Post 40: Notebook exchange with Daisy Diamond

Seeing Daisy in Cleveland makes me want to draw with a more wobbly line.

[This initial sentence led to a notebook exchange between Daisy and me: We began by each writing a question in our notebooks and then trading notebooks to write our corresponding answers. So, we had two writing/drawing conversations going simultaneously. We continued this asking and responding for a few rounds, and ended on questions not yet answered.]

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Here is what took place in my notebook:

OG: Daisy, what do you think your line is like? Would you say it’s wobbly?

DD: I think my line, or a line more broadly, can be expressed in different ways…

• line type (quality, size)

• relationship to other lines (perpendicular, parallel, random, contained)

• image function (creation of planes ↔ breaking up planes, representational ↔ abstract, etc.)

I like lines that create a feeling of repetition and also a sort of layering.

This repetition and layering, I feel, leads to a sense of place or space. I like when looking at a drawing makes me feel like I’m “seeking” something. When I draw, the ones that feel the most generative and fun…I feel like I’m “seeking” out the image or shape in the process of making it.

Are there certain shapes you’re drawn to? Could you draw these shapes in a list? How (if true) do they vary? What elements of these shapes feel representational and what elements feel abstract?

OG: Sometimes, I find myself wondering how much I think about shapes at all. This feels related to/in keeping with what I was saying earlier today about not thinking that I make anything that is a true drawing–instead, anything I “draw” is done as a way to imagine what something may look like three-dimensionally (a way to test out three-dimensionality before bringing something that begins as an idea straight into a volume [volumetric form?] ← somehow feels more right to say this but it also sounds a little overly serious).

If there are shapes that I am drawn to, the conceptual aspect of them (hm, trying to think of what the meaning of this is)/the words they bring up for me are probably more important than the raw shapes themselves. (Aka the idea of a shape is what makes me like a certain shape.)

• Right now I could say I like this shape because it is a snake.

• I also kind of like a shape like this because I imagine it connecting something in the sky to something on the ground. (These both feel like the same shape, oops.)

To go back to repetition/layering–space/place: Are there different types of repetition and layering that you employ? Or one way that feels like the type you are drawn to? Also, what is/how do you think of the relationship between repetition and layering?

DD: It’s funny to write about this because I actually feel like I haven’t drawn much recently. But when I use my hands for work, there’s often a lot of repetitive movements and I find that to be soothing and nice. I guess I like little pockets of concentration in a drawing. Like a garden or a recessed part of a rock where something is happening inside. I also love the art of erasing!! It makes everything look so good.

To me, the erased circle just instantly has so much presence and dimension of time. I love the shadows and variability in the line that happen when it’s erased. Gah!

I’m super drawn (hehe) to your shape of connection. I like how this creates something.

• A channel

• A chute

• A tunnel

• Something that can swallow

OG:

• _A straw_______________________

• _A hole (though, this is like a straw?)_

• ______________________________

I feel like I’m so often thinking about connecting things . . . I’d call it the ultimate pursuit of the making I do. Probably because my favorite thing in the world is what I would call “two things next to each other.” (Even though a lot of things are “two things next to each other,” this doesn’t take away from it being my favorite thing.) It does not have to be two things directly next to each other, as in side by side, but often, one thing, some space, and then the other thing. In order for this to come together as my favorite thing, these three components have to be connected to one another, hence connection being of huge importance.

I’m thinking about the different means of connections you listed . . . swallowing as a connection between food and body (I think this is what you mean lol) and how this expands what I think of as a connecting item. This is where I’m thinking of a hole (possibly connecting above ground and below ground).

I’m also recognizing that as much as I’m saying connection is significant, I don’t really use any “connecting items” in the things I make. Empty space is often what I feel connects things, and somehow needs to be construed in a way that I feel like it performs that function. Though it’s interesting to hear myself say that, since how would empty space fail at connecting things? Certainly there are ways.

How do you feel when you have lots of empty space around you? Does this ever stir up feelings of being connected or disconnected?

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And here is what took place in Daisy’s notebook:

DD: What do you think of slowness?

OG: When I think of slowness right now, I’m thinking of “slow motion.” I’m imagining walking in slow motion. This would make the way that arms and legs move while walking seem kind of exaggerated. When I picture myself walking in this slow motion way, it’s easy to think of there being a lot of resistance to movement--in the sense that moving is happening slowly because of a difficulty of pressure working against the act of moving. But, isn’t slowness somehow the opposite of this? I think I can allow slowness in when I don’t feel pressure to be anything. Slowness is what can take place when there is freeness. Recently, when I go to the pool on Wednesday afternoons and swim laps for a 30 minute session, I spend the last two minutes floating on my back in the water. My ears are under the water when I do this and so I'm not really able to hear anything--sound is blocked out or distorted by whatever impact water submersion has on hearing. This decrease in sensory input makes this experience feel like an experience of slow.

DD: underwater → slow! I really vividly can imagine the feelings and sounds of this experience you described.

Have you ever been fully underwater and on your back and looked up at the surface of the water? Light on the surface and really muted sounds. Do you wear goggles? This makes me think about modified (or mediated?) eyesight as something creative.

Swimming is a really happy activity in my mind. I have a memory of going swimming with my grandma Marilyn when she was about 90 years old and she swam for 30 minutes then sat in the hot tub for a long time with her eyes closed and a jet on her back.

I do remember really not liking swimming as a kid; I think mostly because I felt so cold.

I also love the part of pools where the bottom transitions to the deep end. I have no better word for this than “awesome.” The bigness and deepness of space filled with water is really awesome. Also seeing people swim who are super graceful is beautiful.

Do you remember learning how to swim? When you swim, are you thinking about form? What is your experience of learning like?

OG: Gosh, I feel like I don’t really remember actually learning to swim, but I do remember trying out for a swim team in elementary school--you just had to be able to get yourself across the pool to get on the team, and I held my nose with one hand and swam across the pool with my other hand. I’m also remembering it took me so long to feel comfortable jumping into a pool instead of taking the stairs in. I can think of so many times when I was standing on the edge of my town pool in the summer and kids in the water were saying “jump, just jump!” and I just couldn’t get myself to do it. I wonder if I finally did it at a time when I felt more alone.

I love seeing the surface of the water of a pool from underneath! It almost feels like something you shouldn’t be able to see--or maybe this just highlights the uncommonness of seeing something from underneath. I’m thinking of a moment from an artist talk given by one of my professors--Christina Tenaglia--where she shows these photos she loves of objects on glass shelves (I think in a museum) from underneath--so you can see their undersides. This makes me wonder: Is there any experience you have, sight you see/have seen that in some way feels like what making/drawing/creating feels like for you? Like, in having the same energy. This question feels different than experiences/sights that inspire you, though I’d be interested in that too if any of those things come to mind.

DD: Yeah, I think seeing the boundary-ing1 surface of an object or painting or pool or any kind of thing is really inspiring to me. 

This makes me think of a talk I heard by the artist Gala Porras-Kim. She spoke about how art conservation (what I’m training to do for a job) involves seeing versions of the paintings (like the back) or objects (like the side that’s supposed to rest on a surface) that the author never wanted you to see. I think she’s really interested in the experience of looking at “collections” as a unique thing that is worth conceptually taking seriously. I really like how she talks about art, and the art that she makes. I think it resonates so much with me because of why I’ve been so drawn to conservation as a way to learn more about what other people are making/have made and how materials can look or be used.

Yeah, like what happens to stuff when it’s lived for a little while, and the surfaces gather a sort of patina (or affective presence otherwise) from their surroundings? How do the things you’ve made change over time (in a literal sense or in how you feel about them)? What do you think about the “back side” or “underside” or “inside” of the things you’ve made (or that other people have made)? Do these sides have some kind of an impact on the “front side” or “outside”?

_____________________

1 Boundary-ing = boundary + -ing. Boundary = where one thing is adjacent to another thing. ___-ing = ___ is in an active state. Boundary-ing describes the state of being for a surface, edge, or thing (?). I think it could also describe the status of a concept, maybe at the very limit of what is “true” for that concept (or what is just proximally outside of that concept?).