John Cage’s work engages us with silence and in the ‘Wait’.

His work embraces the idea of becoming ‘fluent’; when we learn a language by ‘voicing’ and using in context our new vocabulary until new sounds become familiar and we can dream in our new language. Waiting has its own vocabulary. It is sensing heartbeat, breathing…its usually a consciousness of others, we rarely ‘see what happens’ ..wait time usually exists fleetingly because we try to fill the ‘Wait’ time as though its an absence.

We are mostly unhappy to Wait and perhaps we see waiting as a waste of time.

My work for the Artworks Fellowship has largely been about looking at this ‘Wait’ in my working methods.

I make Art work in my head every day.

On the surface, I’m too busy teaching or doing the stuff I need to do, I don’t look like I’m making actual Artwork, but the ‘Wait’ is important to me; ideas sit in the ‘Waiting Room’ of my head and play ‘The Waiting Game’. I formulate plans and then when I have the studio time, then I make..it is, as Becket would say, a ‘siege in the room’; a significant period of creativity, I ‘Make’ after a ‘Wait.’

Open Lab, on July 14th 2016, an experimental day of learning, at BALTIC Centre For Contemporary Art Gateshead.

As part of my Barbican Paul Hamlyn Artworks Fellowship, I invited my own’Gurus’ …artists whose work has inspired my practice…. to consider my ideas and theirs …and to develop a way of working that creates ‘Wait’ …or soak /steep time.

In the picture above, I’m standing ( I think better on my feet!) Corinne Felgate is to my left followed by Eddy Dorrian, Jane Arnfield, Ruairi Mc Guinness and David Reynolds, Gary Malkin is manning the camera.

 

 

Ruairi McGuinness talked about the importance of sound recording and how his sound collages manipulate how we choose to hear and remember what we have experienced. His recordings register the time before/as we think and enable us to re-experience Wait.

Here, in the photo, he is looking at the Borderlands app on the iPad, having remixed our Stairwell Conversations remixing ambient sounds that are picked up by sensitive microphones.

He included John Cage in his referencing and the opportunity for listening acutely was a large part of the day. Thinking time/soak time/waiting to see what evolved time, was the underpinning experience.

I am conscious that my days are full, as a teacher I am timetabled as are my students and change happens every 60 minutes ; a change of people, activity, pace.

In the Open Lab, I wanted to let time happen naturally.

 

 

All the participants of the day did a stream of consciousness writing at the close. The writing is extraordinary and the resonance revealed a need for creative people to have space to think and wait.

Artworks advocates innovation in CPD. ‘Supported, Collaborative Wait Time’is an important part of my practice as a Teacher, Learner, Leader and Artist.

Gary Malkin made a record of the morning and some of the afternoon, the video is in post -production at present.

 

https://player.vimeo.com/video/123416907“>Christine In Conversation with Selina Thompson as part of Baltic plus archive.

 

In the Tate Summer School, I tried to bring in some Wait time and really try to push myself to think clearly, listen well and Wait to see what happened.

Live performance in Tate Modern Switch House 2016

Short video Pokemon flying dog / cef and Tom