ARTISTS TALKING

# 11 [24 April 2009]

A comment on one of my posts, fantastic – thanks Laura! There is a world out there!

Isolation seems to be epidemic amongst artists. Although it’s a real peak experience when artists come together and join in a project, the very nature of creativity sends people spinning away again.

Artists find it impossible to plod along enjoying each others’ company for long, they soon get inspired and go off and do something whacky – often on their own.

Back in the early 90s I helped get a group of artists together – we all needed a break, and I’d found a community centre who wanted to help: free exhibition space and low cost room hire in return for publicity.

Our philosophy was to use the opportunity to help each other get where we wanted. We spent a lot of time talking about where we wanted to go. It was challenging, about raising expectations and not settling for second best. It started about us all wanting to get our work exhibited, then it got into gaining experience – teaching, administering, gathering practical skills. Then onto money, why we wanted it, and then how to raise money in ways other than selling paintings and running workshops.

Within a year, one was enrolled for a PGCE, another was running Yoga groups, another had decided that more than anything she wanted children, another joined an advertising agency, and I went off to start learning about ritual.

It was really fabulous … but doomed to disintegrate.

I’ve been in five such inspiring situations, and the years in between have been filled with the dark feeling of being surrounded by people, but still feeling lonely.

I was commissioned to write an article about it for the Artists Newsletter, which was really about heralding the innovation of the AXIS register (not online then), as a means of making contacts with artists. Ironically, 15 years on, searching the AXIS database, I don’t get a single hit on ritual – and the selection panel continue to reject my annual applications, so sadly never much use for me.

Having a family has been a great comfort. Children idolise their parents, and as much as being loved is good for children, it’s also good for grown-ups!

This morning I was consoling my daughter, who was in tears of frustration over drawing a glass. It was a genuine delight to sit down with her and a glass, and show that the glass is only visible by the way it distorts its background, and through its specularities.

Tonight, my son and I are sleeping in camp beds in my study/studio, ready for an early start hanging the Wolfson exhibition. He’s the official photographer for the private view, and will be videoing my performance … for the simple joy of being involved in something exciting.

When the kids leave home, I will miss them like my own limbs … back to the dark times of seeking out those chance encounters with others whose journeys briefly join the same track.

# 12 [24 April 2009]

I've had some feedback from post #10, about railing against the conceptualists.

Far from it, I think the conceptual movement has been a vitalising and challenging force in the art world, and some of my favourite art is 'conceptual' in nature.

I just find it both upsetting and annoying: the way that artists demean their work by the things they write about it ... and the fact that contemporary courses encourage this stuff.

Write about your process ... write about your techniques ... write about interesting things you found along the way ... but please, do we have to write rubbish as well?

Remember, the best art stands on its own, moves us at a deep level, and requires no explanation of what it represents, no details of references.

Sometimes when I exhibit, I write a little story or poem for each painting. But the stories that get read most avidly go with the paintings that people like most: the art must stand on its own, if it needs propping up with a heap of junk, then it is a heap of junk.

# 13 [25 April 2009]

I've done rather a lot of reflecting in this blog, I'm going to try and do a straight diary entry!

Hanging the exhibition today, something I haven't done for 13 years. Forgotten how much hard slog it is.

First off, the muscle (my Czech ex-army neighbour) let me down - turned out he got pissed last night and crashed out on a friend's floor.

Now, I can only just carry the performance equipment on my own. The speaker and the electric piano are a hundredweight each. But with the advancing years, the consequences of carrying this stuff are severe: back-ache for a month, and acheing wrists that prevent piano playing for a similar period. Since I'm shifting it with the intention of performing tomorrow, I can't take the risk.

Eventually, me and my son slid the equipment down the stairs (narrowly averted squashing of son), sledged it across the garden (sorry lawn) on old blankets, and ramped it up into the back of the van on a step ladder. Once we were at Wolfson, all easy, helpful porters, trolleys, lifts, etc. discovered son suffers claustrophobia in the lift. Funny you can live with someone for 12 years and not know something like that.

Hanging was pretty much trouble free. Here's a tip which few seem to know about: "Leger Stops". If you're hanging stuff with nylon fishing twine, these things stick onto the line, but can be moved if you pull hard. Really easy to get pictures at exactly the right height without endless knot tying. Available from all decent angling shops, and on the internet.

Confronted with exhibition lighting tracks for the first time. The fittings made some horrible cracking and squealing noises when I moved them around, but I don't think anything snapped.

The folks at Wolfson are very kind and helpful. They plied my son with free coke (the fizzy stuff with caffeine in it) all day, at the end of which he was whizzing about between the 3 rooms like a rocket had been strapped to his backside.

He did a fine job all day with the nylon twine and leger stops, and did his job as documentor excellently. He deserves a treat some time. Don't we all?

Back home, panicking about the performance at the private view tomorrow. Been trying to remember the last time I played the piano in public. 1996 I think.

I've made a list of the things I need to pack in the van tomorrow. Forgot to launder my clothes ... think I've still got a pair of clean jeans somewhere. Must have a bath, I stink this evening, family too polite (or too familiar with it) to complain.

So it's all over, really, bar the shouting!

And why did I do it all? Honest answer: To keep life interesting enough to bother trying to stay alive. Just now, it's really fun!

Thanks Megan (not real name) for permission to (mis-)use your story.

 Thanks for the encouragement, Rob!

# 14 [27 April 2009]

My son has made a fantastic video of my performance, time to get that bootleg video editing software installed.

My daughter enthralled the audience by making weird noises into the microphone.

Simply having children has a dramatically soothing effect on audiences.

In fact this works on everybody: If I go into Boswells department store alone, all the assistants put on  blank expressions, step a little back, keeping a wary eye on my activities. When I go in with the kids, it's all smiles and "can I help you sir?". Sir? People never call me sir. Well, they do when they see I'm a Dad. One of the perks!

At 9.00 pm, off went my partner and kids with a friend: school on Monday, the kids must get to bed. If they're late to school we start getting formal letters from the head, and unwelcome interest from the educational social worker. We've learned from experience.

Ex-army Czech neighbour made up for Saturday by staying behind helping me load the van 'till 11. "Naaahees Vun" as he would say.

Got home at 1 am after stacking glasses, clearing bottles, paper plates, screwed up napkins, etc., wiping up spilled wine, scrubbing the cream cheese off the carpets and hoovering up crumbs. By the time I got round to eating (after performance) there was no food left, so at home made myself a cheese sarni and cracked open a left over bottle of wine.

Daughter woke up crying. "It hurts, it hurts" ... "Where does it hurt my darling?" ... "The exhibition hurts ..."

Yes, it always does, however well the event goes.

No matter how much people enjoy themselves, and what lovely things they say about my paintings, the press, arts council reps, local council arts officers, local gallery managers, etc. are always conspicuous by their absence.

People come to Oxford for the tradition: for the Christchurch  collection of medi-aeval art, the 12th Century wall paintings and Tudor royal portraits. People don't come here for the fringe contemporary art, so why clutter the pages of the local press with it?

There's the cost too. I try to justify it as publicity for my business (teaching and offering ritual and ceremony). That's the year's profits wiped out ... it might convince the tax man, but ultimately I have to justify it from a deeper motive!

And finally, there's the post-exhibition depression. The rapid disappearance of large amounts of adrenalin from the system, it's a kind of drug withdrawal. Combined with the sudden onset of existential meaninglessness now there's only computer work to do, always unpleasant.

So, up late this morning (7.45 - the days of a quiet lie-in after a late night ended with the arrival of children!). Son rushes out, shoe laces trailing, and leaps on bike with piece of toast stuffed in mouth.

Daughter, miserable, trails to school, late, in the rain, with partner.

I take van to studio. Now, how am I going to get this equipment back up those stairs?

# 15 [4 May 2009]

I am so tired. I got into my “office” on Monday to find 10 messages from a customer. Their new Chief Exec is starting, and they forgot to ask me to link up his blackberry to email. Do I really care? The last Chief Exec barely used the computer, let alone a blackberry. Other panics from customers take me to mid-afternoon, and I’ve yet to get music equipment up the stairs. Eventually good friend helps.

Tuesday, on site with customer until 6, then partner goes out, so I deal with bedtimes. Wednesday same. Thursday, partner at interview in London, bedtimes again, then working until 3.00 am. Friday up early to install software for another charity. Friday pm, collect daughter from school, then weekly food shop, clean studio and re-assemble music equipment. Finish 10 pm. Saturday, end of month accounts. Partner suddenly wants to attend ‘no kids’ party in Southampton, leaving me babysitting yet again. Hey – why can’t we all go? Nasty argument ensues, partner leaves and goes to party anyway. Sunday, kids play in garden while I go back to sleep, neighbour takes pity and entertains kids. Sunday pm partner returns, I spend rest of day learning to transfer video of performance to youtube. The simple transfers and edits take hours. Video uploading, will probably take all day and night.

Why perform? We all like to be the centre of attention from birth. My son, age 3, used to play thrash metal drums on whatever was around. My daughter enjoys improvised movement to Miles Davis. She prefers a tight structure, and begged for ballet lessons. Ballet lessons are for the bourgeoisie to impose stifling discipline on the unspoiled creative spirit of a vulnerable child. Apparently not.

My son hated his sister for years, until he was able to explain: “When I was little, I walked into a room, and everyone looked at me. Now, I walk into the room with my little sister, and everyone looks at her.” Totally true. Totally unjust.

My son got a handycam last year and spent his birthday videoing his party; at the end, complained: “When I’m videoing, I’m not doing - just watching”. He’d rather be ‘doer’, performer, than reporter, audience.

Performance is a form of ritual – Psychologically, it’s a way of moving the emotions around a group, enabling people to be heard, expressing and solidifying subtle changes in relationships. Socially, it’s a way of expressing and resolving social tensions, re-ordering roles within a group.

There are 2 ways of doing it:

Specialise: polarise between “artist” and “audience”. The artist as spokesperson, representative, and thereby powerful broker of social expectations and realities.

Or Democratise: the artist as facilitator, teacher, enabling the personal development, participation and emancipation of the observers.

As parents, we have to make the same choice: Do we bring up our kids as receivers of our authority, confined in our realities, expressing our expectations? Or do we facilitate them to explore their realities, define their own ways to participate in society?

# 16 [7 May 2009]

My daughter is made for school. After 2 weeks at school, she made herself a workspace in the living room with table, chair and lamp, sitting there after school making school books for her teddies, marking their work. She already wants to be a teacher, and she probably will be.

School doesn’t suit my son (he’s mildly dyslexic - reading and writing are painful), and it’s been hard persuading him that adulthood offers loads more opportunities than the school curriculum.

After much discussion and thought, he’d like to be a Civil Helicopter Pilot: “something risky, but not where I’ll be shot at”.

But when he’s really settled at school, he wants to be an air traffic controller, and even works on his Spanish to get up the career ladder as an international controller.

Mostly things aren’t so good, and it’s helicopter pilot. When things are really bad at school, he wants to be a fighter pilot, and shoot the s**t out of everything.

He has the curse of talent. His teachers have picked up his aptitude for science, and he’s on “Gifted and talented” for art. But he skips the after-school clubs for science and misses the coach for Special Art away-days. What he really wants to be doing is climbing trees and learning to fly helicopters.

I suffer from the curse of wrong talent – I can do computer stuff better than almost anyone, but do I enjoy it? It’s tiring, frustrating, complicated, stuck in an office all day … but pays well, and is flexible.

I love art, and always have. But I have little talent: I really struggle at it, but I love it so much I put the work in. Even so, it will never pay the bills.

The most brilliant bits are group improvisations – music, painting, movement, whatever … it just sends me.

But what I discovered about 15 years ago was that officiating at sacred-style ceremonies is very similar, giving the same natural high.

It’s the sort of thing art therapists are paid for. So, why not do an art foundation and degree, then a 3 year art therapy training? 7 years of full time education? I’ve already spent 7 of my adult years in full time education. I can’t justify another 7 years of poverty ending with a debt I’ll never pay off, to halve my earning potential.

But there might be a way through this – occasional lecturing on therapy training courses. I’m not qualified, so I can’t offer therapy, and I can’t train therapists in therapy. But I can train therapists in ritual: “ … for personal development”.

I had some opportunities last year to do just this, and I’m beginning to get enquiries from training institutes. It’s fantastic work, and pays pretty well. But is there really enough of this work out there? Or will it always be another hobby I fit in around everything else?

I just hope my son manages to get his career sorted out younger than me …

# 17 [13 May 2009]

Children of artists Part I:

“Dad, we’re not like other families, are we?”. My son has discovered the elusive concept of lifestyle … and the fact that ours is a little unusual.

My daughter still lives in the blissful illusion that everybody is like us, and is often outraged that anybody might do anything differently from us.

My experience of childhood was that I was expected to fit into my father’s every lifestyle decision - to the extent that when my father’s mind started to weaken I ended up enduring 6 years at military school to fit in with his delusions of having been a heroic soldier.

My partner’s experience was similar – daughter of a real career soldier, she and her siblings trailed half way across the planet and back, to and fro between home and British boarding school, to satisfy the demands of a life in the forces.

Our experiences weren’t unusual for our generation … and not that unusual for the new generation of kids … what is unusual is that we have both developed an interest in childrens’ democracy.

My partner taught at Summerhill school for 4 years: the school that regularly hits the headlines because lessons are optional. What doesn’t reach the front pages of the rags is that the school is utterly democratic – every person in the school has a vote on every rule, and anyone can propose changes to the rules. Given that adults are vastly outnumbered by children, this results in a fair childrens’ democracy.

But there is a flaw in the democracy – one important fact that indicates the school is a model of democracy for children, rather than a real childrens’ democracy: The constitution (the way rules are made and enforced, the way transgressions are heard and punishments decided) is fixed, and non-negotiable. Unlike the real adult world, there is no possibility of revolution. Also, whatever the children vote for, the basics of food provision and building maintenance continue unaffected.

Translating the idea of childrens’ democracy to the family is difficult. I have definite non-negotiable boundaries, as does my partner … the equivalent of the fixed constitution. However, the adults in a family do more than the teaching staff at Summerhill. We are not just educators and facilitators, we are also bread-winners – earners, shoppers, cooks – and cleaners, and nurses, and affection-givers, and protection. The constraints imposed by fulfilling these roles create a host of inflexible boundaries.

More difficult still – when two kids at Summerhill fight, the other kids intervene, help to negotiate, enforce discipline when necessary. But when two kids at our home fight, there’s only the adults left to sort it out.

Finally, at least when the kids are young, their limited life experience limits their choices. When we get a take-away they don’t know about the Lebanese, the Chinese, the Sri Lankan, the Greek, the Pizzeria, the Indian, the Jamaican and the Thai … they just go along with the adult choice of fish’n’chips.

# 18 [13 May 2009]

Children of artists Part II:

So can life in a family really be made more “democratic”, “child-centred”? And would it really make everyone happier?

So far I, and the other artist-parent blogs I have read, have explored the question of “being an artist with children”. But what about “being a child with an artist parent”?

So before writing this blog, I asked my kids: “What are the good bits, and the bad bits, about having an artist parent?”

“That’s a hard one” says my son, “Flipping heck, that’s hard”. He says he would like to have more ready cash floating around. A decent computer, cash for gadgets and computer games. He’s a true child of consumerism.

On the other hand: “I really enjoy the events, the bonfires and everything”. He also appreciates that I keep a stock of cheap art materials for teaching that I let him use, and when he’s really into something I let him use some of my ‘professional’ materials – canvas, acrylics, adhesives, etc.

Do the plusses outweigh the money? “I like the way we live” he responds.

My daughter is less ambivalent: “I really like art, and you can teach me how to do it, I like that … I also like being able to use your paints, I think that’s great.” She’s less enthusiastic about the events: “When you’re getting ready for an event, you’re really busy and we don’t see you, I’d like to spend more time with you. But I like the events, I like handing round food, and I like looking at your pictures”.

What about money? “I don’t like posh things all the time, they really annoy me. I just like a little bit of posh, and then just ordinary. If we had lots of money for a posh holiday, I wouldn’t enjoy it.”

And then there are the things that aren’t to do with me being an artist:

My son says: “I like not having strict rules, and that the house is messy. I’d hate to live somewhere that’s always clean with strict rules. I enjoy it like this, it’s kind of hippyish. I wish I didn’t have to go to school, though”

My daughter: “I don’t like rules, I want to be in charge. When I’m grown up, everyone’s going to have to do what I say.”

But by far the most important thing for both kids is that we stay in Oxford. They place huge value on their friends and local community. Not just school friends, but the close-knit network of adults that they’ve grown up with, who they trust, who will always be there for them. And also the familiar surroundings – the parks, the trees, the memories.

We visit Summerhill school occasionally, and the children love it – the school community quickly accommodates visiting children. “Would you like to go to Summerhill?”. The kids reply almost in unison: “Only if all our friends and grown-ups came with us”.

# 19 [20 May 2009]

The Wolfson exhibition came down on Saturday. My son helped pack it all away in our van. Now – on with the subject of the blog: “What Next”.
The last 3 weeks has been full-on computer work, 6 days a week. This week I’ve just got half a day’s work, so am catching up on essentials, like van maintenance. Spotted antifreeze on the ground where it’s been parked - needs a new radiator. Must fix it before next week, when we’ll be camping in Devon. In fact, need to get it fixed before Friday, when I’m taking my exhibition to the Tavistock Clinic, London.
Fix the van myself or take it to a garage? Checking the Haynes manual, I could spend a day on this. Though the job is simple, there’s a lot of jacking up and easing fragile things apart. It will take a garage a couple of hours, and if they break anything, they’ve got spares. 2nd phone call lucky, they can order the radiator and do the job on Thursday. Let’s hope they’re not bull-s******g!
The Tavistock Clinic, NHS centre of psychoanalysis, has an exhibition space, though not open to the public. They like my work, it has a psychological angle (I exhibited there in 1997). This time I’m seeing the exhibition as a targeted marketing opportunity – therapeutic ritual is on the periphery of psychoanalysis, so maybe some teaching work could come out of it?
Feeling a bit down today. Just discovered the Tavistock picture rail is 10 inches higher than the Wolfson rail. That means re-stringing all 55 items, which will take me the best of a day … since I’ve got computer work tomorrow, that means today. Since I’m taking the kids this pm and evening, that means late into the night.
Monday, went for a long walk in a local nature reserve. I sat down and listened to the Spring birdsong. I started feeling myself dissolve into my surroundings, stress trickling out of my muscles. Wind thrashing the newly green trees, clouds cascading across wild sky … so overwhelmingly beautiful.
This is where my work starts, my deepest roots. Whatever next, this is the place I come back to.
Well, not exactly, because there’s people too. Although I’m no extravert, I have a great love of people.
People are dreadful. As Iraq and Afghanistan demonstrate, dump people with no authority structure, and they start kidnapping each others’ children and shooting each other. There are many people who complain incessantly about the actions of the police. Over the past few years I’ve enjoyed saying: “Why don’t you move somewhere there are no police, like Iraq or Afghanistan?”.
But people also have the most amazing potential for creativity, positivity, self-sacrifice,  altruism, expansion … and this is where the inspiration really kicks in – drawing the hidden best out of people, finding the deepest beauty of nature, and bringing the two together. This is fundamentally what all my work with ritual has been about.

# 20 [31 May 2009]

Thanks, Barbara, for doing me the honour of reading my paper. Although the paper you’ve read focuses on ritual as applied to therapy, the underlying theory applies to any ritualisation, and was developed from my experiments with ritual as a context for multi-artform events, and my explorations in ritual as a form of visual art.

I agree, I have experienced “Spiritual” ritual as confining, crushing all but the tiniest opportunities for creativity, originality and self-expression. However, I have a spiritual approach to life, in which my creativity is rooted. Further, I enjoy ritualising my spirituality creatively. How so? … the thrust of my research has been the attempt to square this circle.

Mary Douglas analysed ritual in terms of its effects on communities. She sees social and religious ritual as mediating “Grid” and “Group” within a society. “Grid” is about how people take on roles in society, the inflexibility of roles, and  the difficulty of changing role. “Group” is about the cohesion of a group: to what extent group needs dominate individual needs.

I’ve taken her work, combined with Catherine Bell’s work, and moved it into psychological theory. From here it becomes evident that strong “Grid” is maintained by strong external authority. Conversely, a society in which individuals follow their own aspirations and define their own roles, is characterised by an emphasis on individual responsibility.

Many of the psychological techniques I’ve identified as being used in rituals, are associated with the placement of authority. For instance, “Traditionalism” (identified by Bell). This can be used in two ways: “It’s always been done this way, so that’s how you have to do it”. Strong authority, strong Grid.

Or: “It has  been done this way, that way, and another way, let’s explore combining these elements and try this”. Weak external authority, emphasis on individual interpretation, weak Grid. But still a potent ritual.

There are also techniques that promote, or diminish, community cohesion. These can be delivered “Inclusively”, emphasising human commonality; or “Exclusively”, emphasising difference. For instance, communion wine can be presented as representing the blood of Christ – drawing an exclusive distinction between Christians and others; or as representing the blood that flows through all our veins, promoting an inclusive community.

My aim in my creative work is to empower individuals: raise awareness of roles and inter-dependencies within communities, and the world at large, and provide tools for change: “Enabling people to orientate themselves in the world”. To do this, I focus on the psychological techniques that promote individual responsibility, together with those that promote inclusive community cohesion.

My “Technical Analysis” relates to ritual in the same way that the laws of perspective relate to representational painting. Suddenly there is a toolbox, which can be used, not only in designing Ritual Events, but also in designing any kind of event, such as a private view or a performance. Since every human activity contains ritual elements, every activity can be organised in a way which empowers individuals, while maintaining, or strengthening, inclusive community cohesion.