Thursday 30 March 2017

In Canada

I am in Canada for 3 weeks it seems a long time and I miss my kids and all of you but it is good.
I am doing a talk about this project and I am trying to work out what is good about it. What I really like about the project is that the Critical Thinking Group really are helping us think.
Lots of projects do things but not so many have thinking time built in.
I am trying to convey how that is important in the talk. I am also trying to work out what is working on this project that didn't work before.
Here are some thoughts:
1. We are not too arty. In some projects I think we have been too arty, that is, art comes first. In this project it seems to be much better, it is about the sugar paper, the meeting, the focus on what we can do, practicing stuff and making it happen.
2. The balance is about right between different sorts of expertise. I don't want to get into an 'artists/not artists and university/ community' kind of dichotomy but here I realise we are all much more connected in different ways and our sense of shared purpose is good.
3. I am getting so much by having in built time to think. Like lots of people on this project, I started as a community worker and I am naturally a do-er, not a thinker, I even tend to rush around while I write as it is stressful sitting still. This project has built in thinking time in the form of the Critical Thinking group and also John and Katy.
That's it for now. Hurrah for us.
I couldn't find a picture of Canada though so I will just post a piece of art that I did for Steve which went in the Millennium Galleries in Sheffield for one day. I was very proud of it but Steve said it was like Ransom notes. It was about bid writing. My mum was impressed though.

2 comments:

  1. I like Ransom notes especially this one in fantastic mr fox https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4XjM097Tm8

    I also like this quote from Heidegger that nobody else seems to like Building and thinking are, each in its own way, inescapable for dwelling. The two, however, are also insufficient for dwelling so long as each busies its self with its own affairs in separation, instead of listening to the other. They are able to listen if both...belong to dwelling, if they remain within their limits and realise that the one as much as the other comes from the long workshop of long experience and incessant practice.
    (Heidegger 1962: p. 362; see also Latimer and Munro 2009).

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  2. Looking forward to hearing how it went in Canada

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