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Where does the poetry and artwork come from? Not from me but through me. It’s all already there and I, the artist, am blessed with the vision to see it and gifted with the skills and materials to capture the fleeting, shifting beauty and make it manifest. Each poem, photograph, video and piece of fibre art is a prayer. And what is a prayer but a dialogue with the Divine.
In your light I learn how to love.
In your beauty how to make poems.
You dance inside my chest, where no one sees you.
but sometimes I do and that sight becomes this art.
-Rumi
I love my bicycle journey to and from work, along a road which undulates and curves with the river valley it inscribes. Every day that I ride, I enter into a poem. I read the poetry of the landscape around me in scattered lines of verse – a heron fishing in the shallows as I ride over an ancient stone bridge, a necklace of Devon Ruby cattle strung along a narrow field like prayer beads, a flutter of autumn leaves, mist hanging high over the River Teign, frost-brittle bare hedgerows, lemony sun pools poured through verdant summer trees.
One morning last April, I rode through a dew-drenched morning.
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Night Washed
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Here on the shoreline where night meets dawn meets day
A pearl encrusted dandelion glows like a seacreature brought here by the tide
Mysterious
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No precious spumes of seafoam here, but diamond drops of dew
Stud each blade of grass
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A seashell scattering of wildflowers is left upon the shore of morning
Now high above the tide
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In a valley washed over by the dark ocean of night
Being at the Festival of Quilts a few weeks ago gave me a great opportunity to see some fantastic fibre art and art quilts, share a big part of my life with Steve, spend time with a new friend and see some familiar faces. It also touched off a maelstrom of thoughts and a myriad of feelings. I’m not sure if the whole quilt show/competition/teaching/lecturing/writing a book thing is for me. When I see people I know who are publishing books and winning prizes, I feel envious and slightly frustrated. Not because I wish it were me, but because they’ve found a niche, reached a goal that makes them happy. If I went after those things it would be to try and find recognition of my artwork, the purpose and meaning of it and a sense of belonging outside, like how I used to search for home outside of myself or the way some people covet and acquire material things, but still feel empty inside.
However, the good thing about knowing what I don’t want to pursue is that I am left with a void of quiet, stillness, intimacy, soul, essence and knowing. Here is some of what I know-
- I’m able to make the work which makes me happy and is meaningful to me – the Little Gems I made, I had been imagining for a couple of years. I put how I feel about things and how I see the world into what I make. It’s deep and people who see my work can have a deep response. That satisfies me.
- I love to make things that people can wear or meditate on (or both!), with words hidden on the inside, private and intimate.
- I love to make commissioned work for people and use my communication skills to connect with and discover what a person would like to have expressed in a piece of my artwork.
- I love to show my work in places where there is space for contemplation, which invite a sacred and soul experience.
- With teaching, there are people who are far better teachers than I, who can explain the steps and lead people through creating a project. I love to work with people in a way that combines my counselling skills with spirituality and art-making. Not necessarily Art Therapy, but deep, healing work via creativity.
So I do know which way to go, but I’ll be making my own map. It is always scary to find my own way, I worry about getting lost! It’s wonderful to have found home inside finally and to be making a home together with Steve. He understands about what I want to do with my artwork and I have the feeling that he will do anything he can to encourage and support me. I’m also getting gleamings and glimmerings of recognition from real-time friends and from cyber-friends in the wider eCommunity which are invaluable.
In the process of setting up my new studio, I’ve sorted through a bunch of stuff. I’ve weeded out a lot, but have found and set aside some seeds of ideas that I’ve had in the past couple of years. In early 2007, I completed a foundation course called ‘Art in Mental Health’ taught by Karen Huckvale and Malcolm Learmonth of InsiderArt. I decided not to go on and become trained as an Art Therapist, but the course helped me to clarify what my art making means for me and to reflect upon my creative journey. Here is the paper I wrote at the end of my course. It was good to re-discover and re-read it. Artful Engagement reminds me of what it’s all about for me and helps me to chart my course.
Am I creating for approval or the edgy contrast of anti-fame
Steve and I each have our studio/work spaces on opposite ends of our home. The kitchen is right in the centre, at the heart of our home. It’s our shared studio where we make creations from food, sometimes separately, sometimes together. I keep my laptop in the bookcase and do an awful lot of my blogging at the kitchen table. The night before our housewarming party a couple of weeks ago was the big test for using it as a shared space.
The menu for the party all began (and originally ended) with Posh Nibbles, eg olives, sea salt & balsamic vinegar crisps, homemade gougeres and cheese straws, garlic & herb roulade, Carr’s water biscuits.
It was Steve who said ‘Let’s make a poached salmon’ and the whole concept was instantly elevated to a new level. The final menu became:
Poached salmon in aspic
Pork, juniper and pistachio terrine
Aubergine purée with pomegranate and almonds
Roasted spelt, red pepper and pistachio salad
Tuscan potato salad
Beetroot and goat’s cheese tart
Leek and gruyere tart
Meringues, fresh berries and cream
Tarte aux abricots
Frosted brownie
While Steve poached the salmon and made the terrine, I made the brownie, apricot tart and roasted the vegetables for the tarts and salads. It was good fun. Our kitchen is very spacious and we can clear the table for an additional work surface. At about 9 o’ clock, we went out to the White Horse, our local, for a takeaway stone baked pizza. We amused a couple of our friends when we said we’d been cooking all evening and had come out for some dinner.
Here’s some of the party food, followed by a the recipe for the star of the show.
The poached salmon was quite impressive to behold and, according to Steve, relatively simple to prepare. Our fishmonger, Fishes, in Exeter lent us a salmon poacher and serving platter.
Poached Salmon in Aspic
- A 6-7 lb. salmon, gutted
- One bottle of white wine – Chardonnay or Burgundy
- Fish stock, about 2 litres
- An onion, sliced
- Two egg whites
- Gelatine, one packet
- Cucumber, sliced thin
- Fresh curly parsley
- Cherry tomatoes
- Peeled, cooked shrimp
- 1-2 lemons, sliced thin
Place the salmon in the poaching pan, scatter with sliced onion and pour over the bottle of wine and fish stock. Add enough cold water to just cover the fish. Bring the liquid to the boil. Boil for two minutes and then turn off the heat. Leave the fish, covered for a few hours to cook through. Let the fish cool in the liquid.
Drain the fish and remove the scales and skin using the side of a knife blade.
Strain the poaching liquid into a saucepan, using a chinois or a colander lined with cheese cloth. As the stock will be made into aspic, you should clarify it so it is beautifully clear and sparkling. This is accomplished by beating egg whites into the cold stock, then heating it to just below the simmer for 15 minutes. The egg-white globules dispersed into the stock act as a magnet for all its minute cloudy particles. These gradually rise to the surface, leaving a crystal clear liquid below them.
Aspic (or meat jelly) is made by adding unflavored gelatine to clarified stock in the following proportion: 1 envelope of gelatine for 2 cups of liquid. Sprinkle the gelatine over the hot stock and stir to dissolve.
To decorate the salmon, Steve sliced the cucumber into transparent slices using a mandoline. Then he brushed on a layer of aspic and arranged the cucumber slices into an overlapping fishscale pattern, finishing with a final coating of aspic. Then the salmon was chilled overnight in the fridge. We had to remove the head and tail to make it fit, but these were cleverly ‘re-attached’ the following day by concealing the join with a layer of cucumber slices and brushing with a final coating of aspic.
The salmon was garnished with parlsey, tomatoes, lemon slices and cold shrimp.
To accompany the salmon, I made a Lemon Tartare Sauce and a Creme fraîche and Dill Sauce.
The star of the party
Neither of us got the chance to sample all of the food on the night of the party because we were pre-occupied with showing our guests around the flat and making sure they had everything they possibly desired. But we had really good leftovers for a couple of days.
A good thing to do with leftover salmon is to make an Alfredo Sauce with some lemon juice and capers, stir in chunks of salmon and serve over tagliatelle. I will post a couple of other recipes sometime later on. The beetroot and goat’s cheese tart and the frosted brownie were particularly fine.
What is real and what is a dream?
Sometimes a thing, a pattern, a mood or an idea captures me and I am drawn into another experience. I might go off momentarily into a reverie, or a new world may take shape inside of me which demands expression, never quieting until I have made a new creation.
Whilst walking across Place Flagey, late at night, in search of an ATM I noticed traffic lights, passersby and boys kicking a football around filtered through opaque glass. Dreamy . . . . . .
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Yay! I got an email today confirming that my artmoney is now offered for sale via the Bank of International Artmoney website. You can check out my profile here.
Artmoney from BIAM (Bank of International Art Money) is an international art project established by the Danish artists Lars Kræmmer and Flemming Vincent in 1998. Artmoney items are original works of art the size of big bank notes (12×18 cm). They are attractive for art collectors, and can also be used as an alternative currency at shops and to pay for accommodation on a host network in Denmark and worldwide. The project has got a great deal of attention because of its comments on art and social cultural policy. More than 1000 artists from 40 countries participate. More than $80,000,000 of art money has been issued. Artmoney has been featured at several national and international galleries and events.
My first pieces of artmoney are from my London series of photos. I took some to Birmingham with me and bartered for a meal and a place to stay one of the nights I was up there.
Bicycle couriers, London
XXX, Soho
Big Ben
Jubilee Bridge
I’ve been planning to take an artmoney trip to Denmark for ages and may just do it quite soon. I have a few more pieces left from my London series and plan to make some more from my recent Digbeth photos.
I procrastinate for various reasons and there are different issues depending on what I am putting off. I know why I procrastinate when I need to do something like vacuum the house or organize paperwork. Sheer boredom and lack of interest.
When I was in college I had a conversation with a friend about waiting until the deadline to turn in a paper or application. That has to do with control. Until I actually submit whatever it is, I have control over it; I can still make changes to it or fantasize about what grade I’ll get or if I’ll get the job, but once it’s turned in, there’s no going back. That’s what it is about for me anyhow. I still see a deadline as the time it gets turned in. It’s a stretch for me to turn something in a few days in advance. Maybe I also like the thrill of working to a deadline!
There’s another more sinister procrastination that happens to me though. When I am working on a new piece of art like I’ve never made before or on a new technique, I can get paralysed with an insidious, grabs-me-by-the-wrists procrastination.
I feel like I have to figure it all out in my head and make it come out the right way before I can begin the work. So it will come out perfect. Which is nuts. Because a) there is no such thing as perfection, and b) it is the trial and error, the very imperfect process which creates the work. Duh! Why do I keep forgetting that?
I think this is one of those lessons that keeps circling back around from time to time.
These past few days, I’m working on my final entry into the Festival of Quilts and have been doing everything but working on my final entry into the Festival of Quilts.
Last week, I came face to beak with my inner critic. I sat with my bogged down, wrists-tied feeling and became aware of a big black, clawed, sharp-beaked bird sitting on my right shoulder. This guy actually looks a bit goofy, but note the sharp claws and beak.
Earlier this week, I was dithering around and not working and I consciously picked him up from my right shoulder, plucking his claws out of my skin and set him down in the corner of the room and said, ‘You can watch, but if I hear one peep out of you, I’ll put you in a cage and out a cloth over it. You’ll have to go to sleep like a canary”.
And I was able to get on with my work.
Julia Cameron, author of The Artist’s Way, suggests that an artist draw or make their Inner Critic and put it in their studio. I think it’s a really good idea. It gets that destructive voice out from the depths of the subconscious and into the light of day. Somehow that lessens the power it can have over our creative process.
Right now, I am taking a break after a three hour stretch of work in which I’ve figured out how to make the border on my Manhattan Angel quilt.
I’ve been wanting to work in 3D some more and I think my next project will be my inner (now outer) critic.
“The maxim ‘Nothing but perfection’ may be spelled ‘Paralysis’” buddhabuddhabuddha- Winston Churchill
