ARTISTS TALKING

# 1 [29 June 2009]

Engineers Report Book 11^th April 1874

Gentlemen, I beg to report that I was at the Goldstone works yesterday and the Number 1 Engine was working well.

Your Obedient Servant, M Johnston

My Notebook June 2009

Ladies and Gentlemen, I beg to report that I was at the Goldstone works yesterday and can inform you that, following the tiptoeing through archives of crumbling Victorian cuttings in the County Archives, I revisited the works with a new found vision of the museum in its previous incarnation. I t has been a few weeks since the news that funding has been allocated and explorations have been initiated. Proliferations of mind maps encircle me in themes from inspirations, to locations to lifestories. I now have the task of drawing out one thread.

# 2 [20 July 2009]

Random Inspirations

Peter and his knowledge of machines

Old photos (he has worked at The Engineerium for 30 years)

Archives East Sussex Archives' Ledgers, diaries 1876-1900’s for their imagery and Victorian turn of phrase.

Ham Baker and Co catalogue, makers of waterworks machinery.

Russian Theatre especially Shepyanov's 'My Friend' 1932

The Art of the Engineer beautifully exact

Paolozzi , early collages

Charlie Chaplin (Modern Times)

Union Carbide Silicones, adverts drawing on photos (Fortune Magazine, 1950)

‘Promptitude’ a pub sign I saw walking home. I’ve never noticed it before.

I’m reflecting on all my interests that, through working habits and getting trapped in a certain process, have stopped finding their way into the final work- writing, forging links and threads, photography,design.

A need to create last week, after being encircled by ever changing mind maps, saw me drawing machines on sheet metal. It provided a lesson in exactitude! and a reminder of Victorian precision! Not to mention how long it is since I've worked on a finely detailed still life. Now I'm trying to draw like a machine. At the same time I’m mechanically moving round and reordering the images and material I've collected to find that heart.

# 3 [10 August 2009]

Engineers Report Book October 12^th 1875

I beg to submit to your notice a sample of the present quantity of coal now being delivered, which appears inferior to the last.

Your Obedient Servant, J Johnston

My Notebook June 2009

Ladies and Gentlemen, I beg to report that I was at the Goldstone works last week and can inform you that I have spent some time at the works rediscovering my skills, long since used, of penmanship and have embarked on drawings of draftsman like intent and collages with a feel of exactitude. I can report that the meeting has been arranged for 9.30am on the morning of the 11th to commence the hunt through the pumping station’s own aged documents in storage. It is anticipated to reveal the daily routine of the blacksmith and workers of such like. I can also report that a clear summary of intent for this exhibition has now been composed and is ready to mail to the building’s former industrial archaeologist and a steam enthusiast of high regard.

# 4 [10 September 2009]

Here I am thinking I’m following a new direction when it appears that my past is just re- emerging!  ‘Art and the Industrial Revolution’ (Klingender), which kick started my reading, is the book I discovered during A level Art.

Recent attempts at more technically accurate drawings reminded me of my Rotring pens and my nostalgia for once tracing out Future Bold on a light box, before the days of computer typography.  I’ve dug out my much cherished pens (some were my Father’s from his mine surveying day) and abandoned any thoughts of charcoal (a fleeting ‘coal like’ consideration) Revisiting old sketchbooks (hunting down a drawing I once did of a Lego man- for my little boy!) I found the Sheeler like drawings I made of the steelworks in my native Yorkshire.

It all stacks up! A deep affection for the industrial landscape and people combined with the satisfaction I get from a graphic meticulousness. I am about to do a timeline of my life and list all my past creative obsessions and see if there is anything else that sits comfortably amid all this research.

# 5 [11 September 2009]

Engineers Report Book January 19^th 1875

I beg to report the current wages at the Goldstone works;

J Baker 2/10/- a week  Engineer

T Waite 24/- day   Stoker

G Cosham 20/- day   Stoker

King 22/- day   Stoker

Adams 22/-   Labourer

R Alderton 1/- a week  Office boy

A Colessida 26/-  Is a fitter and repairs meters and fixes the same, and sluice and sometimes assists the turncock

My Notebook September 2009

Ladies and Gentlemen, I beg to report that the mountain of material in the store changes the shape of the undertaking. Plans and documents have been clarified free from copyright and reproduction issues, -and importantly costs, thus the publication has taken on a new life. The Jackdaw and the Engineers Notebook Series inspire and Waterworks memo's, notes and plans have been scanned and reviewed over this recent school holiday.

On a recent visit to the workshop  ideas were discussed. Whilst partaking of a beverage with the Goldstone workers 'Brass' as a title is now discarded on  discovering it is an alloy and not present in the machinery (only on plaques around the building.) After talk of the true description of a cog I returned to notice the silence of the building and the sound of the Edward Funnell clock. I proceeded to film the situation. Adding this feeling of standstill to my mind map a clear theme and final title  emerge – in the words of Wordsworth ‘All that Mighty Heart Stands Still’ 

My thoughts no longer feel compromised, but fed, by all the findings which now, through their own quality and quantity, find their own life in a unique pubication. 

# 6 [7 October 2009]

The officially renamed All That Mighty Heart was launched on the general public at the Phoenix Brighton Open last weekend. Framed collages and a ‘research wall’ showed found material, images, drawings and extracts from the blog illustrating how the work is developing. After a week of illness at the printers the card stand, by the work, didn’t provide the contact details and email address to take away. Best laid plans. But they are done now and ready to start spreading the word!

It has been so long since I’ve let ideas freefall and hope they land in an innovative and reasoned manner. I’ve now made enough mind maps to cover a steam engine, but ideas do come together when you have time to let them. And contrary to belief...the lengthy bus rides to school are not bereft of suitable stimulus for drawing those map strands together. I walked the quiet lane to the Waterworks Cottages (early for the bus one day!) The silence allowed me to picture the workers in their caps and boots crunching along the flinty path. Back at the Engineerium the diggers have moved in to start the new work. The silence is coming to an end. I am glad of the last few months of visualising in the stillness.

Back in the studio, between school runs and hefty preparing for Phoenix Open, I have been experimenting with ageing paper, making it, with candles, tea and lemon juice and adding decades to my images. I’m still enjoying my Rotring (even more so since Peter informed me he uses his to outline the lettering on the side of his engines.) Acting instantly on ideas without worrying about the outcome is becoming a bit easier, again with the luxury of time after last week’s frantic timetable.  

# 7 [27 October 2009]

After presenting my Peer Review at Fabrica and showing mock ups  and photocopies for the first time beyond the home front, my thinking is clearer. I answered some of my own questions. What am I trying to say? What is important to me? What fits the space? (- and if money was no object?)  The group help me answer more....Why am I doing two bodies of work (when only one is clear in my head?) I have been working with layers in recent work, is it enough to have one? – and is a photocopy enough!?  The day after the review I went back, to 1992, and my own limited edition. It’s all about narrative (my life before layers)

I have been sneaking in test drives in camera shops over half term and am on the verge of a Canon. With my head in dusty B&W photography I’m waiting to hear about when they are going to clear the flues at the Engineerium-not quite the same but...

'Step into that cage which hangs over a yawning well away up at the Goldstone Waterworks;-permit yourself to be lowered into Plutonian darkness; and at the bottom of the well you shall have a new experience. You shall not plunge into the cold bath you expect:- for your sake, the mighty engines up overhead have pumped the wells dry, so that you may undergo the strange experience of taking some lengthy walks eighty feet  or more under the surface of the Earth, and may witness some novel effects of illumination.'  The Brighton Herald    May 28^th 1904

# 8 [10 November 2009]

Engineers Report Book August 1918

Gentlemen, I beg to report that In July last I received a letter from the Vulcan Boiler General Insurance Company Ltd dated 10^th of that month pointing out that the boilers at the Goldstone pumping station were now 56 years old and that even when new had only a moderate factor of safety, and asking that the pressure in future should be reduced from 60 to 40 lbs to the square inch.

Your Obedient Servant

My Notebook November 2009

Ladies and Gentlemen

With numerous diggers paving way for the new kitchens, I wandered to the boiler room to attend to the task of envisaging myself meandering round the exhibition. Suddenly I seized on the idea of how the sound will work, a giddy rush emerging on the Number 5B as I penned it in my notebook.

Enlarging and cropping has been the week’s task in hand, and contemplating funding. With a couple of possibilities on the horizon realising this project with less compromise is an option. I know now what I need to achieve with the sound. I’m ring fencing ideas and about to launch my plans on the Engineerium for consent, before I start writing yet another plea for additional funds. Adventurous it may be, but I am endeavouring to drive my work forward.

To quote James Nasmyth (inventor of the steam hammer, 1808-1890)

‘It is one of the most delightful results of the possession of the constructive faculty, that one can build up in the mind mechanical structures and set them to work in imagination...It is the early cultivation of the imagination which gives the right flexibility to the thinking faculty....’  from the British Engineerium executive summary circa 1993.

# 9 [18 November 2009]

Goldstone, Examinations and Repairs Book (found today)

At the newly installed

Boiler Number 4

June 4^TH 1934

Slow fires put in

June 7^th 1934

Raising steam

June 8^th 1934

Inspected by Mr. Thomas at 80Ibs

April 6^th 1937

Flues swept

November 16^th 2009

Day of the flue cleaning of Boiler Number 4, readying it for inspection and firing up after 4 years at a standstill.

The health and safety standard outfits didn’t deter the soot getting in as they scrambled deep inside the boiler, armed with brushes. The soot is so fine and 5 barrows full came out from those dormant tunnels, nothing like the 88 barrows that came out when the boiler was fully working.  

Back in the studio there’s a pile of photos to edit ,which is thrilling me to the core, and Rotring pens to clean...not quite so thrilling (the nostalgia wearing thin as the two I want to use are blocked.)

The latest old paperwork we found may help with my narrative strand...But it’s looking doubtful. Nevertheless the writing itself is inspiring.

My school run ‘bus job’ has been jotting notes for the funding application and on the opposite page thinking about other venues for the work, after the Engineerium...and Christmas lists.(it’s a long trip)

# 10 [14 December 2009]

‘A Kids guide to Managing Time’

What did I spend the most time doing?

What did I spend the least time doing?

Is there something I would have liked to have spent more time doing?

Is there something I would have liked to have spent less time doing?

Is there something I would have liked to have done but didn’t do?

Did I have enough free time when I could do what I wanted to do?

Did I spend enough time doing things I decided to do?

Do I feel good about the way I spent my time?

It appears that I have spent most of my time thinking and printing.

Four meetings in the last week have addressed different aspects of this ‘Mighty Heart’. One: with my funding ‘expert’; one was an APD 1-2-1 session about the ambitions for the work, the third with the project manager thinking about timescale and budgets and the final one with a colleague looking at the practical problems of projecting and sound in the space. Then more thinking! 

I have spent little time making, apart from lists of things to try out in the new year.

More time looking at a book on Railways, Identity and Culture (inspiration comes in unlikely places) would have been good, and for finisihing the list of words that describe the emotional journey I want people to take through the work. Really pinpoint how I want them to feel?

Back at the Engineerium I handed back a technical drawing we uncovered (from 1917) of the grounds this week.

Needed to confirm the depths of some pipe work, as the building work progresses, it reminds us of the importance of archiving all these papers for the computerised era.