Tutorial with Gordon

Had a bit of a panic because I re-read my artist statement and couldn't believe I'd written it...did I really think that...? Was that what I was trying to do...? Oh dear! But had a tutorial with Gordon and he reassured me about what it was and why... It's all about my need to know that there is an alternative or different way to see, and experience. Mirrors are a tool to create portals to spaces that cannot be accessed, but do exist because we can see them and imagine that we are in them... Architectural space can be altered by creating objects in the space or images of the space that point out and temporarily distort, so that we can see past the everydayness and banality of the space, which might suggest if we can change the physical nature of our urban environment, we can change the psychological nature. Or any nature? I think I could be a definite Situationist, but I am aware of their demise! The idea of it really appeals to me though... but we live in a capitalist consumerist culture where money is on people's mind more than pychogeography!

Decided to concentrate on staircases for final show, as I keep on coming back to them and need to resolve my almost obsessive interest in them... they appeal because they are functional but are so varied in their forms depending on their situation. Tenement stairwells still catch my eye when I pass, as they are definite portals to different realities. vertical panoramas. vessel for shifting mental states. thoroughfares...arteries...

MA exhibition title etc

The four of us, Diane, Lindsey, Siân and I, have had many meeting to discuss how we would go about creating a 'wavelength' between our work so there would be some sort of coherency when it comes to the final show. We decided straight off that we were not going to fabricate some sort of contrived link between ourselves, because we all agreed that this was dishonest and would change how we would work and affect our final works. Instead we've been concentrating on coming up with an exhibition title and collective statement that would give the viewer a good idea of our mind-set with regards to how we make and see how work. We were agreed that there is a playful element in our different pratices and that we weren't trying to make some profound statement in the world, but instead we are pointing at the world and coming up with reinterpretations to challenge how we and other people see things.

So firstly, we came up with the title, 'Only the fool looks at the hand when it points to the sky', as this is quite funny and gets across the idea of pointing. Also it is in 'Amelie', a film we all like! But unfortunatley we decided it was too long...

Another meeting and we come up with 'Just to Say'... We liked the implied suggestion of something to follow...

Talked about how we would use posters, catalogues, facebook, postcards etc. and decided we needed bold imagery like the 'Keep calm and carry on' logos, but we also wanted to do something slightly different when it came to distrubution posters, so we came up with the idea of making an ink stamp with the logo 'Just to Say' and stamping it on post-it notes and sticking them everywhere. For the posters, Diane took the scanned image of the resulting stamp and altered the colours to make variations, all in striking combinations!

London Trip!

I went to London from the 17th June to the 21st and saw lots of art!

• 'Ernesto Neto, The Edges of the World' and 'The New Decor, Artists and Interiors' at the Hayward. Really enjoyed the complete immersive and sensual quality of Ernesto Neto's work. Also really interested in the way that he alters the already existing space to change the space's inhabitant's experience. I started thinking about how I could do that, specifically within stairwells...


• 'Rude Britannia' at the Tate Britain. Not really my thing.


• 'Rachel Harrison, conquest of the useless' at The White'chapel Gallery. Quite liked some of it, but was mostly interested in the way she incorporated the plinths into the work. (Dean had said someting about tables instead of plinths.?)


• 'Architects Build Small Spaces' at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Was really excited about seeing this as I've been thinking a lot about the viewer in the work rather than looking at it, but I was quite disappointed by the spaces, I think because there wasn't a specific focal point or viewing point and the spaces weren't exciting enough in themselves, unlike Neto's spaces, to get any emotional response from them. I'll have to think about this in relation to my own work, as maybe trying to get the idea of transition across, takes more than the viewer moving through a constructed space...


• 'Francis Alÿs, A Story of Deception' at the Tate Modern. Loved it! Best exhibition I've seen in a long time. Amazing how he can address some extremely sensitive political issues but creating work that is almost playful, such as 'the green line', which is Alÿs's act if dripping green paint from a paint can with a hole in it along an armistice border in Jerusalem to remind people of the separation of Israelis and Palestinians, and as it says in the catalogue, he wanted to ask what the role of poetic acts could be in highly charged political situations. Alÿs also works in such varied ways, and this exhibition was curated in a way that validated every work, so that the films were never overlooked as their of manner of display was different every time, from massive projections in dark rooms to tv screens with headphones...
• 'Hotel' on Greenfield Rd. A group exhibition, including tutor Dean's work. Really amazing space, but there was no information about why the artists were exhibiting together or what the work was about, and a lot of the work was 'untitled'. Maybe this was deliberate, but I definitely need a way in when it comes to exhibitions... will have to think about how the MAs will get across the information they need or want to when it comes to the show.
• Central St. Martins degree show. Poor work and poorly presented, but did hear a rumour that the style of their degree shows has always been 'work in progress' rather than 'final show'. Good to see though, but left feeling disappointed and unaffected.
• Goldsmiths degree show. Much better than St. Martins, work wise and presentation.
• Saatchi Gallery. Was amazing to see Richard Wilson's 20:50 in situ as have only ever seen it in books. It really does trick the eye. Unfortunately the walkway into the oil was closed off so we could only view the work from a raised platform. This will have changed our experience of it greatly... must think about this in relation to my work.

Photography Stairwell

This image (above) shows a site-specific installation that I started around the 14th June. I wanted to created something quite spontaniously without my usual months planning, and use materials that were to hand. So I used lengths of masking tape stretched across the well between the banisters in the photography stairs in ECA. It reminded me of my previous stairwell project that I made for my project space last December, but I felt no connection to the materiality of the masking tape, as I did when I was using the foil and mirror in my project space, as it was there quite specifically to create a certain effect. The only thing that I liked about what was happening was that the stips of tape started making a curve in the well that would never have been visible without something forming it out of the air. I was making something that was previously unknown and invisible, visible. I didn't complete the installation as I wasn't convinced that I was getting across what I wanted to about the experience of being in the space, but thought I could come back to it again after trying something else first...

Studio F7

'Studio F7' was the response to Dean's challenge to make something in my studio space without using mirrors. The idea came from reading Foucault's 'Las Meninas' also as he talks about the use of mirrors in the painting and how there is a triangulation between the artist, the viewer and the subject. And so, I attempted to put a photgraph of my studio in my studio and take a photo of it, and then repeat this process three times to create a certain triangulation. I hoped the viewer would think about the position of the artist when the photograph was taken as well as the creation of depth within the already existing space. This would hopefully create a relationship between the viewer, the artist and the subject.

tutorial with Dean on 8th June

First individual tutorial of the semester. Dean and I talked over my year's work and areas of interest. The most interesting point to come out of the discussion was the fact that I had admitted that I wasn't too keen on mirrors as objects and would use anything else if I could to replicate the reflective/space-making qualities of mirrors. Dean suggested that I make a work in my space without using mirrors. He also advised me to look at Foucault's essay on 'Las Meninas', which acts as his introduction to his book, 'The Order of Things', and also, 'The Optical Unconscious'.

We also discussed the problem of the sculptural quality of my work overwhelming the thing that was supposed to be internally viewed by the audience. I have always had problems with this double experience issue and so I could attempt to simplify the work and not put all my eggs in one basket.

Another problem still is how to immerse the viewer? I feel we are so tuned into looking into things ie. the tv, that it is an easy way for an audience to view work. To be unable to enter a space, makes us want to be in it more? ...

A list of my interests

Light, space, architectural space, transitional space, ie. stairwells, corridors etc, from A to B, from one state or level to another, verticle panoramas, reflection, creating space within space, invisible/ virtual space, viewpoints, optics, optical devices, the everyday, the situationists, indirect viewing, suggestion of...

Feedback from semester 2

I might as well start from the beginning...

After meeting with Dean, Gordon and Kristin, for my feedback from the second semester on the 7th June, I attempted to write a brief statement about what had been discussed and so it became clear that the most crucial aspect of my work that I was struggling with was whether or not to create wholly immersive work, or sculptural objects that could be looked into. Examples of these two types of work from this year are 'The Stairwell' and the work I made for 'The New Contemporaries' at the RSA (see above).

The idea of immersing the viewer has attracted me since 2006 when I attempted to paint spaces that would draw the viewer in. I then moved onto making 3D spaces and photographing already existing spaces that appealed to me.

My struggle with object making, image making and space making has been going on for a while, and I always hoped I could continue working in these varied ways until I suddenly had an epiphany...

This still hasn't happened so I decided to review my practice as a whole and try and decide on the apsects that need to be resolved, and also the apects that I still wanted to pursue as I suddenly felt there were so many components in the mix that I was getting confused... more follows...

Here we go!

This blog will follow my progress from the start of semester 3 to the MA degree show in August 2010. I will attempt to relay all of the relevant developments in my research and practice that I have previously only noted down in sketchbooks. Hopefully the posts will be chronologically accurate as I try and get up to date with my posts.