It's been a long time in the writing but finally the resources I've put together for -an -the artists information company are published online. I think they work as an introduction, hopefully saying there are lots of potentials but like everything in the arts they are sometimes not easy to find and when you do find them not always what you had in mind. The phrases from a recent print workshop me and Kate ran - "nobody is coming to save you" and "Be careful what you wish for" spring to mind.
Putting together the resources seemed to take for ages and has really made me question my ability to write. As one of the worlds many dyslexic artists I've often fancied myself as a bit of a writer, which is ironic considering it's such a struggle to make the squiggles add up to anything that resembles sense. Spell checks and computers have leveled the field, but it takes a long time and water under the metaphorical lexicon bridge to gain the confidence to press publish on the blog, send on the important email, or submit on the Arts Council portal.
I was doing the final proof of a book chapter I've co-written about participatory film making yesterday and in among the Guff I found this paragraph. I don't know how well it works out of context but it does hold a bit of anger and a bit of passion and it's this type of writing that I like when I read it back. Most types of writing however are a craft and like all crafts we need to practice and although it will never make perfect it often makes things better
'When
the time came to show the Rotherham film, the program of events had overrun.
The television provided had poor sound, the slide packs were assumed to be the
most important contribution to policy. They were familiar, they contained
information that would be useful, they were easy to act on or ignore. During the time between making the
film, many things have happened in Rotherham, and much of it revolved around
young people from marginalized groups not being heard or not being able to find
a voice. I don’t think the film of
shadow puppets and violence against young people, dancing, a man with both a
snake and a knife and police turning a blind eye would ever have made a
difference in the scheme of things. However, perhaps an emphasis on making
places for people to speak and people to listen that don’t get ‘fast forwarded
to the good bits’ (a quote from an academic keen to limit a long film showing) would be a step towards making different
types of representations and encourage a closer form of listening. '
The writing for -an- comes after 11 years of working as a visual artist in research and public engagement within universities, I have a lot of experience but getting it down on paper was not that easy, lets hope I didn't make many spelling mistakes and that people realise the ones I did make I did on porpoise.
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