Posts Tagged ‘interventions’
Grass Hearts, a little journey
Cut grass, aluminium printing plates and tent pegs on the way into the Secret Gallery. These are my alternatives to news papers! My friend found these sheets of aluminium beside a skip, I think they are used for printing news papers. I have used some of them for dry points and a few of these even have marks scraped into them ready for printing. Our children helped gather the grass for me. I wonder will they turn into hay hearts! I enjoyed doing some land art/ interventions again and hope to do more, maybe along The Burren Way and the coast of Clare.
Have a Heartfelt journey where ever it my take you! And remember I am having an exhibition in the Courthouse Gallery in Ennistymon, Co. Clare with two other artists on 14th August at 8pm, I hope you can make it!
Water, some Rose Oil and a Hand
The moon is reflected in a distant rock pool
Caretakers of the earth not owners
All part of the same thing
Little waterfall
This morning James set me a challenge. It was to spend one hour in the bathroom with my camera. This challenge James said was to do with the fact that we as humans like to put ourselves in places and situations where we can just go on auto pilot and hence use minimum effort, this can be good and bad. So doing this challenge forced me to do things that are different from usual. It is also my idea of bliss to spend an hour on my own in the bathroom, but I would not have thought of bringing in my camera so it was even more fun! These photographs relate to earlier interventions of mine, it was really nice to play! It is wonderful to have someone to think of interesting things to do that help you feel creative. Thank you my Muse!
Laying a line of Mother of pearl along the garden path
Today, I suddenly started to tidy up the garden, it had got pretty neglected looking. A month or so ago, I had put a kind of trail/ladder of mother of pearl shells and driftwood down the garden path. Gradually it had turned from a line to a tide line to a messy bird picked, children kicked, moss covered and even seaweed-like, green balls of slime infested path, with some random shells and driftwood on it!
I cleared (I am trying not to use weed killer, my hands have aged about 50 years in a single day!) and edged the path and washed the shells and relayed the trail, starting this time with oyster shells, then driftwood going up as far as the little tree, and up to a branch! Then I lay the Mother of Pearl shells, it was such a meditative experience; gathering the shells then washing them and laying them out carefully. It felt like a lovely ritual, I would like to do it once a month or so.
Even after the big tidy up, the path was still a little messy and mossy, and wet and ended in a Turlough, complete with strange green slime balls!(Does anyone know what these rootless, spreading, weird things are?) Placing these perfect, beautiful little shells on top of natures contributes of it’s persistence and constant reclaiming and growing back over the man made path, both gestured at poetry and absurdity! This felt like a meditative ritual, creating a space to be very quiet and work in a gentle way with nature. When doing my interventions I like to introduce unexpected objects to a place, they tend to be playful and often quirky: changing the way we see things by putting them in a different context.
Memories of interventions and other things in the Burren
Walking on rocks the sea covers.
Watching words in the sea
being covered and uncovered by sand.
Wind blown drip drawing
indigo and gold.
For a moment the sea looks white like a milk pond.
Two crows on sea warn grey rocks.
Do the boat like vessels still drip indigo tonight?
Where is the dolphin sleeping tonight?
Is there shelter beneath the great tall cliffs?
Swell of wind blown grasses and sweet flowers.
Sea and rain hollowed rocks hold little pools of sea water.
The stony beach looks different today, hills of rock.
Roaring sea.
Returning home, stepping on sun-warmed rocks.
Rock pools like rivers.
A trail in the sand of an unknown bird.
Tide lines.
Art and part time insanity
Being an artist is a little bit like “controlled insanity” or “part time insanity”! Functioning reasonably normally to survive and maintain a calm exterior! However when it comes to making the art, normality is simply disregarded! Perceptions of reality are challenged and rearranged.The imagination buttons are pressed on fully. There are no rules to make the journey a little safer or predetermined. Bravery and honesty are just some of the requirements that are taken for granted when making art.
I find myself often simultaneously diving inwards and outwards; into the deepest parts of me and out into the universe and seeing which correlates. For example, something I see in the landscape strikes a chord a resonates deep within me, then I start to pursue this. There needs to be a sense of discovery while I am making the art; to feel like I am making some kind of sense out of chaos. Or learning about our own nature from the nature we inhabit and are part of.
I am fascinated by the cycles in nature and natural order and spiritual science. Much of my interventions take on a quasi-scientific approach, sitting on the knife-edge between poetry and absurdity. I don’t fully understand why I do them, though they speak from the part of me that is in awe and amazed and that cannot be a bad thing!
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