reflection on project 2 : Forgotten English

Ah, that didn't go as well as I expected.

I should have made the instructions clearer, but I chose experimentation and decided to see if people could pick up what to do just from a demonstration. And it worked! Except that the demonstration by itself offered no way for anyone in the audience to know that the definitions weren't supposed to be read.

Whoops.

I also felt that the way I was too imperious. Commands were an integral part of the last performance, but here such a style was superfluous. Maybe I didn't need to read over everyone's shoulder? I was just trying to make sure I knew when to take the notebook back and do the conclusion.

I'm not certain what I was doing with the opening monologue. Maybe that was unnecessary too. What I was going for was a fluxes-inspired music, the music of old English words, long forgotten -- in our practice earlier that morning, Haley said that the words we were working with sounded interesting. See, there's music in our lives every day.

The notebook is a found object in the stye of John Cage, because I rediscovered it after losing it for a few years. The words in it are also found objects, because I rediscovered them while looking for what was int he back. I forget why I added them in the first place.

As for the length, the piece went on so long because I had all the weird old words interspersed with more ordinary ones, and I wanted to include all my favorites and I couldn't alter the notebook or re-write it without changing its nature.

Foo.

I think I need to plan my pieces better.

Who is Eve as an Artist?

Who am I as an artist?
By Eve Schmitt


Not entirely certain. I read a story, in an 8th-grade art class, about a man who did (maybe invented) assemblage, and everyone who knew him said that his artwork eased the pain of his depression, so that he remained alive.

I'm not THAT melancholy, but I do feel more sane when I'm doing artwork. More driven. Focused. 
But that doesn't answer what I'm trying to do, does it? What kind of artwork I want to do?

Hm.

I went full experimental with digital and film photography. That was fun. I got good results. Maybe I do my best work when I'm experimenting with mediums, instead of trying to achieve high technical standards. When I'm trying to meet high technical standards I turn full perfectionist and I spend too much time and effort trying to get things just right and I throw away stuff that might have been good enough and it gets really frustrating and I forget wether I'm doing it for myself or the grade.



Most of the artwork I've done, most of the best artwork I've done, has been for a grade. 

The bit with the digital photography -- that was when I began to do serious artwork on my own terms and schedule. I went nuts with the editing filters on iPhoto. Got some good pics. Discovered a trick to get perfect black-and-white, no greys. Look.

That's me.

But now, with performance work?

With performance work there's no technical standards like there are with drawing or painting -- there is idea, effort, presence, and play, and experimentation.

I've heard it said that all creatures play, because play is free expression, and who wants to spend all day eating, working and fucking? 

and Gary Larson said, in There's a Hair in my Dirt, That play is vital for the mental growth of living beings, because play allows for experimentation, and without experimentation we learn nothing. Ask a scientist.

I'm going to have some fun.