Growing Versions

Today painters do not have to go to a subject matter outside of themselves. Most modern painters work from a different source. They work from within. -Jackson Pollock

The light switch is turned on or off. Optimistic or Pessimistic.  Approved of or disapproved of.  Active or lazy.  Pulled together or pathetic.  Faithful or negligent. Filthy or pristine. Outgoing or introverted.  By the book or cheating. Just or criminal.  Qualified or pretending. Not started or completely finished.  Unattainable or abysmal failure. Worth pursing or worthless. Too much or not enough. Embraced or rejected. Hilarious or embarrassing. 100% correct or riddled with errors. Exactly right or catastrophic. Awake or asleep.  Remembered or forgotten. It is time to install a dimmer switch.

The making sense of time chronicles roll on.  My son has declared more than once this week that he thinks we are running late.  When I ask him how he knows this (is it the slant of the light? his insistent internal clock?) he states that he checked the time on the microwave before we left. "What kind of time is this?" he asks.  What number, what happens now? Right now time is still the only time there is but there is evidence that it is losing ground to another "kind of time" which he hears other people discuss, adjust and regulate.  It is not yet something tangible that he can hold in his hand and line other things up against.  Even though the day has a linear progression from morning snack to afternoon snack and bedtime snack, time, expressed as a number, which can be measured against other these things is still vague but slowly and surely taking hold. He  noticed a calendar last night and wanted to know what comes next.  Looking at ...

Cloud, 2012 (Materials: painted wall, hole in wall, stuffing from kid's bed stuffed into hole) I'm just coming off of a busy streak.  Well, a busy chunk of years actually. As a result, my domestic situation has gotten way way off track.  There are literally heaps of unsorted laundry, Christmas ornaments (ugh...Halloween ornaments) jumbled together, and piles everywhere.  The toilets are clean, the kitchen is cleanish and there are clean clothes they just aren't stored  particularly well, but otherwise, we're in a bit of mess actually.  I'm so done with all this chaos and the feelings of perpetual defeat that accompanies it. Yesterday, for the first time in what felt like years, I finally had time to be at home when others were not.  Instead of feeling mired in chore-filled angst, all I could see around me were beautiful canvases. Instead of making me swear under my breath and stomp around, these tiny canvases stopped me in my tracks. ...

Growing up in a small town with gravel driveways and gritty asphalt school yards and few sidewalks prevented me from being exposed much to chalk art and hopscotch.  Seeing hopscotch in action only happened when we visited my city grandma.  She lived adjacent to an endless scroll of sidewalk.  City kid neighbours taught me their versions of hopscotch.  I got taught and re-taught and exposed to it in a bunch of different ways...but you know, if there is an official version, I have no idea what it is. How do you win hopscotch?  What is the goal? Other than balancing on one foot occasionally and alternating feet, is it something more than a coordination activity? I wonder.  Can you tell me? Maybe it doesn't matter.  Maybe the idea of it and the image of it is all we need to believe in its existence.

Do you remember using your toys in ways that they weren't designed to be used to suit your play requirements?  I distinctly remember re-envisioning a kid sized type-writer, back when there were not even adult sized personal computers, into a film projector. I had an elaborate explanation for how it worked that was only slightly more technical than my explanation of how gymnasts fit inside the t.v.  My brother used a kid's record player as a pottery wheel (yes, plugged in and yes, with water). I converted many a thing meant to be one thing and turned them into something else. I look around at my kids' toys and I see a lot of this inventing going on with them too.  The main exception is that they are lucky enough to have "real toy cash register" and I am still tempted to play with it. I got a job at Zellers when I was seventeen just so I could get close to one.  I spent my whole childhood (and some more besides) seeking out a cash register to play with.  The ...