Artists Talk: materials
NAME: Sarah Riseborough
oCCUPATION: MRes practice-based
LOCATION: North Northumberland
MEDIA: Event dependant use of objects
1. When initiating a piece or body of work how do you determine the materials you will use?
I have a working relationship with certain materials, I feel I have both a vocabulary of gestures and phrases and there is also a sense of potential remaining. The things I use very much belong in the everyday and I don’t feel they have a sense of the personal about them- they are not artefacts of a life, as such, but artefacts of life.
Their task is to assist in my work, to bring myself fully into the present and in so doing, acknowledging what is actually present in the event.
Their task is to assist in my work, to bring myself fully into the present and in so doing, acknowledging what is actually present in the event.
2. dO THE MATERIALS THAT YOU USE HAVE A VALUE IN THEMSELVES OR ARE THEY JUST A MEANS TO AN END?
Value is an interesting idea, nothing has a value in itself. Things have properties and humans create property. We have to work really hard to maintain the attachments to things that are not of our bodies.
I used to paint, to work with oils and canvas and I think I became bogged down in both the perceived need to use the best material I possibly could, and my projected expectations of the presentation of the work.
‘Value’ speaks of hierarchy, that everything sits in a relative position while if I reflect from my own current position where I am typing at a desk that belonged to an aunt, at a machine that cost me a lot of my savings but at a window that offers a view of the outside, then nothing is less important, it all enables both my task, and the communication of presence of everything I am aware of. I haven’t mentioned my transient thoughts and feelings, and my perception of others-
My point is, that we choose, but are not always aware that we make the choice. Everything has a value, everything is a means to an end.
I used to paint, to work with oils and canvas and I think I became bogged down in both the perceived need to use the best material I possibly could, and my projected expectations of the presentation of the work.
‘Value’ speaks of hierarchy, that everything sits in a relative position while if I reflect from my own current position where I am typing at a desk that belonged to an aunt, at a machine that cost me a lot of my savings but at a window that offers a view of the outside, then nothing is less important, it all enables both my task, and the communication of presence of everything I am aware of. I haven’t mentioned my transient thoughts and feelings, and my perception of others-
My point is, that we choose, but are not always aware that we make the choice. Everything has a value, everything is a means to an end.
3. please could you discuss any correlation between ideology and materials in your practice
I think I began to speak of this through the last question. I abandoned the materials of painting (and would never say that I’d never paint again) because they felt so loaded with a hierarchy attached to my own sense of being enmeshed in a dialogue with an authority that demanded both the best of my work, yet appeared to constantly expect my failure- it has taken a long time to untangle the knot of projections and experience that would successfully propel me from a state of present awareness. Those dialogues would sit between myself, and the act of making, so I really felt I had to fight to attain a communication with my work.
Using stuff, things that are of utility in the world have come to my attention, but are not signification particularly, I mean, in a biographical sense. Upon reflection, it is possible that others have particular attachment, or repulsion to the kinds of things I use, but the intension is to shift the assembled components of the event into the state of significance within that event.
Performance acknowledges the truth that the act of making is about and involves the body. Maybe my choice of materials reflects a value I put on my own body, but I strive for a position of being just as present, just as equal as every other body.
I have not yet been drawn to an object that is considered valuable and explored that, I find there is so much left to explore in the profusion of the mass-produced, in the seemingly similar being able to express the distinctive, as a momentary experience. Those experiences, they have value for me, because if I am not fully present to them, I miss something detail, some sensation which is irretrievable, the process to re-enact the conditions (in practice) is not lost, but one can never assemble exactly, every component in the same way. The act of repetition means that the previous act is present in some way.
I also hate throwing things away. I was sure for a long time that it was all about ecology, and it was, on a level. I was concerned that humans just abandon responsibility for things that no longer serve a purpose. I was aware of the materials I used were detrimental to the environment I was depicting.
I am fascinated by that part of the creative process that is the release of the art object back into not-art, similarly, I hold on to what has potential to be useful as the component in an artwork. So, it’s all in the movement and the communication. By maintaining a focus on one set of actions, values or objects without paying attention to that attention as a process, everything grinds to a creative halt. I know a lot of artists who know that sense of giving attention to the unattended, or abandoned, not necessarily fixing something, or making something ‘better’ but allowing movement to take place.
Using stuff, things that are of utility in the world have come to my attention, but are not signification particularly, I mean, in a biographical sense. Upon reflection, it is possible that others have particular attachment, or repulsion to the kinds of things I use, but the intension is to shift the assembled components of the event into the state of significance within that event.
Performance acknowledges the truth that the act of making is about and involves the body. Maybe my choice of materials reflects a value I put on my own body, but I strive for a position of being just as present, just as equal as every other body.
I have not yet been drawn to an object that is considered valuable and explored that, I find there is so much left to explore in the profusion of the mass-produced, in the seemingly similar being able to express the distinctive, as a momentary experience. Those experiences, they have value for me, because if I am not fully present to them, I miss something detail, some sensation which is irretrievable, the process to re-enact the conditions (in practice) is not lost, but one can never assemble exactly, every component in the same way. The act of repetition means that the previous act is present in some way.
I also hate throwing things away. I was sure for a long time that it was all about ecology, and it was, on a level. I was concerned that humans just abandon responsibility for things that no longer serve a purpose. I was aware of the materials I used were detrimental to the environment I was depicting.
I am fascinated by that part of the creative process that is the release of the art object back into not-art, similarly, I hold on to what has potential to be useful as the component in an artwork. So, it’s all in the movement and the communication. By maintaining a focus on one set of actions, values or objects without paying attention to that attention as a process, everything grinds to a creative halt. I know a lot of artists who know that sense of giving attention to the unattended, or abandoned, not necessarily fixing something, or making something ‘better’ but allowing movement to take place.
4. do you consider what you materials might look like in the future, or are you just thinking about how they look when you use them? for example, do you consider whether the materials might change?
Yes, I do, I’m aware that everything changes, and that there is a pressure of legacy, of longevity in the art community at a particular level. I’m currently thinking a lot about documentation more than objects in galleries or collections. I’ve a few unfinished projects that involve having things made, using particular materials and presenting in that white space. I am concerned with the method of ideas going out into the world, but there is a point where responsibility shifts, once some contract (it might be acknowledged, it might not) has been entered, otherwise, the broken, degraded, decomposed must be attended to, the more processed something becomes, the more process has to be invested to release it. As an artist who makes things, I feel it is important to define that boundary of responsibility with every act. It allows me to explore aspects of myself, as invisible, abandoned, or out of bounds.
5. are your materials significant in how you identify yourself as an artist?
I identify the act of being an artist with how I think, how I pay attention.