final copy of the artist statement and space map

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Today's Document

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@ashleysingermfablog
final copy of the artist statement and space map
the energy pattern:
ashley singer, installation trials, 2024, documentation of offerings on offering stones
Over the course of the week, I reworked the stones individually creating lots of complicated patterns and direct symbols, as the time continued with the clootie tree continuing to sway outdoors, the space felt more energised and I adapted each offering arrangement according to how I was feeling in the space.
Pulling what was feeling like more fragmented energy towards the fragmented well, I began to feel secure in the inwards feeling pull coming from the tree, informing my scattered slightly looser pattern making, where I hid symbols of spirals, broken rings, and a slight scattered yet darting feel to many of the patterning. These patterns do not decorate the offering stones, but add intensive visual signification to the energy that has been intensely studied over the course of the week of the install, spending full days arranging, observing, moving slightly, moving completely, until the arrangemts rest still.
I am consciously thinking to my poem-making, symbols that build up sometimes one word poems, or poems that repeat a phrases over and over again like an incantation or spell. The bracketing has become a significant motif in this instal, as I think to Blodeu(w)edd, the Cymric goddess of Spring, who holds space for her transition from flower maiden to barn owl, and her complex meanings for transformation, distance and loss, signified phonetically in the bracketing of the ‘w’ in her name (in Middle Welsh: blodyn means flower, blodeuedd meanings flower maiden, blodeuwedd means flower face literally, or owl.) She pivots many meanings in one small space.
The clooties blowing…
The final layout:
Retrialling some more designs, moving offering stones closer together or further apart.
I have been referencing welsh traditional quilts, the patterns play off of more ancient Celtic symbols. I am also looking back to a previous post, where I discussed my ancestors Parish near Usk, Mourmountshore, Cymru (Wales) which was sat on a ring of ancient stones, and inside contained many patterned limestone blocks with vegetal motifs. I seek to draw energy from those spaces in my rituals.
Wk 00, 2nd of November, 2024
Refining the combinations of the offerings
Wk 00, 2nd of November, 2024
Charting to build the exhibition
Plotting the intersection point of my nanas childhood house in The Vale of Glamorgan and Hupai in Auckland with the gallery space,
I begin to track some feelings of energy from the tree into the space:
I then loosely plot my works in a wonky way across the tapped sections to give myself a rough estimate of space.
I will then go in with the intersection point and track where to hang my charms and where to re-plot my offering stones in the space. For now I’m just getting a sense of the size of the space, the walkway (keeping in mind the high foot traffic at the openings), and the brick wells placement in relation to the tree outside
Building up different arrangements on the offering stones
Wk 00, 2nd of November, 2024
Beggining to start the clootie tree :
First the ribbons^
Then building up the colours and the clooties (rags) were ripped from strips of excess cloth on site and tied onto the trees branches. I was very cautious of the trees new growth and works in the larger branches to make sure the tree was not destabilised.
Wk 00, 2nd of November, 2024
I picked up the vinyl from Make Shop on Kroad.
Catalogue inspiration that I am gathering for formatting and adjusting my catalogue. I like the idea of having a smaller booklet with some poem inside the larger catalogue with works, so they can be read together. I am currently collating some poems that I have done from across the year and focusing on ones that include Celtic languages (some Welsh proverbs and some Gaelic phrases) and some sentimental/earnest sentiments in English, as well as including the small spiral work I did using text.
I am making two small booklets to slot into my catalogue, one that examines my own garden and clootie tree/outdoor arrangement I did in it.
and a collection of a couple poems and translations.
these are the pictures that document the sculptural installation in my garden taken on 35mm film. I did the outdoor arrangement using a common medium for me when working outdoors: found garden pebbles. The shape I made is the symbol of two joining spirals, that reference energy connecting, perhaps references a connecting of two places- my mahi in Aotearoa and the indigenous knowledge from Wales Cymru.
Attached is a video of me tying my wishing site clootie tree at the courtyard for the final exhibition:
ashley singer, 2024, installation video: clootie tying
Wk 00, 14th of October, 2024
Trialling some works in DEMO
Above are some bronze, wax and porcelain offerings on offering stones as well as some of my hanging charms, I also tried some new pāua shell work on the offering stone.
For the wishing site, making a wishing tree with the clooties and ribbons I also found a way to use a loose branch from a tree in my garden to make a couple hanging ribbon pieces. Here I have wrapped the ribbon around the tree piece and then let ribbons hang from the circle.
This was following research on other ways Celtic regions are decorated with hanging charm-like offerings on trees. I will keep these as mementos and continue to tie more cloth-material and elements of ribbons to the tree in the courtyard.
Wk 00, 14th of October, 2024
End of Year Installation references: (Celtic Architectures- wells, wishing spaces, offerings)
Woodland garlands (online source)
Wk 00, 14th of October, 2024
mānuka, calan mai,
pāua, glimmer
a careful heart, dôn is
in meadows,
(ashley singer)
After a lot of mahi, and trial poems and lists of poems that weren't right, I decided on this collection of key elements to structure my poem for the vinyl cut on the gallery space window.
mānuka is a hearty variety that grows well in the heat of summer, and blooms most abundant-like in spring. mānuka begins the poem as it is the historical link to the whenua of my foraging grounds for gleaning my matter for work. I forage across mt eden-mt cecelia park, where the mānuka would have grown thick and in tuffs in the landscape, so I honour mānuka first in my poem. secondly, the mānuka flower shape (as I have unpacked in a later blog post) is distinctly the same shape as hawthorn, the mayflower that heralds in the springtime's coming, and the summer's burst of energy in the Celtic landscape. thus my inclusion of this flower form in many of my hanging charms.
next,
calan mai, or calan haf, is the Welsh (Cymric) term for mayflowers festival or Beltane. this ritual of creating offerings happens in may (in the northern hemisphere), yet could be practiced by welsh decedents like myself in November (as this links the two areas seasonally). This tradition often involves the tying of ribbons, using may poles, the giving of offerings on altars or stones and the gathering of people.
thirdly,
pāua, links with the beads and shells in my hanging charms, and was often gleaned on beaches in my nana's girlhood which links her to the seaside town of Barry, where she grew up in Wales.
fourthly,
glimmer, glimmering, shining: this is an intention of the whole exhibition. the reflection of the welsh term 'teg' the lightness which has layers of meanings.
a careful heart, relates to pākeha ways of being in nature, there needs to be respect for whenua, on the heavily planted soils of Tāmaki Makaurau, additionally my objects hold a lot of delicateness.
dôn, is the welsh earth mother, she has a genealogical link in welsh prose tales. she is like papa.
I have put the comma at the end of the writing to suggest perhaps a further editing or an openness in poetic voice.
some variations of this poetic theme that I am trialling:
ashley singer, 2024, poetic trials for the wall/window vinyl
having done further research into calan haf (also historically called Cyntefin), this festival that signifies the beginning-ness of summer and the end of spring is a celebration of this segment of the seasonal calendar.
overall, this years exploration into poetic notational practices (generative photography, sculpture-making, installation practice) and botanical folklores has led me to the time of the year: calan haf.
I am coming to sense that this may be a bittersweet time, as this part of the season isn't celebrated in it's traditional form by my family despite our welsh heritage, to me, perhaps this exhibition being the 'thin place' where this seasonal festival is revealed.
aptly, I am looking at using this poem, as a summation:
the last dream of calan haf
(ashley singer)
the pagan calendar in times of the Southern Hemisphere (online source)
I wanted to add this here as throughout the video this welsh folklorist often clarifies with the beings in the mabinogi (Y Mabinogi) that meaning changes in welsh drastically through the change of one simple letter. We have seen this with Blodeuedd (flower maiden) into Blodeuwedd (Flower face, Owl), the U being replaced with W signifies great change of being in the tale.
This is another important way that welsh speakers make meaning phonetically, and emphasises the careful consideration that must be given to all language around my practice.
This perhaps leads us to unpack Tylwyth Teg also, with the first word: tylwyth meaning folk, and the term teg (which I have alluded to in the past) really meanings lightness, fairness (as in moral), luminosity. Perhaps one can see fae or fairies (the welsh Celtic entities) as viewable as buds of light in nature, this adds to the conjugal mysticism coming from mystery and mist.
In such a way that language differs and is impactful to meaning on a granular level, so to is the materiality of the matter I am working with, the problem solving and decisions I am making in making processes and what leads the completion of a work.
To me, when meaning and materials align a work is completed (in poems the materials are your words used, and the punctuation, fonts etc) (in my hanging charms materials are the beads, or things I am threading into the string/wire) (in my floor works it is largely the materials of the earth or the insect i.e. waxes, clays, sediments, bronzes, flowers dried). Making meaning comes from these materials only in that my practice revolves around language. Using a glass bead vs a plastic one is a complex of a decision as using a letter in welsh writing. Signifiers I often use and return to are: butterflies, the spiral/tendril, the garden as a space for fae and meaning making, closing the gap between trees and a contemporary re- digestion of botanical folklores (from middle wales, oracles, te ao māori, celtic folk stories/prose tales from bards).
https://www.instagram.com/reel/C6ZsJJZorXi/?igsh=MWUyOHl5bmZseWQ2NA==
The fecundity of this time of year, the southern hemispheres equivalent to Beltane or in Welsh Calan Haf (or Mai meaning May), so May Day. Where the anything rushing and shooting into bloom and growth.
I was talking to a fellow masters student Esther who was explaining the māori linguistic version of teg that comes from the naming of leaves. She said: It's rau which means leaf as a whole word but ra refers to the sun/rays and u is an amplifier so it the whole word is kinda about how the light dances off of the leaves.
After working with my friend and design student Ashleigh Lowe we were able to fulfil the vinyl print requirements for the Make Shop printing for the poem on the wall/window.
I was then able to discuss with her the font, colour and style of the poem and how I wanted it to look customizing it on Adobe Illustrator.
We then were able to format it to be able to be printed with the printing company and I had to select some vinyl to bring in for printing.
This is how the final formatted document looks for sending off to the printers.
Wk 00, 14th of October, 2024
Exhibition plan
Following the discussion with my supervisors I have created the below exhibition plan:
A poem from one of my poem booklets as a 'charm' or 'spell' on the window of the gallery space.
The pathway of offerings arranged on my offering stones (pavers).
Hanging my ribbons and some charmed ribbons (with beads and tying methods) to make a wishing tree with a lot of hanging elements.
Hanging my charms from the roof across the install space.
Using DEMO Gallery to test the layout of the pathway of offerings, having the gallery act as the 'thin place' revealing the offerings.
Using my key architectures like the well and the garden path to guide the installation.
Going in on Friday or Thursday to test the roofing for the ability to hang charms,
Poem workshopping for the wall space:
ideas are as follows...
length- a phrase
concepts- Glimmering
Hawthorn
Teg (lightness)
Include Welsh (Cymric) words?? Cyntefin "foresummer, beginning of summer" (cf. Mehefin and Gorffennaf above).
dod yn ôl at fy nghoed (to return to my trees)
benthyg dros amser byr yw popeth geir yn y byd hwn (all that we have in this life is on borrowed time)
a drop of milkweed and bell heather (potential exhibition title, reads as a witchy ingredients list)
Perhaps we could get better together (this comes from one of my other poems maybe something with this sentiment)
Hawthorn- perhaps too clunky
All glimmering with light... (comes from a book I got second hand about welsh prose tales for children's stories
Notes about exhibition premise:
Beltane is the festival that heralds the beginning of Summer in Celtic countries, in Welsh it is called: Calan Mai or Calan Haf. I have found this when researching from this website.
In the southern hemisphere summer has started as early as 22nd Nov in 2017 and as late as 5th Jan in 1976. On average, when summer is defined in this way, it begins on 14th December. But around the exhibition date the 29th of November, could suggest a time for celebrating a close to spring and an opening up of summer.
What plant:
Pohutukawa wishing tree
Magnolia, lily, dutch iris casts
Rose petals, etc
I don’t want them to think that the plants I am discussing in the poems link to the matter in the exhibition in the way that;
Oh you said heather… where is the heather
quickthorn, whitethorn, hagthorn, mayflower;
going a-maying
with boughs of hawthorn blossom: Beltane or in Welsh: Calan Mai
Kawa Kawa
People would tie rags on a hawthorn that stood over a holy well, believing that the healing properties of the shrine would be absorbed by the cloth. Witches are said to ride on brooms of hawthorn, and wands made from this wood are believed to be especially powerful. A Welsh legend tells how Merlin was trapped inside a hawthorn tree by a witch called Nimue.
From the text: https://thehazeltree.co.uk/2015/04/25/hawthorn-bride-of-the-hedgerow/...
draenen wen: the alternative name for hawthorn is ‘draenen wen’. Now ‘draenen’ just means a prickle or a thorn. And ‘wen’means ‘white’ but there again Welsh loves to layer meanings in words. And ‘wen’ is an exclusively female form of the colour white and it also holds within it the connotation of holiness or bright splendour. So..‘hawthorn’ also means ‘holy lady’s prickle’/ ‘white thorn’ / ‘holy or sacred thorn’.
From the text: http://www.mysticchrist.co.uk/blog/post/the_hawthorn_tree...
continued reading:
trial poems:
may, bell heather, kawa kawa, pōhutukawa glimmer, pāua
sweet magnolia, lily, pōhutukawa, pāua, glimmer as may-thorn
sit by the wayside and watch the flowers grow, in lightness
aroha, in the may-thorn
I really want to end this post with a great poem/passage by Rachel Carson:
Wk 00, 13th of October, 2024
Poem handouts, leaflets, booklets? + window decals
excerpts and formatting from a drop of milkweed and bell heather
film images from a drop of milkweed and bell heather
stylised poems and images from a drop of milkweed and bell heather
cover from a drop of milkweed and bell heather
the title of this new amalgamation of poems comes from gathering the medicinal remedies from two plant species:
milkweed (left), bell heather (right)
I am constantly looking to species and their medical uses, particularly those found in Wales and Celtic regions, and trying to emulate a sense of their substitution in Auckland's vegetal landscape, mainly because these plants have been used for generations as healing tools.
The new poem collection, titled: a drop of milkweed and bell heather comes from poetry book trials that I have written across the year: camomile, hawthorn/manuka, coming out of the spring, tanglewood- changing some poems into a comprehensive readable format for viewers.
This text differs from the intention of my larger printed book hawthorn/mānuka, in that it is not a large reference of poems, almost like field-notes of what I have observed and gleaned. This text rather, is a short-ish, readable compression of key ideas and fundamental principles that unpack my practice’s research into welsh folklore, being-in-the-garden and the role of the artist as pākeha.
I have linked the full text below:
adropofmilkweedandwhiteheather copy.pdf
And am going to keep re-formatting as I have some options for the install in November. I am thinking around ideas of handouts and loose-leaf poems, since in my honours exhibition viewers expressed a want to take the poems further with them to home or around the exhibition more. Maybe less booklet like I could have card hand-outs of some of these poems, this might link to the 'gleaning' opportunity for viewers, to feel like they are picking up and participating more in the work.
I also have printed two wall decals of some of the strongest poems, to place on the windows of the gallery space: this will hopefully give a sense of the poems logic to the sculptural arrangements. And will be a larger scale than the hand-out styled booklets I have done in the past.
tanglewood.pdf
coming out of the spring.pdf
asmallcollection ofhodgepodgepoems.pdf
Maybe I can collate some key poems from my writing and show them alongside my catalogue.
Wk 00, 13th of October, 2024
Moments from Installing for the September Seminar
The light of off the mirrors was able to bounce around a reflective light onto the walls linking the hanging charms on the wall and the sculptural arrangements on the floor. This sculptural idea of reflection and glimmering has been important when working in this space and installing. I am able to weigh up the position of my mirrors to the light that is coming into the space. Here I am wondering if the connection from wall-floor is becoming more important in the install as I look at conveying a sense of 'lightness' by learning more about the welsh concept 'teg'.
Wk 00, 13th of October, 2024
as if from dreaming... projecting video in a darker space
ashley singer, as if from dreaming, 2024, digital video taken on my iPhone through the viewfinder of my 35mm camera
Here, I am trying to convey how I look at nature: I see the leaves, the bright sunlight dappled on the leaves. In a process using the camera to generate my ways of looking, I am thinking about the camera as an 'eye' in which to see the vegetal world through.
This video being taken in Eden Gardens in Maungawhau, is to me the brightest day of summer in 2023, I shot this and many other short clips through the view finder then. It has taken me throughout the year to edit this clip down to its size and flow. A lot of my gleaning happens from the point of Maungawhau suburb street-side gardens and berms, so this is a key location that my practice gets energy from. Because of the sacred nature of Maungawhau to tangata whenua, I make sure to not gather on the mountain space, to collect from introduced plant species that drop matter, and to take only one or two pieces for collection (which then gets composted in my garden bed in Hillsborough).
With the help of Sonya Lacey my supervisor, I was able to have the colours adjusted and the video cropped to work with the projector.
The video is quite grainy or buffy as it comes from filming through such a small gap in the film camera's lens. The viewfinder brings in a lot more glimmering light than the regular lens of the camera, film or digital. I liked when the video felt dreamy and hazy, this sense of looking at nature in a mystical ways conjures a haze, a glimmer and a sense of soft golden light. This has stemmed from reading and unpacking in my contextual research tales of math in the Mabinogion and the poetry of bard's like Taliessin, who spent a lot of emphasis in their writing on the way Middle Welsh times glimmered. Often women were heavily jewelled, the landscape was bright with metal armours, and nature was lush and abundant. I am trialling the short video work in the space to hopefully elude to a dream-like feel of these times past.
Designing Hanging Charms
These charms I made following reading: . I was inspired by the way charms sat on the wall or just off of the wall space on a hook or a nail and liked the idea that they held space for conjuring and combining multiple fragments of materials.
These pieces include metals, beads, gemstones and shells that I found on chains in op shops and second hand stores or some of my jewellery that I wear day to day.
Here is how I am making some of the newer charms and I am laying the beading out in handy containers and surfaces and choosing the beads that make meaning together.
I then use my scissors and craft wire to create the charms and use images that I have found on early-human charms and artefacts form museum websites to translate these styles of tying into my work (see last image).
Here are some places that the beads have been sourced from (second hand stores, junk emporiums).
Above are images of the found trinkets, beads, shimmery metal buckles, buttons, and rare vintage shell beads combined on thin dainty craft wire.
Adding mirrors to see if I can pull in more lightness, on the offering stones, maybe the roundness works in some cases,
Found this image of a Well in Cymru and love the pathway-line that leads out of the well.
as if from dreaming in the form space, needs darker lighting ....