sometime before Christmas last year i started following niall Doherty ‘s round the world journey. his modus operandi is not to fly. i found him by chance, after researching living with little or no possessions. niall’s journey is an easy to follow journey …
while in my first year on the degree, i actively rejected “being on a journey”. i look back on the that time now and reflect that i denied to myself that i was on one too … i denied it as i didn’t know where i was going. i thought i did, after all i explained to people that i was on a degree to get myself from a technical circle to a creative circle. i got confirmation that these are different after watching what artists do all day with the photographer Alfred (sorry forget his second name) i saw just how different they are. in the programme during a rare stop for coffee he explained why he used a technician. if you’ve not seen the programme his answer was because in the field using a technician allowed him to remain in his creative frame of mind and not be bothered by technical things.
following another unsuccessful residency application i have started to ask myself if indeed i’m just a technician with ideas above my station. this is of course a little excessive as i have had some limited success with my ideas. and there’s the crux … my ideas. that’s why i wanted to export myself from the tech circle, so the things i made were from my ideas. and there’s the present crux … what are my ideas ? there’s also the crux of my present stalling … my ideas aren’t communicated very well.
i looked at the website for the two artists chosen for the residencies that i’d applied for. i can immediately see why i didn’t get chosen, my site is very local, not national or international as the two chosen are. i like my site, it reflects me and reflects what i do. i like discovery and there are things to be discovered, a deliberate strategy for the site.
i start to be objective about myself.
coming late to making my own work … has this been a description or an excuse ?
playful … ?
transition ?
possible futures ?
discovery ?
pattern ?
politics of play ?
there will be more …
i see that my written language is very local. i had this confirmed a couple of years ago … i resisted it and refuted it but you know what … maybe i am local.
maybe i’ve been dreaming of being the person i thought i might be … maybe i’ve been missing out on me, who i am … skilled and talented and dsylexic.
being dsylexic isn’t an excuse, it’s real. in being a technician i’d placed a coping mechanism in for something i didn’t know i had. i provided myself with a skill that others would book me to deploy, just as i’d seen with the photoshop tech in the programme. in removing myself from that tech circle i can see now that i exposed myself to myself … i am the originator of my own vulnerability.
so here i am … on my journey.
tonight i am sitting reflecting that i have possibly been trying to journey to a place that i would not get to because i had set off in a misguided manner. it had been making me unhappy. it had been making me anxious.
i watch small video excepts from nial’s journey. his big plan for this year is to get to brazil for the world cup. he’ll do it to as he seems to be able to get done what he want’s to do.
this evening i don’t know where i’m going. i know i don’t want to go along the path i had been, for it made me unhappy, anxious and fearful of myself.
and so … i place … a post … in my journey.
