Mon, 25 February 2019 - Professional Practice seminar - CW

Professional Practice seminar - CW

PPP and audience -

reference to Docherty and the white cube - is it enough to make work for the self, is it important that work is made for people or space - how is it encountered, does it need happenstance, or planned to view -

White cube - the audience - spectator, viewer, observer, perceiver - I tend to say, consumer -

CW- list - witness, observer, audience, participant, spectator, perceiver, viewer, collaborator, partner, conspirator, - the consumer - investigator, invigilator, instigator, the enquirer

peer, look, study, dismiss, power struggle -

How is the audience perceived with he works

how is the work seen

how does the display of the work affect it

15 mins in a breakout room to discuss the audience for our work and what the other person thinks - alternative audiences and ways to engage with them. analyse what role they are taking

Break out with Mark, which is great as Les had suggested I talk to him about the work.

we discuss the projection of work and he suggests. pocket-sized projectors for a phone - Samsung - luminaire phone - will look in to this.

both of us are currently working on the unintentional audience. On producing work/displaying work where it will be happened upon or where the choice of consumption is removed from the audience as they will encounter it unscheduled to them. WE discuss how i may display my work, possibly through the school the newsletter and other published or accessible forms. Then we discuss the lack of access, projecting it into a sealed box or a room that's locked - a sign that says in this room is a video but you can't go in. a non-audience - deliberately not allowing it. the daylight and throw windows and into a room from the outdoors - people will see the projector, they are aware of the happening but perhaps not the work. the visible and the non-visible - when it's happening in a contained room they are aware of it, but when the source is moved outside it creates a new sense of audience - the layers - don't plug it in or leave the lens cover on.

doesn't feel like its art - to busy doing masters in fine art to do the art you want to do.

guerilla audience taking - how to get an audience without having to ask for one. the work has been put to the side to create work for the task, its lead to interesting work but not that was expected. un intention audience - but it is intentional for us as artists, but their consumption is unintentional to them.

accessibility - exclusivity - engagement - comfort and awareness - authenticity and it does the same job if the job is an engagement or a change in thinking - the art world has an exclusivity - self-importance -

not making claims about the work - that we as makers make connections that others don't see - the potential to make a claim that appears unsubstantiated - what the work is about and what is actually visible etc. Where language sits with artwork, how artwork reaches people and its cloaked in the text.

the first audience is the person assessing the open call/ exhibition selection.

how do open calls help move an artist practice - what do they bring to the work, the career, etc

doe it enables the production of work, dies it refine medium or practice - explore boundaries - medium specificity - theme specificity - how to apply to and gain feedback from an open call.

PPP - 1000 - 1500 words - including last years words.

career plan - summary and map of practice - one year ahead, three years head, 5 years ahead. - dreams aspirations - realistic,
identify networks, need for skills or facilities, appropriate ways of presenting other professional considerations
work back into it in a different colour for this year -
be honest - where you are, where you want to be, etc.

reflection of Testing boundaries- - what do we take away, did it work. Would we continue, what would we keep. how have we changed etc. what have we learnt and have we found a seem of investigation that is burgeoning etc.

Mon, 10 December 2018 - Enquiry: Testing your Boundaries begins - LB

Enquiry: Testing your Boundaries begins - LB

Les Bicknell - Testing your boundaries is intense

The work - where will it go, who would i want to see it

might start making new work that fits a different context - exhibiting work in a different context - out of the gallery - my thoughts - a publication or video or online

Reflective journal - document as it will probably fail but it will document the emails, site, installation etc to support thinking

group work - they are there for support - meeting to share, discuss, and respond, giving feedback - we are our own team - not exhibiting with them but supporting each other

The task is December to March - minimum of twice in contact with the group - 

Group 1 - TB, RT, JO, RF, JV

Group 2 - PN, KVW, MC, MZ, EC

Support - tutorials, seminars

Submit - the work, 

reflective writing - 750-1250 words focussed on the information and research around - the site is chosen, its situation, the audience, the decision-making process, the public engagement, a reflection on benefits and disadvantages for your practice - bibliography and Harvard referencing - evaluation of the task

10-12-2018 - intro

7-1-2019 - context

14-01-2019 self organised meeting

21-01-2019 - deadline to send images and text for tutorials to LB

4-02-2018 - tutorial with LB

11-02-2018 - self organised meeting

11-3-2018 - the journal - present the work

25 - 03- 2019 - student presentations

Testing boundaries - 

connections - who do you know?

1 - you - who do you have access to? - friends, family, extended network, what networks are you connected to ? what do they do? Where do they work/play? - curators, project spaces - odd places - opticians, libraries, place you walk past - 

2 - the work - what is your work about? what s it connected to? where do you see work like yours? 

your making - your context - 

social context - making and seeing work always takes place in some form of social context - the time and the place the work is made

audience for work - who is included/excluded/implicated on the way an 'image is produced, circulated, and consumed. - online, books, zines, publications

the role of the audience? do they need to do something? are they making their own work? do they move your work, do they become your team? do they reorganise?

political context - gender- race - ethnicity - sexual orientation - class - disability - religion

specific political issues - space where issues are engaged with

broad political issues

Personal context - biography- the narrative of the self - particular issues, what motivates you? your skills as an artist  - who cares? - what strategies do you use when the work is not going well? How do you relate to the forces that in part condition, what you know and in which you make? - do you have the expression to give someone a voice? become a conduit?

Critical/theoretical context - does your work relate to particular critical debates about contemporary art and design practices? 

particular critical debates

is your work informed by /engaged with/ contesting particular theoretical frameworks?

Historical context - understand how/whether your practice relates to a tradition, with a history - find a l=place that you are extending the lineage - become part of a tradition - 

work that os specific to a particular time

how knowledge relates to periods in time.

Geographical context - local, regional, national, international, global.

is the place where you make the work important to the work? 

do you make your work in relation to a particular place?

studio, home, church, city, rural, the space online, abstracted space.

Institutional context - OCA - MA Course - the course is informing the choices we make - 

your educational background and how that informs

professional background/experience

your family background /experience

What is the role of the institution?

Cultural context - a whole way of life - this relates to all categories - who are we?

more specifically, why where when etc

what activities do you engage with?

Mapping your practice - ant other contexts worth mapping? Importance, Overlapping, Change - evolution of practice - which contexts are under the terms listed

Break out room - talk about the slide  - who do you know? who do you have access to ? what networks do you have access to?

who do you have access to? 

friends, family, extended network….

what networks are you connected to?

what do they do?

where do they work/play?

MZ - PN - KVW - 

PN - english organisations, local art co-op, 

Mz - elevator art - already done

KVW - events company - events organisers - chef - small business owner - cafe owners - engineers on site - airport - art world people: curators, admin, other artists, gallery owners - radio/voice workers - 

Testing boundaries - 

use of existing systems v new systems

presentation - shop windows - waiting rooms, religious spaces, educational spaces, foyers of public spaces - captive audience in an existing group - pieces that will transform lives for a couple of weeks

shop fronts - empty shops - or existing shops - what is sold in the shop?

library - if the work is about text or narrative - 

sport - interaction - play - children - factories - industry - artist placement group - gardens - outdoors - public or private - open houses - open studios - 

change   format  of your work

translation...... scale, materials, projection, publishing, magazine, newspaper artists book, website..... billboard? antipollution - cleaning dirty things with images, grass - projection - projection mapping - Dubai lynx - lecturers

start - research - reflect - what do you offer/want - who = make contact -name  - consider - appropriateness - of opportunity - trust yourself 

Break - 

initial ideas - small groups - pre-mortum

initial ideas - publication - airport exhibition - cafe exhibition - 

flyering of publication - takeaway artworks - in the cafes - colouring for children - placemats - beermats (Les) - restaurant colouring in  - changing the audience to children or making artworks for adults to colour in - have a message and challenge the concept  - PREMORTUM - the group work - the fracturing of the dynamic - solo work keeps me accountable without the reliance of others - finance - demand - design --feedback from Les - text not an issue - adult colouring book - self-publishing 

EC - stickers - back projection in a space - anonymously - post-mortum - littering fine - is there feedback - is it clear in the message  - not finding the right space, working in the proportions, visibility, work not ready to be shown. Guerilla projection? derelict space - anti-social spaces - forcing a conclusion

RF - capture the process of others and their journey of exhibiting the work - marginalisation of others - documenting the process of other artists - limited footfall, pushback from family - 

when do you know you've been successful?

try to learn something - maintain perspective - avoiding 'changing your life' issues and concepts - in a month - start working out who you know and what opportunities you can open.

Mon, 3 December 2018 -Group crit - KF

Group crit - KF

Open discussion -

On the 3rd of December, we will be having an Open Discussion in which we can have time to discuss emerging issues within our practice/writing/thinking. what do you NEED to discuss and share - what is exciting you - what is preoccupying, puzzling, interesting you. Can you share a question, or an image or a quote, or text or….. by Friday 30th, please.

we can see the practices you are involved with as a whole, not just making, not just thinking, not just theory…...all of it.

Make it useful!

KF- how we manifest practice - Charles Garoian - how we make things concrete, how we see things differently when they are outside of our heads 

https://youtu.be/MKY6VN2Tsis

conceptual wonderings, the ideas of what practice can be and how we find our route through it.

Slide show - - how do we take risks? the ways we all take risks are different and appropriate to our own practices.  Kettles Yard - small things are shifted and made a little more interesting - Jim Eade - Keep off the grass - signs that were ignored and then one that wasn't - things that we are afraid of that we don't know, the sudden fear of what we don't know.  - whats our grass? what are we afraid of? 

my question - think through the making - that is your research - allows there to be concrete links through the process and be embedded in the practice - so we are researching through the materials

Art pursues knowledge and yet resists the assimilative urge to know. This is the why, the what and the how - the questioning through our stuff not just in our heads

Speculative and emergent - a relationship with the work - acknowledging the movement - try to feel unity while in flux - understanding that I am part of the relationship - 

Greenhill - thinking and the aspects - can you replace the word making - is that what I need - this list, to consider that practice and thinking are the same, that research is the making, that thinking needs to happen through the making - let the making research and think for me. 

meeting point - this is something I want to articulate - how do I make these ideas come together - worrying away materially and conceptually - trying to get to the foothold. trying to find the foundations - 

the questions are mapping the practice and doing so appropriately - the difference between thinking and making - having an intention and playing purposefully. 

audio film from Joseph Bouys - link to come.

My moment was actually at the end of the session - I have included the notes from othere members moments below my feedback.

https://katievw.com/2018/12/01/30-11-2018-questions-for-open-discussion/

Above is the initial post with my question in. 

Key points are:

Changing a practice - more art based from design led

Influence or guidance - how to get comfortable

Can a practice change dramatically with a simple term change? 

outside sources impacting directly on practice - to credit? ownership?

materials led vs research led - help!

KF - entanglements happen - differentiate between what you know, what you learn and what you are influenced by and how to unpick it. constantly influenced but don't reference it all - when you find something that influences perfectly and understands your position within it - how do you determine which part is yours. the drawings are coming from me - it's been read through my work - she saw it and offered it - she saw it and found it there in the work. 

jv - would the it help to stop questioning?

KF - don't have to do either or - allows you to play you can do both and allow them to coexist and that they are interdependent and correspondent. complementary - what its doing is enriching - don't have to say whether I am practice-led- or concept based - push the 'what I am doing' sometimes labelling it actually blocks us in to a corner - shift it out of the head and allow the work to happen and realise that the thinking and creating happens at the same time. Let it happen and the drawings take shape.

chatbox:

-We are all building on the work of those before us


-
we all need a framework to give our practices context!
you are tethered!


- 
By a chair?!
You seemed so happy on making day getting into the materials


- 
I guess the difference between design based practice and art based practice is intention even if the outcome is the same physically


- I recognize what you say. I can easily get overwhelmed by my thoughts. That is why I tend to focus more on making because I know my head will continuously do its work; this makes its way easier for me.


- 
I always thought that fine art is a deeper version of other art/design disciplines

- Some of the best scientists are artists too


- 
also Katie: embrace the experiences from the past. I always try to use whatever I developed in the past

KF - the shift from the architectural - to joins and then built - back into drawing and flattening. all the work to happen - allow the drawings to grow in their potential - just let them grow and be surprised by it. Interesting questions of authorship and influence - do my work! collision - disruption - confidence - drawing colliding.

Immediate reaction after the session:

That felt really awkward - there was a point where the pause for feedback was too long and no one had anything to say to me. How do I read that? Were my questions not challenging or engaging enough, was everyone just over it and I was the unfortunate soul a the end of the session no-one could be bothered to engage with as they all wanted their beds? I feel like I'm at a different point to the other members - I spent last year questioning my research and how it feeds into my work while everyone went through materials and making and now I'm going through materials while everyone builds on their research and concepts. Is there something wrong with my practice? is it weak? Some days I question what I'm doing here and if I belong - the language frequently evades me and I spend so much time looking things up to play catch up.

Perhaps sleep will help.

Takeaways from other peoples moments:

questioning time - images that are timeless - or from time? unmooring time - I’m thinking about the way we digest time - the photo is a second in time - a time-lapse is time past but sped up - the piece at Ways of Seeing in NYUAD

https://davidclaerbout.com/The-Algiers-Sections-of-a-Happy-Moment-2008

tactile materiality and physical experience of visual experience - 
the tactile eye by Jennifer Barber

Paul Klee - taking an line for a walk - 

lens based media - analogue vs digital - scale, time and distance - how close you become to something - 

carve out time - using the commute to make work - the car journey productive.

Is the possibility more compelling than the product? How much consideration should there be for the audience? How much research do they need to see? Is a poem enough to let them in? 

KVW - My students and I had a conversation about the conceptuality of space last week - the fact that we talk about space being ‘out there’ but that we are also in space - it’s around us and in us
 - 
a vacuum is still something though—nothingness is still a 'thing’



A metaphor
 - Zen nothingness

Interpretation of objects - looking for a similarity of object - for validation? symbolism - semiotics - scientific drawing to understand an art practice
studying objects - how they speak to us - question how long is culturally acceptable to listen to an object? 

Are all art pieces related/connected to ethical questions? Is the term political correctness* intertwined with the term ethical responsible? Are artists expected to be politically correct/ethical responsible? Or are they may be expected to sometimes deviate from it? Related to the previous question, to what extent can artist behave ‘unethically’ for the sake of increasing awareness or making a statement?

if we are seen to be misrepresenting something - being open to the fact that you might trigger someone or something. Do I need to know what happened next? blocked the path -  put our work out there consistently.

working with others

narratives to be simple, but multiple layers can add to the complexity.

the chance element is really interesting

the butterfly effect - that aspect of a happening having a massive impact or a nothing impact
 and not knowing

work put out there -  let it off and it's beyond the control 
- the instigator

playfulness is fascinating and reminds me of this http://playthecitynowornever.com/

KF - punctuation of every day - situationist's - happenings - a shift has happened with the work as you can see it and it is beyond you. People being annoyed by it - slinkachu - model people enacting things with the debris of daily life

Mon, 26 November - Intersections and Articulations - KF

Intersections and Articulations - KF

WhenMon, 26 November, 5pm – 8pm

Description

Alex Woodall lecture and seminar 

Discussing her research - discussing things and nothingness
how we can know things - spiritual aspects - practice is embedded in research
object-based practice and also the work is done with artists in different space and in museums in their collections - the potentiality of objects - beyond themselves and allowing new work to emerge. RUMMAGING

words that shape who she is - poem - Pablo Neruda - an ode to common things -
ode to things - pillars, scissor, rings bowls hats, love, all things, - link to a poem - loves the notion that objects are alive with us - the notion of an object to have agency and potential and be imagined into new words.

our objects and what they say about us:
Jessie - tiny bucket- life is like filling a bucket with experience and memories all mixing together. 
Rachel - night sky viewer - past a future - represents something much bigger than itself
Mark - pocket multi-tools - feels like he is ready - fix anything with it. always with him, shiny, heavy, tactile. Makes him feel ready.
Mozhdeh - Pencil - comfortable, reliable, erase it, correct herself, trust - made of wood and connected to trees - trees are evidence of history - grew until their last day.
Elaine - hat - love to be outside - always planning to go out - with her hat on. Not the hat she wanted as she can't find it. IT gets lost in pockets and in other peoples homes - they always make their way back to me. Loss of objects - hopeful it will come back.
Tina - Rock with a hole in it! - had stones - always finds the rock with a hole in it. from childhood - had one with a rope that she dragged around, looking through it.
Jo - picture of a chair - not a chair - the ubiquitous white plastic chair that is neither special or not, can be both comfortable or uncomfortable - strong yet fragile. meta-layer - the boundary of what an object is.
Rhoda - earrings - jewellery - obsession- draw full and buys when travelling - used to make some - upcycling - tactile - customising
Me- Moon kaleidoscope - multifaceted - breaking up into beautiful patterns
controlling my environment - control my environment - see what I want to see - finding patterns when they don't exist - making the mundane interesting

AW- object as an idea - is an idea an object? if an idea were an object what would it look like? objects as ideas.

An issue with technology
being able to touch stuff and hold it in your hands.
putting things in your pockets
studied theology
The cloud of unknowing.
the only way we can know something is to unknow something - undoing - reflecting against the grain for what knowledge it. trying to know stuff that we can't really ever fully know.
Mphil - in medieval theology -Cambridge
not religious and didn't want to be a vicar or something
teacher training - taught religious studies?
realised the power of their imagination - massive ideas were easy for them to talk about adults were closed off from them. children -
worked at kettles yard - loved talking o people about the things in the house.

Cut out again

Museums Sheffield
Ruskin gallery
There she met Kimberley - Object dialogue box - unravels across the floor - the objects within it are like compasses that can guide you or interact with the exhibitions/displays
Manchester gallery - object dialogue box - beehive - trolley - tower

Phobia to buttons - a cat with buttons on its head -koumpounophobia fear of buttons
Mary Greg - 1850-1950 - collector - spoons, textiles etc - not displayed.
Mary Greg box - like a house sewing kit -
BREAK
a box to take it out - the first version is a museum-style box - plastisol - uses for holding objects can be cut with a hot knife
house box - Karl Foster - used to take the collection out

Royal Armouries - Leeds - a collection of weapons, guns etc
conservation cf. access

Sainsbury centre for visual arts, University of East Anglia - Norman Foster architect - aircraft hanger - supposed to look like their living room - intimate but situated in a big open space.
Lie down in a gallery - booklet

My internet broke......

Mon, 12 November -Group Crit - KF

Group Crit - KF

When: Mon, 12 November, 5pm – 8pm

[googleapps domain="docs" dir="presentation/d/e/2PACX-1vTlAeq-V-1u-XMps3TcAydhPWbC3IOCLxsXNY80nUW5XrrAJ7sMZc3Xkf_OtJXCoZASuTl-QufUmZhm/embed" query="start=false&loop=false&delayms=3000" width="960" height="749" /]

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1K_23Vx6Y-MLVYRKwPeCC9NAq229YqpH541n7HM-5xlw/edit?usp=sharing

MA Group Crit notes: 

My thoughts about the presentation above:

• Chaos Stagnant
• wanting to explore process and materials but struggling to link the work
• and then Catherine Baker happened!
• materials led practice - I don't know what that is or how to approach it - unlearning design background.
• it felt good and the feeling of feeling felt good!
• the sensuality of the materials.

Feedback from cohort:

Continuum of calm across a rocky road - put an object in (to the book form)

thread  - the thread has potential

took the line with me - over concrete and drag graphite - temporality - 

possibility and a period of time.

fabric or glass - horizon/division

space and anxiety - draw lines on to different elements - powerful and architecture of space - in a space

boundaries and bound - continuum- Jacobs ladder

windows - line above and below

sewing a line through lots of different things

the terminology refreshes

reframe

understand the material process of being an artist - going through the process of making

scale

What happens when you take the line outside?

or a line that disappears after a bit of time - prisons - the great escape - soil dumping.

francis alys

materials that graphite can't stick to

what happens walking through that line?

integrate previous in to current

Anthony Gormley - steel lines crossing a space @ketttles yard - walk under/around

do you feel more comfortable using textile techniques? as in sewing a line as you did in your previous work?

I'm interested in knowing if this work in direct response with your feelings? What happens when you rotate some of these pages so that the line is broken up? - I wanted to ask you about scale too

what about the speed at which you work?

maybe a daily project?

yeah Katie - 30 day daily task?

aesthetically pleasing.

Friday, 9 Nov -Visiting Lecturer Tutorials - Catherine Baker

Visiting Lecturer Tutorials - Catherine Baker

My thoughts and discussions with Catherine Baker:

Feelings about my practice: limited in terms of…. What am I trying to tell them [the audience]?

• articulate a regular routine
• punctuation of encounters
• punctuate routine
• celebrating or mundane?

Talking about the process - what does it mean when I do that.

1 - entity - collisions - in terms of happenings

2 - different materials - drawings on tracing and sandpaper - bring them together - butt up against, a more difficult counterpart.

Fixing them together - simple and how they collide.

-----Go back and see how they collide [previous work]

Leporello approach - concertina approach - a continuum - the fold creates a new space - make the folds out of new materials - wet and dry sandpaper -  

a line is dictated by the substrate it's on - one material across all surfaces.

Allows for the intimacy of a book but could be 12 foot long or A2 so awkward to handle or attached to the ceiling.

How do you want people to behave? looking up and being intimate at eye level, allows for intimacy and distance in its framing.

I’m a materials person - embrace it!

What do materials represent - the difference through materials - the materials are anchored into the everyday - found materials - cardboard packaging, plastic bags; start with the simple materials and then look into the materials and what they might mean?

Structure line.

put work away - sit with them and unpack them.

not diarised - what did it mean when the same line travelled from one space, from entity to entity?

Lebbeus Woods

https://hyperallergic.com/131802/the-radical-and-contagious-ideas-of-lebbeus-woods/

Julie Mehretu

https://www.mariangoodman.com/artists/julie-mehretu

Agnes Martin

https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/exhibition/agnes-martin/who-is-agnes-martin

Sol Lewitt

https://www.tate.org.uk/research/publications/tate-papers/14/ideas-in-transmission-lewitt-wall-drawings-and-the-question-of-medium

collision - unpredictable

bringing together, sand things down - reinstate - erase parts to leave the junctions

To summarise:

FOCUS ON WHAT IT MEANS

how do they engage with it?

do they understand my intentions?

Leporello - small to large-scale - intimate object 20 versions  x 12 feet long

Wallpaper by B. Makhoul - a line in space within so you can’t separate - immersive

bullet wallpaper - Palestine - looks pretty but symbolises violence and conflict - in the home

watch out for diarising the actions and question what is happening.

moments of collision

KFoster & CBaker Collision paper

-in chemistry - in proximity, they react

NOT CHAOS

Notes from Catherine Baker:

These are some of the words I wrote down as you were speaking:

Collage/fusion/adaptive reactions/ circumstance beyond control/ invented narratives/ routine/collision – collision of materials/requirement of proximity/ folds and joins in a Leporello.

I think you need to embrace the fact that you’re clearly a materials-driven person and explore the way in which two (or more eventually) materials can collide and how a repetitive act across them that is identical can be shaped by the interaction with the substrate.  

I’ve attached an image/part of a Print I saw as part of IMPACT 10 in Santander on September 18.  Plus the screenshot is Victoria Ahrens whose work is really interesting. Also classically you could look at Anselm Kiefer (also attached his lead books) and the idea of a Leporello type construction. I’ve included Kiefer as the ‘happenings’ collisions could be material based i.e. A chemical reaction; if you leave a watery gel drop overnight on a sheet of mild steel by the morning there will be a rust spot that signifies and records the ‘collision’ encounter.

I hope all these things help and remember to give yourself space to unpack what you’ve made and contemplate both it and its meaning for others.

Agreed actions:

• FOCUS ON WHAT IT MEANS
• how do they engage with it
• do they understand my intentions
• Leporello - small to large-scale - intimate object 20 versions  x 12 feet long
• watch out for diarising the actions and question what is happening.
• moments of collision - everyday with everyday materials.

Sat, 3 November - Making day: Group 1

Making day: group 1 - KF

Sat, 3 November, 8am – 12pm

 

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Feedback: 

what would happen if I added a million layers?!

Collagraph - print

buildings and constructions

maps - constructing up and laying over

building a new utpia

getting to know the 'flatness' - having a conversation with the work - asking it what flatness means, what building up/construction is?

Monday, 29 Oct 2018 - Enquiry: Intersections and Articulations

Enquiry: Intersections and Articulations

Description:  Listen to audio files, access through LMS calendar

Going forward:  Next week there will be audio files available for you to listen to through the LMS calendar. The second session for listening to the files is on March 18th. Therefore I have decided to split them between these sessions. They are provided to carry on the discussions about the different ways of encountering art, the roles and positions that people may choose to take, or the different ways that people may talk about art. These short files should appropriately fit in with the conversations that we have been having so far. They are really about professional practice.

how you perceive the information that you hear,

what connections you are making,

what interests you and why

what you might disagree with.

You should be reflective in your writing so that it is useful and embedded within the thinking that you are involved in your own practices.

Draw out key points.

Fran Stafford - Artist, Curator and designer - Canadian in Berlin and Bahrain,

Thoughts and discussions:

I wonder how old the recording is as I think the arts and culture scene has really expanded in the Gulf, although it is still very much in the developing practice.

She wears many hats

feels like a spokesperson of the arts- or maybe a 'coloniser' of the arts - yeesh! the fact is its someone coming from the outside and 'showing' 'them' how it's done. I don't have her background so I don't know how much that is true.  - a group of friends recently discussed this phenomenon in the UAE - that most of the 'high flyer' the gallery owners, curators, CEO's of arts companies and institutions are actually white women - I'm pro the feminine aspect of course but is it correct for outsiders to govern a nation's culture?

Uses very 'western' names and brands ie: Redbull - and the term 'test platform' makes me feel uncomfortable, is it right to experiment in other peoples cultures?

Representing a culture that is not yours? is that okay? Can you comment? - Julie Mehretu - paintings about places she has never been too. ethics of this practice?

I question how much time this woman has? How is she doing all of this stuff? does she sleep?

This market aspect is something that is flourishing here in the UAE as well.

She sounds like she is dominating the arts/culture scene - which is great for here, but where is everyone else? I am aware of people that have really struggled in Bahrain due to the cliquy nature.

She's had no experience but has been entrusted with these tasks - proactive or taken advantage of? 

She sounds very confident in her capabilities and achievements - is happy to wear her many hats and build up her experience. She doesn't talk about her practice as an artist although has described herself as one. I couldn't find her work other than her current designs in her new role as a fashion designer.

John Barraclough - Royal Standard Artists collective in Liverpool - drawings, sound works, drawing machines and drawing as human connection, mapping thinking and how the brain works and alternative spaces to create artwork and view.

Thoughts and discussions:

Doesn't consider himself an artist and curator but understands the connections due to financial implications

Bruce Nauman- work outside the studio is responsible for itself - the artist has to let it go. 

Curator - exhibit, preserve, conserve artworks

Newspaper 'Drawing paper' - collab with a fellow artist. A project in curating - funded by the artists participating so it could remain free to the public so self-promotional in effect. Not published regularly - as and when ready.

Content connections - stylistic connections - challenge what drawing is - providing the viewer with possibilities of conversations and varying viewpoints.

distribution is how it is seen - it takes art into a different dimension, one that is portable and easy to ship - repeatable

there are other platforms as well, such as online in blog and Instagram.

Do include own work but not overly comfortable with it, aware that this can be seen as self-promotion and remove some of the agency of the paper.

Creates drawing workshops as a 'living curatorial activity' - so the participants and the leader create and curate their work as part of the final product. utilises the paper in drawing workshops and using it to create discussion. Becomes a tool to instigate discussion.

curators - a tool - the artist can have trouble seeing the value in some work and the lack of value in others so the curators role can help expose the artist to this and guide a practice - rejection, acceptance - use of work beyond intention or out of intention - the critical debate of work and its sitting - in a show how do they interact? If a collaborative group of artists are working together they should work to ensure it works in the exhibition and be open to the fact their work may not fit and be 'deselected'.

To compare the two speakers:

Their input into curating is very different, Stafford is more formal yet slightly ad-hoc as she, herself, says she lacked the experience and had to work out how to produce her projects, whereas Barraclough is very informal and organic yet he is using his experience as an artist and educator to inform the process.

Barraclough discusses coherence - whether stylistically/aesthetically or dialogically. Stafford discusses curating from a cultural and logistical background, moving cultures around and displaying them, and what needs to be in place for that to happen.

This feels like the two sides of my own practice, the practical design-led practice of working out a 'product' vs the more organic process-led practice that I'm trying to work with. Barraclough's talks interested me more as it felt exciting and unknown whereas Stafford's felt familiar and easy to comprehend for me. 

Moving forward: think about the connections my work is making, am I missing the value in it, am I overlooking its potential due to my lack of confidence?