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