It was so funny, towards the climax of the Choice Project – ‘Scrap That’ (Ars Moriendi), when, glancing over my shoulder, my husband saw his image (collagraph print) on the internet. He immediately set up an Insta account and followed the foundation course. Equally funny this evening then, when he turned to me and said (showing me his phone) ‘Isn’t that yours?’…….
Who captured that picture with that chance lighting I wonder? It wasn’t me! The whole project has been about chance and I have enjoyed it enormously! I understand that it was conceived as a way of “getting Fine Art pathway ‘moving and making'” instead of just sitting around contemplating things. I am not a sit-arounder in that sense…. I like to just get going and find where working and making takes me so, perhaps I didn’t ‘need’ this project as such but, I have learned a lot throughout it. For example, I hated the idea of working with ‘plastic’ at first but have ended up rather pleased with the ‘Neuroimagining’ outcomes. On the other hand, I adore textile work and have some uncomfortable feelings about the final outcome of ‘Me And My Friends’ that I can’t quite explain except by reference to Bruce Mau’s ‘Love your experiments as you would an ugly child.’ Speaking of Mau, I can add that, running alongside the practical work we have done in the Dice Project, I have really enjoyed the Dada oriented contextual studies input we have had. It has been fascinating to learn about (and research deeper) into Mau, ‘The Oblique Strategies’, Lomography etc. Also, we have looked at ‘Early Experimental Film Makers’ and I have rather fallen in love with Marie Menken, Hans Richter, Lotte Rieniger and of course, Jonas Mekas and John Smith. The Girl Chewing Gum is refreshingly hilarious but, in my YouTube playlist it is ‘Associations’ (1975) that I keep going back to. I’ve put quite a few examples on the playlist (particularly Mekas interviews) and will look forward to watching them all over the Christmas break.
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/john-smith-12243/john-smith-playing-power-language