Reflecting on the Year

This year has been very challenging after my father died in February, 2015.  I think stress put a strain on my health in the Autumn term and I was unwell until Christmas.

Mum had died three years earlier and I think losing both of your parents is life changing and it forces you to reassess everything. Thankfully this creative path I have decided to follow, provides me with comfort and purpose.  This is partly due to the fact I find it challenging and the dissertation was no exception.

Following my Level 5 Field module on Work for the Public Realm, I became interested in the fact people seem to use going for coffee and tea, as an excuse to engage in conversations.  In fact, I had the feeling that drinking tea and coffee actually promoted conversation. Talking to my dissertation tutor about this, she said that I could pursue it as a topic for my paper.  I felt very excited about researching this, but had no idea what angle I would approach it from.

In general, the most challenging element of my studies as a mature student, is time or lack of it. I have so many commitments to other people it is hard to prioritise my studies over other people’s needs.  However, as a family we enjoy going out for coffee after my husband finishes work, so I used this time to research and read.  I also did a lot of people watching in the coffee shop, it was amazing how many different types of conversations were going on around me.  It was obvious that some business meetings were being conducted at large communal tables and a group of nurses would often come in after work.  There would be small groups of people, husbands and wives, groups of friends, families like my own, some would be local and some originally from Eastern Europe. Even though there was such a diversity of people, one thing remained constant; the conversation.

Initial investigations didn’t really lead me to anything substantial with regards to formulating an argument and I was stressing about this for a quite a long time.  My tutor told me to just write and things would become clearer.  I borrowed a lot of books from the University and Cardiff Central libraries; read newspaper articles physically and online and looked for anything to do with tea or coffee.

My approach to everything is methodical, I think it comes from years of working in administration and then as a data analyst in the civil service. So I decided to start at the very beginning, where tea and coffee were discovered and when they were introduced into Britain. I then progressed along a timeline of key events that involved these two drinks. I found the process interesting and satisfying; when I made discoveries that I felt linked to my ideas it was actually exciting.  An example of this was when I discovered evidence that Samuel Pepys (1633-1703), famous for his diary, had documented going to the early coffee houses, primarily for the conversation.

I think my subject for my dissertation may have looked simple, not related to my degree and lacking in substance. I certainly had some of those thoughts myself on times and worried I would not find what I was looking for. However, after making the connection with Samuel Pepys and the coffee houses, I felt inspired and I was on a mission to find more information.

Through my constellation lectures, I learned that to really understand a piece of art, you have to have a knowledge of what was going on at the time it was created. Whether that was the personal circumstances of the artist, his/her country or the world at that time. This has prompted me to look at the bigger picture and question everything. So much so that my initial ideas for the dissertation, included exploring everything from the the way these drinks were advertised, (PG Tips chimps, romantic encounters with Nescafe), tourism relating to the drinks, the Japanese tea ceremony etc. It has left me feeling a little disappointed that I couldn’t cover everything.  I feel there was enough evidence to write a paper on each of the drinks separately but, that would have meant looking at it from a different angle.

When I started writing the dissertation it was unknown territory and I was afraid of getting something wrong. I produced a draft for my tutor to read and although she said it was fine, she said there was not enough of my thoughts in it. She said it would be that, which would make it unique. I think that my methodical approach can make my work a little ‘stiff’ and I was concerned this was happening with the dissertation too. Following that tutorial I came home and thought about why I wanted to write this dissertation and what had been my motivation.  I remembered my experience of the coffee culture in Australia and decided to tell it from that angle, which made it a lot easier to write.

I think the chapter on the early coffee houses, was my strongest, it was definitely my favourite, with the evidence of the conversations between the mathematicians and the scientists and the diary entries of Samuel Pepys.  I have enjoyed the dissertation process and it has made me realise how much I enjoy research.

This research was also feeding into other areas and fuelling my interest to explore this subject in my making. During the holidays I visited places of interest such as St Michael’s Mount which I found fascinating. I have noticed that I am seeing the world differently since studying art and design.  I look at the finest detail in everything, including architecture, textiles and nature. I think this has come from the Field module I did in Level 4, where I basically put Cardiff under the microscope and went out taking photographs of the streets surrounding Howard Gardens. I looked at all the elements, such as textures and patterns, things you would normally take for granted and basically not notice.  Since then I feel I really ‘see’ the world around me. This has led me to seek out the hidden story, whether it is a person’s story or the stories associated with places and it is this narrative that I want to capture in my work.

I returned to University in September, with a clear idea of using dissolvable fabric, thread and free machine embroidery to make sculptural objects.  Although my initial ideas have changed and evolved following tutorials and group ‘crit’ sessions, I am keen to use this material and process, to achieve my final outcome.  This is a fairly new process for me, especially trying to use free machine embroidery to achieve a sculptural form.  It is very challenging but that makes it exciting too. I have had some frustrating attempts which did not work out as I had anticipated.  However, I have gone to the library and sourced some books that I hope will give me ideas for a different approach.

I would love to have more time to experiment, as I think it can lead to ‘happy accidents’.  I played with adding a little felting wool to my thread and was pleased with the outcome.  The areas with the wool, appeared dense while the areas without had a light and lacy appearance. I get hung up on perfection and I am overly critical of my own work for that reason.  On one occasion, I produced a bowl on the wood lathe and was very happy with it, as I had worked hard to sand and wax the finish. I think the reason why I liked it was that the lines and edges were clean and well defined.  However, with my free machine embroidery, the appearance is not so polished and I feel sometimes it does not look good enough. I am getting there; I have been looking more critically at other textile artists’ work and accepting that these are the qualities of the materials and I just need to learn to love them.

This course has made me seek more opportunities to learn and given me the confidence to pursue them.  I have done workshops at Craft in the Bay, attended artists talks at Llantarnum Grange Arts Centre and a lecture by Mark Miodownik a British materials scientist.  Just before Christmas I attended a winter lecture by David Sproxton of Aardman, which was organised by the museum in Bristol. I was very interested to hear how he co-founded Aardman, who are the creators of Wallace and Grommit.  However, it was the short introduction by the gentleman from the museum, that has stayed with me the most. He talked about the role of the museum, that I had never considered and that was deciding now, what was going to be of historical value in the years to come.

This made me think about my own work and the fact I aim to produce an heirloom for the future.  An heirloom is normally an object that has been treasured and has memories attached to it. This is why it is special and passed down through families, to help keep the stories that are associated with it alive. I am aiming to produce a sculptural object that relates to someone or an event, which can be linked to an online platform, to access film/photographs/audio etc., connected to that person. I hope that this will be a way I can help people have a record of those special people and events, to treasure through the years.