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You learn all the time, as you go along don’t you?
The things you learn this time get absorbed and used more easily next time… And next time throws up a whole new set of problems….

When I got the funding to record the songs for the nine women installation two years ago I had no idea what might happen to them after… Had I known, I might have thought more carefully beforehand and taken certain things into consideration when trying to balance the budget…
I ended up self funding a publication run after the money ran out, because I wanted a lyric book… And I part self funded Laura Rhodes to do my video.

Two years on, in the process of getting ready for the second launch of nine women, other costs are incurred that wouldn’t have occurred to me before… In this case, some of the incidental/accidental obstacles have proved useful in that they delayed me from making potentially expensive mistakes…

I, as a self employed person, as usual, am owed a lump of money. Nothing new there except I was going to use some of it for a run of 200 CDs of the 9w soundtrack. The delay in payment and the bloody awful nature of the 3 company websites I looked at meant I couldn’t order them. But then subsequently decided not to anyway, that it would be silly to get 200 CDs to sell ten if I’m lucky, to have them stuck in the loft. So online was the next thing… But not knowing anything about the process, panicked a bit…. Then in my usual fashion asked Dan a stupid question… Not that I knew it was stupid until after I’d asked it!
The thing is, we realised in conversation, this isn’t really a music cd… Well not in the traditional sense… So the iTunes route may not be appropriate… We don’t quite know what is yet, so we will holdback on that and think about it.

In the meantime, for the exhibition, Dan suggested I do a small, DIY limited edition run of CDs … Signed and numbered as art duplication usually is! Genius!

Then, as he says, we can think about the online thing slowly and carefully and do it properly, because you can only do it once… You can’t take it back once it’s out there… This is in effect my first solo release. It’s good work, and deserves to be treated well.

It will also, if we get it right, pave the way for the next sound work I do… Establish my own, unique, unusual selling point pathway. This work isn’t like anyone else’s. So let’s see what we can come up with….
Watch this space as they say….
www.elenathomas.co.uk

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The Curious Narrative

Hints.
Secrets.
Tales of foreboding.
Keeping the secret in plain sight.

Heredity.
Genetics.
Memory.
Family histories.
Family hysteria.
Everyone knew about Aunty Margaret didn’t they?
No.

Remnants of stories.
The beginning.
The middle.
The end.
But never all three.
Pick ’n’ mix ’n’ match.

Huge assumptions.
It’s obvious!
No it’s not.

Whispers.
Hand-me-downs.
Itching and scratching and never quite fitting.
A child among adults
Never understanding…

Until…

That moment in adulthood when at last the penny drops.
The shoe falls.
The switch is flicked.
Can never now be unseen.

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Ok I’ll admit it, there is a bit of a Goldilocks Vibe going on here. But that isn’t totally out of whack with the thinking… maybe.

But this isn’t yet nasty enough for me to like what is going on.
At the moment we have odd chairs, stitching, fabric scraps. Its getting somewhere, but not quite as I want. Yet.

I’m not sure if the streaks of stitches are too abstract. I know what they are, but does anyone else?
Do I care?

well… sort of… because I hate that whole the-artist-has-to-explain-it-before-you-can-possibly-understand-it thing. That is elitist and leaves no room for the viewer. I like to leave room for the viewer. I like the stories I get told… they weave themselves in too.

Is the fact that these are recognisable, familiar, but slightly peculiar chairs with stitches on enough?

Where am I going to get the nasty from? Maybe the song. The song is coming along…

I have the mantra “Avoid Tautology” in my head again… I must remember to keep my touch light…

I do have another oddly shaped chair at home … four… that would take Goldilocks out of the picture… or maybe let her stay?

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Art is not therapy¹

It is more animal than that²

During a rubbish week of illness, death and injustice, I get myself, finally, to the studio.

This is not escape
This is not soothing
This is not relaxation

This is animal activity – this belongs to the fight/flight/fuck variety of responses

So don’t be fooled by the apparent slow and measured activity.
I am angry and sad.
This is the way I respond to the world.
I’m writing and drawing…scratching ink furiously into paper.
Jabbing my poisonous needle into the fabric…pursed lips…hunched shoulders.

I am powerless to prevent the inevitable. So I try to insert it into my work. I attempt to assimilate it, to make some sort of sense. I am not assigning it to the gods.

The activity I undertake is not distraction. It does not serve the purpose of diverting my attention.

This art is focussed, frustrated fury.

It works through; it acts out; it filters,sorts and files; it absorbs the facts and spits them back out.

No.

This isn’t a gentle thing
This isn’t ladylike and modest.

It is hard work.
Exhausting.

But the world has to be dealt with, and this is the way I do it.

¹But it might be Therapy

²Dan Whitehouse told me. He is a wise man

I’m making myself write this blog post.

I have nothing to write about, because ironically, nothing kills art quite as quickly and thoroughly as applying for funding for art.

The chair in the previous post hasn’t yet made it to the studio because I haven’t yet made it to the studio. There’s no wifi there, so “Going Up The Portal” with Sonia Boué means doing so from home.

We are, frankly, sick of The Portal.

The sooner the damn submit button gets pressed the better!

(Any minute now…)

When the button is pressed, we will have six glorious weeks of peace before we hear yay or nay… during which time I will have: a solo exhibition of nine women, complete with two workshops and a performance; A CD to master, do art work for and get reproduced; A recording session with The Sitting Room;  several rehearsals……..

But, although this is all art, it isn’t making new work, it isn’t getting to grips with the thoughts swimming around in my head, that have been hastily scribbled into my sketchbook, just in case they get forgotten.

Sometimes, by the time I get round to it, the things hastily scribbled are no longer relevant… my mind has moved on…

…………..

In another part of my working life, I discover I am learning things that I should have learned years ago. I’m learning in a deep and meaningful way about how other people work, think, learn. I have taught for over 25 years. I don’t do so much now, but the things I have learned over the last six months would have come in really handy and would undoubtedly have made me a better teacher.

I’m also learning that some really excellent art and design teachers I know are leaving the profession, or are close to collapse. This cannot go on, and I don’t know how to help, or what to do. I managed to escape it, and did so with my mental health barely intact. I have recovered, although certain sorts of stress get me too close to that edge again.

And I have discovered that some of us have a thing in common – Survivor Guilt.

This is totally wrong, it isn’t our fault, but we feel it anyway. We have deserted the children when they needed us, and our colleagues who needed support.