Today was a very, very long day! Early start at the Media Resource Centre, today we were starting the process of editing our film. We have about 80 film sequences shot, now comes the task of putting them all into the correct order, choosing which shots are the best where we’ve filmed the same thing a couple of times or from a few different angles. Then we have to shorten each clip so we are only showing the best seconds or exactly the gesture we wanted to capture. It is stunningly time consuming but wonderful fun! We’ve taken a lot of macro shots and they are just beautiful. I cannot wait to see it on the big screen when we do the final reveal!
Tonight was a sculpture night class again, this time we were invited to sculpt a skull from clay. I’m very pleased with my efforts:
Yes, that is a real human skull we had to model from. Apparently this one was from India. It had a very narrow face and fine features.
You can see here the my skull shape is all wrong, what’s happened is that the clay we were using was incredibly soft and as we were working with it it was slumping down. So everyone’s skull has ended up with almost no forehead and eye sockets looking up at the roof!
Here’s some of the other student’s skulls – all looking up!
I’m very pleased, despite the flaws I feel it’s a pretty good effort. I really enjoy working with clay and getting my hands dirty, and my heart just thrills to the social atmosphere and the challenge of a teacher saying “make this” when I’ve never tried it before and there’s nothing hanging on the result, just the fun of pushing myself to try something new. I just love it.
Finally got down to the ceramics studio to collect my work and results, I was given a distinction for the last term’s work, so that’s cool. I won’t be pursuing it as a major, I’m interested in it but not totally absorbed by it the way I am with some of the other art mediums I’ve been working in. There’s always later if I decide to take it up more seriously. At the moment I’m taken by ink, fabric paints, beads, sculpture, film making, photography, installation, jewellery… sigh! Sometimes I get really anxious that my interests are so broad and unfocused. But the joy I get from learning new skills and pushing myself to try new things over rides the considerations of career. Young artists (not that I can really call myself that anymore!) are often advised to find their medium and style early, and to strive to create a brand where their art is distinctive and instantly recognisable. I don’t know if that makes good career advice, but it doesn’t make my heart sing. I already do many difficult, tiring, and frustrating things every week. Art is a space to be free. If I can’t build a career out of it because I’m too busy using it to keep my mental health as intact as possible, then so be it I guess.
Sarah K Reece 