February 1999
•“These fragments are the disjecta membra (scattered parts) of an elusive, coveted and vaguely scented knowledge.” Guido Ceronetti, The Science of the Body
•My work habits suggest nailing down, when really I am more interested in what is left elusive.
•“strange speech”
•I realize I am attracted to the notion of strange speech because so often what arrives as the material for my making is garbled and clipped. A bit of. A nuance. A moment. The forms are usually made before they are known—almost always in fact. And so in effect, I work in the dark. The struggle comes in the fight between wanting to name them and letting them be long enough so that I may eventually observe a glimpse of what these things really ARE.
Today I tracked down all the artist statements of mine I could find. My gathering is in response to the fact that I begin writing for tenure this semester...a long, long process of combing through and compiling ALL I have done as an artist and teacher over the last five years. For now I am focused on writing my "creative" activities statement--the statement all about what I make and why. A useful way to begin seemed to be a stab at reading through everything I've written about my work since graduate school, and I must say the activity was gratifying. I realize that despite the change in appearance, my work has consistently grappled with the same themes and ideas, over and over and in different ways, for the last eleven years at least.
Above I post sections pulled from a first year graduate statement. The "struggle" remains the same; the quest for "strange speech" is constant.
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