First Impressions

Zoe Partington-Sollinger's Blog

March 2011

Six Weeks on a Roller Coaster

They keep bringing my children home from school with various virulent bugs, deadlines are piling up and the June completion date for my Go Public Cultural Olympiad piece is getting ever closer!

But chaos aside, last month was a critical time for reflecting and analysing my artistic identity and style. During a very enlightening trip to Dartington Arts Centre I encountered the Encounters Shop and its creative director Ruth Ben-tovim, along with several other inspiring speakers and artists. They are at an interesting stage there, developing new creative ideas and opportunities on a historic site, but what I took away was their openness and total comprehension of the need for space to ‘think'. 

Some weeks later, other Independents from Dartington and I were invited to stay at Battersea Arts Centre in a residential capacity to explore questions and spaces. True to the term ‘independent', BAC gave me total freedom to do exactly what I wanted and experiment with how I interact with my environment. Despite other work commitments, negotiating new contracts and tending sick children, I felt very spoilt to be given the chance to build an installation without any criteria or rules to follow.

The BAC building is unique, the staff incredibly welcoming and living on site was great - the perfect environment for artists to flourish and be part of an international community. More and more I recognise that discussing and sharing ideas is key to developing your thinking in extraordinary ways that may otherwise never occur.

Being able to reflect and build ideas formulated through my experience of sight loss, and to just play with the space, quickly led me to consider taste, pleasure and the simple question:

What do you see?

With this in mind, I built my installation in a darkened room using an intimate strip of flashing lights. I wanted to recreate a snapshot of a scene without being too prescriptive or forcing anyone to wear simulation spectacles. Visual information can sometimes prevent you from getting to the essence of an experience so it was interesting to offer the insight that without it, you often see much more. Visitors were asked to record their experiences of the room on post-it notes.

The time at BAC gave me the opportunity to explore an idea and it was wonderful to have the space to discuss that and many other ideas with some amazing artists. Listening to their everyday thoughts and varied approaches to a huge range of projects was a real pleasure. The whole experience was delightful and thought provoking.

The concept for my installation was born out of many years of discussion, and out of a reaction to my own experience of sight loss and the categories into which people wanted to place me. It took a while for me to realise that because various systems or procedures were inaccessible, more pressure was put on my own every day life and work. This pressure to do things in a specific way really took a lot out of me. I felt exhausted and frustrated every time I went out or visited anyone. I began noticing that abstract philosophies set in stone, with the intention of providing significant access routes, are often ill informed. Too few meaningful connections are put into design to render it useful to a wide range of users.

Out of necessity I ignored the so-called expected ways of doing things and took a step back to re-examine. Losing my sight made wayfinding extremely hard and it was vital to find a new method of navigating to protect myself from extreme tiredness and feelings of despair and frustration. Most people I meet have no concept of how hard it can be to manage all this while still fitting in. And while I consider fitting in to be wrong on many levels, the system is so inflexible that if you don't fit in, you can become very isolated.

The installation I created at BAC was actually a precursor to the larger piece I am developing in High Wycombe. That will be a far more complex experience, looking in more depth at journeys and the clues in urban design that enable us to understand and locate streetscapes, shops, amenities and public buildings. In contrast, the questions raised by the work at BAC are immediately apparent:

What do you really see?

How do you really look?

What do you look at?

What has shaped your understanding of what you see?

What did seeing mean to you?

The ‘What do you see?' series is playful and subjective, which allows it to work on many levels. But more importantly, it has the potential to encourage viewers to ask a much deeper question:

What do you choose not to see?

 

February 2011

Wayfarers, Independents and Soggybottom Beer

Where to begin?

This month has been an enchanting journey through my creative work and life. I attended a course at The Hurst in Clun called ‘Wayfarers and Independents' - part of the CLP (Cultural Leadership Programme). The Hurst is an 18^th Century house previously owned by playwright John Osborne and now part of the Arvon family.

I'd never have signed up for this course had it not been for Go Public as I have always been somewhat cynical of such things. In my experience, cultural leaders are often either classically trained or members of the privileged elite. I know now that this isn't entirely true. Times are changing, as evidenced on Radio 4 this morning; writer and actor Mat Fraser was reviewing the Sunday papers with Rachel Johnson, author and journalist sister of Boris, the Mayor of London. I'm still laughing at the thought of the editor of The Lady magazine sitting alongside Mat. Having a disabled person on the show, and treating them with integrity and respect, is a hugely positive change from 15 years ago.

Arvon was pure magic. Every visit to The Hurst is special, but this one allowed me some moments of reflection, development and intrigue that are rare in my hectic everyday life. I found comfort in strenuous walks, curling up in front of log fires listening to the discourse of others and having the time to just breathe. I stumbled on so many things I previously knew little about, including hip-hop, a depth of understanding in my work process, and a beer called Soggybottom at The Sun Inn!

On long forest walks I discovered my hidden passion. The instant I stepped into the forest it seemed all my worries, concerns and fears were washed away. During one particularly long walk with a woman called Hannah, we discussed our own art practices and dilemmas and I described the aims of my Go Public commission. Eager to understand how a concept with which I am fascinated might inspire and resonate with a complete stranger, I thought the time was right to ask:

Would anyone be interested in this?

Blissfully unaware that we'd missed the path back to The Hurst, we continued walking. We spoke about theatre and plays and about what audiences take away with them. I explained how I would like my final Go Public piece to be a truly immersive and layered experience that connects deeply with participants' emotions.

There have been times I've ventured inquisitively into a gallery and found work so powerful it has left me sobbing. That emotion and the impact the work continues to have on me is unforgettable. In an earlier blog I described a piece I created in Denmark called Naked Space. The moment I returned to England, I loaded the audio file onto my laptop and listened to the perfectly captured sounds of the Copenhagen streetscape. Standing in that incredible urban space I felt not only free and deliriously happy, but also intrigued and confused by background music, the noise of the cars, the bikes and their bells (of which there were many) and the bleeping of the crossing point. These are the precise feelings I want to replicate with my Go Public installation. More than simply a binaural sound piece, it should be a collective of impressions and sensations - a unique insight into a moment in time.

Arvon introduced me to many captivating artists, some of whom have inspired me to write a play called ‘Clogs and Chips'. But that's another story...

 

January 2011

Happy New Year

Maybe, just maybe, I am beginning to get the hang of this blog thing and I can now start telling you about my monthly journeys into the realms where my creative ideas begin. I'm sure it's no surprise to learn that few of my ideas actually develop in the office; it's usually when I am doing something completely unrelated to work that concepts take shape. Recently it was a combination of shopping with my daughter and watching many contemporary short films and music videos on You Tube that sparked some thoughts about my Go Public commission. 

In contrast, my previous month had been somewhat heavier:

I thought I'd conquered the chaos of Christmas by ordering just about everything online through Amazon. It seemed a pretty smart idea until the blasted sub zero temperatures hit our peaceful and beautiful shores and chaos was restored.

To make matters worse, I spent a lot of time in November and December getting to grips and over the trauma of my new insulin pump. As I said in my last blog, I naively thought this device would offer an easy ride, but its cannula trickery and vague ‘occulation' warnings meant I'd lots to re-learn. Instead it took me deep into a psychologically disturbing, life questioning space. I generally try to avoid being in these spaces as it can lead to a slippery slope of despair, self-pity and time wasting. However don't be put off it is much better with a pump.

Not wanting to be left out, my son was then taken in to hospital with a serious condition - one that is apparently very common, but of which I'd never heard. Thankfully, he's now fine.

Adding to the mayhem was a multitude of work deadlines, correspondence for a large museums and galleries programme (one being the completion of the audio podcast for the recent Water Powered Lift exhibited at last summer's London Festival of Architecture) and mounting pressure from many other angles too ridiculous for words. It's nothing short of a miracle that I managed to come out the other side in one piece. Although, I am convinced the regular and hilarious Balti nights out with the belly-dancing girls, many Singapore Slings, and a great variety of other inebriated moments helped enormously.

But anyway, back to work and shopping. Our intention was to shop ethically for Christmas, buying everyone a cherished book with a slightly battered edge. In the latest Oxfam to grace the small town of Ludlow, Shropshire, I perused the shelves while my daughter hit the children's section in search of a new Jackie Wilson. However, our eco-morals soon fell by the wayside as we got lost deeper and deeper among the tightly packed paperbacks. We completely forgot why we'd gone in and ended up buying only for ourselves. I found myself a Charles Schultz Peanuts edition revealing Lucy's philosophies on gifts, facial expressions, knowing ones self, accomplishments and musicians - this made me fall about laughing but any musicians reading it will definitely need a thick skin.

And on that note, as we're just into the New Year, my Go Public project awaits - and a structured tight plan for the next 6 months at my finger tips, without this the elements of chaos and usual artistic endeavours would fall apart! Happy New Year!

This month's blog is dedicated to my Great Uncle John who died in December 2010. An incredible inventor and the scourge of all car thieves, the addition of a simple mechanism allowed him to turn his car's petrol flow on and off by means of a secret button.

 

December 2010

The Art of the Cannula

It has been quite a frustrating month. I wanted to push forward the sensor programming development but Royal Liverpool University Hospital offered me the chance to go all modern, and after 37 years of daily injections, an all singing, all dancing Bluetooth insulin pump was hard to refuse.

Perhaps naively, I was sold on the fact that I could be in a meeting and administer my insulin via a mobile handset device with nobody any the wiser. Previously I either did my NovoPen injection as discreetly as circumstances would allow, or I accepted that I'd feel shit for a while then deal with my medication after the meeting - neither option was ideal.

So, my journey into pump therapy began and boy, was I unprepared for the impact this change would have on my sanity. However, three weeks into the pump I am already much more relaxed and enjoying the benefits. The only problem now is that I am too paranoid to leave the instruction book at home in case there's a malfunction - and the book is enormous! Obviously, a digital copy is the answer; once I have that on my laptop, I can feel in control again. And some of you who know me well will appreciate my need for control.

But what have I been up to this month besides facing my inner demons, getting used to not injecting four times a day and mastering the art of the cannula?

Well, I met with Kevin Wilson, the Director at Artpoint, who is supporting my CPD (Continuing Professional Development). He suggested I take time out to undertake some R&D on short films and digital interventions, and look at the type of art installations that energise and inspire me. So I headed to FACT in Liverpoool - partly as it was en route to the hospital and partly because I wanted to check out the Dada Fest.

There I became fascinated with the work of Meiro Koizumia, a Japanese artist who featured a film entitled My Voice Would Reach You. The film centres on a man's attempts to talk with his mother on the phone while becoming increasingly lost among hordes of city dwellers. The voice at the end of the line is not that of his mother but a stranger at a call centre, implying either that he has gone mad, or his mother is dead and his desire to communicate with another realm is overwhelming his reason.

I was fascinated by the artist's approach and found the piece extremely evocative. The experience also helped me focus on the journeys through the urban realm in High Wycombe, and how those journeys might best be represented. In Spring I intend pursuing an idea to be tested with the journeys as they develop, as I am keen for the viewer to have a close relationship with the space and the memories triggered by movement through it.

I'm also keen to recruit a group of ten disabled and deaf people to test the journeys for me, so if you're interested in the project and publication I'm developing, please email: zoe.partington@googlemail.com

 

September 2010

Observing Spaces

This month I have been reading Hunter Davies's Behind The Scenes at the Museum of Baked Beans. It's one of those books that is simultaneously fascinating, insightful and occasionally hilarious. If you're an avid collector with a penchant for the weird and wonderful, I recommend you try it.  One quote in particular jumped out at me:

"Working in a museum, even if it's just voluntary work, is also a way of meeting the world and having a social life"

As I get deeper into the book and spend more time in this genre - and because I am currently training a number of museum curators, directors and staff - the world of historic and contemporary artefacts and their gate keepers has begun to occupy an entirely new dimension in my life.  

I have had great fun during my recent consultancy and training work with museums and galleries. The unique interaction and discourse that arises through focusing their understanding of ‘opening up' to disabled people as visitors, staff and artists is a rare treasure. And the journey into these spaces, collections and people is quite magic.

        

One of my favourite spaces is the Pen Room Museum & Learning Centre in the Jewellery Quarter of Birmingham. The volunteers there are so passionate about the heritage of nibs, quills and manufacturing processes, it's a joy to experience. I mention this because these journeys I regularly embark on, and the snippets of community life they reveal, resonate very closely with my work to be unravelled in High Wycombe - another town with an incredible manufacturing craft industry.

Observing the spaces I will be working with in High Wycombe has formed the bulk of this month's investigation. To start the ball rolling, I've had meetings with Buckingham New University to discuss the merits of my ideas. And I was thrilled to meet a group of disabled creatives, along with some graduates from BNU who are all going to help and be part of this creative journey. 

Some of you may be aware of my fascination with urban space and my passion for public art. I love moving through, and being moved by, spaces and the objects and buildings within those spaces. It seems obvious to me that every one of us should be engaged in discussion about our shared spaces and what they mean to us collectively and individually. The nature of urban spaces is high on my agenda and my work needs to consider how the viewer is engaged, while at the same time encouraging them to question, debate and consider their relationship to their environment. I want to create an immersive experience with the aim of eliciting a definite response.

Over the next couple of months I will be scoping out the installation that is to be developed around BNU and working with Wolverhampton University, programming the sensor technology to collate the bio-medical data that will help form my piece. As part of my professional development, I'm also exploring the world of short films in order to strengthen my understanding of their impact on the viewer - so, in this month's blog I have included some photographs, video footage and audio files of the spaces I'm investigating.

 

August 2010

Deliberation and Investigation.

Another month has passed and here I am again, sharing my thoughts with you. It has been a month of deliberation and investigation: what is the viewer's understanding of my work? How do I transpose my physical ideas into the digital and audio realm?

I have begun to explore the area of audio description along with its significance and relative value to blind and partially sighted people. While I am keen to strive for further developments in this field, I want my work to be much more than a simple interpretation; I want audio tracks and sounds to become an integral part of the finished piece.

Another fascinating aspect of this work for me, as a partially sighted person, is the way in which I am able to realise this public art. I can engage the viewer in a way that reveals both the positive and the frustrating elements associated with urban space. I can tell the story of all the decisions and routes I take while moving through an urban environment.

Once again, however, this throws up many questions: exactly how do I go about this? Why would a casual passer-by be interested? And what do I intend they take away from the experience? Naturally, I want the interaction to trigger thoughts and emotions but where do I begin?

In a couple of months I'm sure I'll be glad I didn't succumb to impatience but right now, I'm feeling frustrated that I don't already have the bio-medical data in front of me. I'm eager to experiment and hone my artistic practise. Recent weeks have been intriguing; I have had time to reflect and organise initial stages of the work. This has led me to conclude that the intricacy between the concept and the physical outcome is key to this project; it will define how the viewer perceives my work.

The next step is a preliminary scan of the urban space I've selected so I can begin to engage others in my journey. The route I have chosen is between Bucks New University in High Wycombe and the nearby Eden Shopping Centre. Hopefully, this is an area that will generate many varied emotional, as well as physical, journeys. I can then begin discussing workshops with BNU in order to start mapping the students' learning outcomes - I need to understand their reactions to the public and urban space. I must also learn to appreciate the limitations of the sensor technology and the organic nature of the data it produces.

Working alongside me throughout will be another disabled artist. This artist has agreed to be mentored by me and as the work progresses, he will develop his own creative journals, capturing the process in images rather than words. I am unable to interpret or generate imagery in the same way as sighted people, often relying on words and other stimuli to make sense of the world, so the visual counterpoint offered by this artist is sure to be an incredibly worthwhile contribution to the project.

 

July 2010

I was thrilled recently to attend the ‘Interpretation, Theory & the Encounter' symposium at Tate Britain; as a disabled person, I was entitled to a discounted ticket to this prestigious event. With no preconceptions about the subject matter, I looked forward to hearing academics discuss their theories, philosophies and opinions.

During the day, my thoughts turned to my Go Public commission, First Impressions*. The commission has greatly encouraged me to develop my artistic context and my conceptual and contemporary understanding of art and culture; I wondered how audiences coming into contact with my ideas and developments would read my installation.

The Chair on the day happened to be my History of Art lecturer from university, Adrian Rifkin, who had taught me to always ask:

‘How is art presented to you?'

At the time, I didn't fully understand what he meant. Then, after completing my BA (Hons) in Media and Design, I gained a grant to study an MA in History of Art, Design and Architecture. My sight was failing fast and I began to question the viewer-audience relationship that I'd been taught. Visual imagery became, in some contexts, meaningless and uninteresting. At the same time, my old lecturer's question grew in significance.

Throughout what can, at times, be an isolated yet intriguing way-finding journey, I have developed many techniques with which to navigate through space. For disabled people, observing our environment can become quite an obsession and the reality is that, to many, the experience is totally unique. However, we rarely seem to share our experience and knowledge with others. At least, I didn't until now.

The Go Public blog feels, to me, like the perfect place to offer some incredible insights; insights often ignored by those with little concept of how the exclusion of disabled people can inhibit the development of an exciting contemporary society. One thing I can tell you is that my journey is one of pure fascination, curiosity and an increasing sense of identity. I wouldn't change it for anything.

My aim is to encourage people to reconsider how they present art to disabled and, in particular, blind and partially sighted people. The installation I create will be an expression of my investigation, my experience and my passion to encourage debate. I want to engage my audience and persuade them to consider their relationship to their environment in a new way.

To give you some background: in 2008 I was offered a scholarship with CABE (Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment). I visited urban spaces around the world and wrote a paper called 'Naked Space'. This helped me pinpoint where gaps in knowledge existed in the minds of creative urban designers, planners and developers. I interviewed Lars Gemzoe, Bjarne Winterberg (both highly respected in the field of urban design) and spoke to Professor Nick Tyler about the PAMELA (Pedestrian Accessibility and Movement Environment LAboratory) research. A common factor was becoming apparent; the process was missing a link. That link was disabled people. Not ‘access consultants' speaking on our behalf but real, free thinking disabled people who can draw on their years of experience to make a creative contribution. People with the vision to say:

‘If I was designing that I'd do it this way so as to make my journey easier, more fun, more interesting.'

It is time for designers and professionals, along with educational institutions, to stop seeing us as the ‘problem' and begin seeing us as the ‘solution'.

Anyway, back to the conference: it's half way through the day, and I keep hearing the term ‘culture' bandied around, along with the phrase, 'interpretation, meaning and understanding in art'. There is much talk about opening up art as a catalyst and applying it to the transformation of culture. This leads me to think that the same principle should apply to our streets and perhaps my installation can be a positive influence on the design and construction of more inclusive urban spaces.

I'm then led to wonder:

'Who selects the art work we are viewing?'

‘Who decides the value of that work: academics, curators, historians or art critics?'

'What is the history of the concept of interpretation?'

I seem to be providing more questions than answers. But the aim of the Go Public programme is to help me develop as an artist and artists are supposed to question things, encourage us to open up, see the world differently and look at how art reflects our role in contemporary culture. 

Later, with these thoughts still in mind, thinking about thinking and metaphysics, I stumbled across the work of Extant (Britain's only professional performing arts company of visually impaired people) and its Artistic Director, Maria Oshodi, at Battersea Arts Centre. Their use of haptic technology was fascinating and integrated audio clips from blind philosopher Martin Milligan made the performance all the more absorbing and worthy of further investigation. I tried ordering some of Milligan's publications from Amazon but it seems they are currently out of print - I think a revival society is needed!

More thoughts, developments and images next month.

 

*First Impressions is an artistic concept about utilizing digital technology to research, capture and play back the bio-medical data of disabled and non-disabled participants; to record their heart rate, temperature and brain activity during their journeys through the public realm. It enables the artist to investigate and capture the way disabled people feel emotionally and physically about their experiences in their streetscape. Comparisons and contrasts can then be made between the same journeys taken by non-disabled people. The participants will also provide a narration of their route while a small camera films the entire journey. The artist will use the collated bio-medical data to experiment with the development and manipulation of audio-visual media. Images and sounds will be projected into installations to create an emotional space that reflects disabled peoples' feelings about designed public environments.

Design or lack of design can have a significant impact on both a person's wellbeing and their emotional experience of the space they find themselves in. This will be the first time that bio-medical data captured in this way has formulated a thought-provoking installation with many learning outcomes and viewpoints. Through the interpretation of the data, the artist will highlight different ways in which an environment can affect people psychologically. The intention is to encourage the viewer to redefine their interpretation of a streetscape. It will shed new light on the way disabled people orientate in their environment and the use of new technology to capture bio-medical data will influence how urban designers and planners create space for people.