Maxine
Bristow
Monday 31st March 2003
Dropped Kyoko off at the airport last
Wednesday morning finding it difficult to believe that seven
weeks have passed so quickly! It had been something of a rude
awakening when a couple of weeks ago, we realised that Kyoko
was soon to return to Japan, and that we both still didn’t
really know what our intentions were for the exhibition!
Understandably Kyoko has spent a fair
amount of time over the last few weeks ‘getting out
and about’ visiting Manchester, Liverpool, Hastings
and a couple of trips to London, and being her first visit
to the UK, these trips were largely about familiarisation.
Kyoko having said that she was intending to pursue new processes
and new ideas for this project, I was left wondering what
these ideas might be. In Kyoko’s position, I think I
would have engaged in some ‘nest-building’, surrounding
myself with visual material in order to provide myself [and
indeed anyone else] with some clues as to how the work might
develop. I was therefore somewhat surprised that Kyoko didn’t
use the studio in this way. In talking to her, however, she
said that she doesn’t have a studio at home and that
also as an undergraduate student she didn’t have a personal
space, with most of the teaching and learning taking place
in a workshop situation. It was interesting to note our different
approaches to the development of work.
With little visual evidence though and
not at this stage doing much making, we were left to discuss
our ideas and intentions. Articulating verbally what are speculative
ideas and unformed abstract thoughts is difficult enough at
the best of times and although Kyoko’s English is very
good, the language barrier does make the exchange of ideas
all the more difficult. Having initial written statements
about each other’s work was certainly useful, and in
an attempt to be helpful I have, over the last few weeks,
presented Kyoko with my own written reflection, and other
contextual material. It is only latterly, however, that I
have somewhat insensitively come to realise that every essay
or article that I have casually passed on, has presented Kyoko
with a hefty and time-consuming exercise in translation! We
have, nevertheless, had some interesting conversations over
the past few weeks and through discussing issues of mutual
concern, I do feel that we have come to some understanding
about the themes we are hoping to pursue through our work
over the next few months. What has been interesting to note,
is how during the last couple of weeks when we have begun
to discuss what the practical outcomes for the exhibition
might be, language hasn’t been an issue at all. In discussing
practical ideas we have been able to communicate visually
through drawing, and once we began to do this it was exciting,
to see how easily our thoughts came together.
My own thoughts are concerned with developing
my handrail pieces and exploring other aspects of the built
environment which present points of contact between the body
and space. Although there is this general concern with the
body and space, there are a number of things that I am thinking
about. I am interested in the unconscious repeated patterns
of bodily behaviour through the touching of handrails, door
handles, finger plates, light switches etc. I am also interested
in the fact that these are often anonymous, overlooked aspects
of the built environment but are crucial to its functioning.
This makes me also think of utilities such as gas, electricity,
water, and the network of pipes, cables, and conduits etc,
which facilitate the functioning of space. I am thinking about
what marks the boundaries between the body and space, the
public and the private, both in a physical and metaphorical
sense, and how any boundary or border by its nature marks
difference, but also how boundaries are not neutral or arbitrary
but are socially and historically constructed and are therefore
subject to critique and revision. I am thinking of permeable
or flexible boundaries or aspects which mark a point of transition
between the inside and the outside, the public and the private,
such as doors, windows and more recently ventilation grills,
where I make a visual correlation with the form of my bags
and buttonholes. I am also reminded of Nina Saunders Pure
Thought II at Jesus College, Cambridge.
In Kyoko’s work she has pocket
and clothing forms where the boundaries between the inner
and the outer space become blurred. What begins as an internal
pocket extends to become part of an external ‘skin’.
Also, although the boundary between the public and the private
is marked through her pocket and clothing forms, the process
of knotting that Kyoko uses means that again any boundary
is seen as being permeable. In the preface to Fashioning the
Frame, Dress Boundaries and the Body the editors Alexandra
Warwick and Dani Cavallaro suggest that central to their investigation
is ‘the idea that the body is both a boundary and not
a boundary, that it is ambiguous and that this ambiguity produces
a complex relationship between self and non self’. It
would seem that this book could provide a useful critical
context. I think maybe the difference with my own work and
that of Kyoko’s is that rather than blurring boundaries
where inner and outer space become merged to the point that
it is difficult to ascertain which is which, the boundaries
which mark difference between public space and private space
have to be recognised in order for the work to strategically
effect any inversion of these two binary terms.
In terms of practical developments, the
contexts of minimalism and needlework continue to inform the
work. I see two lines of enquiry that I would hope to pursue:
one is the handrail form, and the other is looking at the
possibilities presented by other features within the built
environment of public space.
The handrail forms which I made for the
Jerwood exhibition presented me with all sorts of technical
problems, indeed I have never before made anything that was
so seemingly simple but which demanded such technical accuracy.
The biggest difficulty with the column handrails was having
to work within a millimetre of accuracy to ensure that the
corners fitted, with all the ensuing problems of cutting mitres
on a circular section, handrail fixes that I had had manufactured
but which were all different sizes, and walls which were not
square! Added to this were the logistical problems of producing
work which was site specific when the site was a three-hour
journey away. Acknowledging these difficulties, I thought
it would be useful to explore the idea of freestanding handrail
forms and I am beginning to think of them more in terms of
athletic hurdles or the kind of temporary barriers which are
used to control crowds or fence off construction sites. I
am also thinking how easier it would be if the handrails could
be square rather than circular sectioned! Work which comes
to mind to inform these developments are Donald Judd’s
1966 floor based equivalents of his wall based ‘stack’
pieces and Robert Morris’s Untitled [Stadium] piece
of 1967 which combined the ideas of modular permutation and
provisional setting. I like the idea of having barriers that
can be rearranged and the way that different arrangements
can transform the space in which they are presented. I would
still like to use tapestry/counted thread work as a technique,
but I am still presented with the problem of wanting to create
larger scale sculptural installation pieces through a process
which is so time consuming that it makes them totally unfeasible.
The needlepoint kits and the idea of collaboration is something
that I will still have to address as a possible way of being
able to realise the work, but that will have to be the subject
of another project.
About five years ago, playing with ideas,
I made a shallow cast plaster block with buttonhole shaped
fabric inserts. The idea had come through making a visual
correlation between a row of buttonholes on one of my bags
and a bank of light switches that I noticed whilst sat on
an exercise bike in the gym! The connection at that time was
purely visual, and although I was pleased by the sample that
I produced, the work never developed beyond this one piece.
In the light of exploring other features within the built
environment, I can now see this as an area of possible development.
One of my concerns over the last few
weeks has been that whilst I am exploring these new possible
areas of development, it would seem that Kyoko was intending
to respond to my bag forms. What has happened through our
discussions, however, is that again similar to the bank of
light switches, through making a visual correlation, the bags
and buttonholes may be nudged towards something more specific
such as ventilation grills, rather than what they are at the
moment which is more of a general signifier of function and
of material culture.
I have enjoyed
our time together, and it is good to see that at the end of
this first phase of the project that we now have some common
interests and what appears to be an emerging rationale for
the exhibition and for our individual investigations over
the next few months. It also looks as if there will be an
element of collaboration. What I am now relishing is having
a bit of time over the Easter vacation to actually get on
with some making!
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Kyoko Nitta -
March 26th 2003
At the end of my residence.
It's very prosaic to say, but, time flies.
The 47 days have gone so quickly. On my arrival, I saw Maxine
wearing the same coat as mine, but in different colour. It
was a positive sign for me to start this project.
I very much appreciated Maxine being
such a hospitable host for me. She must have been so busy
with the college new term. As well as Maxine, I want to thank
Lesley who organised the project and also Ms. Kawashima who
always available to answer my questions.
I divided my residency term into two
parts because of my personal circumstances. For the first
stay in February and March, I tried to see and hear the new
environment. This is my first time to visit the UK, so it
is crucial for me to become accustomed to the culture first.
During the stay, I made two short trips to London, a couple
of day trip to Manchester with Maxine and I also managed to
visit Liverpool once. Again, the time flew while I was looking
around the museums and the galleries. This is how we started
our collaborative project. We started to make a plan for our
work, a week before my leaving. We set the details in a hurry.
I will begin my second residency at the
beginning of August. I will prepare in Japan, as much as I
can possibly do. One of the common points between me and Maxine
is; massive amount of tedious work. Once I get home, my industrial
sewing machine will be working absolutely non-stop.
I will focus on finishing the work in
Chester after the Summer.
I want to thank Chester College
for being a sponsor for the project. I will be coming back
in August.
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