the latest in my series of random wanderings around the city of Wolverhampton. This time its things I've read on the way:
Paradise sundays the red house look both ways unit to let furniture warehouse one way all traffic academy of dance only instore finance headquaters the diner bell street metro-st Georges mehan bargin centre loose materials babywear panahar peacocks 1/2 price sale is fast food slowing your kids down? image sale shopmobility east west original oriental grocery the bag shop telephone we are open sundays oceana first port 2 for 1 drinks bank's timpsons game clarks key cutting shoe repairs engraving motor industry cash aid reaction minder coming soon 1 minute walk beauty pharmacy dental surgery final clearence ideas your photos in seconds baking here now bannuttal loyds bank limited evening mail art gallery charlies fish bar baego's beer and burger time to invest in me smart ply funeral care open pawn broking adult bookshop
Thursday, 29 January 2009
Thursday, 8 January 2009
Boyle Walk no. 2
The Second in my series of 'Boyle Walks', inspired by various artists including the Boyle family. I walked through an industrial area of Wolverhampton, around the Chapel Ash area, near where I live. The photo's have come out really bad; they were shot on 100iso slide film and have come back all washed out, riddled with camera shake, as I didn't use a tripod. Next time I'll use faster film. Some of the images I've been able to rescue and I think there's something to them.
Thursday, 27 November 2008
26/11/2008. Wolverhampton. Or, 'Study Governed by Chance (after Richard Long and the Boyle Family)'
The first in a series of walks. The starting point and end point are determined by sticking two pins in a map at random. The experience is then documented in whatever way seems appropriate. What you read here are snippets of conversation:
Start. What? Come on. Which way are we going? Memorial: 'Their name liveth for evermore'. S.I, Lefebvre. Drop your reasons for movement to experience the city in a new way. The Planet really is a dump. Need faster film. Found a pen. Are matches relevant? Where's the Post Office? I want to go see the reindeer. Where are they going? Cactus in the window. Princes Street. We're also on a project, another project. Get that one. Princess Alley. That's really bright. Look at the amethyst. Bag fallen off the van. I've never been down here before. You're in my way. Walkabout. Manhattens, whats that? Used to be chiggi rock. Want to see the reindeer. Hang on. Failure is interesting, but failing because you're cold isn't. That's two lame franchises. My bum's cold. Carpets. Look at this. New watch? Bell Street, TKMaxx. The Beach? What's this? End.
Start. What? Come on. Which way are we going? Memorial: 'Their name liveth for evermore'. S.I, Lefebvre. Drop your reasons for movement to experience the city in a new way. The Planet really is a dump. Need faster film. Found a pen. Are matches relevant? Where's the Post Office? I want to go see the reindeer. Where are they going? Cactus in the window. Princes Street. We're also on a project, another project. Get that one. Princess Alley. That's really bright. Look at the amethyst. Bag fallen off the van. I've never been down here before. You're in my way. Walkabout. Manhattens, whats that? Used to be chiggi rock. Want to see the reindeer. Hang on. Failure is interesting, but failing because you're cold isn't. That's two lame franchises. My bum's cold. Carpets. Look at this. New watch? Bell Street, TKMaxx. The Beach? What's this? End.
Below are images shot by Helen, who came with me:
Wednesday, 5 November 2008
Statement October 2008 (extract)
Heres a section of a statement I'm working on for my creative enquiry module:
The major turning point in my development as an artist, crucial to my practice, is the realisation that the process is equally important as the exhibited work. This illustrates a shift in position and understanding, a shift away from any notion of finality; from understanding artworks as ‘end products’ to reading them as documentation of a process. A recent article on the MA Fine Art show at the University of Central Lancashire addresses this very issue. In it Chris Young refers to Site specific art in the late sixties/early seventies and Lucy Lippard’s 1972 book ‘Six years: The Dematerialisation of the Art Object’. Young poses the question of how the process of engagement and exploration, which is where the interest lies, can be communicated to an audience?
‘Thirty-six years on , the case of process-based work takes the issue further still – where the outcome of a project is uncertain there may be no physical end product at all. The interest is in the exploration of ideas and the process of investigation. How can this be communicated to an audience expecting and deserving an involving visual experience?’ (Young, 2008, p6)
With regards to my own practice this question is crucial, and one which, at this stage in my development, I have yet to find a satisfactory answer to. The important point is, to reiterate, the shift from reading the artwork as an ‘end product’ to reading the artwork as documentation. Two bodies of work from my practice highlight this shift, work that illustrates crucial points in the development of my practice. The first of which is a large body of photographs of the various studio spaces I have worked in over the last couple of years. The practice of photographing my studio and work in progress was one I picked up at foundation level and continued through my undergraduate degree. The photographs often depict unfinished art objects (paintings), and as such are documents. The essential point is that these are, at the same time, also ‘end products’. The major revelation was that these photographs of my studio were to be valued as much as ‘end products’ as the paintings they depicted were. They are ‘end products’ in as much as they are produced by a process, but it is a process that is theoretically endless, and so they are also documents. The defining factor is finality. The difference between the two terms is the degree of finality inherent to the work: An ‘end product’ has a heightened finality as it is the end point of the process. A ‘document’ is its polar opposite having little or no finality, as it comes during the process, a process which, theoretically, may have no end point.
The second body of work I produced for my undergraduate degree show. It consisted of a series of paintings, drawings and a video/performance work that utilised the Dadaist/Surrealist technique of the automatic. The paintings were made by covering the canvas in one or more layers of automatic writing. Whilst there was a certain amount of chance involved in this process, it is a controlled amount as there were conditions (Number of layers, size of text etc). This marks a major shift in my practice, in that the work actively privileges the process over the ‘end product’: As there is little aesthetic interest in the finished works (many of the canvases were completely covered in either black or white paint, a deliberate choice to minimise the aesthetic value of the works), the artworks as ‘end products’ approach redundancy, as the art objects exhibited become interesting only because of the process. While this work was produced at undergraduate level, it is only in my current practice I am able to fully comprehend the implications of this shift. My current practice centres on the word ‘Psychogeography’, a word that has a long history but whose major touchstones, for my own practice, are the Situationist International and the revival psychogeographical practices had in 1990’s London by authors such as Iain Sinclair. This work consists of going on walks and documenting them through film, photography, drawing and writing.
The major turning point in my development as an artist, crucial to my practice, is the realisation that the process is equally important as the exhibited work. This illustrates a shift in position and understanding, a shift away from any notion of finality; from understanding artworks as ‘end products’ to reading them as documentation of a process. A recent article on the MA Fine Art show at the University of Central Lancashire addresses this very issue. In it Chris Young refers to Site specific art in the late sixties/early seventies and Lucy Lippard’s 1972 book ‘Six years: The Dematerialisation of the Art Object’. Young poses the question of how the process of engagement and exploration, which is where the interest lies, can be communicated to an audience?
‘Thirty-six years on , the case of process-based work takes the issue further still – where the outcome of a project is uncertain there may be no physical end product at all. The interest is in the exploration of ideas and the process of investigation. How can this be communicated to an audience expecting and deserving an involving visual experience?’ (Young, 2008, p6)
With regards to my own practice this question is crucial, and one which, at this stage in my development, I have yet to find a satisfactory answer to. The important point is, to reiterate, the shift from reading the artwork as an ‘end product’ to reading the artwork as documentation. Two bodies of work from my practice highlight this shift, work that illustrates crucial points in the development of my practice. The first of which is a large body of photographs of the various studio spaces I have worked in over the last couple of years. The practice of photographing my studio and work in progress was one I picked up at foundation level and continued through my undergraduate degree. The photographs often depict unfinished art objects (paintings), and as such are documents. The essential point is that these are, at the same time, also ‘end products’. The major revelation was that these photographs of my studio were to be valued as much as ‘end products’ as the paintings they depicted were. They are ‘end products’ in as much as they are produced by a process, but it is a process that is theoretically endless, and so they are also documents. The defining factor is finality. The difference between the two terms is the degree of finality inherent to the work: An ‘end product’ has a heightened finality as it is the end point of the process. A ‘document’ is its polar opposite having little or no finality, as it comes during the process, a process which, theoretically, may have no end point.
The second body of work I produced for my undergraduate degree show. It consisted of a series of paintings, drawings and a video/performance work that utilised the Dadaist/Surrealist technique of the automatic. The paintings were made by covering the canvas in one or more layers of automatic writing. Whilst there was a certain amount of chance involved in this process, it is a controlled amount as there were conditions (Number of layers, size of text etc). This marks a major shift in my practice, in that the work actively privileges the process over the ‘end product’: As there is little aesthetic interest in the finished works (many of the canvases were completely covered in either black or white paint, a deliberate choice to minimise the aesthetic value of the works), the artworks as ‘end products’ approach redundancy, as the art objects exhibited become interesting only because of the process. While this work was produced at undergraduate level, it is only in my current practice I am able to fully comprehend the implications of this shift. My current practice centres on the word ‘Psychogeography’, a word that has a long history but whose major touchstones, for my own practice, are the Situationist International and the revival psychogeographical practices had in 1990’s London by authors such as Iain Sinclair. This work consists of going on walks and documenting them through film, photography, drawing and writing.
Thursday, 16 October 2008
Review at Rhubarb
Today I went for my portfolio review with Rhubarb Rhubarb. I had mixed feeling about going - Rhubarb Rhubarb is very much a photography agency promoting photographic work from the West Midlands, yet I don't really see myself as a photographer despite my current work being largely lens based. In the end though I figured it couldn't do me any harm so I went.
It was actually really useful, the woman reviewing my work (Lorna, I think?) immediately spotted my problems, namely that the work I was producing wasn't what I wanted it to be, the things I'm trying to convey are getting lost somewhere between thought and image. There is a lot of potential in my work, I knew that already and she seemed to pick up on that ('a good start' I thing her words were) but, again same problem, that potential is getting lost somewhere. At the minute I'm struggling to figure out what exactly the work is: I know its not painting, and I think it might be lens based, but i lack confidence because I don't know what I'm doing. The solution suggested is to experiment, play around with cameras, film, printing the photographs myself and to go out more with my camera. Once I've done that and my work has progressed some I'm to go back for another review session.
While I'm feeling a lot more positive about my practice than I have been as of late, I know a PhD, which must come out of practice, even if it's a theoretical research project, is further away than I thought.
It was actually really useful, the woman reviewing my work (Lorna, I think?) immediately spotted my problems, namely that the work I was producing wasn't what I wanted it to be, the things I'm trying to convey are getting lost somewhere between thought and image. There is a lot of potential in my work, I knew that already and she seemed to pick up on that ('a good start' I thing her words were) but, again same problem, that potential is getting lost somewhere. At the minute I'm struggling to figure out what exactly the work is: I know its not painting, and I think it might be lens based, but i lack confidence because I don't know what I'm doing. The solution suggested is to experiment, play around with cameras, film, printing the photographs myself and to go out more with my camera. Once I've done that and my work has progressed some I'm to go back for another review session.
While I'm feeling a lot more positive about my practice than I have been as of late, I know a PhD, which must come out of practice, even if it's a theoretical research project, is further away than I thought.
Thursday, 9 October 2008
Notes on 'Ways of Seeing'
Notes on ‘Ways of Seeing’ (1972)
by Berger, J. Blomberg, S. Fox, C. et al
Chapter One
- The essay seems to take the central ideas from Benjamin’s ‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction’ (loss of ‘aura’, displacement of notions of ‘the original’) and situate them in a structuralist context
- Berger seems to be, much like Benjamin, be writing from a Marxist perspective. A lot of what is said seems to connect with the Situationist International. A lot of Situationist tactics are alluded to throughout the essay (e.g., detournement: ‘Because works of art are reproducible they can, theoretically, be used by anybody.’(p29) These could also be connected to postmodernism and, more recently, postproduction. The text is essentially Marxist, not postmodernist however.
- The premise of the essay, and indeed the book, divides up the world, like structuralism does, into signifiers and signifieds. Connections can be made with Lacan’s ‘mirror phase’ ‘Soon after we can see, we are aware that we can also be seen. The eye of the other combines with our own eye to make it fully credible that we are part of the visible world’ This notion of the other can be connected, and indeed is present in, (post)structuralism.
- ‘Adults and children sometimes have boards in their bedrooms or living-rooms on which they pin pieces of paper: letters, snapshots, reproductions of paintings, newspaper cuttings, original drawings, postcards. On each board all the images belong to the same language and all are more or less equal within it, because they have been chosen in a highly personal way to match and express the experience of the room’s inhabitant. Logically these boards should replace museums.’ (p30). Sums up the essay. Art should be appreciated for its use value rather than its originality, or uniqueness. This position is shared by postmodernism, neo-avant-garde and the Situationists (and etc). It is an essentially Marxist statement in this instance as it is directed towards removing the bourgeois hierarchy of modern museums and open up art to use by the lower classes.
- The comodification of art a major theme, especially painting. After mechanical reproduction any notion of originality lies in the work being the original of a reproduction, its value lies in its quantitative value not what the image contains; ‘The meaning of the original work no longer lies in what it uniquely says but what it uniquely is’. Central idea from Benjamin’s essay.
Chapter Seven
- Publicity: The colonisation of the everyday by capitalism. This is the central premise of this essay
- Publicity sells the past to the future; ‘Publicity images also belong to the moment in the sense that they must be continually renewed and made up-to-date. Yet they never speak of the present. Often they refer to the past and always they speak of the future.’ (p130). Again the debt to Benjamin is prominent, notions of mechanical reproduction are central.
- ‘Publicity is about social relations, not objects.’ (p132). Publicity is about potential: when you buy a product you buy potential for what you could be. The product embodies your relations to others, this is why publicity is never about the product itself, but potential.
- Publicity’s use of history significant: presents history as something to ‘dip into’ (again Marxist, links with postmodernism, situationism). Art and history lend the product a sense of authority and speak of social mobility. Again, the potential for what you could be.
- ‘Publicity turns consumption into a substitute for democracy. The choice of what one eats (or wears or drives) takes the place of significant political choice. Publicity helps to mask and compensate for all that is undemocratic within society. And it also masks what is happening in the rest of the world.’ (p149)
by Berger, J. Blomberg, S. Fox, C. et al
Chapter One
- The essay seems to take the central ideas from Benjamin’s ‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction’ (loss of ‘aura’, displacement of notions of ‘the original’) and situate them in a structuralist context
- Berger seems to be, much like Benjamin, be writing from a Marxist perspective. A lot of what is said seems to connect with the Situationist International. A lot of Situationist tactics are alluded to throughout the essay (e.g., detournement: ‘Because works of art are reproducible they can, theoretically, be used by anybody.’(p29) These could also be connected to postmodernism and, more recently, postproduction. The text is essentially Marxist, not postmodernist however.
- The premise of the essay, and indeed the book, divides up the world, like structuralism does, into signifiers and signifieds. Connections can be made with Lacan’s ‘mirror phase’ ‘Soon after we can see, we are aware that we can also be seen. The eye of the other combines with our own eye to make it fully credible that we are part of the visible world’ This notion of the other can be connected, and indeed is present in, (post)structuralism.
- ‘Adults and children sometimes have boards in their bedrooms or living-rooms on which they pin pieces of paper: letters, snapshots, reproductions of paintings, newspaper cuttings, original drawings, postcards. On each board all the images belong to the same language and all are more or less equal within it, because they have been chosen in a highly personal way to match and express the experience of the room’s inhabitant. Logically these boards should replace museums.’ (p30). Sums up the essay. Art should be appreciated for its use value rather than its originality, or uniqueness. This position is shared by postmodernism, neo-avant-garde and the Situationists (and etc). It is an essentially Marxist statement in this instance as it is directed towards removing the bourgeois hierarchy of modern museums and open up art to use by the lower classes.
- The comodification of art a major theme, especially painting. After mechanical reproduction any notion of originality lies in the work being the original of a reproduction, its value lies in its quantitative value not what the image contains; ‘The meaning of the original work no longer lies in what it uniquely says but what it uniquely is’. Central idea from Benjamin’s essay.
Chapter Seven
- Publicity: The colonisation of the everyday by capitalism. This is the central premise of this essay
- Publicity sells the past to the future; ‘Publicity images also belong to the moment in the sense that they must be continually renewed and made up-to-date. Yet they never speak of the present. Often they refer to the past and always they speak of the future.’ (p130). Again the debt to Benjamin is prominent, notions of mechanical reproduction are central.
- ‘Publicity is about social relations, not objects.’ (p132). Publicity is about potential: when you buy a product you buy potential for what you could be. The product embodies your relations to others, this is why publicity is never about the product itself, but potential.
- Publicity’s use of history significant: presents history as something to ‘dip into’ (again Marxist, links with postmodernism, situationism). Art and history lend the product a sense of authority and speak of social mobility. Again, the potential for what you could be.
- ‘Publicity turns consumption into a substitute for democracy. The choice of what one eats (or wears or drives) takes the place of significant political choice. Publicity helps to mask and compensate for all that is undemocratic within society. And it also masks what is happening in the rest of the world.’ (p149)
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