course journal year 2

footpath through to Phoenix Causeway

Journal year 2

11th October

I went to the Amy Sillman show at Camden Arts Centre. I liked her big paper pieces hung right across the room but not sure about all her oil paintings. Some are gorgeous and they somehow make sense, work but others don’t seem to. Interesting to read her writing about shape in one of her zines – the recent one with really interesting conversation about prunella clough and others. I think I liked the paper hanging pieces as an installation… I liked the big clips.

Then went quickly to Wellcome institute to Health and Architecture exhibition. Fantastic film of demolishing of Royal… hospital. Stunningly moving. Very very interesting so glad I made it. Architecture and London, re. unit 3. Jane Rendell and art and architecture… book.

Even though it meant I was late for image showcase at Wimbledon with all the full timers. I was very late so missed most but heard lots of interesting discussion at the end. I talked about mine, including walking process, how the repetitive nature of walking round the site creates a kind of map, a topography.

Words for this :

My work is about memory; relics and what we choose to preserve. I collect found objects, what seems to be rubbish, little scraps, nothing valuable, maybe already in a state of entropy/ together these seem to represent what isn’t there, the absences. They become imbued with memory, representing a cycle of demolition and rebuilding on sites like this. With the juxtaposition, somewhat clumsy joins, of materials, I am trying to echo the messiness, the non conformity, of the limimal edgelands they were collected from. Snippets of canvas and daubs of paint reference traditional painting techniques. Mention Mark Dion, creating archives. Lara Almacegui, cataloguing building materials and wastelands, neglected and undefined spaces.

18th October

Tutorial with Geraint

I took in several pieces as G had mentioned importance about seeing actual work. 3 relief pieces from show and a painted board I made this week. And the photo books, and the piece of writing from my Lewes show. He said do you really care about loss of creative spaces ? I said yes, then we talked about creating temporary spaces and structures. Mentioned Bourriard relational aesthetics and idea of a shared space.

He handled one small piece, no. 12, mentioned Susan Hiller and the idea of cataloguing etc.

He also mentioned Ed Ruscha re. photographic books. I mentioned 60s food café of Gordon matta clark etc. He mentioned Heather and Ivan Morrison. Again temporary structures. I mentioned Jane rendell, again.

Overall tutorial went well in that he said don’t worry you are doing enough work.

One thing he emphasised was the narrative, researching and finding a peronal voice, a person, photographs, this links in with unit 3 research for me.

Also, use of b/w photos – G thought no reason they couldn’t be incorporated into artwork.

22nd October

I tried pieces on the floor but decided to work on one coming away from the wall, keeping colours restricted and using different materials, long and thin, like a cross section, and also delicate so can be pieced together insitu, I suppose a prototype temporary structure. Also did some small paintings of fragments, on paper and chipboard.

Sheela Gowda, Indian artist, who works with materials which have special meaning and resonance, like human hair, and a pigment from insence industry. She references the labour of poor underpaid in india. Work is also very beautiful… the cut outs of metal bowls at ikon in Birmingham very simple, and also just found objects.

How to make sure that my use of materials can develop some meaning, when I think this I also come back to idea of chalk and flints too, a more earthy underpinning. So – chipboard, plywood, tarps, plastic clips, metal poles, rubble, and bits and pieces like tiles, cloth, cardboard, etc. Also, how to incorporate photos, maybe bits of drawing and painting. I do feel that I don’t know what im doing half the time and the other half I have a vague instinctual idea that I do !

Tarpaulins are very interesting and cover ruins, temporary shelters, and building sites, they originally were tarred fabrics used by sailors, the tar making them waterproof. You can buy amazing ochre coloured waxed cotton tarpaulins from india online, they look great. Maybe look at pics of building sites elsewhere, in Malta, the tan coloured netting covering hoardings compared to our bright blue here. Make tarpaulins with canvas and pigments and dyes, with eyelets. Also looked up Ibrahim Mahama, Ghanaian artist, who “uses transformation of materials to explore themes of commodity, migration, globalisation and economic exchange. Often made in collaboration, his large scale installations employ materials gathered from urban environments such as remnants of wood and textiles, or jute sacks, wich are sewn together and draped over architectureal structures.” White cube… jute sacks reference trade markets in ghana and used to transport cocoa beans but end up as multi functional objects. (bit like Sheela gowda ‘s bowls) . I like a wall he made of shoe shine boxes. Maybe join more of my “fragments’ together to make a larger structure.

24th October

Had talk with social anthropology phd student staying with me about his project in Kolkata and overlaps with architecture. How architecture makes you feel etc. very interesting but not sure is quite research I need. I will find out more and if it is maybe we could share some and I could use for unit 3. He told me funny story about how his cat gets very angry and frightens his girlfiriend but only when he is away. We talked about his project on a gated community in Kolkata which is built on site of very large factory and displacement of the community that had evolved around that, and it seems this kind of thing is happening in all large cities. My daughter Rachel studying Anthropology and she has done some research on rising crime in gated communities in India and has an article on this very place he was talking about.

I talked about topology and organic architecture of Lewes and how shape of town evolved around shape of river etc. and how industries on river then later shaped town, river straightened etc. and then of course later on big roads shaped towns development, phoenix causeway.

I have made a wall and floor piece for exhibition tomorrow in sections that can be screwed on the wall when I get there. Im not sure about whrere im going with it but definitely a move forward in terms of building a kind of structure, lots of them could form a kind of lean to against the wall. Not sure yet how to integrate the tarpaulin. Ive wrapped a small piece round one of the bits of wood which I will tie on with string maybe.

All the pieces are laid out on a tarpaulin to carry to W tomorrow so all is an experiment to see how well transports and fits together. I still don’t particularly like the pieces. But it getting somewhere I think. I used some filler on the wood but there wasn’t time for it to dry and sand so maybe another time try with some plaster and carve into it.

Pieces taken in for October installation

6th December

Tutorial Mark Fairnington

There wasn’t time or space to display work so I spent a while pulling it out of the plastic thing I carried it in and it kind of opened up as I put on floor. I referred to those folding bikes you can take on the train. I also brought in photos, the ones stitched in to books, and parts of a sketchbook but showed no digital photos. My intention was to talk about how to integrate different elements of practice – sculptural, drawings, collage, photographs, found objects, etc. and to thread through a personal and historical narrative.

Here are separate notes I made for this tutorial on history of Phoenix Ironworks :

Phoenix Ironworks : 1832 – 1986

Artemis arts 2008-9 had lottery funding to do research and create an archive about history of ironworks. In record office at the Keep. Includes oral history recordings.

Originally operated by a horse drawn fan. John Henry Every non-conformist, Westgate chapel included a window and fixtures made at Phoenix. In the Anne of Cleves museum in Lewes there is Everys collection of historic ironwork, incluing egs of medieval ironwork. (photo of windows at phoenix place). Link between church and business – non-conformist tradidtion in Lewes, lots of different chapels, and all built by local business men, reference to town hall portrait research . I will email artemis arts see what they doing now and also look at objects of ironwork on town trail, maybe do drawings of trail etc.

Tutorial however focused more on the materiality of what I was making and issues of transportation.

Because of implications of carrying, transport, etc. which we discussed alongside my amassing of visual research on the industrial site in Lewes, Mark pursued issue of transportability, lightness etc. and idea of a piece, or several pieces, joined into one unfolding, light, structure, not just concept of unfolding but also unpacking, where the form would then dictate outcome etc. I was remined of Jackdaw history folders I had when I was aged beween 9 and 10 years old and avid member of Puffin club, and found these folders really fascinating. The main thing about jackdaws was that they used reproductions of primary resources. (reminder that I need to find more of these which relate to Phoenix industrial estate, so far have catalogue from Parsons woodyard, and the hand written account book, alongside photographs from Reeves and others online via Artemis Arts ) Jackdaws – history in a cardboard wallet.

Mark first mentioned Kurt Schwitters - his hand-held sculptures,made when he was travelling between Germany and Norway, and Britain. Combining painting and modelling. Schwitters had his definition of Merz – anything can be used to make art, including rubbish. He was forced to flee Nazi Germany in 1937 and he made art with whatever materials he had to hand. (have a look at Tate exhibition catalogue Schwitters in Britain, with new work influenced by him by Adam chodzko and Laure Provost.)

And he mentioned , Duchamps and his La Boite-en-Valise,of which there are 24 versions, or multiples. ( interestingly Teeny Duchamp, Marcels wife, was Gordon Matta-Clarks godmother). Translates as Box in a suitcase. It contained miniature replicas of his paintings and echoed the display cases of travelling salesmen. (think now of the unemployed people who come round with bags of cleaning products which unpacks, they carry a card asking you to buy, though thinking of it I haven’t seen one of these for ages probs people too nervous about people knocking on their door, another symptom of online age). it “unpacks’ so that some sections slide out, with other folders inside. Duchamp was highlighting there was no clear distinction between original and reproduction. However, it also had a real practical purpose, to display his pre-1935 work like a portable museum, for when he moved to New York in 1942.

Looked at film of art handlers opening up valise, at Scottish national gallery of art. Use of Perspex and celluloid. Box was made with help of a bookbinder. Contains reproductions and photographs. Interesting the construction and how opens out. Also, for me it is all 2D, it would be interesting to try to incorporate 3d into pop up shapes !?

Idea of transportable history, layered, hinged. The structure of the work starts it ?.. Mark Dion – the creation of the archive is the practice, meaning of the work is embedded in the fom. Also, something that can be carried around – mechanical toys, all the drawings notes phots can be in and it opens up like a tool box (marks), or a folding decorators table (mine) and can actually carry so, carrying element combined in it, like handles.

The mechanics of it/they doesn’t have to be precise or laboured, it could have same bish bash bosh aeshthetic of my found object pieces. Try and keep on a small scale at this stage and experiment with something that folds, and incorporate pop ups . Keep and record your work to keep in it or reuse. And display as part of archive.

Mark also mentioned Rauschenburgs monogram so look at that and add notes. He described idea of laying, unfolding something like a tablecloth and then other elements fitted into it.

And, for me, it might be a way to incorporate personal, journal elements, record cards in record box for example.

This is the question though – can the viewer touch and move and remove elements to look at ? Do I want the viewer to handle the bits of artwork ?

16th January

Paper bag tutorial with Geraint

The week before I had used papier mache layering technique to make a cast of a plastic woven shopping bag. This was in relation to creating containers, a way of carrying things, to transport my bits and pieces, a, to create containers for an archive. In this instance the archive is made up of anything to do with the site at Phoenix industrial estate and any research/drawings/photos/writings made alongside that. This was also in response to tutorial with Mark Fairnington, December 6th, in which we talked about the materiality of making something that unfolded/unpacked to contain/display an archive.

G talked about importance of signifying what sort of bag I was trying to make a representation of , I talked about bags used by displaced people transporting their few possessions or an example of the women used literally as human transport to cross the border at Ceuta, Morocco/Spanish border. They are made from a woven plastic fabric which is used to make lots of different sizes, types of bags, and also to make tarpaulins and other building site materials, like sand bags, big hippo sacks, etc. you see variations of them along railway lines, white and bulging. So…important what size, colour and somewhow to show texture. Colour and texture seemed important to me. The big bags on building sites are a kind of dirty white, and others might be striped in some primary colours, but faded. Tarpaulins are usually blue and green.

I have made a bag by making rubbings on newsprint which ive stuck over the papier mache bag sections. I have pieced and glued it together. Its fairly robust but very light ! Also, the rubbings combined with the paper and glue have made a sort of vellum type material. Vellum was originally animal skin which was scraped and stretched until thin. Now its made like tracing paper. Interestingly the rubbings have picked up the studio floor below the bag and created another layer of marks.

The bag will now be the container to take the bits and pieces to College for assessment… the bag can sit or hang ? I have also covered a large tarpaulin in paper/torn paper and will stick sections of rubbings of tarpali onto the paper and then half lay on floor and up wall. On it I will put the small sculptural bits from found objects, and the record box made from card with the record cards inside. I am also going to make a layer of map which I will fold and lay on top of the tarpaulin. I like the idea of leaving everything in the bag with instructions to the viewers on how to unpack and display ? This might be confusing and also I cant tell how it would work until I make the installation. The map will be another layer of papier mache using enlarged sections of medieval map of lewes with town wall and green wall and river on it. I like the idea of making some printing blocks to do the river and orchards and rows of houses but there probably wont be time for this assessment. If this works, ie making large scale rubbings to make a large installation for final show, then I can spend more time making some smaller pieces like printed pieces to go in a small book/newspaper to go with archive.

March 8th

I walked along the river by Tesco, after going to Homebase. It was a very blowy beginning of march sort of day, though some people were eating lunch on benches by the river. Like watching a film, and reminiscent of Doigs kayak painting, I watched as a couple rowed along in an open canoe, blown about on the river which was windy and full,at high tide, and moored alongside the recently cleared section of the Phoenix site, actually probably at the very site of the original wharf which was used to transport pig iron etc up river when the Ouse was a busy navigable channel, hence the many riverside industries. They tied up, nimbly hopped out and then toured the demolition site, taking photos, all of five minutes, like ruin tourists, then they were quickly in their boat again and casting off.

May 14th

Two years on and we are all moving on. We lay on the earth and all drifted off in the hot, hot sun,a memory of the burial day how hot we were , dizzy with heat. Our global warming in your face, and sunburn. Us all part of and together in this, moving forwards. We found the fir cones left to mark the place, but it is ever shifting, belongings less imbued with significance, within us. Dried out, still meaningful but less soft and less exposed.

Earlier in the day we visited the David Nash exhibition (see research section) which was lovely, such a great museum, and Naomi used to work there !

17th May

Practice, to unfold a set of pluralities, contingencies, juxtapositions, ruptures, unlikely encounters, chance and also an economy, a mindfulness, an engagement with materials, their source, the implications, the politics of place and space, and the materials, and the land that is us. Cannot just demolish, smooth over, start again, bumps and traces, spuren, of previous lives, buildings, need to be included so that everything always on the move, always in a state of change, never just static. Work places, enough for all, homes, for all, jobs for all, there doesn’t have to be bigger this, or more that, an economy of art, an economy of our expectations, not manifested through monuments, buildings, star architecture, but minimal, complex, sophisticated, but local resources, community. Post war buildings, learn from , too fast, too quick to cover over. Look at traces left in landscapes, old railtracks, old railway stations visible for all, biodiversity alongside our progress, collaboration and interdisciplinary, and the more-than-human. Our ruins can become part of us, absorbed into ourselves, absorbed into our land.

Feelings of confusion, but have to remember this is an art project not a clear, pathwayed research project. There is no outcome, just a journey through time, space and constellations. How I feel in space/place at different times, from one visit to the next, from one walk to the next.

Constitutes places to dream, a liminality, a threshold, to our dream spaces. We need evidence, folded up photos, creased and faded.

21stMay

I met Sonia outside Waitrose and we went to Greenwall together. I was hoping she could help pick some plant samples but I had forgotten that most people don’t want to risk their life climbing over boarded up gateways and sharp flint walls. So I climbed over and she chatted and watched, leaning over the wall. The main thing was that it was nice to have someone else with me. I have become used to being this strange solitary figure, bending over bits of rubble with flying bits of paper in the wind, pacing up and down certain paths, taking endless photos. While this was going on, picking the leaves, two people I knew came walking past and so we all chatted, me on the other side of the wall on the bank that is Greenwall. We might have been meeting in medieval times doing our washing in the town ditch, though I am quite glad we are not. Most people who walk through here now are on their way to Waitrose.

May 28th

I climbed over the wall quite high with jutting out flints, ward off intruders, empty soap factory, the whole bank that constitutes green wall has flourished over night into a bed of lush weeds, strong and ruderal, colonising the stony bank. All typical of wasteland, wonder what is happening to this area in relation to rest of site, if left it will very quickly get very overgrown, would provide natural barrier from existing housing to building site, if and when it happens. I randomly picked some samples, wondering how an eco botanist would approach it, reminded of scientists on roof of waterworks outside berlin, a kind o extensive wasteland on a roof, collecting, recording, measuring, documenting. I find it hard to be systematic, thinking of drying the samples, or drawing them, or mashing them up and making dyes ? a whole other practice, continued, john newling. I looked up some of wildflowers when at home, the names are so evocative yet familiar,

June 2019

Looking at words relating to physical topology of site :

palimpsest, stratas, deep time, squashed, compressed, layers, wiggling out, sprouting, blossoming, mephitic, burgeoning, pullulating, squished, crushed, squeezed, macerate, triturate, pulp, pulverise, crush, grind, pound, thrash, decaying, waning, feculent, overripe, fetid, putrified, oozing, overfull, entropic

and definitions :

triturate : to pulp, to thresh, to grind, from latin, triturare

‘empty the sample of soil into the mortar and triturate thoroughly’

abrade, to scrape,erode, grate, rub, scuff, triturate, wear, weardown, crush

and words relating to building site stuff, ubiquitous parts of everyday street furniture :

netting, hazard tape, sand bags, sticks, rubble bag, road markings, railings, safety barriers, hoardings, safety signs, safety colours, signs, spray paint road markings, pavements, kerbs, metal drain covers, coal holes, water covers.

Then looking at building sites, road signs everywhere I see similar forms, textures, colours, materials. On holiday in Portugal, a strand of hazard tape caught up in the branches of a olive tree. These bits of plastic from our building and demolition sites are everywhere.

May 26th

Swimming in clear waters at the Pells, conifers (planted long ago when the park was donated to the people of lewes by factory owners) silouetted like a mediterranean skyline against the blue sky, a bright blue line to swim along. And behind the pool, the sound of demolition through a tactfully shrouded building, a systematic, thorough demolition that leaves few traces, of those black sand hills. The Pells, and land that became pool, were given by a charitable benefactor, history of philanthropic benevolence other parks in Lewes, give history of the business men behind them, the Every ironworks donated Paddock field to its workers, and built houses etc. is this similar to our sponsorship by big business, of tobacco and oil companies. Are we entering a more responsible times when development of economy and therefore business is no longer seen as advantageous. End of capitalism brings with it realisation that economic growth has actually increased gap between rich and poor. How do art galleries and museums function in this environment ? does a museum which is responsible and hands back artefacts to countries of origin develop with fewer actual exhibits ? We need to look to a curation of events, experiences, temporary artworks, as ways to curate art of the now ? (ref. to Obrist, and his book on curating which I've read recently, and his crazy comment about how much air travel he does to see all the exhibits and biennales worldwide - that seems it should be a bygone age that someone would do that now).

Thursday 6thjune

Visit to mums to help her move back upstairs.

Swimming in the river at Mums, a deep brown colour with mud and smell of minerals – beautiful light of shadows of clouds flickering over the water , a sudden swooping of a flock of very fast canoeists, passing me in the water so close I feared for my head and waved vigorously at them in case they didn’t see me. River pollution, time passes.

June 21st

Cleavers, ragwort, groundsel, valerian, rosebay willowherb, herb robert, speedwell, bent grass, buddleia, elder, yellow hawkweed, hawkbit,bindweed, wood sage, green alkanet, hedge woundwort, dead nettle.

On this, the longest day, I met Jo Carter, contacted through the Lewes wildflower forum, down by Green Wall to look at wildflowers, ‘weeds’, that have flourished there since Gosnells moved out. Where we were standing will have a view of a car park in front of it, though providing access to a much needed new doctors surgery. At the moment the corrugated grey roof of the old soap factory building has melded with colours of landscape, all very pleasing on the eye, sorry it will go. How shall I record, just this conversation ? I like the idea of a conversation being a remnant remembering the vision of this bank covered in wildflower profusion over years of plastic and rubble.