Tutorial report after my zoom meeting with Michele:
I had the most wonderful chat with Michele in spite of a very busy day full of distractions on our building site… I was nervous because I wanted to prepare a bit better but before I knew it, it was time for our zoom meeting. I found her to be lovely and relaxed and SO encouraging. I was able to talk to her about how I feel about the course so far and about where I am at personally. She was very understanding about the extremely disruptive process I am currently in the middle of, which is my building project and the fact that we are moving into the new house (which will be unfinished) in two weeks time!
We spoke about how I am taking inspiration from my circumstances and how ‘Fracture’ is actually so suited during this time seeing that I am in the middle of the ’fracture-stage’ of my house renovation. I felt relieved to share and to talk about how I could practically manage to continue making work and write and engage with this MA during a disruptive time. Fractured time…
Michele’s advice was that I should try to work small and often. To keep a sketchbook and materials to hand and to work on my car’s steering wheel if I have to! 🙂 I aim to take this very literally as I start to build a habit of small and often. I think I have been setting very high standards for myself in terms of quality and outcome of work. Michele mentioned how she use to drive her kids around and how she gave herself the small goal of working on her art for one hour a day – sometimes it would be two half hour slots. Consistency will be one of my main goals from now on.
We spoke about the work I did during the making day on Saturday. Jannis Kounellis, is the name of an artist that Michele thought of as she looked at my ’making day’ work. He is a Greek-born Italian artist who made use of humble materials like burlap sacks, wax and coal in works of sculpture and installations. We had a quick look at his work as Michele shared her screen but I look forward to speding more time looking at his work. He seem to have offered a poetic statement to the values of art and architecture.
Another theme that we spoke of that could overlap quite well with my current theme is that of child rearing as well as what home and parenthood/childhood looks like in the lives of other people in my country. This resonated with my the heart of where I am hoping to take the influence of my art.
Family Ties Network is another group that Michele said I should look at. It sounds intriguing. This is a quick introduction that explains what they are about and I look forward to investigate them some more. Here is a little piece of introduction from their website:
The Family Ties Network is a research group of artists, filmmakers and writers who explore memory, space, place and the family in photography and moving image. Through events, conferences, exhibitions and publications, they aim to investigate a range of issues, encompassing the visual representation of family memories, the family album, oral history, bereavement, displacement, estrangement and the family home.
We went on to speak about an art movement called Arte Povera. I will read about them some more over the next few days. Here is a short paragraph from Tate modern website that gave me an overview:
Arte Povera which literally means ‘poor art’ but the word poor here refers to the movement’s signature exploration of a wide range of materials beyond the traditional ones of oil paint on canvas, bronze, or carved marble. Materials used by the artists included soil, rags and twigs. In using such throwaway materials they aimed to challenge and disrupt the values of the commercialised contemporary gallery system.
Lastly Michele reminded me of the JAR journal for artistic research. I aim to spend some time here as well and look forward to getting into the minds of some of these artists and how they think about making art.
I left our conversation feeling inspired, encouraged and much lighter knowing that there is time and space during this course to really experiment and without rush. I am excited about the journey and very glad that I decided to commit to this MA in spite of the house renovation (and -move), because it is a temporary disruption and surprisingly proving to be a source of inspiration!