ARTISTS TALKING

# 14 [23 May 2011]

It is now the time to bring this blog to a close. The Private View has been and gone, the work is installed and on display for the forseeable future and I have finally managed to get an image of the entire work - front on.

It has been a fascinating project. The almost obsessive behaviour needed for the collecting, layering and cutting has been somehow cathartic - a release from the dear frustrations of raising small children. To have realised this project from inception to conclusion is an achievement and one that only some space and time after installation has allowed me to recognise.

I am very grateful to all those who supported me in this, Alice Lobb from artsdepot, Coppetts Wood Primary School, The East Finchley Archer and the Libraries of Barnet Borough. Many thanks also to my kind friends who routed out bits of paper for it too.

For those who care to visit the work- Paper Trail (100,000 Cuts) is available to view on Level 3, artsdepot, Tally Ho Corner, 5 Nether St, LONDON N12 0GA. artsdepot is open to the public everyday 10:00 - 4:30 (except some bank holidays). 

# 13 [1 March 2011]

Well - with relief I must say - I have finished the work. Having spent a truly manic last few weeks completing the third section, I have this morning delivered the work at artsdepot ready for installation on Thursday. 

The third section was originally going to be about mapping social networks and how the traditional paper based map was beginning to become obsolete due to GPS. It has in fact become about something else.

Whilst working on this project the government announced its spending cuts and as a result it is known that several libraries in Barnet borough will close and that local government funding is being withdrawn for the artsdepot. One of my main sources for the paper I have used has been from the libraries in Barnet and I have visited many of them at a time when their futures are vulnerable. Talking to the invariably helpful librarians has shown how uncertain everyone feels about it and also how unsure of what the criteria will be to keep any particular library safe from closure. 

Demonstrations, whole schools enrolling and other strategies are being employed but the facts are some of these highly valued hubs will go.

In response to these uncertain times the work is still about the future, but rather than being about different forms of mapping it is about the places which have enabled its creation. The first layer is made up primarily of the routes to each of the library locations. The subsequent shadows are made up from paper from the libraries. Onto some of this I have printed articles about the demonstrations and the proposed local government policies. It has a rather more chaotic feel than the two sections I made before - this is down to processes I employ - but I feel this suits the subject well; that of disruption and the unknown. 100,000 cuts...

# 12 [12 November 2010]

The Big Draw at the artsdepot has been and gone and all in all it was a good experience. After some initial technical problems installing the work it was a successful and very busy day. Dozens of children visited the space and drew in relation to the shadows that had been cast on the floor, I have kept some of these to work with - others went home with the children.

I am happy to say that the work is going to be installed at artsdepot when complete for a minimum of six months. I still have the third section to complete which is going to be based around notions of mapping in the future, considering the increasing use of GPS and the inevitable decline of paper maps. I went to Queen Elizabeths Boys School in Barnet to talk to them about the project, and from that discussion the idea of mapping social networks arose. This has led me to  think about using a current map of the Borough to track the places I have visited and the people I have approached in relation to the developing work and the artsdepot and then start to link them using nodes and vectors. This will hopefully produce an open-looking network which is defined by the boundary line of the borough, and an interesting object from which to build up the final section of the work.

Giving myself a short break from this project - enough time to regain feeling in my cutting/index finger perhaps. One piece installed at Middlesex University along with the work of other artists in residence, Gaea Todd, Katharine Dowson, Gabriella Sancis and Cornelia O'Donovan.

# 11 [11 October 2010]

Open studios went well - if a little quiet due to engineering works on the tube.  I had some very positive feedback on the work - the map initially draws people in as they can't resist trying to read it, next they start to try to decipher what is actually on the paper that has been used. Observing this engagement is pleasing as it suggests that the work suits it's intention.

i have been hard at work on the second section which seems to have claimed its own form - being almost comet like. I'm not entirely sure if this is a good thing or not. I temporarily installed both pieces together in the studio to see how they relate to each other. After the Big Draw the plan is to work them together to form a continuous relief. I definitely want to make a third form (always my intention) but need some time to work out how that is going to develop. I have an idea that it needs to do with the future of the area, something to do with renewable energy and young people/ children's visions of how it might be.  I am speaking to QE Boys next week and also to a range of Fine Art students at Middlesex University in the next week or two so perhaps so ideas may come from those meetings.

Any thoughts anyone?

# 10 [27 September 2010]

The second section is well under way now. This is just as well as it is being installed for the Big Draw in less than a months time and I have to be back at Middlesex University to resume my residency next week. I have temporarily installed the first section in the studio in Tottenham. We have Open Studios this weekend and it'll be good to get some feedback on it.  

On doing a bit of research on the history of the Barnet area I discovered that an early cartographer John Norden used to live in Hendon House . He produced maps of London in the 1600's. (It still amazes me at the ease the internet allows you to find things out.) I have printed out (onto donated paper) some images of his maps for use in the work and I am hopeful that the historical theme of the second section is being made clear. I have decided to use a variety of paper within it though as it strikes me that to only use paper with historical detail on it is either going to be too limiting in terms of resources or too contrived if I have to print out too much. Enough now - I'd better get on with the making and photographs of the second section to put up here..

# 9 [13 September 2010]

It seems the decision as to when I should leave this first section and move onto the second one has been made for me. I have an Open studios weekend coming up 1 - 3 October at  my Euroart studio in Tottenham and I am going to install the work there this weekend. I need to get it out of the shed here anyway - although I have a great new wall in there (courtesy of my lovely husband) it is now nearly 2m wide and I can no longer photograph it in the house. The photo I have just put up is taken in the shed and I had to move to the side to get it. It'll be good to see it in a different, larger space anyway.

I have had a bit of feedback on the work recently, a couple of friends (also artists) have visited. It was a relief to be able to talk to people about what I am doing - especially when the making process is an odd combination of being fractured and yet intense. Lovely to get a comment on this blog too. Thanks Claire.

Anyway - the result is I am feeling much more confident about the work and being ready for the Big Draw event at artsdepot on the 24th October. I'll write more about that later...!

# 8 [4 September 2010]

Just grabbing a minute to do this blog between feeding and bathing grumpy children!  Managed to clear a little bit of space in the shed whilst the younger one had a nap - I am expecting a visit from a journalist for The Archer (local free press) on Monday to talk about the project so I thought it might be prudent to make it at least vaguely accessible! I have to admit I am pleased that it's going to get a bit more local publicity - I still want paper from a wider cross section of the community and getting the public's interest is the only way I can think might help with this. There is going to be a collection box for paper outside the gallery at artsdepot from Monday too - so please pop some in if your passing. Paper with info on local history would be good -  but honestly I'm grateful anything really!

In terms of the work itself I haven't done as much as I would have liked lately as I've been away for a bit, but the hours I have managed to snatch when smallest has been napping and small has been happily occupied have helped to move it on. It's becoming a bit more sculptural now with areas being pushed up into high relief and the shadows cast are to do with the form of the work rather than the initial cut map. I can't allow the work to get much bigger top to bottom but I need to extend it from the sides - you might be able to see I'm starting to do that already form the photos.

Thanks to Chipping Barnet library for the paper by the way.

# 7 [18 August 2010]

The school holidays have proved to be an interesting exercise in time management! Trips to libraries to collect paper (thank you North Finchley) and two visits to the delightful Museum of Barnet have been family outings. I am hoping that The Museum of Barnet will be able to find some photocopier erratum with a historical link for me to use in 1894 section. Working on the piece has meant snatching the odd hour when one child is napping and the other ensconced in some activity - however I do now feel it is really progressing. Have done the majority of the intricate first layers the lower ones are less complicated as each subsequent shadow projection is less detailed than the previous. The work is beginning to take on more of a sculptural form and extending from the 2D map format into a softly undulating mass. 

Whilst making it I find myself reading the paper I am working with. It is an activity that is both revelatory and anonymous: shopping lists, drawings, texts from university courses...they tell me something about the donor but it is only the briefest of things. 

# 6 [5 August 2010]

It's been a little while since I last blogged but I haven't been sitting around watching paper curl as it were. I have collected a great deal of paper from my daughters school and also from the artsdepot which is great except of course it all makes it rather real. I have to admit on occasion I do wonder if I am going to be able to successfully pull off this project. The work is happening - I am at least making it and working within the parameters I have set myself (using paper collected from the community, layering and drawing and cutting the shadows and so on) and it is beginning to resemble something like I had  imagined. And yet...I want a broader range of material from a wider community and I am finding it difficult to know how to access this. Additionally, I am fighting with a natural inclination to want to produce an order to the work - to impose my own set of visual aesthetics on it. I suspect I ought to let the work evolve by process alone, which is what gives it some of its integrity but the 'arranger' in me wants to interfere. It also makes it difficult when you know 99% of people who see it will judge it purely visually.

I went into artsdepot today and did a mini install which was useful and allowed me to get some up to date photos for this blog. I put it up in bar depot which is where it will be installed for the Big Draw event. When that happens it will be suspended at angle over the bar and not on the wall but it was good to be in the space to see how the scale is working.  It needs to get a bit bigger - at least 4 times the size I reckon. If I mange it I suspect I will have lost all feeling in the tip of my right index finger by then! I have also started the second section - from an old 1864 map of North Finchley which is closer and so slightly easier to work - but more of that later.

# 5 [14 July 2010]

Just had an enjoyable and remarkably relevant trip into east London. Amongst other galleries I spontaneously went into Tintype on Redchurch St and saw  Joby Williamson's installation 'What have you forgotten?'  An archive of post-it notes he has picked up and collected, slides of which are projected from a number of points. It is in turns funny and poignant. Worth a visit. A second, most relevant show was 'Whose Map is it?' at Rivington Place. Artists including Susan Stockwell who use maps and mapping in their work. A bonus is the free colour catalogue that goes with the show...collected paper and maps, now what would happen if you brought those ideas together?!