Threads

I like my blog.

I can write how I speak. I can prattle on a bit, go down cul-de-sacs, take a tangent or two, and meander slowly back to where I started…. Or not!

It’s when it comes to “Important Writing” I have problems. I write essays like an 8 yr old… or at least, I think I do. Other people’s writing is always more intelligent, cleverly structured, properly argued. I always feel mine should be peppered with “yeah, but” and “ ner ner, told you so” and “I think you’ll find I’m right!” and even the occasional “oh f*ck off” when I encounter a standpoint I don’t understand.

So the funding application process is fraught with danger. I have no confidence that what I am writing makes any sense to anyone. I am convinced I am repetitive, leave out the important bits, presuming the funder is psychic.

I was the same with the essays for my MA. Backwards and forwards they went, till they made no sense to me either. I don’t think I learned much about the process of doing it, despite the best efforts of my tutor.

Last night at this year’s MA show at Margaret Street, I met a few people about to embark upon the PhD option… I truly and deeply think they are mad. I wondered about it for about a week. Then I said “I have to read HOW MUCH?” and “I have to write HOW MANY words? No thanks. The thought of juggling 50,000+ words when I have trouble getting to grips with 500 brings me out in a cold sweat.

I admire these people greatly. They are doing something I feel I am never going to be equipped to do.

But I bet they can’t do a decent French Knot for toffee!

It wasn’t so bad.

The day started with the predicted ire about other people’s rubbish, but I have come to expect it, so just got on with clearing it, before starting my own work.

I also handed out some flyers for ONE. These were met with curiosity, surprise, bewilderment, and also, satisfyingly, a few people seemed impressed. These people I work with mostly don’t see me as an artist I don’t think. That is because when I started working there I wasn’t really. My steady development as an artist over a ten year period has largely gone unnoticed. I think this has been of my own making, as I wasn’t ready to have it questioned. Now that I am, to them, it must seem like a sudden change. So I started to look back upon those ten years after work yesterday. How was I when I started?

I was grateful. I was on the verge of going mad. I had thankfully been offered this job at a point when I felt totally trapped by my teaching in FE, trapped financially, professionally backed into a corner I didn’t want to be in, but it had happened so gradually I hadn’t noticed till it was too late. When I started, I just wanted to feel I was doing something creative again – anything. Therefore, my price was low, and I wasn’t worth much to be honest. I was a bit of a liability, emotionally fragile.

The first two years were therapy. I did as I was told, followed the scheme I was given – occasionally with misgivings, but followed it anyway. I got stronger, and having been given a creative lifeline, wanted more. The Artist Teacher Scheme was a life saver the first time I did it. I signed up a second time, and it changed my life. Again, I don’t really know if anyone noticed. I saw a different me emerge. A me that probably hadn’t been around for 20 years or so. I recognised this person, not new, but awakened. A gradually building confidence allowed me to finish my degree… thanks to the also therapeutic, supportive nature of the Open University. (It is so sad their costs have sky-rocketed, as what was available to me then, would now be totally unreachable). The ATS awards masters level points… it took me quite a while to convince myself I could do it. So having had my brain changed by the ATS, the MA hauled me up by my ankles, slapped me, shook me by the shoulders, told me to pull myself together. It filled me full of the tools to carry on. It gave me reading to do; art to look at; gave me people to talk to, work with, and those people told me when I was talking rubbish, unafraid! They told me when the work wasn’t good enough, or didn’t work how I was wanting it to. They did also tell me when it was getting there. They asked the right questions. And in some cases, laughed at me and took the p*ss. In this, made sure I didn’t take myself too seriously. Far from putting me down, this process built me. Because when the week before your final show, when the person who has been telling you the work isn’t quite there, isn’t quite hitting the spot, suddenly says “Yep. Pretty good.” You feel like you can fly.

There is, of course, the inevitable post-MA slump. A year on, I now see it for what it is and am moving out of it… if you have been reading this blog a while you’ve probably seen it for yourself.

So I no longer feel I can fly, but I’m skipping along quite nicely, thanks. I feel good about the work, and feel good about where it is taking me. I am no longer emotionally fragile. I have challenged much of the teaching I started with. I do things differently now. I do things as an artist now. I’m worth more now.

I’m back at school on Monday.

I have to remind myself that having inset on the first day, then not seeing the children till Thursday when I’m next in, is a horrible way to start the year. This is because I am already in the “I don’t want to go back” mood, and will not be reminded why I like it until the children are in. Undoubtedly, having cleaned, cleared and prepared my room in July, all and sundry will have used it as a half way point to the skip in the holidays. Out of sight, their rubbish will be forgotten until I scream upon entering the room.

I try not to talk too much about my teaching here, because that’s not what I do this blog for. But now and again, its effects are undeniable, and need acknowledgement.

I have spent the last six weeks working towards ONE – the joint exhibition with Bo. I had to do this because October will be here before I know it, and there is little time to decide what to show, and to get the work showable! Consequently, teaching is the last thing on my mind, the artist takes over completely, I am pretty content, the trials of the artist being so much more preferable to the trials of the artist teacher. I feel totally me. To the non-artists, that might sound quite selfish, and to an extent it is I suppose. But the artists know that this is the BEST state… creativity whizzing between eyes, fingers and brain, total absorption. This is like the talk of an addict perhaps. Towards the end of this six weeks I resent totally the need to return, longing to hand in my notice, to spend all of my time in the pursuit of art.

The M word.

Money.

I am supremely fortunate, my rational brain knows this, that I can afford to only work in school two and a half days a week. I have to be reminded that what this gets me is creative freedom. I don’t have to make my work fit anyone else’s brief in order to make money. So instead of whinging about having to go back to school, I need to plan my time carefully, and use my days off to the best. I need to make my school life feel fulfilling, do it to the best of my ability, so it doesn’t become a millstone around my neck. I need to prepare work to inspire the children, get them thinking, make them laugh. Then when I leave the building, I can become the artist again. In the meantime, I can plot and plan, for that glorious day when the artist jobs and income streams become more, and the teaching income becomes less, and then perhaps eventually I can give it up.

Dream on……

Just a short blog, with a few photos, to share my excitement…

I thought it was going to take weeks to source this item for my piece to make for New York, but I found it!

It is a 1940 British Infantryman’s greatcoat. I have spoken before about how things speak to me in junk shops… well this was a risk, this was eBay, I didn’t even get the chance to sniff it before I bought it, but it is perfect. Worn, stained, tatty and torn, moth-eaten. There is so much evidence of the man who wore it, and the life he lived in it. I am quite emotional about it really.

I will need to clean it up a little bit, a brush and a sponge down here and there, and I will perhaps steam it a little so that it hangs better for exhibiting purposes.

Then the stitching will begin.

An act of love.

The work I’m doing at the moment, apart from the search for military coat, is totally focussed on the show with Bo in October. So I’ve decided that the specific stuff about the art can go in our joint blog, “pix”, but the general stuff can be here, as the issues concern everything else I do.

Framing…

In recent years, I have not made work that needs framing. Methods of display have required inventive use of steel cables, bias binding and stuffing.

This stuff does require it. It is two-dimensional mostly, and requires something substantial to give it an impact/importance. Especially in the gallery it is in, in the town it is in, and especially as I would quite like to sell some of it. And there it is. I said the S word. Yes. Selling. The last few years have cost me a fortune, and I’d quite like to get something back. I don’t think I have compromised my art thought processes, but I have perhaps selected and framed and priced, according to what I think will be attractive to a buyer. And now, I have a possible trip to New York to finance. Having work that people want on their walls, as opposed to work they will be interested in in a gallery situation is different.

Gallery…

The gallery we are in for this exhibition is in a quite well-to-do market town in Herefordshire (publicity material to follow soon). We both have links to the town, but it is not close to either of us. This coupled with the fact the gallery has NO online presence AT ALL, means we have to do everything ourselves, apart from the very local stuff, which the gallery owner is happy to do for us. Be prepared for social media bombardment, and please if you feel so inclined, we’d be very grateful for any word spreading that goes on.

Stewarding…

We will be doing this ourselves, and roping in other people to accompany/help. Luckily I have friends who are quite willing to spend a whole day with me for nothing more than a free lunch!

All in all, this is a huge investment of effort, time, money, emotion.

All for a week of travelling to the gallery and back, in the vague hope that someone might quite like these scraps of stitched fabric enough to buy one of them. If I sell one, I cover my petrol costs. If I sell two I cover the framing. If I sell three I cover the cost of eating while I’m there. If I sell four or five I might cover materials costs. If I sell six I cover publicity/printing costs. If I sell seven, I shall buy myself a cake to celebrate! If I sell eight, I shall feel like I am famous artist! Saatchi won’t want me, but that’s ok.