It is interesting that the dynamic and relationship within a working-practice group starts to determine its own language. In a recent 3-month project with undergraduate and postgraduate Fine art students there was a notable difference between the conversational position of where we started and the newly formed language that we ended with at the end of the project. This wasn’t simply forming visual language; it was the language of and around the visual. It enabled the reordering of words so that they could hover around objects and images. These words would then stand in for or try and grapple with the relevant definition or description of a thing. The object that stood for a word and a word that suggested an object.
A group starts to trust the process, they develop ways to use words and objects to support there thinking and support their making. It is a hermeneutic navigation. I have decided that as I try and form the appropriate reflective route for this research process that I will anchor the preoccupations, theories, quotes or ideas with the visual. I am keen not to illustrate theories or ideas but to have visual, physical anchor points. Making concrete the ideas, grounding them. I rolled the plasticine wanting to make the sphere as perfect as I could before I put it in the mound. I had ordered the enamel pop tart tin online from America conscious of how the vessel itself framed the spheres and presented them ready for use. The cream surface against the grey, the perfect fit. The tin had a new function, no longer for novelty cakes but for the weighter plasticine, dense and full. The plasticine is primed. It is smoothed and pressed and held in its cases. It should feel precious, with a certain consideration. It is an intentional object made for someone, made for you. I am interested in the invite to touch, that by accepting the participant becomes active and has made the decision to engage. There is always the unknown and the risk of what this encounter might present but equally there is an implied generosity that this was made for you. 24 clay balls are ready. How do we see an experience beyond a photograph or a written or spoken description? How do we see or know it through a thing. A physical object or material. How can this stuff becomes reflective through a reflexive action? " I am handing out these plasticine balls, there is one for each of you. They are for you to hold, move, manipulate use or ignore whilst I am talking to you. " These balls are chosen and held. People laugh or roll them on a table, touch them against their faces to test the temperature of the plasticine, squeeze them between their hands or place them in front of them softly on the table. After a moment of checking what each other are doing, we begin. As I talk about the project, about materiality and touch, about objects and encounter the group are facing me but moulding the plasticine in different ways. They contribute and we enter a lively discussion of possibilities of practice. As we start the next stage of the session, the plasticine balls are collected. They are altered, mishapened, smaller, imprinted, stretched, dissected. But they are evidence of the last hour, they are a physical remnant.
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Kimberley FosterKimberley's practice as an artist is pedagogical, it doesn’t just reference learning, it plays with, embodies and encourages learning at its core. The objects consider ideas of collaboration and authorship, discussions about touch and encounter, and bring into active consideration issues of learning within social and participatory practices. Archives
October 2018
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