pupa-families

between the lines is a growing collection of texts in the format of a blog. A blog that gathers stories and scenes which resonate with me, make me think and muse, describe perceptions I find stimulating. Over the last couple of months these texts have become kind of a 'cathedral of sanity' to me. between the line will be part of Dolls - Pupa, an exhibition of text-based work, 23 March to 4 May 2019 at L'atelier de mélusine in La Trimouille, France.

At the heart of the blog is a text by Max Frisch (Swiss writer 1911 - 1991), which vividly describes how the substance of a text lies in the space between words and lines:

"On writing" - an excerpt, translated from the German original
What is important is what cannot be said, the white space between the words. The words themselves always express the incidentals, which is not what we really mean. What we are really concerned with can only, at best, be written about, and that means, quite literally, we write around it. We encompass it. […] the true, the inexpressible experience emerges at best as the tension between the statements.
[…] language is like a chisel, which pares away all that is not a mystery, and everything said implies a taking away. […] Like the sculptor plying his chisel, language works by bringing the area of blankness in the things that can be said as close as possible to the central mystery, the living element. [...]  
Max Frisch, Sketchbook 1946 - 1949, p 25, (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich)
translated by Geoffrey Skelton   

Words - texts - lines, they become storyline and thread of the story. Yet, as Frisch puts it, what is essential cannot be said - it lies as an immaterial unspoken, yet living, substance between the lines. The words are just pointers, so to say. Thus, I liken Frisch's 'central mystery' to the 'pupa' that is enveloped and hidden between the lines - the threads and webbing of the cocoon. It is the reader's mind, our thoughts and feelings, that brings the inexpressible, the area surrounding the words, to life and transforms the 'pupa' so it becomes 'imago'.

The format of the blog allows the reader to choose focus - keywords or themes - and in this sense it works as a bot. The string of stories/texts that come up depending on such a focus build a new kind of 'pupa-family', whose members interact. For instance, you may find Werner Herzog as a child in a group with Matthiessen's son and Naoki Higashida a young, autistic writer from Japan.

And else

While compiling the docu of works shown at Artlink this summer I'm gathering my thoughts upon what I was working on earlier this year.

In doing so images of a proposal (maquette of another projection on threads, 2010) resurfaced. They relate to two earlier posts Watching the clouds and Movement (silent). But then... life took another turn.
Yet -  it's nice to rediscover these pics!

Shoal

Working for Artlink's 30th anniversary show (see Events). What has been on the horizon line for quite a while suddenly broke into reality.

Two pieces related to the Humber area will be on display. Seascape [Fr-Agile] will finally have a come back, in its home town of Hull(!). Shoal, a new installation, will be composed of stones donated by the public. It will be a work in progress into the first week(s) of the exhibition.

Southsquare Gallery

A visit to Southsquare gallery in Thornton where finally two time-based sculptures [Fr-Agile: projection on wide-screen and close-up-screen] will have a debut in February 2010. Hurray ;-)

Larger space, view towards and from the gallery entrance: Things* seem to fall into place:
Amended plan 14 Dec 09

The smaller space with a view to the adjoining larger space

*namely curved screens and projectors

Sounding and Fathoms

'Sounding fathoms out the height of the space'. It is the human scale that interests me in this vast space (Midsummer place).
Both bands will be one Fathom wide and composed of 36 ribbons. So, each ribbon will occupy half a 'Handbreadth' or two inches.

Image: Vitruvian Man by Da Vinci (source)

A Fathom is a unit of length used to measure the depth of water or the length of a nautical rope or cable, equal to 6 ft (1.8288 m)

Verb
1. to measure the depth of; sound
2. to get to the bottom of; understand thoroughly

Etymology
ME fadme fæthm (akin to OFris fethm, OS pl. fathmōs), the two arms outstretched (to embrace, measure), akin to German faden, thread
From: www.yourdictionary.com

Proposal

Proposal for site-specific work in a Gallery in Sheffield (December 2008): Two pieces related to light. Their proportions will respond to the dimensions and character of the bright ground floor Main-gallery space. The titles are working titles.


Split: grey and white Viscose gimp threads form a sort of wall. Sections of the threads are cut away and replaced by invisible thread splitting the "wall" into two pieces.



Floating Red is made of suspended brilliant red Mohair threads which form a floating brick shaped body.


The big window of the main gallery faces (south-)west and is almost square: 2m x 2m. This is the warm and sunny side (if there is a sun shining...). Another smaller window towards the sculpture garden faces (north-)east - the shadier side - and is about 0.75m x 1.9m.

Sounding

A site-specific installation commissioned by FRINGEMK 2009. Sounding will be displayed in Midsummer Place in Milton Keynes from September '09.

Midsummer-Place is a building approximately 20 m high featuring a wave form roof which spans a concourse of about 60m x 90m between the old and new part of the shopping centre. Daylight enters through five skylights of about 4m x 20m and through the two glass façades towards Midsummer Boulevard. The roof is supported by 48 crossbeams which rest on two rows of pillars, six to support the low part of the roof and six for the high part. A couple of trees and the odd bird join the congregation of shoppers among the cafes and food stores within the building.

Once inside the building it is difficult to grasp the vastness of the space. The huge volume above the retail area is filled with light and air but there is little to guide the eye. I was surprised to find that each of the 52 tiny looking glass panels which compose one single skylight must be about 1m x 1.5m. The following proposal relates to the height of Midsummer Place and to the way light illuminates it.

SOUNDING
Material: royal blue man-made string with a silky sheen
Dimensions: One or two bands, approx. 30 - 40m x 1.8m (1 fathom)

Near the west entrance one or two threaded bands will span between high points of the skylight and roof supports, similar to stretches of warp taken from a loom. The bands will twist slightly while keeping their width of one fathom from top to bottom. Sounding fathoms out the height of the space and ‘puts it into perspective’.

Sounding will be composed of man-made thread which captures and reflects the light. Depending on the onlookers position the shade, shape and transparency of the piece will change.

Seascape projection @ Cupola

Over the past couple of weeks I've been glued more or less to my desk writing proposals and applications. And now I really look forward to making something real!

Possibly one of the Fr-Agile screens will have a home for one month at Cupola Gallery in Sheffield next July. Below is a plan how it will sit in the space.

View from projector fixed underneath ceiling