Blank.
Full moon…lack of sleep.
Just spent the last two and a half weeks in Level 3 lockdown again in Auckland, New Zealand after an outbreak of Covid-19 from a mystery source. This time we were a little unprepared. Our heroic Covid-free world status was short-lived.
Funny how quickly humans forget the bad stuff and get on with their lives as if nothing has happened. Such a thrill to be a consequence of a humanitarian government and a bit of a shock when the virus appeared again from nowhere. Thousands of kiwi’s are heading home from heavily infected countries, quarantining and bringing the virus with them. The battle is not over. So, back to masks, social distancing and hyper-vigilance. Using an app to scan wherever we go is quick and convenient…hopefully it will help the tracing of the community transmission.
August 2nd (while still in Level 1) I went to see ‘Deadweight Loss : The Value of Making’ at Objectspace…a talk with Moniek Schrijer, Laurie Steer, Cat Fooks with the installation designed by architect Micheal McCabe. Three prolific makers. Very inspiring show. Particularly impressed with Moniek Schrijer’s 7,000 jump-rings on her Money Bags, 2020 work. The work has body-like ‘shrug’ feeling about it. Like you just want to stand underneath it, brush against it, put your head into it. Which I expect is what jewellery/art is all about. I also love Cat Fooks’ work…she uses anything around her and paints it. Kim Paton writes about it here…value, craft, popularity…can so relate.
http://www.objectspace.org.nz/exhibitions/deadweight-loss-the-value-of-making/
I watched this…the letter that Sol LeWitt wrote to Eva Hesse – read by Benedict Cumberbatch sent to me by mother who came across it while researching.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnSMIgsPj5M
It is reassuring to know that pain is the driver to make – for some of us. It certainly isn’t about peace and serenity even though I keep on tackling that one. It’s about the doing. Again. Oh yeah, the doing. Tragically, Eva Hesse died in 1970 at 34. I wonder how her work would have progressed had she lived. So much work to do, so little time. I see a ‘link’ between this work and Moniek Schrijer’s work above. These are from artsy.net
https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-transformative-career-eva-hesse
I have also been looking at ‘How to be an Artist’ by Jerry Saltz (borrowed). It’s a really good step guide for progress, and when you read it you get the ‘oh yeah’…the doing.
So, to the doing.
Attai Chen 31 August 2020
I finally caught up with Attai at the end of August.
He had been teaching weekend workshops in Munich with masks on, sanitising tools, then oiling tools and so on. Exhausting. He realised that if there was a time when masks come off, he will not recognise the students at all.
Makes me think we’ll have to start photographing the bottom half of our faces for the future so that people can see our noses and mouths and teeth.
Our last discussion was around making a finished piece to see if I could turn my ‘jumpy’ ideas into jewellery. So I decided to finish a necklace that I had quickly thrown together made from found plastic pipe, and repurposed a sheepskin steering wheel cover that was a gift from my sister sometime ago. It lost a bit of it’s tension from the initial spontaneous thread-together, but it’s a delight to wear and I love that it carries the memory of both stories.
I had cut into the pipe, drilled holes in it, scratched it. Decided I liked it better just as it was, so cut it into different lengths…thinking about how we see things in different ways.
I’ve been cutting up plastic fencing that I pulled from a skip. It’s very therapeutic. And trialling it in a variety of ways. Now my challenge is to turn it in to jewellery.
Attai asked, ‘what is a necklace to you’, and ‘add some more content to the framework’. ‘Conceptual opposites’, the inner spokes and the outer spokes…’reference polynesian/ethnic necklaces…how do I want it on my body’? ‘Narrow it down now, without disturbing the power and spontaneity.’ Hmm…
Be playful, then fine tune. Do a few experiments, stitch, rivet, wrap etc.
How to turn this particular story into jewellery. DO something!
