Two Words (And an accompanying ramble on the importance of them. Or not.)

Summer is finally over, and I'm glad. My bi polar brain despises the extended daylight hours, the glare of the sun (on the odd day Northern Ireland actually gets sun) triggers migraines, and really incapacitating auras that have me feeling constantly motion sick.

My writing has gone to pot these past couple of months. Don't get me wrong, it's no lack of wanting to make headway on my part, just the inability to gauge what I'm writing dispassionately. Emotionally, I'm all over the place. I have a feeling peri-menopausal hormones thrown into the mix, due to my age, aren't helping matters.

Despite having mental health conditions which can sometimes be a tad debilitating, I consider myself very lucky in many respects. Many people with the same conditions are reliant on medications to ease the effects of the highs and lows. I use my innate creativity as therapy. I tend to write and compose/play music on the down, and dance and draw on the up.

I've been spamming the Members Picture Gallery, and my Facebook wall, with a high count of pics this last couple of weeks. It's my way of staying connected during this period of disconnection. I'm running manic but unlike some, I'm fortunate enough to realise that I am. The upshot of the mania, this time around, is the fanatical urge to compose pictures. This is not something I consider harmful to my being, (unlike errant spending) so I just tend to go with it to see where it leads me. Sometimes I'll look at a photo I've taken, and an idea occurs. Other times the concept comes first and I try to find a way to express it.

Another member asked recently whether we on the forum call ourselves 'writers.' I don't, any more than I consider myself a dancer, a musician, an artist... so what am I then? Everything, and at the same time, nothing.

I started a piece yesterday... it was one of those times when the concept—nay, not even so much the concept— the title, came first. That's a rarity. It was triggered by having been out for a walk when it was raining. When I got back home, I took off my muddy boots, and left them by the back door. They are army surplus. My mind got to thinking, 'mud' and 'boots' and the title just about slapped me in the face.

So... I went to work with my concept. I came up with what I thought was a rather pleasing representative image, (though it is still in the early stages) although I thought, like so much of my written work, the viewer might not see in it what I do. That got me thinking.

I did take art at school, but I left under a cloud at 15, so most of what I do and my approach to art is entirely self-motivated, and more visual than cerebral in nature. I love museums and galleries and, on the very odd occasion I now visit foreign cities, that's where you'll find me. (There and trawling around ancient ruins.) In the Members Picture thread, I recently mentioned the fact that I suspect my writing and artistic pursuits overlap like circles in a Venn diagram. My writing is obviously visually, (and externally sensory) inspired, so I started to wonder whether my art has a wordy element to it. I thought not, until this concept struck me, and I started to give consideration to how much the title of a piece matters. We've all seen the little plaques beside gallery exhibits giving the title, year of creation, artist, medium, etc.

Even though I knew what I was trying to say with the piece, I suspected it was too vague and a little too... ummm... hidden in plain sight? By that I mean that I incorporated an element that the vast majority of people wouldn't recognise. I thought I'd try it out on my FB page to see if anyone at all understood the significance of it. That was last night, and as yet no one has clicked.

So back to my title. If I need to spell out the intention of the piece using the title as a clue, does that mean I've failed? Do we really need the title of Dali's Persistence of Memory, in order to fathom what's it about? Or does the title sometimes serve as a road map of the piece, so that the viewer doesn't get 'lost'? This isn't something I've ever given serious consideration to. Is the title truly an integral part of the whole, or is that only the case when it needs to be? And does it then follow that untitled pieces need to be wholly self-explanatory, or purely aesthetic?

These might seem to be naive questions but, keep in mind, saying something through my pictures hasn't been something I've even attempted before. In art class I worked on fabric designs; repeat patterns, tessellations, use of negative space, and so forth. The thought of having to say something beyond the sheer aesthetic value of the piece wouldn't have even occurred to me. I wasn't a very mature 15 year old.

So, with all this in mind, here's the picture I'm working on.




Okay, so there are boots, a load of squiggles, and the recognisable shape of a heart. One of my friends came to the conclusion that I clearly loved my boots.



Not exactly the reaction I was hoping for, though I strongly suspected that it would take something of an enthusiast to make sense of it. Another friend was getting visions of The Elephant Man, due to the sackcloth texture and colour scheme. Uh... nope. (I don't think he even saw the boots.)

Initially, when I'd been staring at my muddy, army surplus boots, I'd remembered coming down with a particularly nasty medical affliction when on a hiking trip. With that name in my head, I thought of the worst possible examples I could think of, and an idea started to germinate. It was by sheer luck I found something incredibly visually moving to me that I decided to incorporate.




It's an aerial view of... well, this image is pretty self explanatory isn't it? It's an aerial view of war-time trenches. It this case, the Western Front, 1916. Even looking at it now, I get a strange feeling in my stomach. The heart stirs so many emotions. Indescribable conditions, so many lost lives. And yet there in the middle of it all, the symbol of courage and hope. I had to incorporate it, but I knew the likelihood of recogniton was slight.

The question I'm asking myself now is: Is the title enough for the viewer (who has never seen the aerial photo before) to put two and two together? Do two simple words bring clarity to a mud coloured mess? Like with my writing, I'm at a point where I just can't tell. We talk of creativity in building block terms, but also it has a descontruction counterpart, knowing how much can be sheared away before it ceases to make sense to anyone but the creator. I'm starting to think my failings in both writing and artistic endeavours share a lot of similarities.

What two words tie muddy army boots, my hiking debacle, and my attempt at artwork together?


Trench Foot.