Back with Update #14, to be honest I thought I'd have fizzled out on these by now but ey, still here. Aight on with the update.
Personal
So in terms of my personal life, It consists of working, involuntary rain trekking and reconnecting with friends currently. It's been good, with the new restrictions being eased, and a lot more of the entertainment/leisure industry back to being open for the public, I have found myself in a lot of plans and a lot of reconnecting. Consider me very excited to catch Fellowship of The Ring in cinemas. Other news, I have passed my theory test for driving, with a lot of my friends saying it takes two to three tries to pass the theory I went in rather chilled with the expectation to fail. To me it's another step into independency and leaving the valley in which I live in, which is an exciting prospect to be thinking of. Now for the massive wait for the practical test.
One of the things I've seen in reflecting with myself is I've been waiting for the world to wake up a bit more in terms of my career, and now I feel it's all coming a little too quickly for me to catch up and maintain the balance between financial, creative and social stability, whilst having enough sleep to look less zombie-eqsue.
Pepper Seedlings are booming, and my strawberry is too, and currently have some succulents in the seedling phase to see if I can grow anymore from one succulent.
All in all life ain't been too shabby at all. I had a call with a good friend of mine and discussed about how there is still an underlying feeling of guilt when it comes to meeting people and friends in this climate even though considered legal.
This got me thinking of the governments damage control when it came to the advertising campaigns in which they flipped all blame of any negative or un-expecting spikes of infections towards the public. This is I found quite interesting to look into the effects after which have set in from the pandemic and peoples opinions. Personally, I find that the current governments ideology of taking credit in glory and blaming faults on the public to be a shameful, cowardly and immature tactic, but unfortunately, for the people who are sick of politics and looking beyond face value it is a effective tactic. This does worry me for the future of politics in which the blame doesn't sit on those that have well earnt it, when the faceless million can take the brunt. One rule for them, one rule for us.
Kneed Collaboration Update:
So from the first meeting, it is safe to say my first impression wasn't the most impactful. Something I didn't take into consideration was how nervous I was going to be, this oversight came into play when I had 2 minutes to talk and instead of focusing on 1 or 2 of the points in detail, I tried condensing a 4 page summary I made into that time frame which went for lack of a better word: s h i t.
However, through the introduction of a Slack channel and the Miro Board, two excellent resources for digital planning and collaborative work, thinking and idea-boarding, I have been adding more and more different discoveries and interesting resources to look into and dig a little deeper into. One of the focuses of the group is 'Alternate ways of Mapping' in connection to space, time, process, nature and sustainability. These are the two I'd like to highlight which I found super interesting:
MTA.ME - A website created by Alex Chen, who programmed using the NYC Subway for notes to be played when trains collided routes depending on their length, this interactive way of mapping connects the process of trains journeys in time, and the spaces they share on the rails.
Another discovery was how we can imitate nature for mapping, which is what scientists used to create future train subways by mimicking mold."...placed oat flakes on a wet surface in locations that corresponded to the cities surrounding Tokyo, and allowed the Physarum polycephalum mold to grow outwards from the center. They watched the slime mold self-organize, spread out, and form a network that was comparable in efficiency, reliability, and cost to the real-world infrastructure of Tokyo's train network." (https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100121141051.htm)These ideas of interactive maps, and connecting nature to ourselves and our process of mapping could be interesting to dig a little deeper into, such as following where natures takes us.
There is a lot more I could talk about in terms of slow-processes and ideas of sustainability like was mentioned in the application process, but I might make it into an article for one of the updates in the future.
Podcast recording with Young Creatives Podcast.
I had the pleasure to finally get around to feature in one of my good friends podcasts, The Young Creatives Podcast, In which we discuss each others work through performance art, the nature of that practice and a few pieces we have seen and felt had a strong understanding of the piece. That and some little natters in-between ranging from the lighthearted to the (personally) uninformed political views.
This is the first podcast in which I have taken part of in, and I really enjoyed podcasting actually, I think for me it's the more casual aspect of podcasting which I find the most appealing. As I mentioned before, the pressure and stress of the Kneed collaboration meeting I crumbled over the stress of trying to talk a lot of points and context in such a compressed timeframe, whilst podcasts are very much the opposite, allowing me to have time to ramble and converse with a friend as opposed to strangers.
For the future, I find it important to find my flaws and accept them as things in which I am not skilled in, therefore allowing myself to utilise myself effectively and improve on skills in which I think I am lacking. This being currently academic speaking in concise timeframes and nerves when it comes to tackling talking in front of other professionals. This was something I didn't anticipate for myself being from a theatre background and presenting numerous presentations in university for assessments.
Keep an eye out on The Young Creatives podcast in the very recent future!
Instagram- https://www.instagram.com/theyoungcreativespod/?hl=en
Spotify- https://open.spotify.com/show/1YRtIEia5llLjlr6KuwZVr?si=d93c4ab928df4f95
Artist Meet-up in Manchester
As I am writing this, I was to attend a meet-up in Manchester with a group I found on Facebook to take pictures of our work, collaborate, and network. This event was cancelled. Although annoying when plans such as this do not follow through, it has gave me time to focus more on the piece I brought and further, what I could do to improve it.
I had no real guidance for this piece when I started, the only idea I had was to focus on the groups themes (punk, hedonism, edgy alternative, escapism, raw.). With these themes, it gives me a very wide range and decent level of creative freedom when it comes to improvising. With this piece, I rejected the idea of using brushes and replaced it with using one piece of cut sponge. I also actively avoided washing the sponge and leaving the paint on the sponge when applying more paint to the canvas.
On my walk I also found that someone littered half a destroyed mannikins head. I thought by adding readymades into it firstly goes against the usual conventional painting format but also in all honestly just looked 'edgy' (sometimes art doesn't have to have a million hidden reasons, case and point.)Through this however with this addition of the head, sewed poorly with thick red thread, it leaves an emotion of entrapment, and sinking into the murky colours of the canvas. Take it as you will, but to me I get themes of oppression from the way the sewing contained the readymade.
Do I like this piece? Not really. Do i think its aesthetically pleasing? Also no. These are questions in which I find interesting in terms of breaking the conventional aspects of art is what I started to find myself trying to follow.
If the meet-up was to take place, we were to take photos through the northern quarter of Manchester. Through this I would invite other artists to doodle whatever they wanted onto the piece with tip-ex. This is a idea of implementing my practices of collaborative work and the notion of further connection between artist and audience, seeing the evolution of the piece whilst capturing the chaos of freedom for audience to interact with the piece they see fit.
Rain Spoken Word
This is the complete piece for last months focus on 'Rain' It was rushed to make sure I hit the deadline for the month.
The things I like to reflect from this piece is that I think the accompaniment I made captured the right atmosphere I was aiming for. However where I feel it falls flat is the spoken word, this is something I have no or had little experience in messing with. The flow of the spoken word I find lacking, but with this knowledge and a first attempt in the bag, the only way is up.
SOTW- Gorrilaz - Man Research (Clapper)
A odd one, from one from the earlier music from the Gorrilaz, I picked this for it's focus on the the atmosphere it has created within the music. I think the mastering in terms of reverb and levelling is perfect, and feels very much like a lazy journey.
Invincible - 9/10
As a person who has never been particularly a fan of superheroes, with the recent surge of superhero tv shows from amazon ands recommendations form my friends, I gave it a watch.
The animation in Invincible gave me the feeling of early Sunday morning cartoon vibes, with however a much more intricate plot, dark themes and a lot lot lot more gore.
The characters in this TV show are actually pretty impressive, the majority of the characters were fleshed out and were distinctive between one another.
The only inkling I have with this TV show was that it's falling into the trope of 'power corrupts' which a lot of superhero themes films and TV shows seem to be displaying at the moment. A small complaint, but did not get in the way of the enjoyment of this show. 9/10
Love Death and Robots- Season 2 - 6.5/10
Love Death and Robots, If i was rating the first season it would be a 9/10, as the premise I felt was quite unique at the time allowing smaller animation studios chances to flex and create the work they wanted to. Through this, what was shown was some really interesting, varied and very clever pieces of work all with there own themes and excellent style (Bar the Hitler episode, didn't vibe with that one too much.)
However with season two, it felt a lot of the wild and wonderful pieces from the first one were replaced with more focus on the horror and hyper-realism works. Which in all fairness there is nothing wrong, but I felt the quality overall of the episodes in season two were less varied, and less intriguing than the first. There was some really impressive episodes in the 2nd season don't get me wrong, (Such as Pop Squad and Snow in the Desert.) but the variation is where i felt the first season really reigned supreme. 6.5/10.
That's it for todays update, a little longer than I usually do it I believe, fuck it. See you in the next update.
Peace,
- S (23/05/2021)