In Canada, Collaboration and Wire Sculptures

I've abandoned a collaboration with a Canadian, where she was supposed to provide me with photos, which I'd use as a basis of stories. She wasn't really pulling her weight and her photos weren't really good enough. I'd entertained a sort of fantasy that I might be able show her rapidly how to produce better images, but that notion turned out to be false. Ergo, it was futile to continue.

There are a couple of the stories here- there were supposed to be eight.

This is often the way with collaborations- people enter them without really thinking about whether they are really committed or not, and it turns out to be a waste of time.

I think the appeal of collaborations is that it offers a relief from the fairly lonely business of making things, and you can believe that one person at least- your collaborator- is eager to see what you come up with. There is also the idea that the collaborator brings skills that you don't have to the table.

But in fact it is rarely like that- often one or other party doesn't deliver the goods, or is only really interested in the collaboration as a vanity project. And in my case, I am a much better photographer, so depending on her was a waste of energy,.

In that respect the experience was good, in that it has helped me see that I know an awful lot more than I realised.

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It is great fun making these little desk-top sculptures, balancing the bits of wire and photographing them. The act of balancing things is enormously pleasurable. I wonder why?

Where to?

I don't know what to do next. The roundels series was well recieved. I know I have to work in a completely different way for the next series of works. Beyond that, however, what exactly to do, or indeed, what precisely to make work about is uncertain to me.

I'd like it to be something connected to the plates of drawings found illustrating natural histories, however.

Here is another detail from the Rooundels Series. The entire set can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/28509471@N05/

New Ideas

I like to have a break after completing one body of work, before starting a new one.

I've a number of ideas knocking about.

1. To do a series of posters, with words and very bold images. The posters (cover pages) for the series are usually very popular and sell well. They would have lettering and simple clear images. One would be for Bristol Cars. I am not quite sure about the rest. I'd ake about 7.

2. To start on a series concerned with billiards. These would be cheerful green prints featuring billiard balls. Very charming and light.

The "Nerves" series was quite heavy and serious, and I want to do something light and fun next.