People, Purpose, Process – the Three Ps
Or put another way, audience, narrative, material/technique. This is the thing that I hold in my mind from time to time. I love this new material technique. Working with industrial forms colliding with the waving forms. But what is the narrative? And do I care who the audience is? The question that came up this morning surrounding who am I doing this for? The answer is , don’t worry about it, get the first two rolling, enjoy those two, and let the audience come to you. The reason for the question about audience is about imagining how it will be viewed. How it will be seen in the world, where it will be seen. It’s an important question, but something that should dance in and out and you consider the other two often and carefully.
The current work narrative moves from being a “machine” in space to merely being a 3d canvas for paint. How much should I consider the tangible story of the thing. If I illustrate it to be a machine, then it is a very specific illustration, and it gets stuck there. I don’t like being stuck. A sort of “is what it is” comment comes to mind. I want to dance between you knowing and not knowing what it is. Two narrative sculptors that I can think of that I play between. Kiki Smith, whose works are very clearly mythological, but yet in the figurative combination of elements plays with abstraction. And Nikki De-Sant Phalle, who very clearly is taking her ques from Miro, but uses colorful decorative applications on something specific. But where am I? I always want to talk about the spiritual nature of being. I think these works I’m calling “dream viewers” need to randomly weave flashes of thought, in the same way a dream randomly moves from topic to topic. This may be the answer to the narrative component.
Hold the movie “Until the End of the World” in your mind then, as you move through this imaginary landscape. Play with landscape, mystery machine, and dream. And here-in lies the narrative.
