Weeks 3 and 4

Liz Atkin, 27 August 2008

Interlude...then practice

When I arrived today, Liz had created a beautiful wall sculpture-tree limbs, branches and tiny twigs leaning against it, lined up from tallest to smallest, with 3 fat sized limbs standing stoic like soldiers against the adjacent wall. She used a cliplight to spot the main wall of propped sticks which cast incredible shadows that were so expressive. She had also left long skeins of string and globs of tape, that earlier had been used to wrap her body with. They were discarded on the floor in random heaps. Together we unraveled and rewound the string into balls, sharing this communal act. I asked her if she would leave the branches leaning against the wall. The environment she had created, the play of light and shadow, the architecture and texture of the branches was so inviting, that I wanted to film them and play with them also. Shortly after Liz left the studio, I set up the camera and began my practice for the day.

Reading from Deborah Hay's book, My Body,the Buddhist, I read aloud an excerpt from the first chapter titled, "my body benefits in solitude", and taking the lead from her words, entered into the space and lied down on the floor to "play dead" in the corpse pose. Behind me, as backdrop, the brilliant wall of leaning shadow branches in silhouette shone. I listened attentively to my body's lead and moved with as much awareness as was momentary. Sometimes I would utter spontaneous phrases and words, that connected with what my body was doing or observing. When I picked up a tiny fluff of lint from the floor, and regarded it with interest, I spoke the words, "a strand of dna". As I lay on my back and looked at the grid of the ceiling beams I waved my arms in a gesture of invisibly stroking the ceiling and with sudden recognition the words, "caressing my friend" came out of my mouth. Eventually, the branches were disturbed by my movement, and a quizical motif developed while I placed one branch on my knee to balance, another on my shoulder, and finally several on top of my head. Strutting, squatting, stealthily moving towards and away from the camera, an odd bonnet of branches balanced on my head and shoulders felt like antlers or a Medusa's crown of snakes. My movement meditation/exploration spun on and came to its natural pause, just as the film from my tape ran out. With the clarity of synchronicities that have so often occured during these weeks of Genesis, I returned to Deborah Hay's book, opening the page, and resting my eyes on these words..."Wherever I am, the dance is." Cheryl

A selection of practice from the first few weeks

Liz Atkin, 20 Aug 2008

emotion potion

I'm used to having a studio. So in some ways I didn't think that having these 3 hour blocks was going to translate very well. I thought I would feel rushed, maybe unproductive. Some days I do. And that's fine. I just have to let it go and trust the entire process. Yesterday I had this incredible moment where I realized that I've learned so much about my relationship to the studio and what place it holds in making art for me. Because of the time blocks being shorter than what I'm used to, I have to make disciplined use of the space. And more than ever, I've realized these threads that flow from this space and what I'm doing here out into the world that I inhabit when I leave. I've started ice skating a couple days a week and the direct relationship to being in here working on whatever junk I'm working on to the movement that I'm doing on ice and the awareness of my body is profound. I was a serious figure skater and quit around the age of 15. I'm 28 now and to go back into this activity that at one point of my life defined me entirely and that I struggled with so much, is profound. Obviously I ice skated at first because I loved it. But in the end I hated it, and I felt incredible amounts of guilt for quitting something that my parents had invested time and money into. So now to go back with my own time and money and my body that harbors an intense double dutch aftermath of fucked up knee, pulls me into this almost high, completely aware state of mind. And my knee doesn't hurt when I skate. I cannot figure out what that's about. is it psycho-somatic, am i using my knee in a good way on ice? anyway, in sea and space, my time is used completely differently from on the ice. I don't do a lot of movement in here, and instead workshop my time. I'm building costumes, planning sets, scripting out this project that I want to do with Cheryl and Hana. Everyday the project changes and tells me something new. It's like everyday my brain is doing flips inside my head and one day i'm looking this way and the next everything appears upside down. i feel like i've been knocked over in a way. Like my life this month is full up of love. I don't know how to write this without sounding cheeseball-heavenish but it is. and that's that. in the space, i'm having less pull-my-hair out moments and many more moments of- 'oh shit. this is exactly what I want to be doing.' and then I go ice skating, and I feel like I've been on this long journey to find what makes me feel grounded and it's in taking my feet off the ground. and there it is. I've defined my studio practice, my process if you will: and it's back to where I started.

Alison

After Thoughts, Before Noon

Having not commented for a week, it was good to catch up with the new postings from this weekend and feel the intensity of our investigations...working out the logistics, listening and receiving, touching base with the week's happenings and feeling our hearts touching as well, as we circled up to share in the soup of our sea and space. Last night I couldn't sleep thinking about what I would like to explore this week in the gallery/studio. Traces of our sharings from the week filtered back into my recollection and I was reinvigorated, thrilled, surprised and inspired by all that has already transpired...covering the space completely in white, pulling out everything in the room that's white and placing it in the space; covering the floor in white cloth, plastic, paper, tables, like giving the room a "whitewash"! Taking out "the heart of the floor", by removing the center 8 floor tile/squares and descending into the well of exposed concrete below, to pound out intricate rhythms with shoes and bare feet; casting light and shadows on the walls; in duet, shadow, light, darkness and ancient Mayan myths burn their images through the dreamtime of choreography and art play. Clothes tossed off and bare skin imprinting the floor, lapping up the textured grid that marks the floor, from slick sweat steaming off bodies; "in the moment" shifts, down river skating and fishing for the "fruit of the sea and space". Measured ropes wrapped and tied to heart strings and running limbs repeatedly circling the square room; hands, hips, bellies and breats pressing against and pushing back from the walls and floor, while harlequin-themed curtains demarcate the separation of time and space between the urban cacophony of sirens, wheels of cars and trucks churning, passers-by passing, from the silent order that throbs on the other side of that curtained window, "practicing" each day how to roam and play.

Yesterday I bought some colored sand, ribbons, feathers and stones to play with. I find myself wanting to design and craft objects, representations of my journey and explorations this month. I want to leave landmarks and chart maps...or is it just following the impulse to make and do something, while at the same time not being attached to the idea that I have to make or do something in order for it to have value? But why struggle, I ask myself? Just enjoy this interplay of disciplines and ways of knowing. My body is the medium and the actualizer, so there's no need to alienate myself. The promise of a new week approaches and some collaboration is also anticipated. Cheryl

washing the floor, again

Holy shit, shista, cow, dog, curtains! What a day, what a day. I am so beat. and feel pretty raw and on the verge of tears. Sara Wolf was supposed to be with us today leading a workshop in writing about one's work. I opted to try to lead something in lieu of Sara since she threw her back out. But it turned out to be mighty serendipitous not to have the structure of the workshop today. There was so much sharing, digesting, logistical working out to do, and space cleaning and rearranging to manage. We were there till nearly 6 with no time wasted. I am bumbling along with the role as director, facilitator, getter of stuff, logistics negotiator, and ultimately fellow artist, questioning and examining my own practices and products. I have several self-conscious regrets about how I operated in these many roles today, not wanting to impart my priorities, revelations, interests and questions onto the others' practices. Next week I intend to listen even more. Though I did thoroughly listen today as we went around and each artist shared some of what the experience of the week was like.

I am truly impressed by the "inter-disciplinary" nature of this space we are creating. Everyone seems to be moving fluidly between movement, crafting, drawing, photographing, meditating, sleeping, chanting, writing, responding to what they are needing as they face their practice and themselves, alone in the room. I was so deeply moved listening to everyone's experiences from the week, holding back tears many times as I imagined Cheryl chanting and initiating the space, Alison sleeping on the floor, Liz crunched up in the bathroom washing paint from her naked body, Brooke tied to different parts of the room assessing her "value" her strength in relation to walls, beams, and Cesar sitting for 90 minutes staring at a fire in the center of the room. I know now that creating the space for this project is deeply meaningful to me. It is something I want and need to offer others and it is invaluable in helping me understand the nature of experimentation, practice, process, failure (though all these words are feeling trite, overused, and inadequate to describe the honesty, risk, political radicalism, and unglamorous ugliness of the event.

These walls are holding brilliance for hours and hours each day and I could feel it the moment I walked in the room.

Logistically: We are dealing with issues of privacy, time slots, heat, organization of the space, the ability to black out the space and work with light, and definitely with collaboration (more seems needed/wanted, yet the nature of how to make it happen and if we have enough time for it in this short month, is unclear). We've extended some slots, added late night slots, and are generally putting the whole schedule on the table for revision. The artists will work out with one another more or less overlap time between their slots and even potential collaborations. Next week we will need another 3 hours for check in and logistical issues though we may do that somewhere else (Huntington Gardens possibly) before going on a field trip?

peaches and cream harlequin curtains

It's friday night and i'm taking my first down time of the week. I'm exhausted. Requesting the early morning slots seemed like a good idea and will be i'm sure, as soon as my body adjusts. I've been on the go, having just relocated to L.A., looking for a place to live, and also assistant-editing a documentary. That's my time outside of Genesis. Yesterday while in the gallery, I left to go to my car and get my sexist 'do-it-herself' kit and was amazed at how loud and abrasive the street was, and how quiet, comfortable, and welcoming the space was when I walked back in. My time has been mountainous ups and downs during this first week, and I've been really trying to listen to what Genesis has in store for me. Cheryl's poem-writing exercise kick started my week. She led us through such a powerful exercise of reaching back into the past to acknowledge what and where it is we come from, what we bring with us and how we're drawing from ourselves-all the self-perceived good and bad, the struggles and self-doubt and the malleability of ourselves to other whole struggling people that bring all their stuff here also. What does it mean really to enter into a structured month long residency, expel our own expectations, and also honor our limitations and desires at the same time? If we are to be in conversation with all these sometimes conflicting elements, can we be quiet enough to hear it, get comfortable, and just drop it all and dance hard? It's interesting that while dancing and ice skating and jump roping and all these really physical things are a part of my studio practice already, I really have considered myself a visual artist mostly. and yet the most consistent part of my studio has been dancing. like by that I mean breaking it down, busting a move, some heavy hard escapist gyrating. ALONE!!! and now here I am perplexed the most by the role of collaboration in where I am at this present art epoch of my life. The 15 minute overlap doesn't really allow for much collaboration, but I'm also terrified of those 15 minutes and my instincts say 'clean up and ship out'. However, collaboration, community, conversation have all been important to my thought process about art from my developmental get-go, but putting it into action is really challenging for me. I led a double dutch workshop last week for the first day workshops and tackled it like it was some dude coming at me about to knock me out. I can offer a formula to 'get' double dutch. But that is soooo not the point. I forgot that joy in jump-roping in some weird unconscious moment of feeling pressed for time to 'teach' double dutch. It is so not mine to teach. That's what I learned this week way way after the fact.

A few highlights:
1) I spooned with my dog today on the romper room minimalist grey conceptual grid floor.
2) I have been madly, deeply, fellatiously inspired by those peaches and cream harlequin curtains. So much so that I have some serious ideas about what I'd like to attempt in the space during this month...it involves the artist formerly known as Prince.
3) Likewise, I'm really into those beautiful beams up on the ceiling housing our fairy light friends.
4) I have been inspired by some of the materials in the space and am making a head-dress.
5) I really like coming in and inspecting the remains of people's work. We leave these slight shadows in there that hint at what we're up to. It's like being in a strange hearing-impaired conversation and really digging it.
ALISON