Push It : The Joy and Pain of Doing The Work

Knowing when to press on, knowing when to stop.

Currently I am experiencing a sense of relief. On Monday 24th May, with several hours left to go before the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition submission deadline, I pressed send. Spellbound is finished, and the die is cast. Wind back seven days and things were very different. Seven long days ago I was deep into the production of Spellbound, making progress, and simultaneously running out of time. I felt I was almost having too many ideas, and I didn’t know where (if anywhere) to include them in my never ending unfolding work. How many different ways are there to experiment with the same illusion? As many as you need.

How Many Different Ways?

I made myself ill at one point. I had a lunchtime Chalk And Talk session booked in last Wednesday and right from the start of the day I wasn’t feeling right. I tried to pretend it was nothing and the harder I pretended, the less like nothing it became, until about an hour before the session was due to start, my head was pounding and my stomach churning. I cancelled at what felt like embarrassingly short notice, and headed to bed. I woke later to some very kind, understanding notes, and eased myself back into work the next day.

Thursday morning I took a long look at my work. Realising I was closer to completion (is anything ever really finished?) than I had been allowing myself to think, I turned away from Spellbound for a while. Instead I occupied my time with other tasks – farm work, arts admin, walking. This continued for a couple of days until I returned to the drawing pen, feeling refreshed.

Crucible, Forest Bathing, and River Incantations

As I played with my concertina sketch book on Saturday morning – I enjoyed seeing how various pieces of the puzzle can be hidden and revealed. I added two more devices to the book, thinking of them as little keys, or maybe pathways from one spell to another. Intentionally simple, and a joy to draw.

A Springtime farming spell flanked by two keys

On Sunday I turned all the way back to the front of the book, and carefully slid a rectangular zen doodle behind the Spellbound title, before wandering to the far end, and signing on the inside back cover, where the memento mori [Latin: Remember that you have to die] resides. That signature ended the making.

Beginning to end

I showed the work to Carole. She admired it while I cried a few tears. As you know, I submitted it the following day. It took me over three weeks to make this. I’ve drawn on aspects of my creative practice learned over lockdown and way before – to produce something completely different. I pushed it. I pushed myself, the work, the ideas, the story, everything. It’s been a challenging experiment and whatever happens next I’ve made something adventurous, something I am proud of.

Footnote: We now have to wait until Early July before finding out whether or not this work gets shortlisted. More to follow.

Perseverance

I wasn’t going to write today. Instead I was going to do some other work – make a few calls, hustle a little and perhaps knock off early. My nice shiny new iMac had other ideas however – and I’ve just spent 3 hours 20 minutes on the phone to Apple while together we have tried and failed to get the $%@king thing working properly. I hate it when new hardware won’t play ball. I hate it even more when it is intermittent, either break or work damn you!

Today’s intentions are a bit out of whack, and it is tempting to just down tools and sod off down the pub. But let’s face it – that beer isn’t going to taste as good as it should after the morning I’ve had. So instead – I’m just going to go and grab a sandwich and start the day again. I’m going to persevere.

A few of you may know that Joe Gerstandt and I have a poetry thing going on over at Facebook just now. This week, we’re turning our poetic minds towards ‘Perseverance’. I penned this little offering yesterday and in view of how today has gone so far, I think it is timely to share it with you. And if you would like to join in our poetry game – look me up on Facebook and let’s play.