Monday, February 28, 2005
"I have held ice to ice seemingly for ages waiting for it to freeze, only to let go and see it drop off."
"I need to work in a wide range of scale, reflecting what I find in nature. Working small with grasses or leaves is a strain. A sudden gust, a hungry robin, even a worm can cause collapse. I enjoy these delicate tensions, but they cause an occasional need to work large and physically hard. Once scale releases energy for the other."
A. Goldsworthy, Introduction.
What I'm working toward is a union of the intimate/small and the larger scale; that is, a series of smaller pieces that form a large one. I think this is impt. because I cannot conceive of the piece in its entirety first; I need to know the smaller pieces first (know them by making them).
Verbs, nouns only; no adjectives or adverbs. The thing describes itself in its being, not by some outside force pinning descriptions to it that do not pertain to its thing-ness.
Currently working with old sewing pattens; they seem to me to tell stories, not just in the time/events represented by the fashions, but the fact that they were already cut out, had pins left in them, some 30-50 years old. It's that trace thing again. I love to think about the person who carefully cut the thin paper and pinned it to the fabric for cutting. I love the strange sewing terms and directions, the contrast between the dark, sans-serif type and the translucent brown paper. I love the way the paper bends and holds but is remarkably strong and resilient, often allowing me to make several pin holes in the same area.
Martin talks about the pattern being the promise of the real thing, the transition, gateway. Yes, I suppose that's one way of looking at them. They seem to me like representations of the body, skin. That sounds morbid, and in fact, does remind me of Silence of the Lambs, but my own work with them is pure-intentioned. And he pointed out, correctly, that I am ignoring the very thing that they are, sewing patterns, and the language contained on them.
I am frustrated today. I (as I often do) imagined the perfect scenario wherein all my different agendas merged perfectly in one piece, perfectly executed of course. I finally sat down to do it--folding and pinning so that I could form simple verb-noun structures with the existing text on the paper. It's incredibly difficult. I couldn't think of any good words, and when I would, I'd be missing a crucial letter. And even when I'd succeed in forming a sentence, ("Skin This"), it lacked the impact I was counting on.
I will try again tomorrow, go to Scrap first and get more patterns, make a few more sentences, and begin pinning them to the wall to see the resulting structure; remembering, too, that often the impact comes when focusing on the small details; or it could come in seeing the larger structure.
I will also try to sew into the paper layer on drywall.
"I need to work in a wide range of scale, reflecting what I find in nature. Working small with grasses or leaves is a strain. A sudden gust, a hungry robin, even a worm can cause collapse. I enjoy these delicate tensions, but they cause an occasional need to work large and physically hard. Once scale releases energy for the other."
A. Goldsworthy, Introduction.
What I'm working toward is a union of the intimate/small and the larger scale; that is, a series of smaller pieces that form a large one. I think this is impt. because I cannot conceive of the piece in its entirety first; I need to know the smaller pieces first (know them by making them).
Verbs, nouns only; no adjectives or adverbs. The thing describes itself in its being, not by some outside force pinning descriptions to it that do not pertain to its thing-ness.
Currently working with old sewing pattens; they seem to me to tell stories, not just in the time/events represented by the fashions, but the fact that they were already cut out, had pins left in them, some 30-50 years old. It's that trace thing again. I love to think about the person who carefully cut the thin paper and pinned it to the fabric for cutting. I love the strange sewing terms and directions, the contrast between the dark, sans-serif type and the translucent brown paper. I love the way the paper bends and holds but is remarkably strong and resilient, often allowing me to make several pin holes in the same area.
Martin talks about the pattern being the promise of the real thing, the transition, gateway. Yes, I suppose that's one way of looking at them. They seem to me like representations of the body, skin. That sounds morbid, and in fact, does remind me of Silence of the Lambs, but my own work with them is pure-intentioned. And he pointed out, correctly, that I am ignoring the very thing that they are, sewing patterns, and the language contained on them.
I am frustrated today. I (as I often do) imagined the perfect scenario wherein all my different agendas merged perfectly in one piece, perfectly executed of course. I finally sat down to do it--folding and pinning so that I could form simple verb-noun structures with the existing text on the paper. It's incredibly difficult. I couldn't think of any good words, and when I would, I'd be missing a crucial letter. And even when I'd succeed in forming a sentence, ("Skin This"), it lacked the impact I was counting on.
I will try again tomorrow, go to Scrap first and get more patterns, make a few more sentences, and begin pinning them to the wall to see the resulting structure; remembering, too, that often the impact comes when focusing on the small details; or it could come in seeing the larger structure.
I will also try to sew into the paper layer on drywall.
// posted by Scoop @ 7:22 PM 
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