The Last Bell

Our degree show will begin on the 25^th May 2017. This led me to explore the date more closely in terms of its importance around the world, and to see if I can create a piece of work not for the degree show but out of it, linking my work more closely to real life.

I found one interesting ceremony that I remember being part of when I was younger. In Russia and post-Soviet countries like Latvia, where I was born, there is a tradition that happens every year on the first day of school and on the last day of school. The first day of school is always the 1^st September. On the day everybody dresses smart and brings flowers to their teachers. Also on the day the youngest are led by the last years in line. Then a bell is rung by the first year to symbolize the beginning of the new school year.

This was my first day of school in Latvia 1st September 2002 at Rigas 71. Vidusskola.

The Last Bell (in Russian: Последний звонок) is a traditional ceremony celebration which is carried out just after all the studies are finished. The date usually falls on 25^th May. I began to look into the tradition and also the bell, whether it was a simple bell or a special bell that was used every year in both of the occasions. I began to think about the bell I began school with and whether it was still used to this day. I wondered if I could use this bell to create a small performative moment with. I became very intrigued in creating a piece for the degree show that is very close to real life and has some personal connection to myself. Creating the right situation and time for the simple piece to occur, joining past and present in one simple moment.

To find out more about the bell used for the ceremonies I rang the school to talk to a couple of teachers about it. I was very nervous to ring because I had to talk in Russian which I was scared might be rough in some places. However, it went great and I have found out information I needed. I have found out that the school has a collection of different bells given to them as gifts from different places. One of them was a bell with interesting engravings, given to the school as a gift from a Russian monastery. All the bells are hand held bells, unique with interesting history. As I really wanted to find the bell I started the studies with, they have promised to find out which one was used.

The idea that I have for the degree show, is on the day of the opening which will be 25^th May, to be in Latvia and ring the bell for 30 seconds, that was used when I started school. The art is in the moment, seen as simple but was created to fit the situation. The process of research, communicating with the school, flying there and anticipating the moment is also part of the art. It’s about feeling, journey and finalization in the form of this small gesture. It not only focuses on my learning journey from primary school to university, but also creates an interesting atmosphere and experience for people in the show, in a different place.

This is potentially a piece that joins the two spaces together, creating different atmospheres and feeling in space. Throughout the last year of study, I have been questioning gallery spaces as well as their connection to life outside of it. My dissertation also focused on the in-between of life and art. This peace consisting of an intense moment, I believe to be an outcome of this research I have done and the desire to bring my art closer to life.

I don’t want to create a piece of work that will exist in the degree show, I want to create a piece of work that exists in real life first, but has connection to the degree show as well. I am still unsure whether I will transmit the sound to the degree show at the time of ringing the bell, so the sound is present in the space. Or whether I have a sign in the degree show saying that at a particular time somewhere in Latvia a bell will be rung, so the people will know that it is happening but will not be able to hear it. Both ideas appeal to me, I will have to just experiment and see what works best. In terms of any visual information, I think it is not necessary. I feel the sound or the absence of the sound is enough, the work is in the moment.

~Ev

Sion Jones - 15th February 2017

I liked Sion from the start of his talk. He started off very unique, asking us to participate in a very short meditation session right there in the lecture room. Asking us to close our eyes and breath naturally, whilst he slowly guided us through it. I was very pleased that a lot of people were positive about it. 

From the start I understood that he is a yoga teacher and is very much interested in the present moment and mindfulness. I am also interested in yoga and meditation and I am currently in search of what works for me, so that I can integrate it within my everyday routine. I believe from all the research I have done on meditation and yoga and the benefits of them, that they do really work when you turn it into a normal part of your everyday life. 

Sion has talked about the inner and outer experiences, inner and outer space that is very interesting. The mind being the inner space that sometimes is overwhelmed and stressed out, triggering waves of negative thoughts to the surface. Overthinking is something I am struggling with, finding it hard to sometimes just be in the present moment. His recent work that he has shown us, is focusing just on that: the over thinking mind and the awareness of the present moment. 

Gwacter : Empty Space

link

Screenshots of the video piece:

This video consists of people sitting in front of the camera in silence, eyes closed, breathing. After a while they hear a bell ring once, this is the time for them to open their eyes and look directly into the camera. There is a certain vulnerability in this video, the eyes stare at you, revealing the conflicting thoughts that are occurring behind them. 

This video work is focussed on the practice of meditation to show how people struggle between tangled and conflicting inner and outer experiences, the inner and the outer space. We are constantly distracted, overloaded with information which is hard to process. We have fear, stress, anxiety, mental suffering due to the fast paced world around us. We are constantly rushing and forgetting to enjoy the present moment we are in. We are distancing ourselves from nature, detaching ourselves. Meditation is an aid to calm your mind and be aware of your body in the present moment. Be aware of your existence in the world and everything that surrounds you. 

Gwahaniad / Separation

link

Screenshots of the video piece:

I felt really intense throughout this video, as it truly depicted how my mind feels when I overthink. Sion used rushing water to represent our flooding thoughts, which stop us functioning properly. Flooding information and thoughts that becomes impossible to control and calm, which take over, leaving you restless. Also in this video you can see the inner and the outer struggles of overthinking. The outer and the inner space. The outer is Sion scratching his head, the inner is the thinking, because it's invisible it is represented by rushing water. The video speeds up throughout, changing from one image to the other, until it is so intense its a constant flicker between the two. The only sound present is the sound of the water, creating a very calm and yet intense atmosphere.

I really like the simplicity of both of the videos, with minimal editing for less distractions. They are simple and so intense at the same time, you cannot help but be captured in the moment. 



Thoughts for myself:
What stood out to me is the use of the inner and the outer space which I might want to explore myself too. I like the idea of an inner space that is unique because we are all different. See how I can use that to come up with an intervention/ performance/ experiment. 


~Ev

Triptych Show: 'BLIND' 23rd January

The show overall:

From the start I was mostly drawn to the big garage space, which for me was most interesting out of the three. It was rough and not your typical white wall clean space. There was a lot of potential to play around with the display of artwork as well as the scale of them. In the show there were quite a few big scale projections close to each other, some on the ceiling, or higher up that usual, and some were smaller. I believe scale wise they were the biggest pieces of work on display. However, the work I believe travelled furthest, would be the bags from different shops which were stitched together and created a trail around the whole of the space, which glued the whole exhibition together. 

Another piece that I liked was a big circle created on the floor with charcoal, which surrounded one of the pillars. At the set up stage it looked fantastic with plenty of room surrounding it, looking quite dominant. However, the more pieces went up on display the more the piece lost its dominance and scale, particularly after the bags were placed around it, in a way entering the big circles space. 

There was one dominating sound which added atmosphere to the whole of the space. It was coming from a projection and included metallic and robot sounds. There were also different performances, ranging from hidden performances that not necessarily involved the public to engage, to some that require audience participation. 

'BLIND' performance:

My performance consisted of creating an experience both for myself and for the person I engaged with. At first I asked the person to lead me through the space whilst I am blindfolded. I generated questions about the space, positioning, colours, anything that comes to my mind at the time. The space being the start of the conversation, and a medium for the person to notice the smallest of things that he might not have seen before. Then we changed and the person was blindfolded whilst I walked him around the space explaining what surrounds him and explaining to the person in detail what is happening around him, how far things are, what colours, scale, people, sounds etc. Highlighting the sense and awareness of the space. Throughout the interactions I have recorded everything that has been said so I can go back and see what came out of the exchanges. The recordings act as the documentation of the piece. 

Throughout the exchange it was interesting to see how much people would trust me to guide them through the space whilst they were blindfolded, after I myself have done it. At times it worked better and at times not as good, due to the way the conversation was flowing. It was a good experiment to test out what I was actually interested in the conversation and peoples responses, so next time I would know how to guide the conversation better. 

Photographs by Sam Dobson and Shaunagh Chilton 


~ Ev

Lucy Clout lecture + tutorial

I was intrigued to hear about Lucy's practice as she does both video and performance pieces. Surprisingly I have been drawn to work with video recently so I really wanted to talk to her about the way she works and talk to her about my ongoing ballroom obsession and see what she says about it. 

Lecture 10:00

The first thing she said is that she is going to hold her phone whilst giving the talk. At first I thought that it was because she was more comfortable this way, however later I realised it was nothing to do with that, the phone was just there to trigger notes to look at if she was stuck. She was very comfortable with giving a lecture and being herself which I really liked. She was casual and relaxed which was very pleasant. 

She stated that she is interested in embodiment (a tangible or visible form of an idea, quality or feeling) which was very interesting to me as I noticed that I am moving away from any visible or touchable artwork, where the art is in the moment and experience in that moment with minimal objects. I have recently thought about creating a work that is a bit more tangible just to see what happens, such as creating a video.

Throughout the lecture she focused on five recent videos she has made. She said that she creates one video a year, however does other bits and bobs around, such as sculpture and performance. One video she has shown us was called Warm Bath which was a home movie, a fiction telling two interlocking stories. The first story was about seven women living together in one house, being obsessed with the movements of water. The second story was about a man who films a particular drainage ditch everyday, twice a day in California endoeric basin. The video explores and captures the passing of time, systems and intimacy. Throughout her explanation of this video I realised that her research might be similar to mine. She researches a lot of things that aren't artistic such as the geographical terms or looks into history for an explanation, that later feed into her work somehow. She explores what occurs in real life and makes them visible through video she creates, making us see the relationships more clearly. 

'Warm Bath', 2016, Exhibition View, Limoncello, London

'Warm Bath', 2016, Exhibition View, Limoncello, London

‘Warm Bath’, 2016, Video Still, HD Video, 10'08''

In terms of the actual video production and quality - the video was raw which added reality to it. The video of the man filming the water was bad quality and not as sharp as the video created by the artist. Also I found it quite interesting how the artist overlapped the videos together, where whilst watching her own recordings there would suddenly appear a small screen on top showing something else, and the other way round. I really enjoyed the video and the multi meanings and stories it was exploring - time, systems and intimacy. The video was well narrated throughout either by the artist or the video found by the artist where the man could be heard stating time and day he visited the place again.

An interesting phrase that Clout said in the lecture, where she said that the video was like 'a performance which happens between the person and the screen'.

Tutorial 14:30

For my tutorial I wanted to talk about my interest in the old ballroom in city centre and the ongoing research that I keep generating for it, whilst waiting for the opportunity to visit. We discussed what potentially can come from this exploration. There could be a video piece narrated, focusing on the transitional stage the space is in whilst also linking to the transitional elements of own everyday life. The way the builders began working from the outside of the building first, leaving the inside as it is. Whilst walking past it always feels as though the inside is frozen in time whilst the outside is constantly changing. Even the music that is imprinted onto the walls of the ballroom is completely different from the music played just outside, on the other side by the workers. An invisible divide of time.

Are you the music, are you the vibration, are you the air that fills the space? Are you the broken wood scattered on floor? Are you the time that has passed? Are you the light that shines through the windows?

This could potentially be an interesting sound piece as well, which could be listened to whilst in the space itself if I get lucky, as I would require permission to bring anybody to the space. 

~Ev

Triptych Show at The Royal Standard, Cains Brewery (Site Visit)

All of the third years soon will be showing at the Royal Standard at Cains Brewery on the 23rd January. We went on a site visit to see potential three spaces that we might be showing in. First space was a small white wall room, second was the Royal Standard white wall gallery space which was medium size and the third was a very big warehouse garage space. It was the most rough spaces of all, with dirt on the walls and cobwebs, leaking roof and moss growing on pillars.

The big garage space

The big garage space

Before I went to see any of the spaces I wanted to do a little experiment. I wanted to explore the spaces blindfolded and have a sense of space through touch. I was able to do this with the last space we visited which was the big garage. I explored one wall of the garage by walking alongside it, making small step and touching the wall. Through touch imagining what the space looks like as well as the smell and the sounds I could hear. 

First I could hear flapping of wings, assuming that there were birds there. I noticed that it was colder than previous spaces we have been to and more grounded and damp. I began to explore the wall and walk along side it. It was rough and after a while I could feel a pattern forming on the wall through the indents of end and start of the bricks I felt. I could feel how big the bricks were and how long they are. When exploring higher I could feel the wall had a dent outwards and continued upwards. I could feel the thin pipes lower down near my knees and the bolts that were holding them together and in place. After a certain point I could feel metallic line standing just a bit from the wall, very cold to touch, approximately ten centimetres in width. I could also feel the dirt that was mostly everywhere. After taking off my blindfold the place wasn't looking as great as I formed it in my mind. It was an interesting experience as I was very curious what I could feel next and what kind of map I will build in my head of the space based only on touch. Maybe not the best space for this but it was an interesting experience in which I felt very vulnerable in.

Entrance to the space 

After exploring the space for a short period of time I decided that I wanted to experience the space whilst somebody else is guiding me through it and see what happens then and how that is different from the exercise I just did. My friend Eryn helped me with this. As she was leading me through the space I began to ask questions about it, such as how big it is, which way is the door, what is closest to us, are there any pillars… A conversation began to form through this and based on Eryn’s answers I was more curious and new questions would surface. At one point she led me to a pillar and said that she can see moss growing on it. I asked if I could touch it. She also said that on the other side of the pillar there were some plants growing out of it too. This experience has really intrigued me and I began wondering how I can use this for the show. Potentially without this conversation and me being blindfolded Eryn could have not realized there was moss there, so through this minimal performance like participation I highlighted her sense of space and what is around her.

Interestingly this idea has a strong relationship to the observations in spaces I have been creating. Quite intense writing of what is happening around me at the time and how I am feeling, noticing the smallest of things. However this time I am relying on the person to tell me what is happening around me and where in the space we are in that moment. In return my questions and a conversation that follows allows the person that is guiding me through space to notice things and himself in a different way that he might not have otherwise. Another way to experiment further with this ideas is to swap and blindfold the person and lead him through the space myself. It would be interesting to see how different this experience would be.

This idea reminds me of Marina Abramovic piece called Generator 2014. In this piece people could create their own performances and experience. They were blindfolded and given soundproof headphones to create their own movements and expressions, being more in tune with themselves and their bodies. However, in my piece I want to create a one-on-one experience, a conversation with a better connection with the surroundings and what is in it and heighten their awareness.

Because there are three spaces to engage with I have yet to think of what I can do with the other two. The smaller space is roughly 4 by 6 meters and considering around 60 students will be showing there it would be interesting to play around with it. It could be interesting to see if I can let one person at a time into the space experiencing all the artwork in it by themselves just for one minute. So each person will have a time limit of 1 minute to spend the time with the artworks. For Royal Standard gallery space which is a medium size I am thinking of logging every single mark that I can find in the space and maybe just leave it as a text for people to read.

~Ev