Tuesday 26 April 2016

itsthattimeofyear



In academic life it's that time of year - submissions, assessments, final show planning and
some tense but excitable students full of expectation and some looking for the time machine to go back and do work that they didn't manage the first time around (due to planning issues) - it's going to be a good one.
meanwhile - making for ALL in Cambridge progresses - with new objects made and filmed.
Looking at ideas of text and pattern generation.
As well as consuming the final episodes of Girls - harrowing but redemptive and Better
Call Saul - just so sad I've been checking out a few films that I'd missed the
first time around - the all consuming Margaret being the most moving http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0466893/ - there are many commenting on the thing that is youtube but maybe the most astute/disturbing/angry is h3h3 https://www.youtube.com/user/h3h3Productions
finally check out the film about the sculptor Lawrence Edwards - beautiful

Thursday 14 April 2016

transparentsomething


agreed to be part of "INCULCATE" a printmaking show at Camberwell - it's made up of members of staff and students as a way of celebrating the range of skills within the institution - the work explores the idea of 'the hint of a thing', 'an idea that was sort of there', 'the possibility of potential'. The piece is constructed from a range of materials and uses their physical qualities and layering to accentuate these ideas. It employs a printed image of knotted string with all the associated symbolism alongside the string itself which is held within the semi-transparent container.

Tuesday 12 April 2016

disturbingdislocatingfolds

The leaflet for fashion 360 is attractive and makes my work look good - the image of the work and the text work well together.
I've just had a long and mostly frustrating time battling with the Norwich and Norfolk Festival web site buying tickets - but anyway - some of the list..... particularly looking forward to The James Plays - a full day of 3 linked performances from the wonderful National Theatre of Scotland, responsible for Black Watch, a previous highlight of a past festival. The Tempest in Great Yarmouth is on the list and there is some great spoken word stuff with Francesca Beard and Hollie McNish alongside live art at The Arts Centre with Martin Figura directed by the most excellent Ross Sutherland http://www.nnfestival.org.uk/festival/performance/martin-figura
Shane Carruth's follow up to the unsettlingly disturbing Primer is the fantastically oppressive Upstream Colour - the imagery is out-of-soft-focused and leads you down a range of dark fractured beautiful slight narratives which you have to build and then after it has finished discuss it for as long as the film ran....just what is the role of the sampler? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2084989/
Unfolding - my proposal for ALL (Art Language Location) in Cambridge has been accepted - it will be fascinating to see the videos of the folded structures in the hand that explore both the possibility of architecture alongside that of multiple reading of language on the welcome screens in the entrances to  The Department of Architecture and The Faculty of Law. These would give the opportunity for a half imagined moment of possibility.

Tuesday 5 April 2016

foldedtime


    

in around 1989ish I worked with the poet Gary Boswell 
http://www.poetrysoc.com/content/archives/places/recycle/ in an Assessment Centre for young offenders in Lincolnshire creating words and/in books - I learnt so much in that residency - in the car on our journey to the facility we talked about many things - one being that in the very far future there would be a layer of material within the earth created from plastic very much akin to how coal was created - we were just thinking about this within the context of creative writing not really from an ecological standpoint - this idea appears to be all the rage as a topic - generation anthropocene is now on the agenda. this is a stunning read - http://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/01/generation-anthropocene-altered-planet-for-ever - truly apocalyptical doom ridden - a must
two extraordinary films - both exploring the structure of film making itself Victoria - a 2 hour single take tour de force of planning http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/film/2016/03/can-film-work-single-unbroken-shot-victoria-shows-it-can and Mr Nobody - a fractured multiple narrative love story http://www.magpictures.com/mrnobody/ both are quite wonderful in their own way.
I am 'sort of' in this show http://www.kettlesyard.co.uk/events/maxwell/
- well not really - more of a sideline of entertainment to the wonderful Gustav
Metzer, Fischli/Weiss and Hito Steyerl. I have on display some of the vast 
archive of objects along with one of the films I made as part of the Nano^Art project . 

Sunday 3 April 2016

textdanceteaching

looking through some images from New York that focus on the use of text. a great night on Friday at Dance East watching Nora - dancers Flora Wellesley Wesley and Eleanor Sikorski - the three pieces got progressively better as they went on - the last Bloody Nora, conceived by the wonderful Liz Aggiss explored a range of stuff from Max Wall to menstruation if you get a chance get out to see them on their tour. first day back at NUA after Easter with a day of tutorials with textile students. looking forward to OCA tutorials this week and the final session with the 2015-16 student cohort is on Thursday.