Sea piano fret

It's a prelude and it's begun: I'm making a new piece, a collaboration with my resistant Mum (purist of the piano) and possibly Dad and Adrian. Getting back to my roots in video has taken a while (a number of years) and though I've shot and shot and shot stuff in that intervening period most of it remains on its original source tapes waiting for the time when (and if) it will be harvested, but its certainly not to be just now.

Now, this time, is urging another particular investigation into what fascinates me on many levels. The subject that has always been uppermost in my thinking, that of memory - cultural, societal, local - is requiring a re-visit. Time itself is asserting its presence.

Rea Tajiri wrote about a kind of memory which wants to be explored because it is a whisper of something hidden, unknown yet in some way known, referring to her cultural history and what is omitted. Laurie Anderson wrote in 'Words in Reverse' about the Cree Indians "I am singing the songs of my fathers... I never knew the words of the old songs... I never sang the songs..." I admire too the work of Vera Frenkel who used her imagination to imagine the grandparents she never knew.

My previous video work was about memory, my memory and not my memory. Sometimes it was just a memory, plucked from the space where my mind resides. A construction a la Boltanski or Marker.

Growing up I was surrounded by generations of family (cockneys) who played the piano and sang, it was what was done at that time (if you were lucky). Mum played by ear (no it didn't hurt apparently - yes that joke has been made before) from the age of 5, her hands so small that her fingers couldn't stretch for the melody and she'd use the side of her hand instead. She was much in demand and, to her eternal regret, everyone at that time said she didn't need lessons because she could play any tune requested having heard it only once. I love the stories she recounts of her playing in the dark during the blitz or even when the lights just went out.

The music was inside her head and her hands found the notes. Mum doesn't like the sound of her playing, because she says that when you hear the right cords as they are meant to be played from sheet music it is altogether 'better' but I don't agree, her music is a sound all of its own - of an era and a place, it is joyful and sad, uplifting and poignant. It is full of history and extremely visual. No wonder silent movies always had a pianist.

At the Barbican - another diaristic post

Feel impelled to write something about this event. Wellers Auction House collaborated with The Barbican (and eventually me and Greg) to put on an auction of Lost Luggage as part of The Surreal House. We went along with some trepidation - located in a room some way from the main event - what would it be like, how many would attend? Well. It was awesome. Wellers professionalism shone - they dressed a non-descript room and made it into something quite spectacular - Elvie, Cieran, John and Alastair (not forgetting Andrea, Mark and Chris who couldn't be present). The whole company consists of real visionaries. If I were to work for a business again they would be first on my list. Their ethos of inclusion is truly heartwarming and inspiring. Anyway, having shot the video which will be tightly edited to give a proper sense of the evening I can honestly say the whole affair was truly superb and people totally loved it (being carried away with the energy meant that I forgot to shoot the exterior of the building - hey but that's life on the wing). There was a real excitement and energy to the whole thing. People squealed with delight when opening their cases - it was like a huge manic Christmas. Someone found a man-size Superman outfit - how could Superman lose his clothing...

Resistance

What's all the flap about?

Just got back from a short and very local break. Seen the most bizarre and often self-centered behaviour while travelling. The lengths some people will go to reach their tiny goal, like getting to the breakfast table before anyone else, even if it means queue jumping a severely disabled person in sweltering heat and requiring them to wait for the lift a whole lot longer... To the man who did that: "Comment avez-vous pu faire cela?" commonly translated as "What's up with you, you selfish git" to put it very mildly.

Well, travelling in another age, several generations ago, things were very different obviously - it was a much more serious affair, even sombre some might say. Look at the trunks - heavy, hardy things able to withstand all manner of treatment, but also looking a bit like they would hold treasure. In the 30's Cecil Beaton wrote an article for Vogue: 'Maiden Voyage' in it he describes the arrival at his departure point "All roads to Southampton were busy with a stream of cars speeding to the Queen Mary. On the dock, a large yellow caterpillar, the awning gangplank, led to the new monster ship, where a Hieronymus Bosch inferno of activity, so strangely in contrast with the bucolic scene outside, assumed an almost terrifying unreality."

Thinking of treasure I have a 'handed-down' book (from my much travelled Great Aunt who was, in her time, a bit of a Flapper) "What to say in French" by Y. Fussot. The language both English and French is very beautiful and so much more serious than now (pardon the lack of ecute and grave accents): "Le voyage m'a derange, je me sens deprime. Pouvez-vous me donner un tonique?" "The journey has affected me, and I feel depressed. Can you give me a tonic?" And "What do you ask for the three rooms and the kitchen?" (I could list the entire book it gives me such geeky pleasure every time I refer to it).

Looking at this later bunch makes me aware that travel had become much less serious in this time, more often, more at the drop of a hat. Look at the cases (no longer trunks) they are smaller, less robust and seem to be smiling. In this period travelling abroad was accessible to a greater number of people and certainly it was quicker, however something quite necessary was lost in the process. Elegance, stature and decorum. Call me a romantic.

I remember as a young adult going to parts of Southern Europe and being beguiled by their differentness and over time seeing these places producing English breakfast, lunch and dinner and so on, how daft is that. Why go abroad if the only thing you will eat is English food? I even saw the archetypal male wearing a knotted hanky on his head and the flag on his arse. That was a long time ago. Maybe it's changed now (I hope so).

However, if our cases are anything to go by (and my recent experience) things have become more downcast, rather ugly and mean.

L'espoir et le desespoir sont freres.

Separation Coda

Anything is possible

Separation

finding this

the imponderable

In the process of new work...

Having filmed and filmed and filmed over a number of years, seemingly disparate subjects and not really knowing why or what could be done with them, some of them are suddenly coming together, meeting unexpectedly, it is shocking to me, why didn't I see it before?  But perhaps that is the nature of watching stuff.  Collecting it.  And in the collecting, perhaps those things begin to gather or repel like magnets.   Time must have something to do with it, the passing of it giving another dimension to thinking and experience.

I am surprised at what is gathering, it seems to me to be particularly articulate and yet it is still early days.  Very much a collaboration and it is strange because even though I am always collecting stuff there has been such turmoil recently that it is difficult sometimes to make anything concrete or coherent in the midst of it all.  To make sense of it. 

Perhaps it is also about going back to the medium that comes most easily to me.  I've resisted it for so long - a mystery to me.   Ironic that I've just paid my dues for a membership that might not properly be mine.

Me and that pink guitar

I am still periodically gazing at it through the window - while it sits there perched on its stand. It's not even expensive. And when it is gone I will miss it - might even rue the day that I didn't get it, as with the crimplene housecoat. Most likely though it would stand untouched and camouflaged by my wall, the colour of which needs changing. In my imagination we would communicate perfectly to each other - me and that guitar. My fret would meet its fret, harmony restored.

Today my attention was arrested by the sea. Its movement. An unusual dynamic motion. Fretting backwards, forwards and sideways, almost like a vast body of fish being herded just under the surface by a quick and frightening menace, back and forth frantically, in wide sweeping arcs. The tide was on the turn, surface almost flat, calm and light blue/green apart from these immense vibrating dark ripples darting about in the huge expanse of water. It was simultaneously beautiful and terrifying to see, to imagine what might be causing it. I should do some more research, the pull of the moon, the spring tides, wind direction etc.

I filmed it and see it in my mind played back slowed down so that every individual splutter of water is tracked.

It will soon be payday

I may yet get that pink guitar.  Or a handyman to mend my windows, create a hatch for my loft, squirt nasty stuff into the woodworm bored holes and build me some monster shelves.

My garden I have finally tackled although it took some doing.   It's like a mini rainforest.   I had to wear gloves, skinny jeans tucked into thick socks, a jacket zipped to the top, a beanie pulled right down over my hair and glasses for long range warning - late last summer the garden was full of albino spiders, they didn't need to hold up any huge signs with 'prohibited' emblazoned across - it was clearly a no-go area.  Now though it looks lovely, not the least bit threatening and soon there will be a bank of bluebells* blossoming.  There is something that tries to grow that reminds me of a triffid so I stamp on it whenever I see it - it is tall and thin and dark red - yuk.  I've got two small raised beds that have who knows what growing in them, they are going to be attacked and used for something recognizable, possibly edible, in the near future, before the albinos colonize them - there are plenty of rocks elsewhere for them to hide under.   At the back, behind the bluebells*, there is a very steep incline - part of the cliff-face - with tall trees, one has a long, long stringy bit hanging all the way down to the ground and I expect Tarzan to come swinging and yodelling through on it any minute.   It's all rather mystifying.  *As indeed is the plant that isn't a bluebell at all.  After all that - it WAS a bluebell, or lots of them - mixed in with Comfrey, so now I know and next year can look back at this and be reminded.

Bedlam

Life has been rather mad, sad and bad recently and I have been reluctant to write anything longer than a very short tweet, however the habit of writing stuff does still continue even if it goes no further than myself.  

...

If it was possible to really articulate the utter insanity of some of the things we have to do and/or are faced with then I am sure it has been done by someone more qualified than me.  There are days when I think that life is totally mad.

Am about to travel back.  I don't mean back, as in time, but back to the location I travelled from just a few days ago.  Back and forth, it offers many possibilities and I am collecting hundreds of them each time.

Travelling through London now has become a terrible chore.   The sheer weight of people that flock towards you is gruesome.  Why are they always going in the opposite direction or is that just an illusion?

However, that is not what I was planning to tell here. 

Is it through comparison that we shrivel at times, inhibiting our progress, because we feel it might not measure up?

One of my favourite books of the moment is Iris Murdoch's 'The Black Prince'.  

A few years ago one of the areas I started to explore was the reduction of the photograph.   Until it almost didn't exist, of course it might be more successful to not take any but that didn't seem to be the point, or the point was lost.  And it wasn't just to do with erasure.   The lasting resonance of colour and sound are what interested me.

Today I found a bright white bri-nylon shirt, size 15 and a half, still in its packaging.  It's been lying there sealed in that cellophane wrapper for probably bang on 50 years, the cuffs untouched by human hands after they were clipped to the cardboard body around which the shirt was folded.   I wonder who bought it and why it was never worn (having experienced wearing a nylon shirt to school it's not really that much of a mystery) nor given to, say, a jumble sale 49 years ago?  Since regretting not getting the crimplene housecoat earlier this year I was not going to let the shirt get away and paid my money - a pound.

Perpend.

Looks odd that word all alone up there in the title box.  I once bought a book designed for teachers of music and children that contained a section on rhythmic clapping, it was entitled 'Pass the clap' which didn't sound very nice.  Nevertheless my juvenile brain somehow appreciated it so I made it into a birthday card and sent it to a person who liked to come in and out of my life at leisure.

I hadn't realised how many cells we have in our bodies, anything from 50-100 trillion depending on what you read, biology was never my strong point, being squeamish, the thought of cutting open anything other than a celery heart makes me shiver.  As a youngster my dream was to become a nurse and I enrolled with the St. John's Ambulance and managed to pass 'First Aid' and 'Home Nursing' easily dealing with the dummies and making beds.  My mind changed a bit later, when my brother too enthusiastically engaged with a glass door (our house was built in the 1930's by Nash and all the doors were glass - gradually my Mum replaced the glass with hardboard because she understood children and glass don't really mix that well) he sliced his arm wide open.   After a mad dash to casualty I passed out as a reaction to all that blood.  Later the blood thing got so bad that I'd pass out trying to give it.

I don't understand the desire now in so many people to become forensic photographers - it surely must be a grotesque thing to do and not the least bit fun.

Thinking about all those cells boggles the mind but reminds me again of Thich Nhat Hanh and Mindfulness.  I was watching my hands and my fingers, the skin covering them, thinking about the ability to touch and feel and how everything all works.  How lucky we are while we are alive.  He's got a point you know.
   
Recently it was reported that there has been a link made between a rise in syphilis in young people and Facebook users.  A horrible thought.  Though why Facebook and not My Space?   Another nasty 'virus' lurking within our netbooks?   Obviously it isn't, it's not the technology's fault but what we do with the information we get from it.   In any case the idea brings me back to the question of my lonely and futile debate, what's best - the book or the screen?

Books don't seem to contain the same kind of threat although it does remind me of a dusty old book I bought for 50p called "The Lure of Love A Manual for future brides and benedicts" written by Dr Robertson Wallace, MB, CM who was also the author of "Indigestion : How to Avoid It" rather appropriate that he wrote both since one begets the other.   The "Lure of Love" had obviously been consulted as I found a pubic hair stuck within its pages,  which raises the alarming question: what deed was being performed to cause it to be there?  It's not like opening a treasured book and finding a much loved lock of hair, this one strand was stuck to the page by its root.

There is no date for the publication of the book but it uses phrases like 'the ribbons and decorations of the men', 'the cloying sweetness of Love's banquet' and all by itself 'Perpend' so it's fair to say the book and the pubic hair are early examples and that the problems of sex have not receeded. 

Afterimage..................................................

Too long spent looking at a screen, reading reading. Why don't younger people (makes me sound old - well today I FEEL old) like to read BOOKS - massive generalization I know but even those close to me who love to read have gravitated towards the digital book and screen, discarding their paper books as too cumbersome, taking up too much space, irrelevant - 'not as handy'. Why do they seem to prefer to read from a screen - the surface of which makes your eyes whirl and burns into the brain? And trawling through the net the content that can be accessed is so often surface compared with books. I presume this will change in time - more depth will be included as books become artefacts. The feel of a book lost to the glare of the screen. Flat, backlit, mostly untouchable, for your eyes only. It wouldn't be so bad if knowing this we knew that trees weren't still being the subject of slash and burn.

As I get up to pour myself a port and lemonade (something my Mum might drink when she was young - though not often being almost teetotal/tea-total - before the days of mass coffee drinking) my eyes blurring with the afterimage of the text on the screen it occurred to me that I don't get that from books. The afterimage I get from books is cerebral not retinal. Am off to bed with my book and head-lamp.

Random eyes

Memory, the intangible thing that is memory, has fascinated me for years.  The universal and yet entirely personal nature of it.  Mostly, we all have it in some form, but for each of us it's very, very different.  So much so that often our shared memories are unrecognizable.  Were I a psychologist that is the area I would research. 

Penelope Lively wrote that our memories (in this instance those of childhood) float untethered (by time), are 'recalcitrant'.   Chris Marker indicated that his filmic or photographic images acted as substitutes for his memory, becoming it.  William Boyd noted that 'our memories will play us false about our past' asserting that only our journals can be the real 'witness' through the passage of time.   The Witness.  Our recording devices.  Boyd also remarks how on reading his journals he didn't recognize the individuals he was.   Lively documents to an extent the struggle to reconcile the photograph with her memory.

Where is it located?  I could research it and find out, although vaguely remember doing that before. Somewhere long ago in my past... a memory exists of studying body language.   Long term memory recall - eyes top right?  Or is it eyes top left?  Why would our eyes move?  Are they attached by cords to the memories in the filing cabinets of our mind - do we re-see those things we are trying to access?  Through pictures or words?  But why in the top right (or left)?   Why not straight back?  We'd look odd it's true (our eyes really in the back of our heads - only the whites showing to anyone watching while we search for the memory - at least the watcher would know what we are doing) but that surely isn't the only reason.

Are our eyes acting like telephonists of the past - they always amazed me - how did they know which plug to link to which socket within that jungle of wires in order for the correct people to converse?  Do our eyes 'plug in'?

Recently I went to a jumble sale with my Mum (it threw us way back in time - are jumble sales back in vogue?) everything was 10 or 20 pence.  We found a crimplene housecoat - I wish now that I'd got it but having worn the fabric as a child I eschewed it at the sale, which is odd given the stuff that has made its way into my home.  Sue told me that it never frayed and was perfect for making into tiny doll's clothes.  Do I remember doing that or has her telling me created a false memory...

Some words are just so redolent of other times.  Crimplene is one.

Italian air

It is cold here, has been for days, weeks, months.  Apart from the odd sunny day that warms my flat and has me feeling oh so happy even if it means sometimes searching for shade.  Today was just such a day.

We English are rather feeble when it comes to the weather - any extremes have us moving sloth-like in all directions adding to the general chaos of our country.   Our infrastructure (personal and societal) struggles to cope if its exceptionally hot or cold (would that be more than a ten degree differential around seventy fahrenheit?) dry or wet.    I have the skin of an Irish girl by descent - it burns in the mildest of sun, turns blue in the slightest chill, white in the snow.   Hence my need to be covered at all times whether I want to be or not.   It seems especially unfair now that age has added deep red (sun or no sun) to my skin's colour range - although thinking about it perhaps not, my body has taken on the colours of my adopted country's flag.

In the process of trying to sort out some of the stuff rescued from a rubbish tip destiny I was delighted to re-discover a bottle given to me by a lovely Italian visitor last year.  Still in its unopened see-through customs packaging (and following the instructions means that it cannot be opened)

it seemed to have swollen rather.   It suddenly came to me that the swelling must be the Italian air that was originally trapped in the bag when it was sealed - why is it swelling, is it multiplying?  Whatever the reason had it not been growing it quite likely wouldn't have been noticed.   My delight in finding this expanding bag that I can't bring myself to open, containing a rather interesting bottle of Limoncello, was heightened when realising that my flat has contained warm Italian air all through the winter.

Reclamation

Although we live in these times of mass consumption it was still rather frightening to hear that according to a recent poll the number of people who believe global warming is happening and due to our behaviours despite so much visible evidence is shrinking rather than rising.    We are in danger of consuming ourselves.

Is it my sub-conscious working overtime since in the last year my collection of stuff that people would otherwise discard is growing?    Who knows when one might have a need for a lidded plastic bucket or a whatnot.   A 16" piece of 2x4?  A narrow inflexible wicker basket?

It was overwhelming recently on a visit to the tip to find people had dumped, ready for landfill, items that would make the Staffordshire Hoard look piddling.   Keith Arnatt's rubbish dump photo's would be unrecognizable at my local dump full of decent usable furniture.   With not even a meagre attempt at disguise, you know - like a broken back, no drawers or badly soiled seat. 

We used to have (and still occasionally do) an unspoken policy here that if you no longer wanted a thing you'd put it on the pavement and within minutes someone would take it.   My ironing board arrived in that way, not that I ever iron anything but someone might want to when they visit.   If on the incredibly rare occasion something is in need of flattening in my home it is neatly folded and sat on.

A younger me never appreciated my Mum's habit of bringing home the most unlikely of finds, ironically thinking they were fit only for a museum (or the rubbish dump).  Taste and appreciation strangely grew with age so I find myself busy collecting some of the things she has collected and a lot more besides because they intrigue me and perhaps to save them from extinction/destruction by the toxic seeping waste they might otherwise be languishing next to and/or contributing to.

What is it for?

Just travelled back.  Being away is always a little bit tricky.  It means not having easy access to the stuff that is usually around us, the collected stuff that might become something or other, the clothes that you might feel like wearing on a given day, or to tuck into the food normally available.  Not that any of it's important really.  Being away pays for the days at home.  So I'm not complaining just stating my thinking.  It does mean that my appreciation for home is greater than when it was elsewhere but always available.  It also means being exposed to even more possibilities for making work.

I've got several bits of work on the go, photographic stills and moving image.  None of these are fully resolved yet (if they ever truly are anyway) and any one of them could continue as long I do.   Chopping and changing, rather than focusing on one thing, makes each piece (series/sequence/set) take longer to complete.   And there is always more pulling at me, wanting to be noticed and/or recorded.  So that really there are endless pieces begun and unfinished waiting for attention.

This blog is unresolved in my mind, how to make it work for me - to suit my way of working...  is it slowly evolving into whatever it might become or is it a scrambled version of my thinking?  I can't tell.   It feels strange to have something undefined (other than it's name) hovering in the background expecting to be accessed and attended to, like a newly found distant relative.   Once the connection has been made can it ever be stopped?

In my ignorance I never really considered Picasso to be that great until seeing a retrospective that filled me with awe and excitement.  His work was superb.  Every day he filled his sketchbooks/ notebooks with ideas.  Driven to produce, to explore a line, realize a thought.   Playfully and seriously.   Looking and seeing, noting.  All those thoughts expressed, made visible and so very adept at it was he.  

Each day I continue to explore the ideas in my head and those that are presented to me even just through proximity.  One that I will not be exploring any time soon (if indeed ever) was the young businessman on the escalator trailing a suitcase and singing "Nick nack paddy wack give a dog a bone..." the darn song has followed me all the way home and is threatening to ruin my slumber.

Waving about

It is always so easy to be distracted by minutiae instead of getting on with the long list of more important things that require attention.  As each day passes the more important things become more urgent, another day closer to the absolute deadline and yet they still haven't been addressed.  All the while that small insignificant stuff keeps itself at the top of the list.  Why is that?

Last night I was lying in bed waiting for sleep.  A habit I had as a child was to hold one arm straight up in the air and wave it in a small circular motion.  Back to last night, I was a bit surprised to catch myself doing it again.  It reminded me of Foxy, not the Foxy of Merrie Melodies but Wolfie (his girlfriend's mother erroneously called him Foxy) from Citizen Smith (John Sullivan) played by Robert Lindsay.  But of course I had remembered incorrectly and although it was Robert Lindsay, it was as 'Michael Murray' in GBH (Alan Bleasdale) that he had the arm tic.  

Lying there with my arm in the air I noticed it looked rather thin - emaciated even - odd indeed since normally I am more concerned with the bingo wings that appeared overnight when I reached 40.  The lack of alcohol has definitely impacted on my weight and my face looks thinner in the mirror, however the amount of chocolate being consumed must surely be reversing the effect.   It must be an optical illusion (the thin arm) or as a result of gravity, the fat slipped down to rest on my shoulder perhaps?  Sleepy as I was it didn't occur to me to compare it with the other arm - maybe I will later, for now it's far too cold to reveal any unnecessary skin.

Hibernating

HAPPY NEW YEAR.
Yes, my greeting is a little late.  Feeling oh so lethargic and have for days, were I a brown bear it might be understandable.  It IS cold, though not in here where I'm sitting looking out at the snow falling again, gorgeous fat flakes and it's hard, isn't it, to really grasp that each of those flakes are unique?  Especially once it's settled and you're crunching through it.

In here I'm wrapped up and have been ruminating on so many strands of thought, a cluster of liquorice string like (or matted hair: a beehive, back-combing gone mad) thoughts that could do with being picked apart.

Inertia.

Knitting

Every time someone visits my flat I get them to knit a row and I note down their name, it passes the time.   The list is getting rather long.  Even the gas man and plumber contribute.   I regularly get people to quote for some work so that the knitting is done and it's even better when they come in pairs.  It started with just a scarf: knit one, pearl one but the rows got into a bit of a jumble with all these different people's differing ability.   The knitting got too knotted, the scarf unwearable.  

Mum loaned me her knitted nativity so that I could photograph it for the annual Christmas card and it got me to thinking.

I needed to get serious and get people to work to a pattern, patterns of people.  Creating a knitted people world, like a 3D Henry Darger. Everyone adds to my knitting and it's quickly becoming extensive.  Sometimes people surprise me, returning on the same day to knit some more under the guise of having left something behind. 

Visitors are now beginning to knit the surroundings for these creations:

Trees are next on the list, followed by the ocean and I need a sun to be done, the electrician might be best for that one.

Merry Christmas

No Zero

I wonder if Yves Klein made a habit of counting everything when he collaborated with Zero or while he was designing the above layout for their magazine Zero 3?  15 sweeps of limited lines should do for that page (7 for the first paragraph)?  Around 1961 he wrote 15 letters to Otto Piene who, with Heinz Mack and Gunter Uecker, was at the core of Zero.

Recently I've noticed an odd habit some part of my brain has developed.  Counting within actions without thinking: e.g.  watering can needs 10, plants need 6 each,  the kettle 7 or 9,  a hot water bottle takes 8.  Gargling 30.  Teeth 180.  From my last home to my present 422.  15 stairs followed by 6. 
A normal walking in-breath 4.  A swig of tea 3.  While the counting is happening everything else seems to be perceived as normal, the numbers are parallel.  I can't even blame my numbered days - they finished after only 4, although perhaps aspects of all my days are numbered (separately from the obvious).  And why count such banal tasks anyway?  Clearly these activities don't take very long, and I am left wondering if the counting would continue during a marathon, what a horrible thought.  Worse is the possibility that should a mistake be made I'd have to go back to the beginning. 

It might be because most of the time I choose to live without extra noise permeating my space.  Am I filling it with these paltry numbers rumbling along in my head instead?  If the inside of my mind is scraped will everything be perched on a background, a wallpaper, of low numbers?  A resonance of Bachelard's walls of sound, echoes of time repeating endless counting.

It reminds me of John Cage in 1952 with his 3 movements that made 'Four, thirty-three', counting certain moments while actively engaged in something else - in that instance listening.

They weren't Edible Panties at all

I spend my life being conned by what I thought I saw and being reminded what a poor thing memory can be.

Getting back to the place where edible panties were spotted, I was horrified to find that they weren't panties at all but PANTS.  As in: mens. 

Clearly I'm still very naive (stupid) because on first seeing the machine I imagined them to be something a woman might wear (if she'd had a skinful).  No.  They appear to be boxer shorts, I definitely didn't buy them - the whole thing seems much worse if you have to eat another person's pants.  In fact every item, with the possible exception of one, was for man.  It's terribly odd.  Does the men's loo sell equivalent stuff for ladies, spare hands for example - I shall investigate next time.  

There were two teenage girls (were they as old as 15?) peering at the items on offer, I would guess the machine inadvertently and dubiously has some kind of severely limited role in sex eduction.  They lost interest pretty quickly and used the top of the machine to balance their camera phone while they climbed up onto the basins to pose for self-timer self-portraits - so the machine has yet another use.  The images of them in the sink were probably whizzing around the airwaves before I got home.

What with discovering the purpose of the pants and the weather being foul it was a fairly dismal weekend.   To avoid boredom it seemed preferable to stay in and devise different ways of looking out.

 

But the sky turned black and the moon came out which signalled my need to return north to work.

Blown in and Vanished

I was extremely annoyed to discover how effective Vanish is.

It's a foul night tonight and it was just such a night more than a year ago when my relaxation was briefly shattered by a crashing of something immediately outside.  Investigation revealed it to be a print of a painting, the frame (which followed a short while after the print) narrowly missed knocking me out cold.  Strange that they came separately to the same place - my place - deposited by a huge puff of wind.

Up until that moment I'd never heard of Tony Klitz.   This soaking wet, smoke encrusted, print of London (known in some parts as 'the smoke'), and Eros in particular, was also signed in biro which raised my interest ten-fold.  Googling gave me quite a bit of information and I eventually made contact with the family who very kindly gave me some more, including why the print might be in this area but not how it might have left the smoke-filled room from whence it came.

One of my brothers loves London and I decided to clean the print up a bit and give it to him.   I don't know what possessed me to put the print in the bath liberally filled with Vanish and water.  Vanish it did, completely, apart from the paper it was printed on and part of the smoke.  

Though the print was gone, not all was lost, Mr Klitz's relative with whom I'd been communicating knew this area as a young girl and remembered the bathing pool especially.  She sent me a postcard that she'd kept all that time, another one for my collection.

 

The bathing pool has long gone - filled in with the rubble of the changing rooms and diving boards, a lone pillar and a slab of concrete sit like a headstone - here lie the remains of the pool.  The persons responsible didn't need Vanish to achieve its effect.  More recently the chalets have been demolished too, replaced by sheds masquerading as beach huts.  These lack any mystery or grandeur and look daft lined up ronsealed in uniform rows.

I've immersed myself in many things over the years, this bathing pool only once.   Smoking was one - but like the Tony Klitz print, I'm cleaning myself up, occasionally inhaling nicotine through a plastic tube that looks a bit like a cigarette holder, my carbon monoxide reading reduced from 35mg to 6 in a week.  Much to my surprise I'm nearly a bona-fide non-smoker (a reading of 5 or below denotes this).  The feeling of mortality has weighed heavily lately and the idea of having to redecorate the exceedingly tall rooms hung around me worse than the smoke that was promising to cling to the walls. 

Blown away

Did you know that a Fan fan club exists?  It does.  Fan's of fans have got together.  Who would join such a thing?  Yes I know, fan holders.  Of museum pieces and especially the HMV fan heater which caused me some confusion when remembering what HMV stood for.  My HMV is another thing that doesn't work, although my Belling bed warmer does so my feet are always warm as toast.

Here is another 'borrowed' photograph - it is of the HMV variety - isn't it gorgeous, must be the 'big boy' of fan heaters and someone clearly loves it - mine is the more usual bakelite kind.  I can't decide which is preferable, sparkling chrome - or cream and brown plastic.

I've been pondering the notion of the photograph (this is a regular occurrence that never results in a fixed position).  Between the poles of document and idea.  It's multiple uses and functions, the real and the fake and the fake-real or real-fake.   I wonder how many photographs have been taken since its beginning?  How many have been destroyed?  How many have changed lives for the better or worse?   It's rather sad as well as humbling when you find an album full of portraits/snapshots for sale in a junk shop - it was important enough once to be bound until time devoured it's meaning. 

Numbered days

Apart from the usual way of knowing what day it is, that of the calendar, for the last few days (four to be exact) mine have been numbered separately by a pill packet.  So the 13th was the 1st, 14th the 2nd and so on.   I've yet to look what it was originally designed for - perhaps its current purpose?  A previous drug, withdrawn before me joining this course was apparently designed for depression but had a curious side effect, people didn't want to smoke, and so some bright spark started to issue them as non-smoking pills.  It didn't last.  There were dark mutterings about it on the course.

This drug isn't a nicotine substitute, it changes neurons in the brain (flicks a switch or two) so that the desire to smoke is lost - all you have to do is kick the hand to mouth habit. 

I started in the days when it was still sexy, even though there was plenty of evidence to the contrary, halfway through my childhood.  It was everywhere, the manufactured seductive nature of it screamed out of every screen, of every interaction every day and I became another sucker, inhaling it all along with many others.  

It took me a week of looking at the packet before gaining the courage to begin taking these pills.   Feeling like one of Oliver Sacks' subjects (who knew what miracle might occur?).  One a day (a quarter of the final dose) for the first 3 days, followed by two per day and then two at double the dose from day 8.  You continue to smoke in the first week and set a day to stop for week two.

From day one (the 13th), each night was restless, with plenty of wakefulness and vivid dreaming.  I stopped them Monday (halfway through day 4, still only at quarter the regular dose) after blanking out momentarily in the middle of the day while driving.  Maybe it was a co-incidence but it would be horribly ironic should the thing that's supposed to save me contributed towards my demise instead.  I hadn't realised that I started them on Friday the 13th.

Being called away

Today it is blowing a gale, the sea is high - so high it could be meeting me on the balcony, except I'm not out there. 

25 years ago almost to the day John Stonehouse did a co-incidental 'Reggie Perrin', leaving his clothes on his balcony and walking into the sea - he wouldn't do that here right now - his clothes would be in Dover joining a ferry bound for France within minutes.

It is impossible not to watch people when they come into your orbit.  And it is equally difficult not to get the jitters when you are watching someone do something a bit risky.   The desire to intervene is huge.   The need to watch becomes more urgent.  

The man was there a short while ago, standing precariously on the concrete groin opposite my window.  Buffeted by the wind, his raincoat flapping madly, he was showered with spray from the waves that were bigger than him.  I watched as he occasionally looked from side to side.  From time to time - possibly in a rather pointless attempt to look normal standing where he was in that extreme weather - he swung his arms about his torso (as people prior to beginning Tai Chi sometimes do) and circled his head around his neck.   Once or twice he glanced behind as though aware he was being watched, Rupert Sheldrake describes it in his book 'The Sense of Being Stared At'.   I was watching, fully visible through my window, camera jammed to my eye (it acts like binoculars) like Harry Beech in Graham Swift's 'Out of this World' - until my phone rang and distracted me for five minutes.

Hopefully he is now safely indoors, lounging in front of the fire, feet up and relaxed, with not a thought in the world for the very odd person who was watching him enjoy, at close quarters, the wild sea.

Weird day(s)

I've been mulling over a rather strange event, having a large family means this happens fairly often.  Although this one ranks up there with the strangest, if not THE most odd.  We are rarely bored because there is always one of us contributing to the drama of life in some way or other.  Occasionally it's not us directly - someone will barge in and implicate us.  So much so that the tv hardly gets watched - why bother - it's all happening here and now.  Time is rarely slow and sometimes it would be helpful if it was.

Madam Blavatsky I guess would have an answer to my question, though it might be murky.  Krishnamurti would probably tell me to answer it myself.   What would Ken Wilber say?  Possibly suggest a brain scan, one that would show the effects on the brain of meditation.

One of my aunts was a spiritualist and that probably kindled my interest in the unanswerable.  I've experimented with all kinds of things since - I feel there are always more questions than answers and maybe that's healthy.  It tells me that we don't know much really and it makes things more interesting while we strive to find out, presumably is also why we have scientists seeking to prove things. 

Theosophy was an important influence on Kandinsky, Klee, Brancusi, Mondrian and Malevich, among others.  Also on Hilma af Klint (see Adrian Searle's Guardian article 2006).

Kandinsky taught at the Bauhaus at a similar time to Itten, Klee, Albers, Moholy-Nagy and Schlemmer - I wish I'd been there.  Hilma af Klint worked separately in Sweden seemingly unaware of the spiritual shenanigans of the teachers at the Bauhaus.
  
And the mystery of the last couple of days?  That will probably never be solved.

Going South

Glenny's illustration appeared in Vogue in the 1930's accompanying an article by Mrs John Buchan.  Those days where women were frequently known by their husband's name hung around for a long time, still existing even in the early 80's the first time I got married.   Their demise was well and truly finalized once we were no longer considered to be chattel by the tax man (or woman) and as a consequence were taxed independently.   But that's not the subject for today and it all seems a long time ago. 

Since brutal circumstances forced me to virtually ditch my car a few years ago - other forms of travel are necessary.  One is the bicycle.  Today I promised myself that I would begin to edit the footage that Sue had copiously taken, but I've been distracted again.  It is at least on the same subject.

Living on the flat makes cycling a rather easy and excellent thing to do (especially if it's not too windy).  I was intrigued by an ad for a saddle circa 1900:

Constra?  Constrain?  The ad says that it's perfect for both sexes, injury is impossible, it is ornamental and smart. As well as being adjustable to the size of rider.  I wonder what medical condition made people give up and then begin again due to this particular saddle, what was accommodated in its gaps?  Where has the thing gone?  Why isn't it still made, given its claims?  Did it adjust itself while being sat on?  And cause injury?  To what?

Meanwhile on the opposite page, if the saddle didn't work :

And Frith would come along and photograph you either on the bike or in the bath-chair, failing that provide you with a beautifully framed image of somewhere else in the world to take your mind off your ailment, they must have been one of the first stock photo agencies.  Turn over the page and there is the much needed cycling route from London Bridge.

It makes the effort of walking pale into insignificance.

CanCan

Some days I wonder about the human race.  Are we here to hinder one another or are we here to help each other? 

There appear to be some people who seem to take great delight in just making things harder for everybody else.

Train ticket collectors for example.  Not the ones who go through the train checking or selling tickets - I generally find them to be ok.  No I mean the mean ones standing at the gate in full regalia.  When their uniform has gone to their head.   Isn't it a given that when travelling - a person is often a bit stressed, with crowds to fight through, bags to (wo)manhandle,  trains to catch, connections to make (other trains to catch).  Stifling, sweaty, dirty airless air to negotiate.  And then you get to the gate, the collector is talking with a colleague and pretends not to notice the queue forming and finally: "You can't use this ticket before 10.30" or "Just you wait a moment" or "Where's the other part of your ticket" and "Why don't you just lick my boots and then I might let you through" (I made that up).

Anyway they are can't people.  I met another one today in a charity shop of all places (usually they are brilliant people) - no I was not buying the duck.   I tried to buy a collection of piano music using a £2 coin given to me by another charity shop (still not the duck) - the lady wasn't having any of it "I can't take that it doesn't look real - it's too shiny".

My parents are brilliant - "there is no such thing as can't" we learned early on (go back to previous post of Seven Sisters 'Exfoliation' - they were used to the underground looking like that - ticket collectors were pleasant, friendly people then) and they brought us lot up to be fairly decent people (no easy task).  However, I discovered that in their younger days they'd gone to Paris and to the Folies Bergere.  Hmmmm.  I have a superb pair of brass theatre glasses given to me by Mum that I am convinced still has one of Dad's eyelashes glued to it from that time. 

Josephine Baker in her banana dress probably wasn't there then as they are not THAT old.  Although she might have been because she was definitely a can person.   Ms Baker was a tour de force in her time, apart from working in the Folies Bergere and Vaudeville she was active in the US Civil Rights Movement, was given a Medal of Honour for her work in the French Resistance and was adored by Picasso, Hemingway, EE Cummings, Alexander Calder and Castro to name a tiny few.

Just up the road at the Moulin Rouge the CanCan was in full swing.  It wasn't just the absinthe, they also had their own spirit.  No Edible Panties needed there.

Price comparison

Exfoliation

I remember a time when bank cashiers were called tellers (is that purely from my early visits to the US?).  Perhaps it was because at that time they would tell you whether they could let you have any money.  It's funny what your memory will do.  I'd got it fixed into my mind that I had a postcard showing Bank (the underground station), it's odd to have a postcard of a tube platform - was it for tourists to send abroad or an alternative reminder for Londoners?  Why wasn't it sent? Why send it? Why buy it? Why keep it? On digging it out and looking at it more closely it's not for Bank at all but a view of Seven Sisters.  Is that the Queen standing in the foreground?

Along with millions of others I've walked the Seven Sisters, thinking it would be a gentle 8-mile stroll (that's what I'd been told) clearly my research was lacking as it turned into something more like 18.  Starting at the edge of a village, at the corner of a field that I would never ever consider mowing because it reached up to the sky and it was a hot, hot day.  Traversing the field took an age.  Walking through one of Brandt's locations, Cuckmere Haven, was delightful though STILL relatively at the beginning of the walk.  I'm a walking weakling, give me the flat any day, boring but flat.  Or my flat.  Instead, my body inches away from the chalky grass up-hills like a downhill skier at Kitzbuhel, bruised face stretched into a smile to hide my horror at what I'd agreed to, being totally unfit.  The sight of the chalk bleeding into the sea made up for a lot, although vertigo had something to do with my needing to crawl so my legs wouldn't fly, of their own accord, over the edge.

Jem Southam makes work at Beachy Head, on the shore.  Setting up his 10x8 camera on the beach and creating beautiful visual documents of the cliff deterioration (does he go by boat, surely not that walk that exfoliates your face followed by a dance with death abseil downwards?).  I like to think I have a wall that cries out for one of Jem's enormous prints, that way I could look at the sea and look at the beach of Beachy Head without going outside, or walking that walk.  It's big enough this wall, even with the piano.  Art and music - well - art is music and vice-versa.  So maybe they'd go very well together.  But that perhaps is for sometime later.

Being 'up north' again means having the tv on to while away another long evening in a motel.  I noticed a very naughty ad-man has encouraged a bank to produce the oddest ad using animated figures that have an uncanny likeness to the Chapman brothers' early work I referred to in an earlier post.  If that's not the case then maybe they just came out of Giuseppe's workshop, either way it's bad news.  Do they realise?  The bankers I mean.  Someone should tell them.