Tough and Tender Beauty
Week 4 – The inaugural “Covid-19 is not gender neutral” trophy.
(I have taken off my rose-coloured glasses. I couldn’t see through them!)
In many ways, women are disproportionately on the frontline of the Covid-19 response—the majority of health care workers, social assistance workers and teachers are women, as are the majority of unpaid carers.
Emerging data shows an increase of violence, and particularly domestic violence, against women and girls since the outbreak of COVID-19.
Women are also over-represented in the industries both heavily reliant on casual workers and likely to be hit hard by an economic downturn.
It seems that gender equality is a fair-weather friend quickly abandoned when “real problems” arise.
My Covid-19 trophy goes to the person that, even though they may have endured “shattering” circumstances, they have shown that it is possible to collect the broken bits, and fuse them together into something that may look fragile but has a hidden strength.
From family experience, I know that single motherhood is fraught with challenges. Compared to married mothers, single mothers face greater financial insecurity, isolation, and obstacles to balancing work and parenthood. A health crisis, or a lost job, is enough to crush a single mother’s financial well-being, since many of them live precariously close to the margins with little savings or assets.
Single mothers always worry about what will happen to their children if they get sick. Now the fear of contracting Covid-19 is bearing down on them, especially since so many solo mothers are essential workers. They stress over who will care for their children should they get sick and what will become of their family should they die. Single mothers have to manage their children’s fears and disappointments on their own. Her children, like all kids, miss their friends, sports , and events, such as, birthday parties. The unprecedented challenges she’s grappling with on her own are magnified by her sole responsibility to keep her children happy and healthy.
The majority of employed single mothers rely on school and daycare programs to care for their children. With the closure of schools and daycare centres, single mothers have to make some worrying choices. Do they place their children with family and friends, risking exposure to the virus, or do they quit their jobs in the name of safety or simply because they can’t find anyone to care for their children? They deserve a medal or at least an encouragement trophy to inspire them to continue on with courage. Some people perceive “encouragement” awards as pity awards… awarded to someone who didn’t qualify for the “actual” award, for merely “showing up”. In my opinion, single mothers’ “showing up” is more impressive than any actual award’s criteria.
Made from scrap glass, the colours of the trophy are in the main green and purple, the colours of the Suffragette Movement – purple for loyalty and dignity; green for hope. A fraction is blue because some men are subjected to the same discrimination.
Week 4 Staying in is the new going out
A couple of weeks ago I got stuck on Kandinsky and his style of abstraction. Abstraction has always fascinated me and try as I might, I’ve never been entirely satisfied with my own attempts whenever I’ve (pardon the glass pun) had a crack.
So the facts…
- Music had long been important to Kandinsky because it was an art form with supremely abstract content.
- He divided his work into “impressions, improvisations and compositions. The paintings called impressions and improvisations were generated more from the impression of nature and spiritual beliefs; the paintings called “compositions” reflected the greatest degree of input from the conscious mind.
- Kandinsky believed that reality was a state of confusion, (ain’t that the truth in these Covid-19 times?) and that the only way to reflect this confusion in painting would be through hidden imagery.
While I’m researching Kandinsky, Husband is thoughtlessly cleaning up around me, trying to guilt me into helping him, (snowflake’s chance in Hell) and serendipitously my iPod reappeared after being “misplaced” for years. My music playlist is perhaps best described as “random”.
So…. (stay with me, I’m giving you an insight into how my brain works) I launch into a “composition” with a great deal of input from the conscious mind, I’m listening to Pokarekare Ana sung by Hayley Westerna (do yourself a favour and do likewise) on my re-discovered iPod, thinking about Kandinsky, and feeling “abstract”, so here goes…. Please note: No alcohol figured into this art-making experience. Just putting that fact out there for the Temperance League. (I’ll know where I went wrong if this process fails. Mind you, some of the greatest abstract artists seemed to have close relationships with either drugs and/or alcohol.)
In these parts, I’m known for my collection of spectacles, so let me put on my rose-coloured glasses.
As we journey back to normal, it pays to remember every cloud has a silver lining.
But without question, Covid-19 has changed the way we live forever. We are now more aware of personal hygiene. You can’t wash your hands too much. That has to be a good thing! Staying in is the new ‘going out’. Is this a Bad thing? We are now “revisiting” the worth we place on our home environment. The Arts and Crafts have saved many a person’s sanity in the last couple of months. Board games are a hit. Dogs are being exercised. We are getting to know our neighbours again. Mother Earth has breathed a sigh of relief without the normal pollution levels. We have proven to ourselves that we can live simpler lives. …all these thoughts with the stirring Pokarekare Ana in my ear. The song Pokarekare Ana is a Maori love song about someone separated from his love and longing for her. Obviously missed the last flight before they closed the borders. That song almost makes me want to move across the ditch. How could anyone not be moved by that music? But I digress ….
Here is the resultant record of ideas.
And after the initial Covid-19 shock, we realize that live goes on, the sun still comes up and as a gardener, weeds are still the bane of my existence. It seems that Mother Nature will always have the last say, or do I mean laugh.
And on my continuing “green” theme, do you remember in 2018, The Green Brigade, a group of artists in Freemantle cultivated a garden of weeds to challenge perceptions about what is useful and attractive. (Not unlike Husband in Covid-19 clean out mode). The Green Brigade set up a mock weed rescue and resettlement service so that they could take unwanted weeds and rehouse them in their art installation. Caring for something that is despised and maintaining a commitment to that ‘thing’ demonstrated that even weeds can be beautiful when nurtured. Same thing applies to people really, but sadly, few people get that concept.
So I had to add some weeds…
Here is the glass translation.
Shelley’s Week 3 – Decisions, Decisions, Decisions!!!
Please be seated with a hot beverage.
As we head into the last week of the Tough and Tender Beauty Project, it’s time to engage in some ‘Reflective Practice’ (or what is known in education circles as the ‘staff room bitch’). Reflective practice is a way of studying your own experiences to improve the way you work. It contributes to the process of life-long learning. It closes the gap between theory and practice. It is supposed to increase confidence….maybe! In a past life as a teacher, I asked students to keep a journal in which they were supposed to answer questions like
– ‘What was your best moment today?
– How can I have more moments like it?
– What was the most challenging moment today?
– How will I respond next time?
– What was the biggest obstacle to learning?
…. you get the idea….So with the tables turned, the teacher becomes the student.
What were my best moments during the past month?
Answer: without reservation… everytime I opened that kiln.
Words cannot describe the feeling of opening that kiln and seeing GLASS. I’ve compared it with childbirth before. The first thing is to check it’s in one piece, with all fingers and toes. Then with slightly less emotion you are able to undertake a closer inspection and you question yourself “did I really make that”. How clever am I? as you break your arm slapping yourself on the back. Then you celebrate with a beverage. Then as the weeks roll by, you start asking “what was I thinking?” and “why did I make that? But I digress….
How can I have more moments like it?
Well that’s a no-brainer …
Q.E.D. Carry on and make Art.
(For those of you that didn’t major in air-head physics (that includes me)…
Q.E.D “quod erat demonstrandum” is the abbreviation placed at the end of a mathematical proof or philosophical argument to indicate that the proof or the argument is complete, and hence is used with the meaning “thus it has been demonstrated”.
What were the most challenging moments?
Making decisions like “when is enough enough?” “ Is this a good idea?” “Will others get it?”
On reflection, if you don’t produce the art in the first place you will never know. To get the answers to this question…
Q.E.D. Carry on and make Art.
How will I respond next time?
I will admit to a mid-month melt down, but when I recovered from being a precious princess and got on with it, greater things followed.
Q.E.D. Carry on and make Art.
What was the biggest obstacle to learning?
Time. The severe lack of it… which turns into a severe lack of sleep. But as a former learned colleague reminds me “Sleep is just a bad habit we got into before we invented the lightbulb” so put daylight bulbs above your workspace (so you don’t realize it’s 1am) and…
Carry on and make Art.
Because I’ve done some big (by my standards) pieces over the last few weeks, I’ve got scrap glass everywhere so its time to be green… Reduce, reuse, recycle! I am very aware (and so is my power bill) that warm glass uses energy, but I do my best to reduce my artistic footprint. I reduce waste by keeping every sliver of scrap glass sorted into scrap containers. I never, never, never throw out even the smallest piece of glass. The smallest irregular shapes of glass can be turned into glass lace, used for backgrounds that will be covered by other glass, fired into glass nuggets … and if the kiln gods hate you… the whole piece can be broken up and recycled, albeit with much longer firing times. I never, never, never fire my kiln unless the shelf is full.
This piece was conceived while writing my reflections. I began with all the scrap glass in front of me and (with the assistance of a beverage) just kept adding scraps until I couldn’t see where I could get any more glass to fit. But decisions! decision! decisions! Do warm colours sit well with cool colours? That red is too much in your face, how do I make it recede? Do the edges need defining? When this is slumped, how will that process affect the design, with this many colours, will it look “muddy”? and on and on until the bottom of the bottle stops the questions.
And here it is!” VOILA” which translates to “My! that’s an impressive cheese platter to go with a half decent beverage! Afterall, we are in extraordinary Covid-19 times!
PS. The bottle had to be emptied to fill the kiln shelf. (Thou Shalt Not Fire Unless the Kiln Shelf if FULL!) And I won’t guarantee that in a couple of weeks I’ll be asking “Why did I make THAT????”
Shelley’s Week 3 Trials and Tribulations
This week marked my first foray into Mackay since self-isolation and I don’t mind admitting it was with some trepidation. I had made an appointment to get a flu shot and I needed Isocol Rubbing Alcohol. (I use Isocol to clean every piece of glass I cut. It removes any oil or dirt from the glass that would otherwise produce a scum on the fired glass.) Basically it is isopropyl alcohol. Well! I couldn’t find it at any of the three major groceries stores. One less than helpful individual, told me he hadn’t seen it on the shelves since Corona struck. Apparently, people are using it to make hand sanitizer. I’m not desperate for it yet, but I will be in the not to distant future.
“Fruit and Vege Farmer” emerged from the kiln.
I am relatively pleased with the results. With the clear blue glass being transparent, it gives an opportunity to add text from behind the glass. Haven’t decided exactly yet but I want to remind people that without farmers, we’d be hungry,naked and sober!
This is what I see when I look out of the glass shed window.
And this is how I translate this view to glass.
The white “bits” are the chemical symbol for serotonin-sometimes referred to as the happy chemical. “Pure Happiness” is in the kiln ready to be fired.
Also in the kiln are more viruses… I mean tests. This one in particular is a test to see what happen when you stack layers and fire at 760 degrees C.
Before
Before and After…. “After” doesn’t fit in a petri dish so its going back into the kiln again to level out a bit more.
As the weather cools off and with a week of showers my garden is calling me. Lots of flowers and new growth everywhere.
This is the result of a rainy day. Because I wanted the bowl to have holes, I had to build the bowl in the kiln, piece by piece, instead of the usual method of using clear glass as a base.
“Before” and “After”. Ready to return to the kiln for slumping into a mould.
All things considered, not a bad week. I’m still loving the self-isolation. I can’t believe how creativity increases exponentially as disruptions decrease.
One week to go on the Tough and Tender Beauty Project
Week 2 The Big Reveal
The petri dish viruses look interesting… and exhibited in typical lab storage baskets could almost pass as an artwork… just kidding… but they have taught me heaps about the new glasses now coming onto the market. But now it’s time to move on… I’m sick (pardon the pun) of viruses!!\
The altar tiles are DONE!!! Thank any God that’s listening. I’m over tiles.
This panel measures about 400 x 500mm. The blue glass is transparent so when hung, the “Farmer” will cast a shadow on the wall. “Fruit and Vege Farmer” is back in the kiln with fused elements looking pretty good. I am quiet happy with this work so far. It builds onto my earlier work that looked at the divide between city and country. Maybe one of the good consequences of Covid-19 will be a better appreciation of the people that grow our food and fibre. When I look at my “farmer” she looks worn , after surviving fires, droughts and floods, and now the added uncertainty of the markets due to Covid-19. And as “townies” miss their coffee and smashed avos, are overcome by home schooling their kids, and wait for their favourite restaurant to re-open, I see a “Farmer” determined to continue on the land. Covid-19 hasn’t changed country people’s daily life that much – it’s still the usual level of isolation and lack of available services.
Life goes on…. and I have more ideas…
Week 3 Tough and Tender Thoughts
I’ve been racking my brain trying to decide my favourite artist (I have lots) that personifies “Tough and Tender” for some Covid-19 inspiration. After much deliberation, I’ve decided on Marina Abramovic. Anyone that leaves a long term tender relationship by walking the tough Great Wall of China gets my attention.
If ever there was an artist that was hell-bent on demonstrating the pointlessness of the haste of modern life, and the need to take time out, it would be Marina Abramovic. Abramovic is often referred to as the grandmother of Performance Art. She collaborated with fellow performance artist Ulay between 1976 to 1988.
Not so fun Fact: Ulay, Boundary pushing performance artist died on March 3, 2020, and that didn’t make any news!
The Abramovic Method is simple, she wants to pare things back, to reduce things, to underline the immaterial, to make art out of nothing, to slow down time, to make people more aware of the here and now.
So now that we’re living more slowly, and expect to being doing so until a vaccine for Covid 19 can be developed, it maybe a good time to look at some of her work.
Briefly…
From Wikipedia
To create Breathing In/Breathing Out the two artists devised a piece in which they connected their mouths and took in each other’s exhaled breaths until they had used up all of the available oxygen. Seventeen minutes after the beginning of the performance they both fell to the floor unconscious, their lungs having filled with carbon dioxide.
In AAA-AAA (1978) the two artists stood opposite each other and made long sounds with their mouths open. They gradually moved closer and closer, until they were eventually yelling directly into each other’s mouths.
(How many times has this artwork been repeated in recent times?)
In 1988, after several years of tense relations, Abramović and Ulay decided to make a spiritual journey which would end their relationship. They each walked the Great Wall of China, in a piece called Lovers, starting from the two opposite ends and meeting in the middle.[14] As Abramović described it: “That walk became a complete personal drama. Ulay started from the Gobi Desert and I from the Yellow Sea. After each of us walked 2500 km, we met in the middle and said good-bye.
(I hope this performance isn’t repeated due to the corona virus)
At her 2010 MoMA retrospective, Abramović performed The Artist Is Present, in which she shared a period of silence with each stranger who sat in front of her. Although “they met and talked the morning of the opening”,[16] Abramović had a deeply emotional reaction to Ulay when he arrived at her performance, reaching out to him across the table between them; the video of the event went viral.
More recently (2015)
‘Counting the Rice’ involves a long wood table with repeating sets of three things: a mixed pile of dry rice and lentils, a blank sheet of paper, and a red pencil. The visitor’s task is to separate the pile and tally.
“You might think it’s crazy to sit at a fair and count rice, but this is exactly what you have to do to reclaim time,” Abramovic said. “If you can’t count the rice for three hours, you can’t do anything good in life.”
There are some protocols to follow before joining the activities. All electronic devices and belongings must be stored in lockers and Abramovic’s assistants – they’re referred to as facilitators – will direct a series of preparatory exercises that need to be undertaken before proceeding, such as breathing and blocking and physical squats. Noise-cancelling headphones must be worn at all times and no one is allowed to speak.“No cell phone, no gadgets, you become completely alone with yourself and in the present. Rice counting is about concentration. If you can count the rice, you count life also.
https://www.nationthailand.com/art/30357025
In our Covid-19 experience, irrational hoarders emptied supermarket shelves. There hasn’t been any rice to count.
I started doodling thinking about the shape of rice….the importance of rice in the diet of many cultures… and then how do I ??? convey the lack of rice …the big hole in the supermarket shelves…and the wish for a simpler existence… rice being a metaphor for a simple life. Add three grains of measured rice. Then simply trace onto a sheet of clear glass… Can’t wait for it to come out of the kiln then return to the kiln to be slumped into a big rice bowl.
Week 2 Its a Wrap, the kiln is full.
Went to the Serendipity Shed to think about the possibilities for petri dishes , disappointed to find that petri dish art has been done to death… disinfected, decontaminated, sanitised, sterilized. Killed that idea off in an instant. But on thinking about it, I’m going to resurrect the project as a research project….
Let me fill you in….
In 2015, warm glass artists (hot glassies blow, cold glassies grind, etch or polish, warm glassies fuse) had their own Corona-like disaster. Most art glass is imported from America. In 1990, American Congress required the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate dozens of industries that polluted the environment. The agency didn’t tackle the glass making industry until 2007. From 2007, glass manufacturers were required to put filters in their manufacturing processes to limit the emissions of arsenic, cadmium, chromium, lead, manganese, or nickel.
Long story cut short, the new regulations sent the smaller niche market art glass manufacturers to the wall. Can you imagine telling a painter that all paints are going off the market because of environmental concerns? There would be mad protests in the main street. With no glass coming into the country, it was devastating news, particularly as I’d just bought my big coffin kiln. Couldn’t even think of selling it to a potter! Pottery kilns are required to heat to temperatures twice that of glass kilns. I had visions of me going to my maker in my unused coffin kiln. Waste not, want not!
It took a few years but the short version of the saga went something like… the biggest manufacturer decided they were out… and closed their doors… no glass full stop. A country that will remain nameless saw an opening in the market so started producing what turned out to be pretty average glass that no one wanted to use. A few years have passed in which time a couple of the smaller producers have ramped up production. One has come to an arrangement with the company that folded to use their recipes. Another, I’m ashamed to say, has moved some of its operation to Mexico, some say to avoid the environmental restrictions, so if possible I’ll use the other companies’ glass.
Now that we are slowly getting glass back into the country, it’s not the same as it was (insert sad face here) and the Australian dollars has dived (insert empty wallet here). I now have a whole heap of glass that I have no idea of how it behaves in the kiln. So petri dish size tests will be very valuable.
Glass comes in many shapes and forms, from sheets to rods, stringers (like spaghetti) , noodles (like fettacine, frit and fractures (make your own by heating glass up and throwing it in a bucket of cold water, or safely order from the safety of your office chair). It can be transparent or opaque. While the colour options are limited, more options can be produced by layering transparent glass over other transparent or opaque glass. Some glass is reactive, that is, it may (or may not) react in the kiln depending on what other glass it is next to. Some glass is “striking” in that it appears pale or colourless but when fired changes colour.
So be prepared… Every kiln reveal is like raising children, there are overwhelming emotions, some that mood-enhancing hallucinogenic drugs can only hope to copy and others that remind you that you shouldn’t even buy let alone wash red socks. There has to be a reality TV series in there somewhere!!!
MoMa’s artist of the day is photographer Dorothea Lange who captured the lives of lower socio-economic “the common” people during the depression of the 1930’s.
In response to her work, I had an idea of doing a series of lino prints “On Counters (encounters) with Corona” . What have teenagers on their counters during the Covid- 19 living arrangements as opposed to that of their parents or grandparents).
(thinking…
Teenagers … TV monitor, mobile phone, can of beverage, small hand santitizer
Parents … wine, dog lead, large pump style sanitiser
Grandparents… teeth in a glass, glasses, good book, rosary beads and soap.
And I’ve been looking at the work of Margaret Preston. Love her dramatic lines… so will play around with that too. It was Margaret Preston that said ‘still lifes were ‘really laboratory tables on which aesthetic problems can be isolated’.
Love you Margaret….
Shelley’s Week 2 Mid-Week mutterings
When I was explaining to my 93-year old mother who still lives on her own, that if things get bad, she will have to quarantine, not self- isolate… QUARANTINE ! She’s going deaf… you have to shout. I was surprized by her insensivity when she replied “bring it on.. I’ve survived on bread and dripping before…” Made me think about how good we’ve got it. Perhaps we could redefine our national economic well-being in ADE (Amount of Dripping Eaten) as opposed to GDP (Gross Domestic Product). And II need to check myself when I watch people struggling to homeschool. During my teaching career, I was often dissapointed in the level of parent engagement with their childrens’ education. I can still remember the day I phoned a parent to discuss what we could do to improve their child’s learning to be told “She’s your problem between 9 and 3. I don’t want to know about it!” To someone that values educatiion, that was totally beyond belief, I was shocked to my core. So Newsflash people, teachers do more than babysit your little lovelies! But I digress…..
Tirade truncated, I must admit to loosing the plot somewhat and coming to rely on the weather man’s waistcoat Wednesday policy to reorientate me. Another newsflash! Life goes on, albeit a little lopsided. And as my sagacious Life coach (Mum) says “Things could be worse. We haven’t had a cyclone this year. “ Have you ever tried to explain to a nonagenarian why some people need life coaches? – That’s what parents are for apparently. And if you succeed, try explaining ‘influencer” Go on! I dare you. But I digress, again…
The last time I remember being this disorientated I was in the middle of a Yayoi Kusama exhibition at GOMA. I had followed a group of no-adjective-appropriate teenagers (who appeared less than impressed with their experience of one of the world’s most influential artists ) into a room with walls that were covered in dots and mirrors – the Infinity Room. While I was trying to remember a spell that would make them dissapear, they did just that – dissappeared! They had left me in this room with no obvious way out, no obvious corners to help get bearings. I lost the plot completely. I couldn’t discern which way was up or even how long I was in there. When I finally found myself’ on the other side’ , the euphoria was like that moment the RACQ opens the car door after your toddler has managed to lock him in with the keys!.
Kusama invites viewers to immerse themselves in her world, to participate in an experience of both claustrophobic and infinite space, and a round trip from the microscopic into the cosmic. Time stops….If the planes ever fly again, get yourself to a Kusama exhibition.
Which reminds me of another favourite artist…Kadinsky and his circles. For Kandinsky, the circle, the most elementary of forms,was of boundless significance. He wrote that “the circle is the synthesis of the greatest oppositions. It combines the concentric and the excentric in a single form, and in balance.
So with nothing but dots, spots, circles non-existent cyclones and corona viruses in my vision, and thinking about the “microscopic into the cosmic”and the ” concentric and the excentric” its off to the glass shed with my petri dishes to remind people also that the solution of our problems will probably come from a science lab….
I’m off to Serendipity….
Shelley’s Week 2
As we are experiencing separation like never before, I’m sure there are a lot of people taking stock of their lives and trying to get a grip on how they want to go forward into the future post -Covid 19. Some think that they are the makers of their identity, but nothing could be further from the truth. How do I feel about the future??? I’ve been surprized at how creative I’ve been in the last few weeks and just how satisfying this feels. I’ve spent a lot more time just with me, myself and I thinking that this could be my new norm…. Maybe some good can come out of this Covid 19 topsy turvy world . That reminds me of Alice in Wonderland’s topsy turvey adventure. There’s an idea! Straight to the mindmap!
Self-isolation has reinforced the facts that I love my family, art, gardening and a simple life. I am more interested in inner beauty than external pretence (including eyelash extensions, but who am I to judge?). This pandemic has made me reflect on a blessed life. I have lived enough life to know that I am resilient; I can just about tell the difference between needs and wants…I know that with a little grit, the sun will come up tomorrow. So thinking about Self, how we perceive ourselves and how society sees ourselves, I am thinking of making a portrait to mark this monumental point in time. (Maybe not a Self-portrait, maybe Society’s Portrait). The ideas are still in the caldron! That reminds me of Shakespeare’s Song of the Witches …
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg and howlet’s wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
Nothing says “We’re all in this together “ like a newt- bat-frog-dog-snake-worm- lizard-owl cook-up in a caldron. Straight to the mindmap with that idea!
So considering, Self, Consequences of Covid 19, determination….
I start with that ubiquitous symbol of millennial navel-gazing, the selfie.
Lordy! Lordy! Maybe I do miss my Hairdresser.
With much haste, I transformed the image using the Paaint App(I think it cost $1.69)to see alternative options and angles. Now that we are confronted with a disruption (you might even call it a reversal) of unprecedented scale, maybe we will all see ourselves differently. So I turned my selfie upside down. I instantly recognized a cross-sectional diagram of an angiosperm (as any retired middle school science teacher would.) How serendipidous!
This made me think of the portraits by Giuseppe Arcimboldo- the most famous being Vertumnus – a portrait of Habsburg Emperor Rudolf II created out of plants – flowers, green vegetables and fruits. Painted centuries ago, this could represent modern day farmers.
Arcimboldo also painted reversible heads. Viewed in one direction, the picture shows a still-life, turned upside-down, a face.
Recently my work has focused on The (perceived or not) Great Divide (City vs Country). My thoughts are still with my country cousins and how their Covid-19 experiences are different from that of cityfolk. All of a sudden as we stare at empty supermarket shelves, the producers of our nation’s food are in the spotlight. “Isolation’? What Isolation? This is their norm. “Teach your kids at home? Do it all the time! The beaches have closed so we’ll have no swimming in the water! Oh NO! We’ve been in drought for the last decade with no water to do anything in…Can’t go to the Gym! Put your active wear on and check out the Farm Fit Video. But I digress….
Another favourite artwork of mine is a self-portrait by Paula Modersohn-Becker, the early 20th-century German painter titled “Self-Portrait with Two Flowers in Her Raised Left Hand”.
Made in 1907, Modersohn-Becker is documenting a momentous time in her life. She is pregnant with her first child, ( her right hand rests on her stomach). In her left hand she holds two flowers – traditional symbols of fertility. The stark composition and muted colours show her determination to show women as they really are, rather than as idealised representations of femininity. I love this style of art because it reminds me of how glass “works”. Opalescent glass has an intensity of colour that makes it impossible not to want to touch it. I often compare glass to collage, in that if you can cut a simple shape out of paper, the same effort is required to cut a similar shape from glass. The more complex the shape, the more difficult cutting glass becomes.
Another of my favourites..
Frida kept monkeys as pets. Her monkeys, she said, symbolised the children that she was never able to bear because of the horrific injuries she had suffered in a bus accident in 1925. Being confined to bed for long stretches of time, medical complications, an abortion and several miscarriages…. I think Frida may have known a bit about isolation and hardship. Her self-portraits depict both her isolation and also her indomitable spirit and sense of self.
And then there is this…. Who knows what Mona Lisa was thinking but she was married off to a slave trader at just 15 so I doubt that things were “peachy” . Can you imagine how isolated people would feel in a time without our Facebook friends? I think the smirk says it all….
So this is what we end up with…..and where it goes nobody knows…
May 8
..and we’re still in self- isolation and it’s” Do it For Dolly Day”. As we are all on-line more these days because of Covid-19, it maybe even more important to remember Dolly Everett, who was only 14 when she took her life in January 2018, following relentless and sustained bullying and cyberbullying.
Dolly’s mother, Kate wants everyone to remember Dolly by fostering a sense of community and togetherness. “Kindness is at the core of everything we do.” Maybe this is particularly important in our current situation.
Inspired by some of my favourite artworks… I want to get “the look” of determination.
My initial sketch…
As you can see Drawing is not my strong suit!
But she (A collective “she”, not me!) looks solid… Steadfast.
The decisions….
What size? Like artists, glass doesn’t come in standard sizes.
What Colours! Green for vegetation, mother Nature, Growth, …
Green for the Green Shirt Movement.
The Green Shirts is a grassroots, not for profit, movement of individuals and families across our nation, that hold a collective concern about the increasing divide between food and fibre consumers, and primary producers and associated industries.
Medium? Glass, so some parts can be opaque and others transparent. The fragility of glass tells of the fragility of societal structures that we saw shatter when the reality of Covid 19 struck… job losses, school closures, Increases in domestic violence, increases in alcohol consumption… but look deeper and you find a “strength”. Like viruses, glass can withstand extremes of chemicals and temperatures and yet a knock on the wrong corner and you have a glass artist inventing new languages because there isn’t enough expletives in this one. Covid 19’s kryptonite is simply Soap and good hygiene practises.
The technical stuff:
– The thickness of the glass will dictate the temperature and duration of firing in the kiln.
– I work with glass that has been manufactured to very specific criteria. I use COE 96 glass. Coefficient of Expansion, or COE, describes by how much a material will expand for each degree of temperature increase. Glasses of differing COE are termed incompatible, ie. Cannot be used together. If COE 96 glass is fused with COE 90 glass, or float glass, or recycled bottle glass, when the glasses of the fused piece are cooling at different rates, it will end up cracking or more stupendously, explode, to release the stresses in the incompatible glasses.
(Insert Sad Face here!)
Shelley’s Week 1 Weekend.
After you think you’ve have had a good idea, (wonders never cease! There is an Art God after all!) it is prudent to give the ideas time to develop before you decide between the good and not-so-good. Ideas are like children. Choosing the best idea is like trying to single out your favourite child. But when you realise that not all children will remember your birthday and others clean the cat tray…. But I digress….
Although nerve-racking, a fast distillation process involves airing your ideas to trusted peers but beware … “What WERE you thinking!!!” may translate to “This is not one of your finest moments” but this doesn’t necessarily mean the idea should be buried with no mourners. It probably means the idea needs tweaking. Keep it on the back-burner until we get a vaccine. With no physical friends at the moment, thanks to Covid 19, and in the midst of pondering economic collapse and possible disruption to the political order, I have been trying to sort my ideas by considering how long would it take, how much would it cost, how many firings will be needed and how well the idea conveys the thinking that was in my head.
As my “new” ideas were developing, I’ve spent the weekend in to my comfort zone.
As you can probably guess, I am a quilter. I’ve been pondering the ‘inside’ and the ‘outside’ and who decides our boundaries??? Ready to fire when there is room in the kiln….
Week 1 – Friday’s Reflection.
It’s been a crazy week.. I started the week turning tighter and tighter circles going nowhere chanting “I’m a teapot…” Too many ideas… Where to start?
Well let’s take stock. We’ve been in self-isolation now for over 4 weeks and finally there seems to be light at the end of the tunnel with some talk of some restrictions being lifted before Mother’s Day. I must admit to liking the isolation perhaps a wee bit too much and I’m wondering what the transition back to normal will look like. Will I go forth with gay abandon once more or go join a nunnery to savour some more silence? It has become obvious that lots of people have come to regard their home as a sacred sanctuary where we feel safe, protected from the ugliness and reality of the outside world.
Weeks ago, when we were initially put into self- isolation, I amused myself by making “Corona” beads with no goal in sight. Now I’m thinking, they may become rosary beads, as lots of people have taken up praying, while we wait for a vaccine to become available. As a result of Covid-19 church services have been cancelled, perhaps the answer is the home altar.
Now those that know me, know that I am not the most religious person in the world, (although I did receive the attendance prize at our local Sunday School on more than one occasion) so I did a bit of research. As it turns out, altars appear in most religions from Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism to Modern Paganism. In the feng shui tradition, each home, as well as business, has an altar of its own to honour Divine energies, express gratitude, give offerings, and ask for blessings and protection. No that sounds exactly what we need.
There are five feng shui elements- Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water. There are no rigid rules but usually, you will have at least two or three items on the altar to represent the elements: candles for Fire, flowers for Wood and Water (or in these covid-19 times Hand Sanitiser), for example on your home altar. If you are looking to improve your health, you would increase the wood (eg flowers) elements. Colours have symbolic significance. Yellow is the colour of happiness and warmth. Gold is very popular in feng shui because of its association with money and wealth. Golds and yellows represent the energy of the sun that brings light and life to all beings.
Coincidently, for the other believers, we are now approaching Pentecost in the religious calendar. Pentecost is celebrated by Christians 50 days after Easter, and marks the day that the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles while they were cowering and hiding behind locked doors (sounds like Corona fever) following Jesus’ resurrection. Some regard the Pentecost as the Church’s birthday. After receiving the power and gifts of the Holy Spirit, the apostles immediately went out ( the end of self-isolation, yeh!!!) and preached Jesus’ message to everyone. Pentecost is a happy festival. Ministers in church often wear robes with red in the design as a symbol of the flames in which the Holy Spirit came to earth. Other symbols of the Pentecost include wind representing God’s first breath of love, a cross and a dove representing peace.
So I’ve had a revelation! I’ve seen the light … or was that just the sun coming up!). My home altar, in response to Covid-19 self-isolation, will have elements to remind us of what caused us to be in this situation, (the corona virus), lots of green to remember all the things I worshipped pre-Covid-19, lots of yellow and gold flowers to stimulate health and wealth needed post Covid-19 , candles to remind us of new beginnings and a dove for hope….altogether hopefully a worthy station at which to celebrate our modern messiah – Hand Sanitiser!
Still warm, just out of the kiln…. my first virus!
Week 1- Monday- A Brand New Art Project.
Super excited to be part of the CQ RASN Tough and Tender Beauty Artist ‘at home’ Residency Program! Four weeks of art Nirvana! And I can’t wait to get into it.
So what are the processes involved in making art?
These are questions that every artist will answer differently… so here is a peek into my brain. Some of you will be surprised to find that I have a brain, others will be convinced that it is not only God “that works in mysterious ways”. I invite you all to accompany me on my “Covid-19” Art Journey.
Let us pray/make art….
Art doesn’t just happen. Well not in my case! I am blessed? with a brain (I’ll have you convinced of it by the end of the month, I’m sure) that goes off on tangents constantly, Some says I’m “scatty”, I like to think my condition more an idea overload sort of thing rather than undiagnosed craziness.
So where does inspiration come from? The short answer is “everywhere”. For example, currently we find ourselves in unprecedented times. (How many times have you heard that phrase?) I was amazed at how quickly people missed their green spaces ie. walks in the park, playing sport. I missed my favourite shop, that green one with the red hammer. I also missed volunteering at Green-mount Homestead , the home of Mackay pioneers, the Cook family. And then where did the green vegetables go? Toilet paper has no shelf life, the perfect product for irrational hoarding… but green vegetables??? Was a side effect of Covid 19, an insatiable appetite for peas and broccolli or was it just a need to be green ie. live more sustainably. Apparently to be properly prepared for the end of the world as we know it, you need chooks. A friend of mine who has aimed to live” greenly” for years now, phoned me with her concerns for the chickens that had been purchased by people who had never owned poultry before the pandemic. Will we be facing a poultry plague post- Covid 19 as peeved poultry people release their no longer loved egg-producers? But I digress….
So as we find ourselves living in a world without “green”, and with a whole heap more time to contemplate navels, I mean artwork, I was thinking of how I could inject some vitamin “Green” back into our lives. This is a divergent thinking process that is enhanced by a beverage.
While ideas fester, I thought I’d post photos of my work space. We live in an old primary school… you know the deal – cricket pitch, tennis court, nine dunnies and a urinal! My studio/ workplace was originally the horse shed where kids who rode their horses to school tied them up (1908) and later it was converted to a kindergarten. My studio follows in the earlier traditions and continues to hold crap and small creatures (now 8 legged ones rather than the 2 legged ones).
My Studio – ( I use the word loosely)
Inside my studio/shed – Note the Stephen Homewood original picked up from the Tip Shop
Where it all happens….
As you can see I’d rather be raging with the Revolution than harassing harmless house spiders. I’ve adopted the Margaret Olley style of housekeeping. Touch anything and you DIE. Probably a pile of glass will come crashing down. Marie Kondo ‘s strategy doesn’t work for me. Well it does… sort of! She says ‘only keep what sparks joy’ — well that’s everything! As I sit in my cesspit of scrap glass, often I’ll serendipitously see a colour combination that I probably wouldn’t have considered. Lots of Eureka moments!
My favourite brain arranging tool is mind-mapping. I find it extremely important to get ideas out of my head onto paper, before the ideas vanish never to appear again. I don’t get too bent or twisted about what it looks like, or if related ideas are on the opposite sides of the paper, it can be re-arranged later. It is also the best way to kick start more new ideas when you come back to it a few days later.
I’m off to Serendiptiy…..
Shelley Engwirda 