Now that I have decided to do two performances, a decision I made on Saturday I realise I need to get going with making decisions over the space and footage to be shown. I think I must be nervous today as I feel quite scatty and as though I still need more in the performance. Currently I happy to show 2 isolated works made within the project- The skate park footage and the 'Bits' boxes footage and then I will have the performance, Desk and gesture footage in the space with me. As the day goes on, I realise the breath of work I have made during the 3 weeks and I become excited. I look back through the performance and realise it does not need any other elements. It came to mind that the element I'm now ready for is an audience.
I spend the morning gathering used Tesco bags to be used as the opening part to the performance. For weeks I wanted to use the line.."Just before we start, I just wanted to remind you all to take your own carrier bag..", but after discussing this I realised it would be stronger to use the actual bags, giving them out to my audience as they enter with a suggestion the the bag will, ..."help with the guilt.."! I become quite attached to the sculptural quality of the used bags this afternoon, hanging each of them off each hanging bar in the space. For a while I was concerned with using a branded bag- such as Tesco, as I didn't want it to be perceived as any kind of support or promotion for Tesco, I didn't want it to detract from the fact they are re-usable. However having used Tesco bags, uniform, I feel happy with the decision and they all clearly say- re-usable on them, so I'm hoping it will work. Also there is quite a lot of press/campaigning in Hertford at present surrounding the local Tescos plans for expansion, and so it seemed right to be political with Tesco bags specifically. I'm now considering leaving the bags hanging for the performance, removing them from their hooks as each audience member arrives. I guess the good thing with being able to perform twice is that it allows me to experiment and develop the performance over the two days, trying different combinations of elements, and having time to adjust for Saturdays performance. I'm slightly worried about the last part whereby I give the objects on my desk away, I mean I genuinely want people to have them but I don't want to replace them for Saturdays performance. I guess whatever goes, goes, and it will be nice for the performance on Saturday to carry that history, by having less objects on the desk to give away.
I spent the rest of the day editing and transferring the video footage from camera to VHS. Yes VHS!- I feel very old school, editing away from my usual method of using a computer and instead of DVD using VHS. The reason for this is that I have been able to get hold of 4 TVs but they have Video built in. In fact really I'm coming to terms with this editing, and embracing its rawness, echoing the very nature of the residency. Really I'm more shocked at how the space is leading towards looking pretty 'finished', a positive feeling in terms of achievement but also a sad feeling that I have now 'pinned' the work down, and the experimentation has died down to a certain extent.
Looking at the work as a whole, it has become hard to descibe what's going on with it all. I mean I do know but its sitting fairly confused in my head again. I'm hoping by the end of tomorrow I will be able to have a minuet to look at the work together and then I hope it will pull itself together for me.
I think was been interesting is often you perceive your work to be one thing and when it ends up as something else it can be quite surprising. Recognising where my interests lie has been quite refreshing, how I thought my work would be is somewhat different now. Running back over the work, it feels a little like I'm fighting against myself. I thought it would be this, that, have more of the other stuff, be more colourful, not about that...etc... but actually its not. Its quite 'local', current, political, and raw. Its taken on a whole new aesthetic, its appears fairly masculine, quite aggressive, and humorous. I think working with humour has definitely been a revelation, not previously being comfortable with using humour but looking back at past works, even the early sculptures made with Ben I can see there is a lot of humour, maybe I just wasn't confident to work with it. I think I may have been focusing on being serious, with often what was quite silly, in an attempt to be profound? I realise there is a genuine sillyness to my work and I do like to be naughty, exaggerating the everyday, being ridiculous, embracing monotony- sweeping continuously for 2 hours etc.. My ongoing interest into human beings and the body too, also stays with me and has become specifically interested in gesture and behaviour, moving from my previous interest in the internal to the more external body. I still draw on my immediate environment, observations and experiences but feel as though I am able to remove myself from the work and make it not just about me but layer it, so it remains about that but is communicated in a more subtle way.
I guess the work has maintained an interest in authenticity, but less about Hertford/ London specifically and more about everyday authenticity. Making this kind of work in this gallery is challenging both Hertford and London without the work being about that directly, what the work is about is my observations I guess by with a dynamic that gives the work depth. It is definitely about me being an artist in Hertford and living and working it buts its also about life and capitalism, emotion and recycling, from the very local to the global, from the trashy to poignant.
Tomorrow is performance day and I sit here tonight surrounded by vHS taper. i have been pressing record/play and stop/rewind for the past 4 hours and my head has grown an internal buzz in the front of my forehead. I will not complete the editing tonight but will have got far enough to make hats left to do tomorrow manageable.
I thought I would finish by sharing with you the 'to do list' i have just wrote to myself for tomorrow in my sketchbook- here it is.
To do
Buy 2 x blank DV tapes
Charge Digi + Vid camera
Audience member to film + photograph
Buy wine + nibbles
Plastic cups from flat
Note objects from desk that are to be taken
Remove glass from desk
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