Week Nineteen
I came across quite an extraordinary puddle the other day. According to ‘wikipedia’, ‘a puddle is generally considered to be small enough to step over or shallow enough to walk through, and too small to traverse with a boat, raft or submarine’. Now as I had neither access to a boat, raft or submarine, I couldn’t quite test out their theory. Apparently though, children, often consider puddles a source of recreation. Now this I can relate to. I actually spent a whole forty-five minutes with one puddle, a rather intimate forty-five minutes I may add. Now this may seem an inordinate amount of time to some, and it did briefly worry me for a nano second, however that elfish character ‘Jack Frost’ had visited this particular puddle. In English folklore, Jack Frost personifies crisp, cold, and winter weather. He is a variant of Father Winter (also known as "Old Man Winter") and it is believed originating from Germanic folklore specifically Anglo-Saxon and Norse customs. 
Tradition holds Jack Frost responsible for leaving frosty crystal patterns in various places. Now Jack (I think we are on a first name basis now), had been particularly creative that morning, and left a frozen heaven worthy of forty-five minutes exploration.
I photographed it obsessively, I videoed my response to it, and also lay next to it listening to the sounds of creaking ice. I would have actually spent more time if the notion of frostbite and my complaining limbs hadn’t set in. It has been particularly cold this week, so cold that some trees are glowing a purplish haze; I figured they’re cold too and it’s their way of letting the world know. It has also been very misty in the wee hours.
I’m rather partial to mist and its disorientating essence. Nevertheless the sun has shined every day; in fact hot enough for no coat. I have had an intensely fantastic walking week, pushing the boundaries of my explorations and distances, and I have felt on top of the world…and well, as I was also literally geographically on top of everything, all was, well…synchronistic. I realised I am still rather apprehensive regarding getting lost, or something happening to me whilst all on my lonesome.
I’m sure Richard Long doesn’t have this kind of anxiety, but he’s spent his life walking and I’ve only just discovered it! It is my unnerving sense of ‘no’ direction topped with my appalling map reading skills that leads me to this apprehension. However with my regular walks I realise I do know more than I think, my visual sense has been piecing together its own map. Nonetheless I am, one day going to do an orienteering course, I need to disperse this fear…it gets in the way! 
I saw and met my first newborn calf. It was only six hours old when we met. It was shivering so much so apologies for the blurriness of the photograph. It could of course be my hands shaking as cows were nibbling at my sleeve whilst I was trying to capture a new life. 
I discovered a natural artwork on a barbed wire fence. A series of cow hairballs about the size of golf balls all dotted along at precise intervals. Strangely they all graduated perfectly in colours from brown to black. It was rather wondrous but also extremely difficult to photograph. I wondered what kind of organisation it took for cows, fence rubbing and colours to be so co-ordinated. 
Another glorious artwork given freely by nature (although admittedly with human intervention) was this luxurious orange colour by a recently felled tree. 
At first I thought it might be a stretch of grated carrot left for some unknown reason, but obviously under closer inspection all was revealed.
“Drawing is the primal means of symbolic communication. It predates and embraces writing, and functions as a tool of conceptualisation parallel with language” TRACEY - Loughborough University 
I have been drawing a lot this week, large textural drawings, with bitumen, peat and graphite. I am again flooded with ideas but feel there is something in their validation. I am again excited about an idea, and energized about large scale. Having the privilege of this large studio and various barns seems an ideal opportunity and fundamental to utilise this freedom. It seems giving space and time, true ideas surface and others fall to the wayside. It is truly an interesting process. I do feel I am collecting a life’s time of ideas whilst doing this residency, and still wonder which ones will come to fruition for my final show. I have decided that it is still appropriate to continue experimenting to the beginning of March…then some serious making is in order. “Drawing is said to demonstrate the relationship between reason and intuition, between sensory perception, interpretation and the process of understanding.” TRACEY - Loughborough University 
I have been in the company of a couple of artists this week, which may also have something to do with my surge of inspiration. In my first week (blimey that seems eons ago), I met an artist called Bridget at the ‘Bastle’ weekend organised by the Tarset archive group. Bridget is also doing a project funded by VARC. Black Middens is the remains of a Bastle, and Bridget is collecting data of colours involved in the building. 
She has an excellent gadget that gives the pantone (colour) reference of a section of whatever the machine is placed on. She came to stay with me for a couple of days so she could work on her project. Many chats on art, the highs and lows of being an artist etc resumed. It was a thoroughly inspiring and enjoyable meeting. You can check out her rather fabulous work at: www.axisweb.org (put in Bridget Kennedy in the search section). 
I also met Karen Rann (http://www.karenrann.co.uk/) another interesting artist who did this particular residency in 2002. It was fantastic to talk to an x resident and hear about her experiences of being a Highgreen artist. She also showed one of her favourite walks around here, which was a real treat. It has been an invaluable experience for me to discuss my work both with Bridget and Karen. It has been a week of many highlights and moving forward in many aspects. One of my favourite moments was witnessing about two hundred Siskins chirping madly in the trees, then flocking and whooshing above my head. A grand week…..week nineteen done!