Sarah and Iris

• Click to read About Sarah, and About Iris

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June 2013

Handshake 7, Objectspace, Auckland: Swansong

Letting go – performance by Sarah, 6 June 2013, featuring:
– bird pendants by Iris (copper, 24 karat gold, ribbon)
– silk packaging, brass label
– meteorological balloon, hydrogen

Installation views at Objectspace

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Email exchange Sarah and Iris, May 2013

1 May, 2013: Iris to Sarah
Dear, I am working on a parcel for you …birds golden and dead. I will send you some work, and you can alter it, turn it, break it … add to it however you want. I mean it. This is the last step and I trust you to do something with me…
Similar pieces will be in other shows and the value of the work is about 8,000 dollars.
I want you to treat it as material and [with] no respect to market value.
It’s yours, do something with it
xxxi

20 May 2013: Sarah to Iris
Parcel has arrived x Speechless x

20 May 2013: Iris to Sarah

good, beat them up, xxxi

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March 2013

Handshake 6, Handwerkmesse, Munich, Germany: Home from Home

Text and images to follow, but you can see the project website here: http://www.thehomefromhomeproject.com/

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August 2012

Handshake 5, The National, Christchurch, NZ: Free Time

25th August 2012: The 5th Handshake show opened at The National in Christchurch last night. It was a wonderful event, attended by 7 of the 12 Handshake mentees; the mulled wine and fondue (thanks Kristen x) flowed, and we were supported by many art lovers, most of whom came early, talked long, and stayed late. Many, many thanks to gallerist Caroline Billing for a great install and of course to project parents Peter and Hilda for your ongoing support; we are a lucky lucky bunch.

For context, here’s the inside of the gallery:

and here is the outside:

The gallery is in the NG building, which is the black end of the block…. unbelievable, huh. So, this is Christchurch, 18 months on from the Feb 2011 quake.

The work I have developed for this show is a project called Free Time. I have created a blog freetime2012.wordpress.com , where you can read all about it:

Here’s the project introduction:

Welcome to the Free Time blog.  My name is Sarah Read and I am a Wellington-based artist.

For two weeks I am engaged in my Free Time project, which means living in Christchurch and volunteering my services free to anyone who needs a little help.

Free Time looks at how we value time and how we choose to use it.

Like most artists, I wear several hats in the course of making my living, and I’m pretty handy.  The opportunity to exhibit my art at The National in Christchurch set me wondering if my non-artist roles might also be useful to the people of this City, who are now well into a second winter of  broken houses and uncertainty.

• I currently have a part-time caregiving job and also freelance as a technical writer.
• Back in the day I co-founded and -managed a small company, and also worked in a not-for-profit organisation.
• And of course there is (always) the house.

So, here’s the plan:

• For two weeks I offer my time and various skills to anyone in Christchurch who needs me. I’ll advertise this via newspaper ads, word of mouth, and posters around the City.
• The contact details in the ads include this blog, where you can view my CVs and references for each of the five roles on offer.
• Bookings are made by phone on a first come, first served basis.
• If I am unable to do a job (i.e. I don’t have the skills or a time-slot that suits) I will, with permission, pass it on to one of Christchurch’s established volunteering organisations.
• I’ll tally the number of hours worked in each role; (see the Bookings page).
• If I have unbooked time-slots, I’ll offer my services to one of the volunteering organisations; if they can’t use me I’ll default to the Artist role (these hours won’t be added to the tally)
• For identification I’ll wear an official Free Time name badge at all times

For more, see the Free Time blog: freetime2012.wordpress.com. Thanks.

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July 2012: Preparation for Handshake 5

Months have passed. The instant I get back into the studio, I am consumed with intense time pressure. So much to do, so little….

I realise I spend much of my life in this state. It has definitely intensified since I began to be active as an artist; the other things in life do not obligingly recede to make that space (not should they; they ARE my LIFE, after all)  – so it is necessary to somehow squeeze in a whole extra role. This makes for some late nights, many missed social opportunities, and an automatic reply to How’s it going?: “Busy” always said in a special kind of blocking way, as if to forestall any invitation for catching up/hanging out.

Is this really how I want to live, moving forward? Long term, it’s neither sustainable, nor desirable.

Iris:” Look at what’s in front of you – embrace it and work with it and you have the show..the things which are here and you care for are relevant”.

So: work about time, then. Here are some readings from my research (turns out I have been saving relevant articles for some time ):

1. Article I found in April:

There was no mention of more sex or bungee jumps. A palliative nurse who has counselled the dying in their last days has revealed the most common regrets we have at the end of our lives. And among the top, from men in particular, is ‘I wish I hadn’t worked so hard’.

Bronnie Ware is an Australian nurse who spent several years working in palliative care, caring for patients in the last 12 weeks of their lives. She recorded their dying epiphanies in a blog called Inspiration and Chai, which gathered so much attention that she put her observations into a book called The Top Five Regrets of the Dying.

Ware writes of the phenomenal clarity of vision that people gain at the end of their lives, and how we might learn from their wisdom. “When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do differently,” she says, “common themes surfaced again and again.”

Here are the top five regrets of the dying, as witnessed by Ware:

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

“This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made. Health brings a freedom very few realise, until they no longer have it.”

2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.

“This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children’s youth and their partner’s companionship. Women also spoke of this regret, but as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence.”

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

“Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result.”

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

“Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying.”

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

“This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called ‘comfort’ of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content, when deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in their life again.”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/feb/01/top-five-regrets-of-the-dying?fb_action_ids=10150642449762546&fb_action_types=news.reads&fb_source=other_multiline

2. Article I found at Cranbrook last October

(From Art School – to follow)

3. Notes from my flight to the States

21 October – on the journey. Reading Clive Hamilton’s The Freedom Paradox:

• A pleasant life: consumer (20s to mid-30s)
• A good life: maker, self-actualised, ‘in flow’ (mid-30s to mid 40s)
• A meaningful life: the wider good (now and moving forward)

4. Quote from Saska Mackert: (from Liesbeth den Besten’s ‘The joy of making the invisible visual by utilising the hand’ – klimt02 forum (click here for the link):

LdB: One of your recent works is a work on the wall, called ‘Ce souvenir sera toujours mon guide’. The letters of the text are covered by a sort of a cloud of hundreds of small metal medallions, all sawed and treated by hand. We, in Holland, call this labour-intensive process a ‘monk’s labour’, why did you do it like that?

SM: First I tried to do it mechanically, by punching them. But it wasn’t right. I think the metaphor is that you need time to create the image. The thinking process and the making process are slow and that gives the image its power.

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April, May, June 2012: Making a living

Keeping my head down, no time for making art, or really thinking about art. In June though I see this:

Since hearing Manon speak at Jemposium, I have had a kind of jeweller’s crush – my first reaction was to want to be her pupil. I grab my chance and book my place: the dates dovetail with the end of my writing contract. Finally: things are moving :-).

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March: Plan for 2012

March already, and the Big Picture for 2012 is still tbd. November’s adventure at Cranbrook with Iris and the crew left me brimming with new initiatives, but the (luxurious) lineup of exhibitions since then (Handshake 3  in December, Retrospect, Joyaviva and Handshake 4  (opening night images by Sandy Connon) in Jan/Feb) has kept my focus on the next thing rather than the broader plan. So.

• The pull of collaboration, third-party participation or social practice became stronger through 2011 and I’m keen to start some proper research.  (During Jemposium  the wonderful Fabrizio conjured for me the term relational aesthetics – which somehow had passed me by – so that’s a good start).
• And the US trip, with all I saw, debated, read and experienced, started me thinking about site-specificity.  HandShake shows in Christchurch in August, and I want to visit the City before starting to develop work to show there
• And in complete contrast… I am experiencing recurring urges to just make stuff – things that I never got round to / new things. Jemposium again, Karl this time: Get these things out of your system.
• This too shall pass and Pass it on are bubbling away, and it’s a priority to see them through, which will take a while.

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February 2012

Handshake 4, Toi Poneke, Wellington: This too shall pass and Pass it on.
Wow. The luxury of space, and the electricity of a primed and buzzing audience. Handshake at Toi Poneke was timed to coincide with Jemposium, Wellington’s very own jewellery symposium, and the opening night was a star-studded affair.

I showed This too shall pass:

(images to come)

and hosted a Pass it on sewing day in the gallery:

Pass it on: Spreading the love on Valentine’s day

Invitation to Pass it on sewing bee, Valentine’s day, Toi Poneke, Wellington

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January 2012: Pass it on in Retrospect, Wallace Trust, Auckland

Pass it on: Each picture card has a sewing kit attached on the back, with the makings for assembling 10 ribbons and posting them back to me. Here, half have gone, revealing the golden glow

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December 2011

Handshake 3, Masterworks, Auckland NZ: This too shall pass

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November 2011

Visit to Cranbrook Academy

This too shall pass at SOFA Chicago

As finally displayed

With the wonderful Gemma Draper

This too shall pass – trial. The box, loaned by Iris, was gorgeous, but felt too Monika for comfort

This too shall pass trial view 2

 Beautiful Cranbrook

Vistas (not views)

….

Architecture (not buildings)

Beautiful people

…….

Snare Nov 2011

…

Be careful what you wish for Nov 2011

…

The people: the culture is unfailingly welcoming and inclusive: Iris, students (esp Steph my lovely roommate), alumni, visiting artists…

One on ones: discussions about my current project (This too shall pass), with Iris, Damian Skinner, Gemma Draper, Reka Fekete

Engaging with my work…

more later….

October 2011: Travel plans! 

So, my big news is that I am heading over to spend 4 weeks at Cranbrook Academy (check it out: http://www.cranbrookart.edu/Pages/Metalsmithing.html), so I will get to meet Iris in person, hang out with the students… It’s a thrilling prospect. From Iris: the students are great and very supportive . it is a monastery ..people work ..and work.

and from the student who has made it possible by offering to share her home: I am trying to get in the habit of being at the studio at 6am and leaving at 6pm just an fyi on my schedule…

A month of immersion / focus – what incredible luxury.  My plan (tho I need to check this w Iris) is to take no materials and no plan – go there and be a sponge and try new things and engage in whatever is going on.  Iris again: i have so much i would like to show to you, you would be part of a discourse which you could take home .

Crikey. I still can’t believe this is happening.

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Preparation for Handshake 3

So, busy busy. I leave in under two weeks (21 Oct) and there’s a lot to do before then, including sending work for our Masterworks show at the start of December. I am planning to launch This too shall pass (see April and May below for the genesis of this work), which is resolving itself into a large project. Still working with healing and protection….

Shield 2011

… but instead of alluding to those things, attempting to devise something that will go some way to effect them in real life.  Little agents of change.

I am piloting elements and collating text and images for a possible online component; for a preview, see http://sarahread.wordpress.com/2011-this-too-shall-pass/.

More later x

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Handshake 2: Advice for young artists* and Object of Desire #2

(* we are all young artists)

September 2011: National Jewellery Show, Wellington For this second showing of HandShake, I wanted to feature a different slice of my year’s work to date – partly because I could install the work myself, so had fewer constraints than for Sydney, and partly to push myself to resolve work in progress (something that I struggle to do without a deadline).

Advice for young artists has been my ‘stealth’ project for the year.  I realised early in my student days that only being able to progress my work in ‘ideal’ circumstances (ie uninterrupted, with great tools/materials, at my bench) would be limiting and frustrating, so I try always to have some work that involves no mess or noise or special equipment, that I can do outside of the studio – while the family is watching tv, for instance. I also realised, at the start of this year, that I would need to surround myself with positive thoughts and encouragement to fortify myself against the downside of artistic practice, especially the isolation and the constant juggling of the time/money dilemma. So, I have been researching,  collecting and embroidering encouraging sayings and advice; some from the public domain:

some from direct contacts with tutors, colleagues and of course Iris:

some from friends and family:

and some phrases that I use to comfort and encourage myself when feeling unsure:

Each phrase takes around a day to embroider; I find the activity meditative, comforting, rewarding.

The relative monetary value society accords to our time, depending on the status of our profession (and other factors such as gender, location, etc)  is something that interests me greatly, as I switch between my different roles; from my well-paid old job (author of technical texts that no-one ever read), through my coolest-ever day job (immeasurably enriching, terrible pay), to the hours of unpaid domestic motherstuff, and the negative $ returns of art-making. I am reading about the wonderful Wolfgang Laib, who made his name in the 80s with pollen work: “Time is unbelievably relative. Collecting pollen is a very special activity, challenging everything in our society that has to do with time, what you do in a day, what you do in a week, in a month, why you do a thing, and the way you do it… And a cosmic world is also involved, in which a human life is like a spark and no longer plays any role at all because it is so short in relation to cosmic time relationships.”

As a companion piece, I showed the thematically related (but otherwise separate) Object of Desire #2: Here I give thanks for Elliot Collins, from my Loved and Lost series:

(shown here where it belongs – in the window of my studio) . More of this later….

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August 2011

Handshake 1, Gallery 20/17, Sydney, Australia: A year of silk

Breastplate (cotton, silk)

Mask (cotton face mask, silk, wool)

 

Mask view 2

Installation view

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Preparation for Handshake 1, August 5 and 6 2011 (Two days, two skype sessions, two recast pieces…)

It’s difficult to summarise this final intense (and ultimately exhilarating) weekend.  Secretly I’d hoped that Iris would give feedback on the pieces I presented and come up with a magic tweak that would somehow meld them into something that worked. Instead, her suggestions involved trying fresh approaches, including drawing. Inwardly I was aghast (Really? at this stage?), but once I went with it, things started to shift and come alive for me again:

• The process of pinpricking and drawing onto the thin baking paper took me full circle, linking back to the Slowest-ever stop motion movie (see the image at the very bottom of this page) and also looking towards the animation experiments I want to begin next. (The drawing itself was excluded from the parcel for Sydney – ironing accident buckled the surface)

• The mask (which I stitched earlier in the year) was pulled into the curation mix by a conversation about chaos in the landscape/environment and the inadequacy of our domestic protection measures/devices.
• Starching the embroidered fabric transformed it from being a backdrop for brooches to a resolved piece in its own right. This was a big moment for me, and I am keen to develop the possibilities of breastplate/shield forms moving forward.

I finished the weekend (and therefore phase 1 of this project)  on a definite high; I feel that my practice is definitely being rolled forward by the interchanges with Iris and the new perspective she brings. Her input sparks me to new thinking, and she constantly challenges me to step outside what is comfortable and safe. She asked “Can you begin a process without knowing where it is going?” and this seems to be at the crux of the matter for me. It is a delicate balance, to genuinely explore and experiment, knowing that there is an upcoming exhibition for which finished pieces are required.

Update to 4 August: Preparation for curation sessions with Iris

So, I spent July making many small brooches, working in hand-gentle fashion, building onto my wire (no-saw) broochbacks, and using a range of materials.  My hands were fine and I could put in some solid hours, which was amazing, and the relief and joy in this carried me for a while.

As the deadline for Sydney drew nearer though I became progressively less satisfied with what I was doing and why. The brooches seemed related only by their size (which in itself was problematic for me – it’s hard not to be cute when you are that little, and cute isn’t what I am about…).  Way out of my happy place, I trialled presentation options that fully reveal my uber-control-freak response to stress…. (So much for being open to relinquishing control…).

By the time Iris was back from her trip I had culled the collection down to a dozen tiny clay and silk brooches, and reunited them with the embroidery piece that had informed them.

I felt the piece had no cohesion or underlying rigor; no amount of title-changing or rearranging helped.

This then was the starting point for the curation sessions…. two days to go and everything to do.

July

Sarah Read: Advice to young artists, July 2011

14 July: Trying for this:

Liking this:

and this:

2 July: The beginning at (almost) the end..
It’s taken a while to process our last conversation (June15th below). We didn’t manage to skype again before Iris left for Europe, with one or other of us away from our studio during the brief daily timeslot, and also, to tell the truth, I have been stalled. I had a fixed idea of how my work would progress towards the Sydney show, and it has been difficult for me to let go of that.

I realise that til now the biggest benefit for me of this project has been the wonderful ‘Handshake effect’; being a part of this lucky group, feeling observed and lifting my act accordingly (prioritising art, sorting out my workspace, putting in the hours, being more professional in general). But to a large extent I have been working as if on my own, informing Iris of what I am doing but responding quite indirectly to her input and sometimes not even inviting comment. I realise that unless I change this, I am in danger of missing the point and the unique opportunities of this project. It feels necessary to properly open up to the mentoring process. The ideas I already have in place will still be there to go back to if I wish, but this chance to engage with Iris is absolutely a one-off. So, I have taken time out to revisit our exchanges to date and think about a fresh point of departure.

Iris has asked what is the biggest hangup or boycott factor in my making, and what would it be like if I embraced this and turned it around. Two of the things that block my making are overthinking, and the feeling that This has to be good.  Another is the question Why am I making this? It is a long time since the purpose of my work was straightforward adornment, and I work at other things for my income specifically so I don’t have to ‘make to sell’. I have complicated feelings about the commidification of art, the gallery system, the art/jewellery distinction and where my work sits in relation to all of this.

So, a new start. Embrace my issues and turn them around.  Welcome the opportunity to participate in the 20/17 show, with the various parameters that apply. Work small, as per Iris’s suggestion for group shows in small spaces. Close my workbook and put aside notions of participation and social conscience. Back to basics; let the materials talk to eachother and see what unfolds. Surrender to the process and be open to relinquishing control.

Some quick sketches:

Iris’s feedback:

I like Iris’s reading of the sketches as a single group; a picture plane rather than a collection of objects. Recently my attention has been caught by images which pattern a 2-d surface:

Many nuns: image from The New Yorker

Many body bags: image from The Wire

Many secret brooches: image from my worktable

With hand protection in mind, I make many low-impact (ie no sawing required)  brooch backs:

and start playing:

My next step is to make more, holding the playful mood, and developing relationships / tension between the pieces.

More soon

x s

18th July: Summarising where I am at:

• Austerity range (for Sydney 20/17, August)
• This too .. (possibly pilot at Wellington National Jewellery Show, Sept)
• Loved and lost (just for me, for now)
• Advice to young artists (for all of us)

Advice for young artists: Follow your bliss/Just make your work/Be true to your vision/Put in 10,000 hours/This too shall pass. Silk May 2011

June 15th: Skype conversation with Iris; our second.

We are both mindful of deadlines; Iris leaves for Europe on 30 June, so, we have only two weeks of possible contact. We agree that moving forward we will talk little and often. So, this time we talk about:

• My experience in Auckland, the launch of Loved and Lost at  theseehere’s show at Masterworks
• Silk as a material; its strength (‘nature’s kevlar’ – it can stop a bullet), its durability; ways to test this (through time, wear and tear), ways to transform it, avoid the cliches, give it something different. Iris: “Think of contradiction, tension…  a volume which has to be filled, rather than cuddling round an existing form, creating an expectation of what would be in that form”.
• the latest earthquakes in Christchurch, which have unsettled me disproportionately. I am back to February, preoccupied with survival, portability, where is safe? Coming from England, where every place has been there for centuries, it is unfathomable to me that a city could cease to function/become unlivable, be abandoned.  I have set my roots deep in Wellington. Love this city
• participatory art; the transformative powers of jewellery, ceremony, ritual, how things are given
•  group shows in small galleries – working small and quiet to draw viewers closer (I like this)
• where next for me in this project? The difficult state of not knowing/being in transition, between the ideas you just had and the ones not yet here…
  Iris: “To bear with being half way is sometimes more profitable than racing for the finish line.”
• I’m obviously finding it hard here, outside the comfort zone of knowing what I am doing next. The Sydney show looms rather than beckons…
  Iris:“ Look at what’s in front of you – embrace it and work with it and you have the show..the things which are here and you care for are relevant”.

June 2011: Loved and lost at Masterworks, Auckland

Object of Desire #1. Silk, 2011. Special thanks to Amelia Pascoe and Sam Auger

9 June: Here be the words: Harrell Fletcher: Towards a tender society of thoughtful questions and answers (2002). HF is my latest research find. Reviewing my work over the years, I realise my strongest projects have had a participatory or gifting element.  It was great to meet the lovely Kristin in Auckland; we share this interest. She’s known of HF for a while, has heard him speak.

Work in progress: Object of Desire #1, from Loved and Lost

2 June: A printing accident, frustrating when it happened (hence crumpled, sorry), but quite lovely when you take the time to read some of the two texts…

Serendipity: “Patti Smith’s Advice to Young Artists” meets “Interim Project Report number 5”: Recycled paper print accident, June 2

Multi-tasking; NOT my strong suit.

May:  Charms development. Looking for ways to save my hands, less time-consuming methods of making.

(to come: All Sorted, Hanging out with Iris in the library, The List, and Back to square one…)

Getting serious

Before: garage and dumping ground

I can’t believe I put this off for so long – after two and a half years, it took two and a half days…

After: ta dah!

April 2011

The things we do to support the art habit/free us from having to make to sell. I am back in my suit, temporarily. Thinking of near-misses, the soldier’s life saved by the bible in his pocket. I  make myself a staid little brooch:

Protection: Brooch for the Day Job: bronze, silver, cotton; lapel view

with a subversive twist that  to shield me from the corporate world:

Protection: Brooch for the day job, inside jacket view

The cotton is too coarse to hold the script, but silk works well:

Musing on our first conversation: Just make your work. Long conversations with Iris in my head; they go like this.

Sarah: I am quite tired
Iris: Just make your work
Sarah: I’m not sure where this is going
Iris: Just make your work

Just (as in ‘Just do it’, as in ‘only’, as in ‘whatever else is going on’, as in ‘don’t give me those excuses, get on with it’, as in ‘always’, as in ‘to the exclusion of Other Stuff’)

Make (as in ‘be active with your hands’, as in ‘stop thinking and make’)

Your (as in ‘the most singular response you come up with’, the thing that is the most you (regardless of commercial considerations), listen to your gut. As in ‘you might as well make your work; no-one else is going to’ )

Work (as in, ‘serious play’, as in ‘if it was easy, everyone would do it’, as in ‘put in your 10,000 hours’, as in ‘this is your job now’, as in ‘enough with the kitchen table; sort out a workspace so you can go to work’)

Beautiful…..

.. but sold. Hate it when that happens

Above: from Capture: Amelia Pascoe’s Pinhole camera and case

First meeting with Iris: 29 March 2011, via Skype

We get to meet via skype in the early afternoon (my time) late evening (hers). I am at my kitchen table; jittery, star-struck and caught off balance (I just nipped home from work to hang out the laundry). Iris is poised, with wine, in her studio. As a starting point I have been sending Iris copies of the ideas I write down – images, things to remember – unedited, because at this point it’s impossible to tell what is important.

We talk about so many things my notes become garbled, then peter out, but here’s the gist:

• Emerging; the short shelf-life of being ‘fresh out of school’, the requirement of having new ‘product’, of exhibiting, being noticed, versus my desire to consolidate and deepen my work. Iris is warm, certain; “Just make your work”; if it’s good, sure put it out there, but for now, just be making it
• My injured hands,  the time-intensive work I undertake nevertheless. Ways to involve others, eg local craftspeople in my making, perhaps to make 10 starting points, that I then develop.
• Tricks for repeats (Time is always a factor for Iris too)
• Subtlety and ambiguity: the allure of the things that at first sight seem stable and fixed but are really not; finding tricks to make this happen; (eg the backs of things; if I gave something, the same thing,  to 10 people to embroider, then all the backs would be different, and this would be wonderful. Yes)
• Working from home – the pros and cons. Sharing tools and resources, having like-minded company, vs the convenience (and economy) of being based at home.  Iris’s studio is at work – she talks about taking pieces home with her, for a change of scene, to see how they look/act in the real world
• Travel (a good thing)
• Iris’s upcoming show (Us, in flux – testing the borders of jewellery; her struggles with scale, function etc)
•  Maker/wearer/viewer; the target of my work last year was primarily the viewer; I want to move back to catering for the wearer, or rather, the person who experiences the work at first hand…I am not sure about actual wearability (I am not sure that I am necessarily making jewellery)
• 2-d trickery: How the translation of our work to 2-d images lets us control the viewer’s experience – lets us present separate components with implied connections as if they are resolved pieces. We both admit to doing this  – I want to move away from it.
  (I realise I have never seen any of Iris’s work in the flesh – I know it only by images)

We take a webcam tour of the studio, which seems vast, with high windows. Iris has recently packed away some 260 pieces, rounded up for a show – she couldn’t work with them around.  But she has many things on the go “20 things happening at the same time”, and I do get to see:

• piles of fabric (soooo much) , recently acquired
• work in progress;  pearls, and a huge hank of pantyhose
• a collection of African jewellery
• a pile of hearts – THE knitted ones; just heaped there
• a separate office area – v organised
• indistinct forms (we are moving fast here), which Iris describes variously as embroidery, fimo, horse, Easter Bunny, left-over sushi, sculpey, porcelain (with a reference which I don’t quite catch to a Detroit gallery and a tile factory)

I have to leave; time to get back to work. 

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February, March 2011: Before we start – research, preparation for first meeting with Iris:

The end of the summer holidays. Everyone is back at school/work, I have the house to myself. Now to begin: Being an Artist. Ha.

Having decided to make my year’s work about protection and healing, I am stunned by the devastation served up in the first few short weeks of my research; the monster earthquake-earthquake-tsunami-nuclearmeltdown quadruple whammy. The news is unwatchable, but I can’t tear myself away.  The satellite photos are chilling; before and after images show entire villages wiped out: http://www.abc.net.au/news/events/japan-quake-2011/beforeafter.htm

I make tiny felt vessels: to comfort myself. 

Something to do with my hands whilst watching unbearable news

I research armour and physical protection, I look at physical healing. I remember from science that our cells are renewed every 7 years; I look at traditional wedding anniversary gifts for the first 7 years:
1. Paper
2. Cotton
3. Leather
4. Linen, silk
5. Wood
6. Iron
7. Wool, copper

All of these were also used in armour (also: velvet, whalebone, satin, straw, sheepskin, brass, canvas, gold and jewels). This seems a fine palette for this year; exciting.

I visit my mother, who has had a bad reaction to some medication and is rendered vulnerable and afraid. Her shopping list breaks my heart (she was once a calligrapher, I remember her inscribing the names on high school award certificates).  I have an enduring love of the printed word, the character of fonts, handwriting. I begin to embroider the list onto silk:

Shopping list: PAPER/Biscuits Chicken legs

the shaky writing is revealing, but it’s the back that really speaks, the chaos behind the facade:

PAPER/Biscuits Chicken Legs (back view)

We need charms against ageing, against memory loss, against bewilderment.

I look at attrition, obliteration.

Our quilt cover (three details)

I buy toile fabric and embroider obsessively to engulf the scene, first with white silk, then black will follow.  I have no idea what I am doing (but if does feel good to be doing it).

Slowest ever stop-motion movie: embroider, photograph every few minutes….