HOW IS IT GOING? ARCHIVE
6th june 2009: picnic time
I can’t believe it, but not a single drop of rain fell out of the sky on saturday at the picnic... and the forecast all week had been for heavy showers. I was up till past midnight on friday preparing food for the fest... loads of vegan and vegetarian raw salads and some indulgent ice-cream filled biscuits! had to scrub up some old deck chairs which were covered in “fur” after they spent the winter in a damp cellar! then it was down to the gardens in front of the riverside centre in centre, behind the town hall and on the bank of the river dour. everything was set up by 1pm and slowly people started arriving in drips and draps... and we shared our food with a friendly homeless man who was quite intrigued by this picnic scene in the middle of the public park! I hope everyone enjoyed it as much as I did!
14th may 2009: it’s up!
yes, it is done! the artwork is up and looking pretty darn good on the hoardings! go down to the site anytime (see google map)and have a look for yourself! there was a bit of last-minute flurry when I went down at 10 this morning and the guys were still installing the last few panels... just in time for the little press event at 11! the sun also came out in full glory for the occasion (had fears of it all being rained off yesterday!) it was good to see everyone’s face light up when they saw the finished work, especially the dover pride team. a moment to savour. the press also seemed to like it, so keep your eyes peeled for some nice pics in the local papers shortly. lisa hayward, the fabulous PR lady for dover pride, kindly gave me a pile of previous press clippings today which I’ve scanned and you can download as a pdf (1.1 MB) here: minD OVER matter_press.pdf
I will be organising a PICNIC for everyone who has been involved, probably on saturday, 30th may, but will confirm the date and location sometime next week! all smiles!
22nd april 2009: 2nd phase begins!
now I’m retreating back behind my desk to actually create the artwork... making compositions of the letters to write the slogans and getting to grips with all the technical stuff regarding the printing process... the slogans will be printed on vinyl sheets and then mounted on aluminium-backed boards, which will be installed on the hoardings around the construction site of the old bus depot... check out the exact location on this google map (which also shows the sites of where the slogans were created!). I’ve got until 1st may to finish everything... wish me luck and patience!
2oth april 2009: the worlD OVER
wow, this is a bit of a result... after 6 weeks of planning we finally got a date! I wandered along snargate street in the glorious sunshine looking for the definitive rope shop in dover and found the perfect place: sharp & enright, who have been selling rope and ships chandlery here for over 100 years. I then scouted out the area along the seafront for a good backdrop for writing the letters using the two different coloured ropes before knocking on rachel’s door at harbour house. rachel bushell has been so helpful in trying to find volunteers. I think it must have been especially hard given the tense situation at the port following the recent layoffs. anyway, she showed me into a meeting room and introduced me to two of her colleagues, yvonne and rob. I started off casually telling them about the project so far – only to surprise them by saying that I wanted to do the action right now... they thought this was just a preliminary meeting! rachel then went off to find a fourth volunteer and came back with ainsley. standing on the pebbles a few minutes later, everyone seemed to enjoy being out in the sun and the wind and took turns merrily writing letters using the ropes... I had my video camera in hand and asked them some questions about dover and the traffic situation and the countryside and regeneration and art... only to find that when I played the footage back later I could hardly hear anything! the wind had been quite strong and the microphone on the camera always seemed angled directly towards the wind thus distorting most of what they said! oh, dear... another lesson learnt the hard way! anyway, I have a feeling they got into it in the end and I hope I can deliver an artwork for dover that fulfils rob’s preference for ’art that makes you think’... check out some ‘making of’ shots!
14th april 2009: not glosseD OVER
this is a kind of post script re the 6th april: the day the sewing centre cancelled on the project! I went from trying to recruit a local W.I. group (that’s the women’s institute. remember the film “calender girls”?) to following a suggestion by the lovely editor of the village magazine of river, rivall, jean hoynes. she thought the knitting circle at the age concern riverside centre in dover might be just the ticket. how right she was! I met some lovely ladies on the 7th and we made a date for the following tuesday... I got a real kick learning that they were the same ladies who knit those cute little hats for the winter edition of innocent smoothies, where 50p from each bottle sold goes to age concern and they knitted 3500 little hats last year in dover!!! how cool is that?
so, back to the 14th april! I asked two more knitters to join us: first up, kim perry, a gorgeous ex-model, wonderful language teacher and wife of clive the amazing cellist! then local artist extraordinaire and lovely lady katherine moloney: you may have seen her mutant baby clothes or knitted granades exhibition at the charlton centre a year ago. anyway, they joined me and pam, joyce, muriel, sandra, sheila and joan at 10 a.m. at the riverside centre. my part of the bargain was to bake a carrot cake which we feasted on for breakfast! then we, well, they got knitting! what a bunch of amazing heroines: they knitted all 14 letters of the slogan so beautifully! we chatted about some of the lesser known history of knitting, which was initially a male domain - mostly fishermen and shepherds! between gulps of tea and mouthfuls of cake, we heard tales of what else these ladies knit for charity, from premature baby clothes to jumpers for kids in africa... they are such a valuable asset to our community and an absolute joy to work with! all hail the ladies: check out some pics!
8th april 2009: minD OVER matter
so, today was supposed to be a recruiting session... but I arrived down at pencester gardens at midday, thumping with a heavy bass line from the sound system around the skate park... there was a skate jam going on. yvonne holder, a youth officer at DDC, had invited me down. the sun was shining and there were loads of boys aged between probably 8 and 24 doing their stuff on boards, bikes and even old skool roller skates! I started discussing the possibility of scheduling a date for the action the following week (still during the Easter holidays) but realised that actually today was probably our best shot at getting everyone together: carpe diem, as they say! so off I trotted back home to get my camera and gear and returned soon after to find a small but willing group of 3 guys! I went about prepping the “canvas”: spreading a thin layer of white powder over a patch of grass, which wasn’t easy given the strong breeze! we then set about devising the best method for “writing” letters using the back tyre of martin’s bike... hm... not exactly brilliant. at times like these you have to exploit the limitations and use what’s at hand, which happened to be a twig! ;-) so a little doctoring with a twig helped to define the letters. soon charlie and his mate rolled up on their boards and struck some cool poses! check out some of the still images here. I’ve got a lot of pretty good video footage, which obviously translates the energy and movement inherent in skateboarding and BMX riding way better than a still photograph... more on that later!
4th april 2009: get DOVER it
today was the day of the first action!!! 9 brilliant kids, and some of their mums and dads, came to the step up school at 1.20pm to get involved with the project. sam and their lovely teacher jenny made it all happen - a big shout out to them! so, we started off sitting in a circle on the floor of the gym hall with a few questions, like “if dover was an animal, what would it be?” and “what is art?”... there were some really surprising answers! I took some video footage which I shall post once it is edited down to a deliciously digestible length. sam helped loads by writing down some of the answers on a big sheet of paper (that was actually a poster and shouldn’t have been used! apologies to my mum!) that was then transformed into a beautiful collage of drawings by all the kids while I was taking photographs of hands for the artwork. thanks again to everyone involved: it was a great pleasure working with the next generation of dover’s movers and shakers! here are a few impressions of the day: click here to see photos!
24th march 2009
here's an overview of where the project stands at the moment and includes my choice of slogan for each group. last week felt more productive, this week things aren't moving as quickly as I'd like, but that's just the nature of this preliminary period. the project is still on track and chugging along nicely, spouting little white puffs of steam!
1. HAND WRITING: "get DOVER it"
GROUP: drama group at st. richard's school, dover (approx. 10 kids)
CONTACT: jenny parks, step up school of dance and drama, based at st. richard’s
STATUS: initial contact was made, on my initiative, by sam adams, an art therapist and mother of one of the children in the drama group. teacher jenny is very keen to get involved and will host the action at the school (inside or outside or combination tbc) end of march or early april.
2. ROPE WRITING: "the worlD OVER"
GROUP: dock workers (approx. 5-10 adults from all dept. incl. admin, rigging, customs, etc.)
CONTACT: rachel bushell, port of dover/ harbour board
STATUS: rachel is having difficulties getting volunteers: I have proposed distributing flyers at the docks but she is not sure this is the best way forward. she is pretty sure she can motivate at least 5 people in total by the end of march. I thought maybe the cruise terminal might be a better bet. fingers crossed.
3. KNITTING LETTERS: "not glosseD OVER"
GROUP: knitting circle (approx. 5 adults)
CONTACT: toni, dover sewing centre
STATUS: I made a poster calling for keen knitters that was put up in the shop window: 3 knitters are confirmed so far. 5 would be the minimum no. required to knit the letters in one afternoon. toni is sure she'll get more than 5 people together by the end of march. the idea of meeting over coffee and cakes for a knit and a yarn at a local cafe (la salle vertes tbc) is welcomed.
4. TYRE MARKS: "minD OVER matter"
GROUP: skaters and BMX riders (approx. 5-10 young people)
CONTACT: yvonne holder, youth officer, DDC
STATUS: as contacting the local skaters at the skate park in dover through a DDC youth officer is proving quite difficult, I have made contact with a local skateboarder (ben, 18 yrs, lives in whitfield, studies in canterbury) who will be sending me contact details of other friends who would be interested in the project and is happy to co-ordinate the group. I think this might be a good starting point for establishing a group.
