Have you ever lost a day? I don't
mean wasted it but entirely misplaced it? Well, that's
what I did, last week. Entirely convinced that it
was Wednesday I was blithely into normal Wednesday
rhythm until around 4 pm when the phone rang and a voice
from the dentist's practice in Salisbury said that I
had an appointment at 2:15 pm. "Yes, I know," I
said blithely, "It's for tomorrow, Thursday." The voice
went quiet and several degrees colder. "Today is Thursday,"
it said. Astonishment, abject apology and embarassment
rushed in, transforming innocent Wednesday into guilty
Thursday. And what's more I lost my pre-booked train
ticket, no refund allowed. My excuse is that I
didn't go out on Monday or Tuesday so I couldn't tell
what day it was because I am so concentrated on the new
project I'm working on.
The new project is Unfolded
Books, a forthcoming exhibition to open in June
at the National Library of Wales and possibly to
tour elsewhere after it ends in September. It is
being organised by artist and curator Mary
Husted,
a friend of Clive
Hicks-Jenkins who
is one of the artists invited to participate in this
project and it is through his very kindly introducing
her to my work that I am included. There are eight
artists from Wales, three from Hong Kong, two from
Australia and one from England (me). All, with the
exception of myself, are personally known to Mary
but we are meeting next month to remedy this. Each
artist has received one or two of the concertina/accordion
books which Mary bought in Hong Kong for this purpose
and each is free to fill it however she/he chooses.
My book arrived last week. Below
is a photo of it - a tall narrow 33cm x 11.7cm when closed.
It's over 2metres long when fully unfolded and I am going
to fill both sides of the accordion - that's 52 panels.
I've decided on a theme and a technique but both shall
remain secret until finished. The deadline is end
of May - that's almost tomorrow and I have a huge amount
of work to do.
What of the physiology of angels?
Probably nothing to do with the above. It came from a
dream I had on Wednesday, 8th February (famously not
Thursday). It was a long and intricate dream but the
relevant bit is that a girl who had contacted me on
the internet asked me to come over and advise her on
a book she was making. So I went to her house, carrying
my breakfast, and sat at her table eating it while she
chatted to me about herself. She seemed bored and in
a hurry and I wasn't very interested in her but to be
polite, I said: what do you really want to do? Her answer
amazed me. She said: I want to research the physiology
of angels. I replied that there is a
team of scientists in outer space who are studying the
particles we are made of.
