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Dust collecting

Methods of finding and collecting dust.

simon starling

Simon Starling is interested in the processes involved in changing things into different things. He won Turner Prize 2005 for the hut below, below. Shed boatshed. He dismantled a shed and turned it into a boat and he sailed it down the Rhine. a buttress for modernity, mass production and capitalism. Do all works have three themes in them? It seems that way 2 me.

Tom Phillips

Tom phillips said "When theres hardly anything left theres always a mark". He made a drawing as a film. It was of nothing in particular. He completed the drawing and then began to rub it out. Gradually he was left with the" scars of history" and a pile of dust on the floor. Some of it is charcoal, chalk, oose, food fragments, body bits, sawdust. These were all part of something bigger at one point. Dust marks are interesting. Repeating marks in different ways, namely different versions of the dust marks. I suppose there is also the idea of mortality in dust. A reminder of were we will ultimately end up. Phillips talks about the park bench being an emblem of mortality - people sitting about waiting to die. This got me thinking about looking at my dust in new angles. Im thinking that wether or not my dust is art; the process involved is art.

methods of research

1. Books

The Poetics of space by Gaston Bachelard, The Dust of Death by Oz Guiness, M/E/A/N/I/N/G, susan bee and Mira schor.

2. Journals

Close Up, Dawn Ades and Simon Baker. Art World, 7th Oct/Nov 2008

3. slide

"The Breeding Ground of Dust", Man Ray

4. archives

5. e-mail

6. talking to staff, students, people

7. Lectures

8. Internet

9. Photographs

10. blog following

11. Video - Tom Philips

12. Looking at other work in studio

13. inspiration from other blogs

14. experimenting in studio - with lamp, energy from duster, blowing, rubbing, mark making, containing, wall banging.

My Philosophy of Dust

Relating to dust, and by "dust" i dont mean clatty, minging, durty stuff. rather I refer to it as the stuff that the human race is made of; genetic make-up and DNA. Which leds me to the idea that one is a distillation of their environment going right back to the begining of time. eg. Darwins theory of evolution or in a religious context,or some other theory. We all started from something or other and From that we have become...therefore that dust is our dust and our dust is from that which came before us. Furthermore, If dust is isolated to a specific area eg. the mack building and people who have traversed the corridors and studios etc.. in the distant past have left remnants of themselves. Therefore by and large they are still here in a sense.

diary for project

4/2/09
arrived extra early with ideas for hanging dust. did it. tidied desk sorted out sketchbook a bit. attended lecture. back 2 studio, more tidy up. blogging at home. crit 2moro 11.40am.

3/2/09
Did drawings, rubbed out and collected dust in bags, inspired by Tom Phillips video. Tried making dust fly off duster - worked a bit. Made dust catchers for this process from stuff I moulded earlier in project. Asked painters if I could place dust catchers below paintings - will collect tomorrow. Spoke to Paul, now im thinking how to take this dust to another dimension. Lifted dust from various things in studio ie. door, bin, wall etc..using a small sketchbook. This made a variety of different marks with varying tones of grey. Some colour came off some items. Stuck masking tape diagonally across the space between the 2 walls at a corner. This created angled shadows almost like a pyramid. Added poofs of dust to some of the tape and a napkin I used to clean dust off chair. Sketching at home - ideas for installing dust. Blogging.

2/2/09
Spoke to tutor about research, got a video. Spoke to jake bout fotography student whose degree was foto of some piles of dust. Tidied work space. Re-arranged wall. Tried out blowing dust at a lamp, never worked. Need a different type of lamp. dust Tried bangning wall to see what dust I could create - not very much. Collected my dust catchers from around basement - result 2 had dust in them. Made duster make a mark in sketchbook - I autographed it on its behalf. Got a few others to make their mark. Blogging at home and watched video.

1/2/09
blogging at home, Thinking about wether or not my dust is art?




29/01/09 - Studio Talked with tutor. I told him everything I didn't want to do then realised that was exactly what I was going to do. Went about skool asking people to make a dust mark in my sketchbook and autograph it. nipped into archives to ask about info on past students etc... Library for a wee bit of research. Collected more dust took fotos. Back to studio to put dust in bags. Stuck some "dust catchers" at strategic places around skool. Will leave them for a couple of days and see what happens. Blogging at home.

28/01/09 - H&C lecture avante garde, made me think about about conveying a message in work.
Studio, mostly chatting bout work and getting involved with others. Made some wet paper moulds and re-arranged research on wall. Did the BBC interview upstairs.
Blogging at home.

27/01/09 - Studio & library. Nipped into CCA to see project 2891 had a chat with artist and his wee baby. e-mailed Peter from Archives re: access to really old dust.
Blogging at home.

26/01/09 - dust collecting and referencing it. Blogging at home.

24/01/09 - Attended Hapless, helpless, hopeless - its about visual language and confusion.
Blogging at home.

Thot for this week - dont poo poo ideas!

Autographs

Heres the thing, I've been collecting peoples autographs this morning. From Tutors, students and house keeping staff, visitors, etc...

Basically, everyone that works, studies, visits the building becomes part of the building. Part of its history. With the avant garde philosophy which goes something like - a classless system, higher standards for all not just the popular ones- I chose to get everyone and anyone to autograph my sketchbook. Its not just the students that keep the school going. There are various elements that turn the wheel of GSA each have an important role in the grand scheme of things.

thots & feelings and a lecture

This car with its Mondrian style paint job is symbolic of avant garde - moving forward. Moving away from dead values of society, but who choses?
I've been getting a bit of OCD about all this dust. I am very aware of it on my hands and I keep washing them. I scrutinise areas and find dust everywhere. When I look around a room the first thing I notice is the dust - this is unintentional and its making me feel a bit weird. Then lo and behold the H&C lectures started talking dust...wow...the stuff is everywhere.

Francis spoke about "The Bauhaus". part of the mindset was a fear of dirt and dust. Shared environments create combinations of dust. Whose dust? It creates unhygeneic diseases like TB. She mentions a hospitalisation of society and the environment. Avante Garde mentality was a campaign against dirt and squallor. Designers produced gleaming surfaces. AG texts were idealistic and psychological. Bearing in mind this was in 1919-1933 tho still relevent today.



I liked the idea of Mondrians "balance" and sense of unity rather than heirarchy. Seeing the world as different elements as oppossed to a stratification of class. Of raising standards for everyone not just an elite group. This level of thinking was revolutionary at the time. It makes me think about the impact artists have on society and how their message can play a part in social change etc... It seems very political for my wee mind. But im well interested. Im trying to think about what my message is.

the site... the place...the context...

site - mackintosh.

place - near right hand corner as u walk in studio.

context - historical, evolutionary, organic, written word, light, kinetic energy?

What message - I wonder...something is formulating within i've just not hooked up properly with it yet.

The dust has a message and its part of life, a mixture of different elements.
These elements are people, fibres from an array of stuff housed within the building. The dust created by all of this is the remnants of the past. If we got rid of it and cleared the entire building in an avant garde kinda way sparkling and clean. It would be like a new beginning. The dust would reform and another time-line of history would start. Also this dust has a unity about it. A nomadic essence. Whats its purpose?..... I like the idea of Mondrians concept of elements - which encompasses things like unity, spiritual wellbeing, higher standards for all. This makes me think about Maslows pyramid - certain basic needs must be in place before humans can thrive emotionally, spiritually. ie adequate food, shelter and clothing. then people can start thinking about higher ideals...

words relating to dust

floating, silent, soft, delicate, gentle, falling, settling, collecting, clinging, drifting, cloudy, choking, suffocating, debilatating.....

Nomadic, wandering, noiseless, quiet, still, voiceless, velvety, blinding...

Flit, float....

Dust
floating silently
drifting aimlessly noiseless
Still quiet
Dust.

In the words of Matt Lucas...

Dust?
Anyone?
Dust?
No?

art I like relating to this project

This image is in outer space somewhere. It is a combination of gases and dust - I love the energy in it. It makes me think about cheryl fields kinetics workshops.


extra solar beta picture.
man ray dust breeding.
burning man Temple of Honour.
mocoloco.com



Hoover dust,pva and wire.

getting down to business

Im starting to think ideas now. I have chosen not to entertain them too much until the artisits workshops on Thursday. This way I wont be stuck in an idea. Its like waiting
till the very last minute to create the piece - whatever that will be. there is a feeling of suspense in the air and I cannae wait to see what will transpire from this project. Im disciplining myself not to jump in head first. I need to cover the avenues I have taken in enough depth and then.......In the words of Mel Gibson in Braveheart "WAIT".

What Im thinking bout DUST

There are various methods of dust collection.

1. Cloth dusters, feather dusters, sponges, using fingers.

2. Recepticles for containing dust. bags, jars, a glass lamp shade, sellotape, paper, laminate,

A portrait of Francis Henry (Fra) Newbery (1855-1946) painted in 1913 by Maurice Greiffenhagen (1862-1931).

Maurice Greiffenhagen was an English painter and illustrator, who turned increasingly to portrait painting from 1900. He taught at Glasgow School of Art in 1906 at the request of Headmaster and Director Fra Newbery.

Born in Devon, Fra Newbery had studied art in Bridport and London. He taught at the National Art Training School in London until in 1885, at the age of 30, he was offered the post of Headmaster at Glasgow School of Art. Under his guidance the teaching curriculum was overhauled, important artists such as Charles Rennie Mackintosh were nurtured and the school attained an international reputation. Newbery also oversaw the construction of the new GSA building (a corner of which is visible in the background of the portrait) designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh. He retired in 1918.

This whole idea of dust being a metaphor for the history of the building....

There must be elements of everyone in that space in one nook or crannie or another.

therefore the dust holds a history of whose been before us and what they have done.

A complete list of all names of students, tutors etc could relate to the dust in some way.

life stories are embedded in far away, non-descript corners of Mack.

These stories are perhaps forgotten. Or perhaps re-iterating a peice of history can inform, enlighten, make us laugh or something.

from those who passed by before us - from us who are passing the noo - the future is yet to unfold.

dust art

I'll tell you what after dusting the mack my chest is killing me. I must get a dust mask for next time.





Mary Partridge above



Xu Bing installation "where does dust collect itself" he collected dust from near ground zero and won 40,0000 award for visual artists.

Who would have thought that I could get so fired up about dust. Aye thats right DUST. It sits silently everywhere. I couldn,t sleep last night and thats when I came up with the idea that I could collect Mack dust. Each sample has a history of its own. Maybe theres something in dust that will have some sort of meaning.....

So I plucked up the courage and front to ask the Jannies and receptionist about the possibilites of getting some. To my surprise they were on to it straight away. "What sort of dust?" and "How much dust?" and "Where do you want to get the dust from"? They were fantastic. Did you know that there is dust that I need to get permission to aquire - must be gold dust.

I've full circled to one of the first conversions I had with another student about this project.


What is dust? My unmediated response is: fluffy stuff, particles from various things and people, It gathers itself, silent, layers over time.

Dust is a general name for minute solid particles with diameters less than 500 micrometers. Dust occurs in the atmosphere from various sources such as soil dust lifted up by wind, volcanic eruptions, and pollution. Dust in homes, offices, and other human environments consists of human skin cells, plant pollen, human and animal hairs, textile fibers, paper fibers, minerals from outdoor soil, and many other materials which may be found in the local environment.[1]

nests

reflections

18/1/09
I saw a reflection in a spoon and it looked cool. Im thinking reflections, I am a reflection of the past. not in a watered down sense. i have traversed a path that has led me to this building. I am the manifestation of 100yr history of mac building like evolution if you know wot I mean. The skool has evolved over a century in many different ways; from single sex classes to mixed. courses of study developing and changing. The building expanding and being conserved. The skool is like an incubator which enables students to realise their dream. In this sense its like a big birds nest and we are the eggs protected and nurtured by eagles, owls, etc...Romantic notions but I like it. Bachelard quotes a poem "The warm calm nest In which a bird sings. Recalls the songs, the charms, the pure threshold of my old home"p100 poetics of space. "and here the threshold is hospitable...and does not intimidate us". I think that the nest is representative of my primal state wherein I am where I was always suppossed to be at this time. My time at gsa is what I make of it.

• 19/1/09

"Everything about a creature that comes out of a shell is dialectical. And since it does not come out entirely, the part that comes out contradicts the part that remains inside rear parts remain imprisoned" Bachalard p108. "To emerge" p109 Emergence.

Just when I think things are going swimmingly I find a brick wall infront of me 20/1/09. everything im doing seems to be going nowhere. What exactly is it im doing? Im not sure! Like the Bachelard quote above I feel a little like the creature from a shell right now - emerging then withdrawing, contradicting myself with this project at every turn.

Rirkrit tiravanija

light

Blue light photography of toby keller

Energy

Im thinking about energy....

I touch the walls in the mack and something happens

Its like a kinda "chi"

Is it coursing thru my hands onto the wall?

Or is it coming from the wall?

Is it a bit of both?