Archive for the ‘the day posting simply’ Category
All Returns Together ART
It’s a new year and I am full of new energy and intentions for writing my blog. After such a long pause that I am having quite some trouble with remembering how do do it. I have been writing in my new sketch book and thought I would start by sharing my first page with you. They are called daily artists statements and inspired by the I Ching and perhaps there will be 64 different statements by the end of the year.
1. All Returns Together
I like art making for many reasons, for one, it has no definite starting point, like writing does. I even write on my art in random places. You don’t start at one corner of the work and work your way the the opposite corner, neither physically or conceptually.
A million things can effect the work to greater or lesser extents. The artist is a filter of ideas. Raw ideas come along during the day and night, they collide and merge with older ideas, they settle and work away like a slow cooker while the artist gets on with what ever the artist has to get on with. When the time comes to make something resembling art, the artist trusts their own inner process and works without trying to recall the ideas. Over time the ideas develop and become so much part of the artist that there is no need to think about them during the process of art making. It is more a case of feeling and listening.
Changing Lines
Listening to the weather and sounds of nature
All of a sudden hailstones!
Staring at my work in the studio,
Thoughtless and silent and still
Even my wellington boots have stopped keeping out the cold,
I think its time to move!
Anything can be Everything
After a long long absence, I have returned to my blog. Things have been moving along in there usual erratic way, slowly slowly then very very fast! On 26th May their was a launch of my recent work at The Kitchen at Galway City Museum. I gave a talk about my practice to a very open-minded and gracious group of people who came to the first of the Galway Meets Art exhibitions and talks. There will be one every month curated by Julia Dunin, I look forward to more regular trips to Galway for these. The work is still up for another two weeks, if anyone is in the Galway area. The Kitchen is a lovely place to get something to eat too.
I showed 10 small framed generative paintings and drawings and one large piece. These included flood records, leaks, puddles and wind records, all of which were created this January and February as the wind and rain often entered our cottage. Using the simple materials of ink, water and paper, I am interested in making visible that which is invisible or fleeting and making connections between things that are all around us but often overlooked. Nature makes the initial marks and I make these mark visible or more defined, isolated as focal points. I like when the work is quirky and playful. I need to keep surprising myself with what I make.
The images below are wind records that I made 14 years ago underneath this very clothes line using folded and stitched bank statements to create vessels that dripped indigo pigment and oil onto the cotton sheets below. I just came across these images today and thought that I would post them as they relate to my resent work in Galway and the work I am making now in The Secret Gallery. Please forgive me if I have posted them before. I hope to have all my new images of work somewhere where I can access them soon, not just on my camera and phone!
Art as Altering Terminal Relationships
Photograph by Marianne Slevin, Liscannor Pier, Co Clare 2012
Lately I have been writing up so many proposals and having to condense my art into a few words that it has done something funny to my brain. I was also influenced by a TED talk by Sebastian Wernicke who condensed 1,000 TED talks into 6 words. This was a funny exercise so I thought I would try to do it with art. There are so many different sorts of art but what holds them all together what is the common denominator?
New ways of seeing the world brought to its final conclusion could be seen as altering terminal relations.
Altering: because an artist endeavors to create different and personal ways of seeing the world we live in.
Terminal: because an artist challenges limitations, boundaries and changes endings, and the final outcome of things. In this context artists challenge preconceived notions about reality, breaking up static and fixed ideas through their inventions and creations.
Relations: because artists explore the relationships between things, whether through materials and or concepts. Nothing exists purely on its own, but is a stream of interconnected relationships.
ATR doesn’t spell ART but artist’s always see things differently so why would it!
I would be delighted to hear your thoughts on this matter, so please write a comment with your words on what art is, in a few words. Try 3 words!
Glimmer
Christal in the window of The Secret Gallery Photograph by Marianne Slevin
I feel like I need to eat about 10 Mars bars before I could do anything that involved standing up or moving. The winter has left my blood feeling thin and generally feeling a bit washed out. This mornings activities involved looking for a hair brush, 6 hours later, no hair brush, but a room that has a little more order and a lot less mouse droppings! I have not promised Saint Anthony money as usual when I loose things, due to the fact that this seems like a bit of a money making racket set up by the church. This afternoon I might give some money to a charity and ask Saint Anthony to find the precious hair brush. School for the little ones starts tomorrow and “Mother” is being put through her paces!
Tulip starting to sprout in Recycled Juice Carton Marianne Slevin 2010
The “glimmer” that I have called this blog post is a feeling deep inside of hope or Spring, as if there is a stirring. After the cold spell now bulbs are starting to shoot the smoothest spikes of green. I am starting to write a list of exhibitions that I am going to apply for. Last night, I tidied the studio and made space for new things to happen there. Sometimes it is easy to forget that the simple tasks of tidying and preparing the studio and searching for opportunities and sending off applications are almost as important as doing the art itself.
How do we make sure when we feel that stirring of new growth gather within us, so that when we have tidied and found the hairbrushes and the paint brushes take it a step further and actually create some art and not let it get lost along the way? There are those moment where we can choose to do something creative or we can decide to let it slip away and do something like watch a movie, browse on the internet or wash the dishes, the list is endless. the car is calling,”clean me” my stomach screams “feed me”! But my sketch book needs me! Or should I say I need my sketch book.
Just found the hair brush, now I must think of a charity. I cant find the cable to plug in my camera now. Great! James just found that. Now what shall is do with those glimmers? Perhaps the sketch book is a good place to nurture them before putting them in large open spaces. So the inner art critic does not get a chance to be too scathing before they have matured to a stage where they are a little more developed and also it is allot less daunting to approach a sketch book then something more large scale and begging to be “finished”. You also don’t have to worry about forgetting your ideas or having them just in your head. I would be interested in hearing how other people keep those glimmers glowing and growing. Please share your stories and tips for the survival of the glimmer.
Creative Anytime
How do I fit the creative hour or two into my day? many people say. Well it can start anytime anywhere, you don’t need to have a studio or lonely garret to make art. I am not staying that it does not help, but it is not essential. I am not saying that this doodle in pancake batter is great or even good art, but it is practice in allowing the creative process into daily life, it is a start. Yesterday while I was weeding the garden I practiced being more playful with my weeding method, I would have looked quite peculiar to any an lookers, I am sure. Making art can have many elements involved, basically the whole of the person or people who are making it. Being mindful and being playful are two of the element that come to mind but everyone’s list will be different.
You don’t have to call yourself an artist to let some creative play into your day.
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