Challenge: Do something with your art practice this week that might not work. Take the risk.

14.10.22

Since February 2022 I have been preparing for a joint exhibition of new work. The collection I am working on signals a shift in direction as up until this point, my work has involved working towards a set brief as an illustrator where the final product rather than the process was the primary focus.

I deliberately left a long period of time to prepare for this exhibition, partly because of the work itself being different (much more abstract/gestural rather than small, detailed illustration) and partly because it was the process of preparing that I really wanted to experience and document.

My sketchbook has been critical to this process, and does now reflect, I hope, a genuine journey through ideas and accidents that is slowly moving towards solutions. I am trying to treat the sketchbook for its true intended purpose and detach as much as possible from it being a contained and neatly organised progression of questions and answers.

The reason this process is important aligns with my work in arts education where I work with teachers to open out on what it means to teach art to children.

To date, some challenges/observations I have faced and continue to do so:

• Battling against a predisposition to make things look too ‘pretty’. As a teenager I was enthralled by the Pre Raphaelites and I often feel frustrated with how, with my figurative drawing, they somehow form before my eyes as far more ethereal than I want them to be. I’m trying to strip this back but it is an ongoing battle that I haven’t won yet. I’ve been looking at cave art to help ‘strip back’ how a figure can look.

• I feel the pressure of the blank page and never work on one piece at one time. I prefer to start a few at once. The same goes for sketchbooks. I started my current sketchbook from a page in the middle rather than at the beginning. I find this freeing – but it doesn’t necessarily show the progression of the project in real terms. Does this matter? (some teachers I work with would really struggle with this!)

• I sometimes feel a sense that I’m being quite as bold as I could be. I want to combat this by working in different scales. Some larger drawings may help free me up a bit.

• I sometimes wonder if watercolour limits this boldness and whether trying oils could help.

• For the exhibition I am producing a range of landscape and figurative pieces, all (originally at least) inspired by Shakespeare’s Macbeth. My ideas have evolved from the witches (or the reimagining of them as restorers of balance rather than forces of evil) into the significance of circles; standing stones, and of female power and kinship. At times I wonder whether seeing the figurative and the landscape as two separate entities is helping or hindering. At the moment, I haven’t found a way to combine the two despite this being something I would like to resolve.

• I change lanes often, partly resolving how a landscape/s might look before turning my attention to the figures. There’s a sense that they must keep up with one another and one mustn’t slip behind or carve out in front too much.

• The backdrop of having an exhibition to work towards is something that helps as well as hinders. There’s an undercurrent of impending exposure that can be paralysing. I’m trying to keep that at bay as much as possible but it’s not always easy. But I also feel an exposure to this pressure is necessary and important if I am to continue to exhibit work as an artist – which I know I do want to do.

• I enjoy uncovering and discovering new ways to draw and paint, simply but experimenting with materials and following my instinct.

As I near the point of exhibition, I’m encouraged by the fact that more questions and ‘lines of enquiry’ have surfaced through doing the work. It’s reached a point of resolution insofar as there are finished pieces ready for exhibiting – but there is also lots of work I want to do that might lead the project into new territory.

This week, in answer to Jonathan’s challenge to try something that might not work, I have pushed beyond the figurative and landscape focus into more abstract territory. Whilst remaining with the theme of the exhibition, I have concentrated on creating simple abstract circular forms on paper that don’t contain obviously recognisable objects. They are neither landscape or figures but circular structures that nod or indicate to stone alignments, neolithic artefacts and henges.

For me the process of making these drawings was particularly successful experientially and in fact reminded me of a resource on the AccessArt website that invites very young children to draw spirals. The process is not about anything other than connecting with a material on paper and enjoying the action of moving across that paper in circular motion, hearing the sounds and feeling the drawing tool in your hand – the tactile experience.

When drawing this past week, I’ve been mindful of these experiences and like the fitting connection with drawing in a way that feels almost ritualistic - with motion, rhythm, repetition etc -all of which chimes with stone circles and their historic and religious significance.

Going forward, I want to explore this further using different materials, and surfaces. I’m particularly keen to try drawing and painting on fabric.