PROCESS
I’ve written a text on making/writing/thinking
5 Grappled sTeps
Below is a list of my making strategies
(good for writers and anyone making)
THE LIST
playing with hypotheticals
Here is a list of possibilities I put together, and still use, to add flow to my thinking/work as a whole, be it an idea, and or an individual piece of work. These notions can shake up thinking and how one can ‘work’ a problem, ie ‘process’ through
It goes like this … can this piece of writing, stitchery, artwork,
idea or problem be thought of …
as a question
can it provide answers
can it be obscure
can it break through something
can it be more sensitive
can it work on the body of the maker or viewer
does it contain autobiographical material
does it contain fantasy
can it be an instillation big or small
can it be an ongoing story
is it loose enough is it flowing and open
can it be part of an epic
can it be about relationship
does it question boundaries
can it be about geometry
is it euro-centric- is there a good reason
can it be about nature/natures
can it be about grammer/ formal qualities in art
can it be against them
can it be about playing
more broadly
more narrowly
more abstractly
remaking/remade
as bigger, smaller, wider, minute, or gynormous
can it be shockingly wonderfully big
can I change the color
can it be invisible
can it be unsaid
can it be abstracted just by ¾%
can it be abstracted 150%
or can the tone of color or emotion be shifted
can it be glitch-ed
can it be smeared
can I change the material it is ‘usually’ made of or from
can it have sound coming out of it
can it be made to move by hand, by time, by nature by wind/electricity
can I change the substances on or within it
can I change the meanings inherent in it
can I subvert part of it
jam other ideas into it
fill it with paradoxes
fill it with riddles
can it be poisonous
can it be evoking
can I change the texture
smell
density
can it be turned inside out
can it be made partly larger
can it be patterned
can it be filtered
can it be nailed into, cut open sanded off
can it be repeated turned into a series
can it be turned into a series that varies only slightly or not at all
can it be whited out
can it be made smaller and smaller and smaller in increments
can it be paraphrased
can it be stretched out
made very fragile
made very very thin
made fat, made flat
made grotesque
made to look conservative, or traditional
made to look like a diagram a code, an instruction model
can it be layered over with materials
layered with meaning
can it be sewn together, ripped apart, patched, mended, stuffed stuck into
can it be made very long
can circles be drawn all over it
can it be made of the unexpected
can it be a copy of …
can it breach copyright
can it never be shown
can it be shy - pale almost not there a whisper
can it be divided
mapped
opened up
folded in on itself
rearranged
etched
can it be made more durable
more expandable
more efficient
more dirty
more obscene
more flexible
more economical
more expensive
more beautiful
more empty
or richer
can it be related to a historical myth
can it be related to urban myth or story
can it be related to herstory
can it be an utopia of the future
a dystopia of now
can it be related to a particular time in history
a social class or genders experience
can it be made unpolitical (no)
can it relate to science
and sciences mistakes
can it relate to woman’s herstory
can it relate to sexuality
can it relate to the body, which one?
can it relate to language, to literature, to the illiterate
can it cry, can it plead
can it relate to medicine or healing
can it relate to art-history
can it be about spiritual dimensions
can it be foolish
can it be about madness
can it be extravagant
can it mimic advertising
can it shit on advertising
can it be an earth work
can it be born of a dream
can it be filmed or a part of a film
can it be digital
can it be 3d a sculpture
can it be childlike
can it be badly done
can it refute
can it refuse violence
can it hold to a new dream
can it explore the lost
can it mirror the viewer
can it confront the viewer
can it tell the viewer something
can it tell a new or old story
can it be un-abstracted
can it be un-abstracted more
can it disrupt a story
can it be dumb … silly or stupid
can it be very wrong
can it be very very boring
can it be obvious
can it be a big fat joke
can it be a very very bad joke, an ‘off’ joke
is it second-hand
can it refuse … something … anything … everything
does it repeat itself without thought – is it thoughtless
can it be crass
can it be more crass
can it be broken in half
can its various pieces be re and re and reconsolidated
is it possible to relate it to something I’ve already done in the past
can it be diagrammed
can it be a reparation
what metaphor describes it or this idea
can it be simpler
can it be easy
can it tell the viewer what it’s about, can it give instructions
can it lie can it give false hope
is it romantic can you smear this or prop this up
can it be pop
can it be fluro-escent
can it be bad taste
can it be in very bad taste
can it be related to your own history
can it be related to your imagination
can it relate to the domestic
can it relate to the world of business
can it be a global work
can it be extended in time and space
can it fold up
can it be burned
can it be cut up
can it be sewn
can it shock
can it shock even more, and shock who?
how?
can it sooth
can it restore
can it explain
can it represent
can it be made in collaboration
can it be made by someone other than you
can it be made invisible
can it be made in another medium
can it be photographed
can it contain the real things objects
can it be about scattering hiding covering up
can it be about the big important things. life, death and the universe
can it be about being a woman, being vulnerable being invisible
can it be a portrait
can it be about what it is to ‘be’
can it be much more beautiful;
can it be much more intellectual
can it be much more spiritual
can it be much more philosophical
can it be much more silly
can it be much more childlike
can it be much more smart
can it be more terrible…
can it be sent out into space
is it monstrous
can it growl
can it be tattooed onto a body
can it be more wonderful
can people wear it
can it be swallowed
can it be sent to inner space
can it ‘live’ in the digital web
can it be more wonderful
can it be coiled up
can it be left open
can it be hung off the ceiling
placed in a pile
sung in a jar
in the middle of a field
can it be the field
can it be a new field
