and created patterns in the darkness. This was a strange kind of museum style display but I can still add it to my growing list of examples; the jars were displayed on shelves like a glowing, postmodern cabinet of curiosities.

Death Cafe Work Ideas

I have been very stuck as to what to make for the Lost for Words Exhibition....I knew I wanted to put in the Dust form a Doctor's Waiting Room, but I have been really at a loss about how it might be displayed. Imagining such a little pile of dust in that vast white space has had me really anxious. It was suggested I present it a museum, or cabinet of curiosities style, but trying to find a suitable piece of furniture (that is affordable) has proved impossible. I considered trying to make my own stand but, without the workshop and with very little time because of all the other work I have to do, this is not really a viable option.

I was finding it so tricky that I thought I needed to take a step back and re-assess what the piece was originally about. i find it easier to physically write down my thoughts, instead of list them on here...

I have decided to go with the last idea, putting very small amounts of the dust onto microscopic slides, as if they going to be examined under a microscope, and laying them out in neat rows. I have an image in my mind of them being displayed like a minimalist artwork, and in similar but not identical multiples, which I am always drawn to in artworks, I also intend to photograph the dust,or the slides of the dust and make them into postcards, which people can take away.

I have written the following for my artist statement:

Dust, the debris of time, is the material remains of the people who have existed and the actions that have transpired in a space over weeks, months and years: a catalogue. Dust is both life and death, at once telling of the body’s growth and of its decay. Skin cells shed and fall like grains of sand in an hourglass.

'Dust From A Doctor's Waiting Room' dissects this most degenerate of materials, both in a physical examination and in an invitation to reconsider its significance. Taken from Falmouth's Westover Surgery, the dust is specific to the residents of the town. Local visitors to the exhibition may well be looking at fragments of themselves in the work. 

Jess invites visitors to take postcards of the dust, so that it will be dispersed back into the local area and beyond.

Each Other's Eyes - Display Compositions

Making Teaspoons of Darkness/Teaspoons of Light

 I had the idea to develop the teaspoons of darkness work by actually casting the bowls of teaspoons in the black emulsion paints. I like the thought of creating quite simple looking objects, where it is not immediately obvious what they are or how they have been made. In my mind there would be a large amount of these small black teardrop shapes, and they would be displayed in rows or lines as if artifacts in a museum. I am always drawn to multiples, especially wen they similar but very slightly different. Carrying out this idea began with sourcing some teaspoons, and therefore scouting the charity shops of Falmouth and Bristol (as if I needed more excuses). In the past year, collecting the objects for my projects has become a significant part of the work, and I quite like how the spoons will be objects that have belonged to people from across the South.

The first experiments I have done have not been a great success. I discovered that, as emulsion is water-based, the paint halves in volume as it dries and therefore does not keep the shape of the spoon. The resulting objects were thin, crisp-like shapes of matte black paint, entirely lacking in interest or poetic potential. Its quite interesting to note how, evident in this example, although a work can be conceptually driven, its aesthetic is still very important in conveying the idea or sparking the imagination. If it is not working it is very obvious but, as I discovered, it is equally easy to know when something is interesting...

I have been thinking of ways to bulk out the paint to maintain the shape of the spoons.. I want to try latex as it will hopefully preserve the colour (which is central to the work) but I will have to wait until I am back in Falmouth after the holidays. I tried mixing with PVA and (some dodgy looking) paint thickening agent, but they still reduced in volume far too much or diluted the colour to such an extent that it would invalidate the concept. In order to just get an impression of what the spoon shapes might look like, I decided to try casting the bowls in wax and then painting them (a tester - I don't think this is conceptually strong enough to do for a final work because it would not be measurements of darkness). To do this I lit a candle and dripped the wax gradually into the spoons, put them in the fridge and removed the cool wax - it reminded me of making the medal and I really enjoyed how malleable and tactile wax is.

I was immediately very interested by the results - where the wax drips in tiny circles onto the metal, there are layers evident in the set article which look like a kind of mottled glass - they remind me of the surface and visual qualities of the contact lenses.  As the wax had blackened in places, burnt by the flame, each spoon came out a slightly different colour; the murkiness also hinted at the darkness and mystery I m after. I realised that, as it was the flame of the candle that made the wax fill the spoons, they are actually measurement s of light instead of darkness. 

I'm really looking forward to developing these. My aim is to collect more spoons to make a more impressive and coherent series, and to perhaps experiment with different colours.

Teaspoons of darkness (painted wax) and teaspoons of light.

Cabinets

I wish I could remember what I was thinking when I write some of the things I later find on my to do list. I came across this note (below) the other day and the exact thought behind it is a bit of a mystery - but I'm going to try and jot some thoughts down anyway because it sounds interesting. 

I think maybe what I would have been thinking is how the cabinet is a place where artifacts live, and that this display method has such established connotations with the museum that it automatically impacts the manner in which its contents are perceived. Museums are inherently about the past, exhibiting objects once belonging to people and civilizations long dead, or the skeletons and preserved bodies of natural history specimens,  

I thought I might take a look at some artists who have used cabinets in their work to analyse their function as art objects and curatorial decisions...

Kate MccGwire - FINE (Fucked Up, Insecure, Neurotic and Emotional), 2012

Firstly, the feather sculptures of Kate MccGwire, which are catergorised in their own section of the artist's website as 'Cabinet Works'. I presume that each piece is made for a specific cabinet to determine its size and shape, which is perhaps quite a different approach to museums (what comes first, the artifact or the museum case?). There is an interesting contrast between these works and MccGwire's installations which, although are created to follow the architecture of the space, are a lot more organic, less balanced in their form and composition. MccGwire's decisions to make the pieces sit quite large in the cases conveys a sense of cramped incarceration, making them even more uncomfortable to view. Presenting them in this way, with the connotations of natural history vitrines also makes them even more animal-like and therefore more uncanny. Although the shapes appear as if living beings, I think they still agree with my note and speak somehow of death, and perhaps more broadly about death in the museum context; the sculptures take the place of skeletons or taxidermy specimens and reveal a unnerving, even sinister aspect to the museum's encasement of the dead.

Cornelia Parker - The Maybe, 1995

Tilda Swinton sleeping in a museum vitrine is unusual (not least) because she is a living artifact, but in a way she is almost as sentient as the feather structures of MccGwire. The work would not have nearly as many connections with death if the performance had not occurred in a museum case; although sleeping is naturally associated with mortality and fragility, here Swinton is in the territory of the dead. As 'The Maybe' also includes more conventional museum exhibits, such as artifacts from the Freud museum, Swinton is related to these other works through the cabinet. The function of the vitrine here, and probably in every work, is ultimately to direct attention; in this case it is not just to her form, but also to her existence. 

Mark Dion - Tate Thames Dig, 1999

I always think of Mark Dion first when ( think of cabinets because I remember his talk I heard in first year. His way of using them as a space to bring things together, to create connection is what is most interesting. The cabinet is a kind of device to put authority on a collection of objects that might not have immediately obvious relationships. I think how this relates to death is perhaps less obvious, but because (in this work above at least)  it is using objects that have been found discarded and buried underwater, it is as if they have been resurrected and the cabinet is a means to preserve them. I am reminded of the idea that we are all equal in death, and this is also what the cabinet does by exhibiting things slide by side as if there is no hierarchy between the objects. 

Damien Hirst - No Art; No Letters; No Society, 2006

Damien Hirst and Death go together so intrinsically that it is perhaps difficult for me to forget what I already know of his work and analyse what the cabinets themselves bring to the work. Although, perhaps the cabinet is part of the language that Hirst has built up, so that within his practice alone, the cabinet or vitrine becomes naturally associated with death and mortality. In the work above, the cabinet is almost a found object, as if it has been removed off the walls of a chemists with the contents inside and put into the context of the art gallery. Thisis different to all the other examples I've looked at, as they are reliant on the cabinet being a means to display, something that has been acquired or constructed after the object or artwork itself; however, Hirst's cabinet here is intrinsic, irreplaceable, ingrained in the meaning of the piece with no chronology of what came first.

I used to read

I used to read books to understand the dictionary.

And now I read the dictionary to understand the books. 

My Cafe Morte Week

Growth, Decay, Dispersal and Disintegration

The title of William Basinski's 2001 composition 'Disintegration Loops' might refer to the rolling course of corroded magnetic tape from which the audio was made, but it also reads as a statement. Disintegration loops: the growth and decay of the world is cyclical. This theme held up throughout our discussion as we spoke of ageing and the body, the poetics of human hair and how bodily materials become relics. I let Basinski's piece play as we spoke.

The week before, as she was saying goodnight to me, my Granny had mused something that I couldn't help referring back to as it was such a stark comment about the body dismantling itself in age. Granny commented that by the time she's taken her glasses off and her hearing aid out and her false teeth out, there's not much of her left. Terrifically bleak and characteristically random, to me her observation had a compelling connection to my recent work involving contact lenses. I have been curating pairs of my old and damaged contact lenses in museum style displays along with captions such as 'Six Months of Sight'. Echoing Granny's question, what would I be without those small, now redundant circles of plastic? A curious point was raised about how glassses, contact lenses, hearing aids and false teeth are all 'identity objects', personal in their intimacy with the body, in their particularity to a person, and in their conservation of aging and changing identities.

I've always had a fascination for and a sensitivity towards decay, whether in small everyday encounters or in an awareness of the Earth's impermanence. While away at university, and only seeing family infrequently, the changes that occur on a human scale have become more evident to me. When I do go home, everyone is that slight bit older, that slight bit slower than my memory had them preserved. These changes were magnified this year when my mum was diagnosed with lymphoma and began chemotherapy. Mum herself suggested I use her hair, which she had collected as it fell out, for an artwork - it was perhaps some comfort to us both that this loss would not go to waste. The topic of hair seemed to resonate with many in the group, and we discovered that there is a vast amount of ritual and myth concerning the subject. It was suggested to me I look at other artists who use hair, including Annette Messager and Alice Maher. We discussed how women's hair is particularly charged, and how there are many poignant connotations to it being cut. If I were to make an artwork with my mum's hair, the material will therefore always transcend the personal story and take on other associations.

The conversation moved on to how bodily objects are kept and displayed. We spoke about Victorian mourning jewelry, made from the braided hair of the dead. It was mentioned how religious relics are often kept in extremely intricate protective cases; the more covers and layers of concealment, the more important the object. This resonated strongly with my investigations into how to display objects to 'elevate' their value. How might I display my mum's hair meaningfully and respectfully? I posed the question to the group about how to deal with making very personal work because there is a lot of pressure that accompanies ideas so close to the heart. Is it always the right thing to do? Is it necessary for the audience to know what the work is about? How to manage this proximity seems to be one of the key inquiries to which Cafe Morte discussions return. This time we came to the conclusion that it is very important to wait until the work feels right to make, and that when it does it is a very valuable thing to do.

I recently read that new born babies cannot see properly until they are at least 12 months of age, and that as adult eyes grow old they gradually return to this state of obscure and imperfect vision. With all the inherited sincerity of my lovely 89 year old Gran, I might observe that this growth towards and then detachment from the world is another example of how life and death and disintegration loop.

'death: the human experience' at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery

Despite being a bold title 'death: the human experience', in all of the exhibition's branding, omits the use of capital letters. Perhaps this is a nod towards the universal nature of death and its (nonhierarchical) relevance, which is very much the focus of the exhibition. 'All eligible, everyone welcome' a further subheading might read. Alternatively, it is an invitation to review the word 'death' without the established connotations that accompany known and capitalised nouns; familiarity is dismantled and interpretation is set free. There is certainly the sense of the open-ended and unresolved to this exhibition, compelling to an extent, but at times leaving me floundering.

The exhibition contemplates five key human experiences of death, each with its own space and display style: symbols of death, stages of death, attitudes to death, human remains and science and ethics.  It is a comprehensive survey, objects and images relating to every aspect of the subject are presented alongside engaging interactive features and a selection of thought-provoking quotes. The curators have been careful to warn visitors about the sensitive nature of the exhibits and I am gently informed as I enter that there are human remains in one room that I might choose to avoid if I wish.

Such is the presence of death in society that metaphor and connotation are unavoidable, but maybe this one should have been avoided... Walking into the first, corridor-shaped room of the exhibition is like entering a huge and gaudy coffin. Luxurious pink material drapes from the walls with a pronounced but distracting opulence. In front of this magenta mass, exhibited in glass-domed displays are objects symbolic of death: a taxidermy vulture, a funeral wreath of white lilies, the fragile orange and brown frame of a Death's-Head Hawk Moth and the exquisite, delicate skeleton of a small Horseshoe Bat. Here, and throughout the other rooms, the exhibits range from recognisable articles, commonplace in British mourning ritual, to the more obscure and unfamiliar objects of other cultures and ages.

One glass cabinet of familiar objects catches my eye and I am met with an array of traditional and popular 'grave goods' that are left with the dead in British burials. Cigarettes, jewelry, mint imperials, letters from loved ones, dancing shoes and other favourite items are among the displayed, together with a mobile phone. I am intrigued and slightly unsettled to read the accompanying quote:

'Requests for mobile phones to be added to the coffin are common, and often come with a comment about "at least they can get in touch if they aren't dead". I hear this fear in a lot of my work. The phone is a bit like the Victorians putting a bell in family mausoleums, just in case. I have had families who make sure it is fully charged so it will last as long as possible and regularly text the phone after burial.' (Su Chard, independent celebrant, 2015)

As someone wary of the most escapable of enclosed spaces, the thought of being buried underground unnerves me to say the least. There is also a poignant sense of futility to this tender, almost hopeful act. In my opinion, highlighting these very personal and very human responses to death are where the exhibition is most successful. It poses the question to the viewer, about what we would wish for our own death and burial. How do others see us, and how might this be summarised in the objects left with us when we die?

One further explanation for the title's lowercase type is the associations it has with learning. When a child first encounters the alphabet they begin with the simplest form of letters possible and build on their understanding from there. It makes sense to assume from the information describing some of the artifacts, that the intention of the curators was to present a simple and essential insight into death. One caption, positioned alongside a small model of a black hearse, reads:

"A hearse represents death and funerary rituals because it's seen at the time of a funeral. Even an empty hearse is associated with death". 

It is at points such as this within the exhibition, that it feels necessary to question the purpose of museums and the intentions with which they display their artifacts. Aside from collecting and cataloguing, the most obvious function of the museum is to impart knowledge; while this display is certainly educational, it is with a sense of something lacking. As many of our Cafe Morte members make work involving found and made objects, the notion of conceiving death through tangible artifacts seems very relevant to our collective research. Our upcoming show 'Lost for Words' could likewise be titled 'death: the human experience' and we are likewise exhibiting objects and images with a broad and encompassing scope on the topic of death. However, where I feel art may have more of an emotional and meaningful impact is the freedom it allows viewers to interpret the matter with their own sensitivities and experiences. Where the museum is informative to the point of being problematic, the art exhibition illuminates with the bounds of the viewer's imagination as its only limit.