Threads

The Lines Between Us

The connected conversations that rely on timelessness, by which I mean no interruptions, no deadlines, no need to be elsewhere unless hunger or sleep call.

I yearn for those conversations that rattle along easily with the occasional punctuation caused by pauses for thought. These are not conversations about offspring or shopping, or when the plumber is coming. I don’t know what they are about, or even actually, if the “about” is the important thing. When these conversations happen, they are calm and quiet and easy. Maybe easy is the wrong word, because sometimes they can be deeply emotional. We might cry and we might laugh. But the display of emotion and the expression of it is unselfconscious, it is loving, and is held firmly between us. The spreading of mascara and mucus is unheeded. A tissue is delved for, proffered, received gratefully but unthanked.

There is a barely regarded, unstated, understanding of humanity. There’s no requirement to fix anything, just the space and time in which to say it and be heard, and to hear it said. A nod, a smile, a hand reached out… or absurd snorting laughter.

I feel a yearning for this mutuality, this lightening interaction on heavy dark days. When in the midst of them we are warmed, understood, valued.

Afterwards I often discover myself deep in thought. I have been challenged in some way, not a threatening challenge, but one that charges me to consider the weight of what has passed. The consideration of one another is a requirement, a need… but it doesn’t weigh heavily because it holds love.

Today I consider… while I draw lines.

Now you know I love to work to music and with music… but some days are best served silent. Yesterday and today are such days.

I used to say to students “trust the process, something will happen to make a change”. It’s harder to say it to yourself, however experienced you are. The change never comes when you want it. Not for me anyway. It always comes after the frustration has set in, when the boredom has set up home, when the last three pieces of work (or more) are saying nothing to me. It is always when I feel exhausted and the lowest that the change happens, when I’m long past thinking it will. The last few drawings have had me beat. They’re too busy. The wrong colour. They don’t connect. They’ve come from the process but not the thought. They seemed empty. I can’t see a bloody thing. I might as well be drawing in fog. So I started drawing fog. Clouds and clouds of hand manoeuvred charcoal to start with.

Swooshing about making that silky noise. Then back to the watercolour and graphite. Unsatisfactory experiments, but satisfying play. So I kept on playing. I kept telling myself to trust it.

I’ve spoken before of my expensive paper habit…? Yes… well… the expensive paper has to be treated well if you need a soft surface that takes the paint and the graphite as required. A scratch or crease wrecks the finish. Unless…

Yes. Unless that is where the process is leading.

I listened to the Christmas episode of The Museum of Curiosity on radio 4 (it’s currently still available on iPlayer if you want to hear it). In this episode among other gems, J. K. Rowling talks about inspiration. Her metaphor is that she walks through the forest to the lake, and in the water lies the inspiration. The lake gives it to her if she trusts it. She doesn’t go fishing for it. Then, when the lake gives her something, she takes it to the shed and works on it. A good piece of writing is the perfect balance of lake and shed. Sometimes when she looks at something again she can see that it’s not spent enough time in the shed, or indeed, too much time in the shed. This metaphor struck me as pretty much perfect. I shall be borrowing it.

So these last few drawings, were definitely too much shed. All shed maybe.

What happened yesterday, in the silence, I was able to hear a small splash in the lake. The crease and the scratched surface were leading me out of the fog. Seemingly onto the rocks, but hey, I’m not chucking it back in the lake. Just give me a few weeks in the shed…

Do other artists find themselves obsessing over small things? I’ve been away from the studio for family and the festivities, so these things are milling around in my head, in my notebook, even in the occasional song lyric. I’ve been thinking about fog. The literal and the metaphorical. Brought about I think, by the general election and the effect it has had on my mood. The thick, pea-souper sort that keeps you trapped. As a child I remember the fog, and being trapped in a field for some reason… I walked the perimeter trying to find the gate, having lost all sense of direction. I felt frightened and sick. I am convinced I walked the perimeter twice, missing the gate to the lane. I think I was around ten or eleven. I was alone.

I left a drawing on my table, half done, probably. Fog. Amorphous shapes and shades and texture driven by the feel of the paper beneath my pencil. This still is about the same themes I think, but the sense of touch has become more elusive. Disconnected somehow. I can’t breath in it, it’s tight and smothering at the same time as drifting. I found myself holding my breath a little for fear of inhaling it.

And after a night of fitful sleep, waking several times in pain* that defied painkillers and cream and meditation and music… I find that the fog is nailed to me. I feel like I have a bed of nails. So this morning the drawing in my head is one of nailing fog. I won’t be in the studio until probably Tuesday or Wednesday. This vision may lose its potency by then. Or it may be desperate still to appear on the paper. By then I might feel better. By then I might have had some sleep and the obsessive nature of my thoughts will have subsided.

Or not.

Fog.

*I have Osteoarthritis that seems to have flared up over the last couple of days

I’ve started a new blog…

NOTES

https://www.a-n.co.uk/blogs/notes/

“Headbanger”

I entered a bit of a time warp yesterday. It served as a timely reminder too.

I took a table at the Festive Makers’ Market at General Office, alongside my fellow studio holder Louise Blakeway. It was a bit last minute for me. Louise had a stall full of beautifully coherent paintings and prints, and I had a bit of a jumble going on… old drawings, new drawings, a series of small scale works just simply mounted. I also had a few old textile things. Some little felt brooches and some vintage fabric bundles. I sold a few things across the range, not enough to go on holiday with, but enough to cover costs, have a take-away in the evening and a lunch out somewhere nice tomorrow… I might buy some new pencils… but it was a long day for small pickings really, and I was having flashbacks!

When my sons were young, from about 1990-2005 maybe, I did loads of craft fairs alongside assorted part time and sporadic teaching in the local FE college. It all fitted in nicely, kept the wolf from the door. But yesterday reminded me why I decided to stop. At least yesterday I just moved my stuff, already made, nothing specially made for the event, from studio into the gallery through the double doors, threw a cloth over the table and set it up. Easy.

I used to spend hours speculating on what would sell, and believe me I’ve done all sorts: jewellery, bags, home textiles, collage, quilting, embroidery, clothes, painting, toys, children’s clothes… only to find the thing that everyone wanted was the thing I’d only got three of. The one hundred specially made items might as well have had a sign on them saying fuck off. (That might have sold better actually!)

I’d load it all into the back of the car with an assortment of stands and rails and display devices, lamps and clamps, a flask, and never enough food to stave off freezing cold and boredom. I had special clothes, shoes, emergency hat/scarves etc… have even resorted to wearing the stock.

Then there’s the interaction with the jolly old general public. If you smile and say good morning, some of them run like you’ve told them to fuck off. Then there are those who want to tell you that they’re not going to buy anything because they can make it themselves. Then those who take not so surreptitious photos so they basically have a pattern to go home and make it themselves. Those you REALLY want to tell to fuck off while retaining the smile you’ve stapled in at 7am.

(But I should also remember the lovely people who have interesting conversations, and buy things too!)

Anyway…It’s a tough way to make money. And if it hadn’t been easy I wouldn’t have done it. And I can’t say I’ll be doing it again, because for most of the day I wanted to run away into my studio to just draw.

I’m sat here thinking I’ll draw all day Monday. But it’ll take me most of the day to put away all the stuff I dragged out. I dumped it all unceremoniously on my big table. Louise and I then ran away into the night. I think I’d rather do an Open Studio, because although there’s the whole tidying and staging thing, at least I can still draw when it’s quiet.

So… if you are visiting a craft fair or similar running up to Christmas, have sympathy, they’re like silent buskers. Maybe offer to watch the stall of a friend while they go to the loo/Greggs/take a break/have a fag or whatever. Bring cake. Tell them it looks magical, and try to buy something, even if it’s just a card. A few cards sold can make all the difference.

The experience reminded me how far I’ve come, how things have changed, and how fortunate I am to do whatever the hell I want, to be able to make whatever I want, that organically emerges from my thought processes.

Thank you world.