Threads

We went to see the Quentin Blake exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge today. Got there really early (free, but timed ticket entry) before it was too full. It is a small exhibition but full of wonder, for me and my son. He grew up with us reading Roald Dahl and laughing at Blake’s characterful drawings. Seeing the real thing is always better isn’t it? What amazed us was we could almost hear the scritchy-scratchiness of his pens. The drawings were full of gesture and movement and conversation. We amused ourselves (is this a good point to tell you my son is 27, not 7?) by inventing the conversations… between the beaky tour guide and tourists; the women and birds; the women and babies; the birds and dogs. Conversation was everywhere, except, curiously, the drawing of the only two “real” people? Gesture and movement caused us to emulate – I especially loved “Big healthy girls” the large colourful woman with lots of uncontrollable hair struck a chord, and we tried to strike her pose – she was wonderful and I want her on my wall. By the time we came away, the room was filling, with adults and children, all of whom were laughing and doing the same poses and actions we had done.

A really unserious look at art. Made us giggle, put smiles on our faces, brought the sun out. Well done Mr Blake, you clever man!

Ha Ha!

Who am I trying to kid?

I knew it wouldn’t last long!

Elena Thomas only has enough words for one blog? No chance.

Anyway…

I have decided I need some decent photos of my work for my website, I feel my quick snaps are not hitting the right note any more – onwards and upwards and all that!

I met a lovely photographer today. You know the sort of person you arrange a short meeting with about one thing, then end up talking about life, the universe and everything?

My friend Dan Whitehouse recommended his friend Carsten Dieterich (link below), so I went armed with a load of work scrumpled into a big ikea blue carrier bag. We chatted, played, looked at examples, decided we liked similar things, didn’t like similar things (one thing too busy, another too bright, simple is best…)

We found we had a lot in common in terms of how we view our work, earning money, variety, and the staving off of boredom through creativity, insomnia and the useful quiet hours between 11pm and 2am.

I am finding these are common threads lately, in the people whose work I admire, be they musician, artist, photographer.

Problem is, when you discover there are other people up at that hour, you start a conversation online and end up going to bed even later…

*stifled yawn*

Carsten’s website is: http://www.focused-photography.com/

He’s a lovely man, and he does some lovely work, in all sorts of shapes and sizes.

Then, I get back home to discover Ruth Geldard has been delving into my ranty archives and has been talking about the Artists’ Lie…(post 224) Carsten and I touched on this a little too, about how what you do to bring in the money doesn’t have to be connected to the thing you love to do, but how variety helps you to keep all these things going, one income stream supporting another, which supports the thing that sometimes doesn’t create much income at all. Doing all of it, enables all of it. Balance.

Ruth’s blog is: www.a-n.co.uk/p/3134411/

(I wonder if Ruth stays up late too?)

Blog writing is going to get tricky over the next few months, because I won’t know where to write! The work I am making at the moment is solely for the joint project with Bo Jones, so it seems logical to write there, and come back to Threads if I get a bee in my bonnet about something else… So I leave this sign post to “pix” for you:

www.a-n.co.uk/p/2910921/

See you over there for a while…

I do try to keep this blog just about my art practice, and not about my teaching too much. Initially that was because I already knew myself as a teacher, but was trying to get to know myself as an artist. I’m ok with that balance now, so feel more able, occasionally, to drop in a post about more teachery things…

This weekend I attended the NSEAD conference (link below).

It has been brilliant. The speakers (mostly) were totally from and with their audience.

Teachers (and artists) haven’t got time to listen to someone who isn’t interesting, informative, creative, useful, or at least entertaining! I have experienced all these things this weekend, and have come away, enthused about taking new projects into school, and livening up some of the stuff that’s looking a bit jaded. I think I was feeling a bit jaded myself as end of term approaches.

Sometimes… and this is going to be difficult to say, I want to choose my words carefully, out of respect for the amazing organisers, and wonderfully inspirational artists and teachers I met this weekend…. Sometimes… you need something to go wrong, so that you see in sharp contrast how fantastic everything else has been. Otherwise you might take the wonderfulness for granted.

Teaching teachers is tricky. Talking to teachers, as a teacher, is tricky. Talking to a room full of teachers among your professional body at their annual conference is bloody nerve-wracking. When I talk to teachers I have to be sure of everything I say, I have to be confident that I can articulate what I think and feel. Teachers and artists working in education should be respected for turning up to these things at the end of a term. They are all knackered. If you put your board out saying you are going to tackle an issue and 100 people turn up to listen to you. You need to tackle that issue!

I found myself quite horrified, that among all this talk of defending and championing our subject, of striving for excellence and integrity, that some people don’t think like this. We are not just needing to convince people who aren’t artists, art teachers, artist teachers and other combinations of similar words, but we have to convince those within our ranks too, that success in the arts is NOT just about knowing what formula to use to get an A*.

http://www.nsead.org/home/index.aspx