Show Blog - Unto this Last

Working steadily on my paperwork ... this is my 250 word artist's statement that I've just also posted to the Show Blog - Unto This Last.

My artistic practice has derived from my interest in historical artefacts, situations and objects that have accidentally survived into the modern era and which provide a memory stimulus to form the basis of our ‘knowledge’ of an event or person. 

The Arab Spring Network is my latest piece and was inspired by a journey I undertook from Carthage to Cairo through Tunisia, Libya and Egypt coinciding with Mohamed Bouaziz’s self-immolation in 2010. This act of protest may be regarded as the start of the ongoing Arab Spring uprisings across the Middle East. I wanted to use the psychogeography implicit in this journey as the starting point for my final BA Art & Design piece.

The Arab Spring riots came about as a result of various and varied actions by many disparate people, expressing their dissatisfaction with their governments and political systems.  I found this to have a significant parallel to the many historical mosaics I photographed on my journey.  Mosaics are a traditional method of using numerous small tesserae to produce a coherent and harmonious picture.  When researching methods of portraying this change from fragmentation into the whole, I realised that traditional quilt production (the earliest quilt in the world survives from 980BC in Egypt) also echoed this process. 

The Arab Spring Network consists of an artwork reflects both the great number of participants to the revolutionary process and its historical antecedents.  The fabric mosaic pieces are mounted on a fragile net background reflecting the network of communication which enabled the Arab Spring to flourish.

Arab Spring update

I can't believe that it's now May and only about 4 weeks to the Assessment for my final degree project.  I've been working quite steadily on the Arab Spring Network - it takes approx 4 hours to prepare and stitch each section.  At the start I got very anxious that I would not get it all together for the assessment but now, with 12.1/2 foot completed I am a bit more relaxed.  However, I want to go into uni on Tuesday and find out where I am going to be exhibiting so that I can work out the final length and mounting. 

Today, I am going to check all my paperwork and write my 1500 illustrated report. 

Arab Spring update

The upshot of all my making squares is :

I spread them out in my living room and was actually quite amazed at how many I had ... this was because I'd been putting them into a bag as I made them, and hadn't really registered how many there were.  I still have a few more to do - because I wanted to embroider them.

I wanted to see how they looked on the net and this was the outcome:



I am away this weekend visiting friends so will continue when I return.  Have put in my Final Show Proposal to BCU so am in good shape (I hope).

Went into Birmingham to the library as I wanted to check out whether there were any 'ethnic' elements to the countries on which I am focussing.  The research came up with just underlined what I've been doing.  There is no traditional Muslim dress and in North Africa the Berbers are the indigenous peoples spreading from Morocco and Algeria to Tunisia, Libya and Egypt. 

Then went to the BMAG to see the African Textile exhibit which was really interesting - put together by BCU textile students.

Squares and more squares

I am surrounded by squares of all colours:

This is a bit of a production line - I've gone back into all my pictures and transferred the most suitable ones onto inkjet silk then applied them to my squares in a random fashion.  As you can see from the photograph I'm producing up to twenty at one time.  This is easier to do than separately.

This 'production line' has enabled me to produce alot of squares all of which are individual:

I am (in between sewing like mad over the Easter Break) looking at how I might put them together:

I thought if I put them together in 3 x 3 they could be manipulated into another pattern as they build into the 'quilt' hanging - they could be random or more structured:

I then wondered if they could be mounted on a background like net - maybe the title should be The Arab Spring Net Work.







Different focus for Arab Spring

I went back through my notes and also reviewed some of the books I have in the house .... I returned to the idea of mosaics and small pieces making up the whole (as in a quilt or wall hanging).  This felt much more like me and my practice.  On Saturday I went with a friend to the Sewing exhibition at NEC - this is always inspirational with some beautiful pieces on show (not quite as good as the Quilt Show in August but who's complaining?) - as I walked round it occurred to me that I could make a quilt with hundreds (!) of small pieces of Arab-like fabrics, of my photographs applied to see-through materials (another theme) and emblematic of many small actions coming together in a ground-swell of activity against the repressive regimes of Tunisia, Libya and Egypt.

I thought of using black - white - red with touches of green but felt that this was too 'arty' and self-conscious. 

The colours of the countryside are reds, ochres, sand, beige, taupes etc with hints of blue sky and blue sea so I am focussing on those.

I went around the show and bought some appropriate materials including fabric, threads etc and spent today (after dropping in my Professional Practice Road Map on time into Uni) making up squares.

Originally I thought of something quite small like 1 inch then a square based on 140 cm (140 characters in a Tweet).  I have resolved this into a square of 70 cm - this will enable me to manipulate the fabrics in an interesting way and mean that there is something for the viewer to 'read'.

I feel that this is much more what I want to do ...

Where I am ...

I'd focussed on the heads and just couldn't see where the fabric would fit in .... I felt that I had gone down a blind alley:

In this I'd also been thinking about what Sean O'Keffe said last week "I wonder that you don't continue the fabric elements".

I said that I felt I was going wrong to Stuart and said I wanted to refocus my efforts.

This I promised to do for the tutorial on 27 March.

Arab Spring

I've been quite busy since my last Blog - went to Amersham to see friends, went up to London to see Picasso exhibition; talk on Turner then Turner/Claude exhibition.  Beautiful paintings.  Worked all weekend towards my tutorial on Tues 20 March producing :

Having a problem uploading photographs so will go onto the next Post