BV Open Studios, June 2013

A few images here of my studio set up for open studios at BV a couple of weeks ago. This first image was taken by my friend Sophie Rae Harding and tweeted (look her up on twitter, gorgeous illustrations!). Most of my space is being used for the making of Unmade / Remade I, so there wasn't much space to play with, I showed 4 drawings (two pairs) the makings of Unmade / Remade I and Canvas Unpicked and Dipped IV.

It was a really good chance to take stock of what I'm doing and what I've got.

In all it was a really enjoyable weekend, lots of chats and saw some really interesting work. Open studios are a brilliant opportunity to see what and how people make things, the variety is incredible.

Graffiti Squares II

Some particularly logical Graffiti Squares, see original post here

Nearly Unpicked!

Almost finished unpicking the piece of canvas for Unmade/Remade I. This is part one of two unmaking processes before the parts will be made into a new something.

 

This last image is only vaguely related. I looked up at one point today and saw these light-dots. The sun was obviously finding someone's shiny dotted thing.

Northern Art Prize

I try to see the Northern Art Prize every time its on. Partly because of where I'm from but also because it always seems to be good.

The artists nominated this year are Emily Speed, Joanne Tatham & Tom O'Sullivan, Margaret Harrison and Roaslind Nashashibi.

Emily Speed
'Emily Speed's interest lies in the relationship between people and buildings' (http://www.northernartprize.org.uk/2013-prize/shortlist/emily-speed)

Speed has two large sculptures and three small, very beautiful drawings in the show. Her work has a strong aesthetic. Neutral building colours, clay, wood, grey, white. Structures are made functional, with an outside and an inside, on castors presumably for practicality, impermanence? They aren't polished and finished, you can see screws and the making. One of the large sculptures is really interesting in terms of space and how the viewer interacts with it. Outside/inside, battlements and bits of architecture you can sit on, display cabinets, models and playing. Really engaging work of the sort I like best - where the longer you spend looking at it the more you get out of it (sounds like that should happen with all work but it doesn't).


Joanne Tatham & Tom O'Sullivan
'Their work might more usefully be understood as events designed to inhabit a range of situations, activating their surroundings and cajoling the viewer into participating in an absurd kind of theatre'
http://www.northernartprize.org.uk/2013-prize/shortlist/joanne-tatham-tom-osullivan

This work is FUN. That's the first impression. Huge, bright carnival like faces as arches have been built over the entrances to a couple of the galleries. You walk through the mouths to get from room to room. The arches are overwhelming, garish and you can't help smiling at them. The faces look shocked and sad maybe. Not entirely sure what its saying other than interacting with the space and mood of a gallery, but I liked them. ('These large painted ‘portals’ highlight pivotal points at which the historic collection meets spaces in the Gallery used for temporary exhibitions.' according to the website.)
They're really carefully installed by-the-way, the edges where the work meets the actual wall are beautifully crafted.


Margaret Harrison
'‘Common Reflections’ is a reconstruction and reinterpretation of a perimeter fence from RAF Greenham Common.'
http://www.northernartprize.org.uk/2013-prize/shortlist/margaret-harrison

Not keen on this one. It's political, about women protesting against nuclear weapons that were held at RAF Greenham Common. Very literal, and pretty flat for me.


Roaslind Nashashibi
'The compelling film projection features dancers, engrossed in private rehearsal when members of the local public walk in and stand awkwardly around them. The experience is mesmeric for both dancers and intruders, twinned together in an energetic performance.'
http://www.northernartprize.org.uk/2013-prize/shortlist/rosalind-nashashibi

I loved Nashashibi's film Lovely Young People (Beautiful Supple Bodies)! It is described in the quote above. There are alot of gormless people standing around and watching the dancers with varying degrees of confusion (and saying some funny things). As a result you spend alot of the film trying to look normal, aware that you're watching something too and not paying attention to your facial expression. Its a brilliant film for people watching. 
The biggest thing for me though was that ballet dancing is hard work. There are microphones picking up the conversations of the viewers and the dancers. This means that when the dancers are actually dancing you can hear them panting and struggling to get enough air. You also see the concentration, hear the thud thud thuds as they leap and land on the floor and see the precise, fighting, strong movements. I've only ever been to see ballet once (and that was because at Junior school they took us to see Cinderella the ballet instead of the pantomime, as you can imagine we were all seriously unimpressed.) It always seemed to me like a very elegant, prancing and light way of moving, I never thought how physical and harsh it is and how powerful the dancers need to be.
I was less enamoured with her other pieces and had the feeling I was missing something, although she showed some prints from trousers she had put through a press which were quite beautiful.

My vote goes to Emily Speed or Rosalind Nashashibi. Emily Speed's work was coherent, engaging and showed the best body of work. Nashashibi's film was the best single work but her other pieces I was less bothered about and it wasn't as good a show altogether.

I do urge everyone who can to go see it, thoroughly enjoyed looking round!

Worktable - IBT

I have been meaning to write this post for an AGE. In February we went to the IBT/13 interactive, live installation that was Worktable (http://ibt13.co.uk/worktable-8/). It all took part in portacabins outside the Arnolfini, each portacabin is a different stage in the installation and its something you mostly do on your own. I don't think you were supposed to know what you were going to be asked to do, but a friend had enthusiastically told us everything the evening before we went.

You pick an object and walk through to a room where you are given your worktable (pic above) and are asked to destroy/take apart your object. We went last thing on the last day and so just got in before the whole thing closed. Consequently there weren't many objects to pick from. There were lots of pieces of pottery but I didn't want to just smash something, so I picked string.

I then spent the rest of the time unpicking and unravelling the ball of string thinking. MEGAN! WHY did you pick STRING! This is just going to be like a piece of work now and you spend AGES unpicking STRING! YOU CAN'T HELP YOURSELF!

Nevertheless it was satisfying and it wasn't canvas threads so it was sort of not the same, and I didn't have to be so regimented as I am when I'm making a work so I unravelled and unpicked and cut and pulled at random. Magnus picked a little brooch, pulling apart and cutting the cheap metal, and he (after a couple of goes) managed to pulverise the stone, I think using a nutcracker.

You then put the remnants of your objects in a cardboard tray and take it to the next room, where you swap your tray for another. There are loads sitting on shelves and you look through and pick what you want. Its a good chance to see what other people have done, lots of smashed up pottery - to the point where you can't even hazard a guess at what it used to be.

I picked a box of shards of pottery (like the one above but that's not the one, got carried away and forgot to take a picture..). 

This bit was the fun bit. I covered everything with glue, scrunched it all into a ball (smelled brilliant but didn't stick all that well..) and then covered it with tape. I wanted to do lots of wrapping but have the pieces of pottery visible so loads of tape and some rubber bands. 

Magnus made a 'necklace' out of a little dish that we had seen at the pre-smashing stage. 

Once you had put your second-hand object back together you took it to another room where there were shelves crammed with all sorts of objects which had been unmade and remade. This was fascinating and I think we spent longer in here than in any other part.  

This (above) was my favourite of all the objects remade, someone has been so restrained at the smashing stage! 

My object's siblings.

Magnus' necklace adorning a taped-dog.

There were some really gorgeous and really creative objects there, some you had no idea what they were or how-on-earth they had been put back together.

It was such a good project. I obviously find it satisfying, and think there is something in taking things apart and remaking them. To have the chance to do it just to enjoy the process and not think, and for anyone off the street to experience taking apart and remaking is a brilliant idea, and it makes for some fantastic objects!

Unmade/Remade I

Work in progress- A stretcher 1m x 1m has been built and stretched with canvas, the canvas has been pulled from the stretcher and is in the process of being unpicked. The threads going one way have been put in one pile, the threads running the other way in another pile. 

The vague idea at the moment (as implied by the working-title) is to unpick all the canvas and unchip the stretcher before putting the stretcher back together, and holding it together by wrapping the canvas threads (possibly soaked in medium first) around the broken wood. I have no idea weather or not it will be possible but that's the interesting bit.  

If you look at the canvas in the top image you will see one side is not being unpicked. This is because the canvas is from the end of a roll - so the threads running longways run, say from right to left, weaving over and under all the threads running up and down. BUT then they loop over and run back left to right (if that doesn't make sense, nevermind, I'll show you sometime). Unpicking these threads is pretty fiddly once you get to the looping back end, and the threads are over 2m long. The work is at a really exciting stage, ideas are sparking as I am unpicking and I am looking forward to trying to unchip the wood. 

Beetle!

Christmas games don't often produce much more than an afternoon of hilarity and arguments. Yet these funny/crazy/quirky drawings came from playing Beetle with my family and Grandparents over the Christmas Holidays.

Beetle, if you have never played it (do!) is essentially a game of chance. You don't need anything to play except a dice and pen and paper. You decide between yourselves which numbers on the dice signify which body parts of the beetle. So here 1=Head 2=Body 3=Feeler 4=Eye 5=Wing and 6=Leg (one leg per 6 thrown, not one 6 for all the legs! (Grandma)). 

You have to get a 1 (Head) to start and then you fill in the beetle as you go round throwing the dice in turn. 

I love these drawings, they are crammed full of character mostly because they are half finished and the way you draw them (I got lots of legs before I got a body-dilemma). Mum and dad both overlapped the head and body to make very upset-looking beetles. Mine looks like road-kill.

Antlers/Dazed and Confused

Legs are all on the bottom- beetle wearing a hula skirt, looks like it walks upright on all its legs.

Whoo!

My favourite (Grandmas) French/devil-bat - very jiggly.