As I finish the first year, I've been reflecting on where I'm at now and how this differs to where I thought I might be. The aim of this is to distill and direct things towards the next steps as I continue working over the summer and into the Autumn term.
It's been very liberating for me to push myself into braver territory and I don't think I would have got there without being on the course.
I'm reconciled with the fact there are lots of areas I'm interested in, but I don't need to deepen my exploration of everything during this course. Knowing some things can wait and recognising that at this point, a selection and distilling is beneficial.
Jonathan mentioned the capital 'T' shape in the context of research. I've been looking at lots of strands that interconnect thematically and conceptually, but now I want to head down further into one or two areas in more detail.
The key thing that appears to have evolved out of my research into ancient sites is the idea of fragments. How our past as a people is crumbled and imprinted (and unearthed) in the land and how some people feel the need to connect and re visit these sites and ideas. What can this tell us about our own sense of who we are and how our past is stored or imprinted? As I write this, thousands have just gathered at Stonehenge for the summer solstice - why do they do this?
How does treading the same paths (some for comfort and solace and some painful) become necessary or habitual?
How part of ourselves can be left somewhere and returning to that place can fill us with strength, comfort or clarity.
How part of ourselves can also be left behind, or severed - and how returning to these places, physically or psychologically can remind us of the part of ourselves we have lost.
A sense that as people we can be split and re arranged by lived experience, that we can become fragmented and weakened- but also that we can re build and re discover (or discover things new).
Identifying, searching for unity. Seeing fragments and something broken, but knowing it is bound together.
How to depict this?
Using chopped up and re bound 'discarded' art work?
Stitching and binding as books
Stitching in strips or as one large piece
Concertinas
Jacob's ladders
Work plan:
Continue neurobiological research into memory fragmentation, and integration - as well as the implications and practice of somatic art making.
Research the concept of gathering and the support of grouping together, from an anthropological perspective.
Draw from observation/imagination the images I have been forming and holding relating to certain memories and experiences.
Experiment with paper construction: concertinas, suspending, stitching together, Jacob's ladder.
And continue other key processes:
Continue working experientially and experimentally, mindful, somatic and automatic painting. Automatism followed by projection
Educational workshops - what to feed in and what comes out from these?
Inevitably, these contexts and methods may lead into smaller paths and tangents, but I think keeping these areas in clear sight will be of benefit.