The call out read ‘This residency is offered to artists who can demonstrate how an intense period of focus may still allow for a considerable effect on the development of their practice through having time and space to experiment and create new work or strive towards completing an existing project.’ So it’s quite open to what I could do.
With so many projects already on the go it would be good to use the time to really get stuck into something I’ve already started, but at the same time I am tempted to start something new.
If I did start something new it would have to be something that doesn’t take as long as my usual projects because I would need finished work for the end of November.
The original proposal I was working on was a progression of the hanging tree project that I’d been looking at over the Summer, because I know it could be completed in the month, it read:
‘I intend to produce an installation of hanging book page trees depicting the shapes of some of our native trees. I intend to spend the residency cutting the amount of trees that are cut down in the month period of the residency.
When they are displayed I would invite the public to take a tree home with them but first they would need to replace it with their own cut tree which they would be able to do there and then with the assistance of ready stapled, folded and strung book pages and a template.’
The intention was that on opening the exhibition the woods would look similar to our native natural woods and by the close of the exhibition the finished woods would be full of cheaper faster growing fir trees.
But I’m concerned that it would be risky to do this project without more preparation as it might look rubbish when installed. The technique or making the trees is so simple purposely so they can be created in vast numbers and replicated by the public with little difficulty but this could look awful and I think I need to create and install vast numbers with a lot of notice for a change in project. Also I didn’t even look to see if this project would be suitable for the ceiling in the gallery space! I’ll have to look tomorrow.
But I think it’ll be the ‘Inner Beauty’ installation I go with, as that’s what I keep seeing in my head installed. Not sure I can fill the walls, but if I can I think I could really create the effect I have in my head!
So for now I’ve taken in my ‘Inner Beauty’ stuff and some tree work to develop. Of course I might do something completely different, I’m going to keep my options open this coming week and see what happens when I’m using the space and interacting with the other artists. Then the following week I think I will need to knuckle down with a chosen project.
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