I was kicking myself when I got to the studio as the idea I had for today involved something that I had to prepare at home. Fortunately I am not short of creative ideas and one just jumped on me when I got to the studio. In hindsight it may not have been the best idea as it took much longer than I thought, and I had other things I needed to get on with there so I was out far longer than planned. All worth it in the end I hope.
I know the outside looks pretty much the same each day, but inside …inside I had to cry. No, no, no I made a mistake, that’s from John Martyn’s “Make No Mistake”! What I meant to say was that inside these similar envelopes there is an original piece of art and I have never done anything based on the idea I produced today.
As you can see I have written no messages on the outside of the envelope again.
I was just about to write some deeply intellectual or arty or witty stuff about the messages on the front not being messages when I found an email from hours ago asking me urgently to provide an image for the Arts Centre brochure to advertise this project at an unspecified “slightly higher resolution” than the image I provided 6 weeks ago! How come they have only just now found this out? What have they been doing since the deadline they gave me? So I am not happy and I am not playing right now.
It’s not often I completely balls up a piece, but today I did. I remember Mrs Williams, my teacher when I was about seven years old telling me how to make a mistake in a picture into something else. I tried that kind of thing but it just made it even shittier! So admitting defeat and not having an alternative to try the original idea again it was start afresh. Which worked out just fine. Now, I keep coming back to this point, the fact of a continuum, this small-work-every-day process, means that I need not worry or fret over a small amount of lost time. Yes I experienced a short bout of mild irritation, because if it hadn’t been for a failure of materials/equipment pretty much out of my control it was a good idea and I will pursue it again at some point with appropriate adjustments. So I learnt something and then had the joy of creating another piece, a piece which I wasn’t afraid to just add a last element to finish it off. If I had ballsed that up it would have been a shame, but same goes, the next piece would be fine.
I had this great idea for today’s piece. It was so good I thought I might do several versions of it and develop it into a larger work but the moment I began the second process I knew it was just rubbish. What was I thinking? How could it ever have worked? I hung on to the thought it was a good idea but that my realisation was poor, my physical technique was flawed. But I knew really that it was just plain crap. I still carried on for a few lame seconds but jacked it in and started on something fresh!
When I had it all finished I realised I had left my camera at home. Not quite with it, but then I had been Tweeting to a mad Swede about Latin, mushrooms and invading Northumberland!
I have an excuse – I’m not feeling well! I have a sore throat and chesty cough which has gone on longer than it should and today has drained me. Well that’s my excuse for not recording today’s piece properly and I didn’t even put a sealing wax seal on the back. Oh well! I did remember to do the artwork and out it in the envelope and put a stamp on and that’s not bad going!
It’s perhaps that I am still upset by our cat being unwell that it took me three goes to get a piece good enough. I think that I may have been over critical of one but the other was crap! Well perhaps that is not fair. The piece didn’t work as a finished artwork and I would not have been happy seeing it on my wall or anyone else’s, but It was useful to have tried it and understood why it didn’t work.
The piece I did complete for the project started a bit tentatively – not surprising after two false starts – but turned out well in the end.
Now I have reached the halfway point I need to crack on with all the things that will make the whole project come together: things like this blog’s design and additional content and being able to buy on-line and sponsorship perhaps.
Well that hasn’t happened for a while and I only just noticed that I have misnumbered No128. Chaos reigns. I’m off to storm the Bastille!
I want to post this before midnight but can I do a simple image adjustment on the picture of the envelope back. No! Once again I fail to see the logic and cannot make it do what I want. So much for my new-found confidence with it. Perhaps I’ll add it later.
Someone has got to buy today’s as I somehow missed taking a photo of the piece itself. Maybe I didn’t do a piece and the envelope is empty. Now there’s an idea!
Well you have got to ask yourself, after yesterday’s mistake, if I would be so hopeless as to do it again or, knowing me a bit, think “he’s a tricky bugger, he’d do that intentional mistake thing!”
It was nice to do today’s piece. A little time of calm in a maelström of chaos getting ready for Dorset Art Weeks – though words like ready and prepared are no longer likely to have any similarity to the factual state of affairs. I have already decided there are quite a few things that won’t get done. But I picked up 29 framed pictures from the framers today so with the ones I already have and the ones that will be done over/after the weekend there will be something for people to buy!