Wednesday 9 January 2013

studentmemories

First day back in London after the break and all is very good - proposal presentation review at Camberwell on the Book Art Course for this year’s full and part-time students. The was some really wonderful ideas at their very early stage and it gives us all the chance to propose, project, and support - it is in its intention a very supportive experience where the students must go away with their heads totally swimming with ideas, almost subsumed by the possibilities. Concepts and starting points such as Analysis of phenomena, Creating work that explores the idea of forgetting oneself, the receipt as a found but authored text and the idea of work haunted by the book.
Then off to Shepard's in Victoria to buy paper, for the unpicking and rebinding - sticking to the rule of only buying papers that are 'invisible' for the project was hard. As a student I spent most of my grant in this shop when it was known as Falkiner's Fine Papers in Long Acre and then Southampton Row - often going without food as a result! And now I have money to buy whatever I wanted ...... but i did stick to my rules.
Finally I managed to get to the Whitechapel to see a show of The Aspen magazine - wonderful - inventive - challenging - again my student self emerged - I spent a lot of time with these in the Special collection in the LCP library - they are now at Chelsea if you wanted to actually touch and turn pages so watching the films in the Gallery are a must. Downstairs is Giuseppe Penone 'tree piece' nice but obvious - I much preferred the copy of the river bolder in the corner. While I am there i must recommend the small show upstairs - Collection Sandretto Re Rebaudengo: Viral Research. The exhibition takes its name from a piece of work by Charles Ray and the rest of the work in the show is all black and white.