Google Earth placemarking...

Possible areas of 're-placement', accompanied by small descriptive notes of the place/memory, and suggestions for which memory box possessions can be placed there...

Maybe my biggest loss is that I cannot think of my losses clearly without missing them more keenly... I mourn who and what I no longer have so much that I cannot come to terms with their losses...

The Den...

'Hanging out my dirty washing'

Finding re-placement in the displacement...

After a week of carrying out visual and mental experiments using the hoarded possessions within my 'memory box', and much deliberation, I have finally determined a more considered and purposeful direction for my work. I had experimented grouping, separating and individualising the collection of objects, using visual and sensual recording to stir the memories and emotions in the hope of defining my concept of the self and how I respond to part losses... I 'hung my dirty washing out', so to speak, with my randomised 'possession line', and created my safe haven, my childhood den (a hidden place of security and undisturbed personal space)... The handling and systematic photography of each individual object caused the memories to come flooding back, which the more I contemplated, became a source of upset and worry; even for the better memories due to their gradual fading into the background of the more unpleasant events throughout my life immortalised in the box amongst the nostalgic memorabilia of haoppier days. The more I began to consider how I would go about deconstructing and dismantling my 'memory box possessions, the more anxiety and upset I felt considering the loss of these objects... they have become the signifiers of a lifetime of unusual memories, memories which I am afaid of not being able to hold on to, or be in control of. My memory box became a vault, a defensive mechanism to combat the fear of loss (in the broader sense of mind, memories and experiences, but also the more immediate such as family, friends, heritage and treasured possessions); a vessel in which I could contain my fears of loss, but yet keep them compact and close at hand... I began to consider instead of deconstruction, the concept of 're-placement'... airing out these fears, placing them in a new context, a new environment in which they are shared rather than destroyed, yet at a known but separated distance from myself... a journey of realisation; a quest to come to gradually and independently come to terms with my fears of loss. I have decided to map my new journey, a journey that consists of taking my memory possessions back to my home, the Falkland Islands, (where many of the objects and memories originate from) and 're-placing' them in the world from which they have become displaced. At times I may need others to complete the task for me, to chose the place and the means... but my work will centre greatly around the process; the documentation of these journeys and the navigation of the self throughout their progression. The means by which I determine to 're-place' my possessions, and their exact locations will become the topic of my research, and will also aid in adding a deeper consideration and purpose to my work. Some objects I may end up keeping, and a large part of my artistic conclusion will depend upon these objects,and why my 'self' could not bear to destroy them... My mind is buzzing with ideas as to how, where and why... but I have purpose for once, and am already starting to feel a more positive change in my concept of self identity towards considering loss and loss of the past... I feel progress... and the gradual beginning of a step towards coming to terms with my fears of loss; and losing my losses... My latest

As I continue my research into Attatchment Theory (John Bowlby's 'Attachement and Loss' being the bible here!) and the nature of grief through sociological and psychological explanations, I have been thinking on an experimental level about my memory box. Since I was a young girl I have kept a collection of certain unusual objects and letters which spark certain emotional and visual memories for me, and have stored them in a jumbled manner within their container. I intend trying to break this confine, to explore the separate, individual nature of each object, and how they fit together within the collection. During this process of separation I will be recording, recollecting and re-living the nostalgia of these physical memory associations... and then I will be begin the individual deconstruction of each; hopefully aiding the process of deconstructing the confines of my own closed and confused approach to dealing with loss. What will I do with these 'memory objects' after I have dismantled them? Will I put them back in the box... or can they never return to it?...

Loss

Ok... loss... been thinking about it all week obviously, and feel like I'm not really getting much further from where I started... We all experience so much loss in our lives... even if it's just a pair of shoes you really liked getting lost, or one of your best friends dying, it changes your life in varying degrees of subtlety and obviousness. I guess loss has always been a confused, unarticulated issue for me... being the youngest in my family, yet living 8000 miles away from them, death was a regular yet diconnected ocurrence. At the age of 5, 8, 10 the death of a relative that you only met a couple of times seems unrelated to everyday life; you cannot comprehend their absence, or the concept of their loss, and they become a faded figure in the crowds of acquaintences thrust into your memory. My grandmother was one such figure... distant... homely, always cooking and wearing an apron and rubber gloves, elbows deep in the sink, or insistently making plates of lemon cake... pleasant but unknown, unfamiliar to me and my life. I felt sorry for her death, but more keenly felt anguish for the pain I wittnessed from my Grandad at her passing. He loved her greatly. People never seem the same after the death of their partner in my family; they seem to fade out of existence themselves when their other has gone... I knew my Grandad. He visted me frequently in the Falklands and was an active character in my childhood. His death seemed more painful because I knew him, loved him; felt his absence, his removal from my world. Loss for me is losing what I knew, what I loved... what I actually comprehend that I can never physically have returned to me... is primary loss. As time goes on a more subconsious, slow- acting loss sets in... that hollow, empty feeling of the extent of wasted time... of mistakes... of what can only ever remain a memory. I think the closest I ever came to verbally describing how I experience loss was when I was 17 and in that precarious self- induced misery time of my life and procrastinating through the misuse of poetry... even though I was such a cliched writer, I still believe it is the closest I have got to describing the loss I felt at 15 on what I still believe to be the most obvious worst day of my life; I have just spent half an hour looking for the poem, the words that described most closely the umcomprehensible ache of the loss of one of my best friends... and seem to have thrown it away or left it behind in the Falklands. Maybe that sums up the way that I deal with loss... maybe it encapsulates the very reason that I cannot forget my losses... because however much time passes I still cling to the pain of their memories. In my experiments towards the finale of my piece, I hope to be able to objectify that pain and in that relieve its burden... but I already oibjectify it... by keeping it all physically and mentally locked away inside a small antique brown box...

Help needed folks!

To my lovelys on the Fine Art course, Please if you have time could you send me any useful information you have about Zabriskie Point, as I haven't been to any of the lessons that you've been to and apart from some youtube videos of explosions and orgies in deserts I'm a little in the dark about some of the deeper aspects of the film which Wikipedia doesn't delve into (hehehe...)? And also I would really like to know all of your mental or visual associations to the concept of Loss (cos i think im looking into that)... what does it make you think about- songs/people/images/objects/colours/sounds/films/stories/novels/etc?... and if you feel comfortable sharing, (which of course you don't have to unless you want to) ways in which you have dealt with loss (good and bad) and particular times in which you have experienced it? I'd be happy just with associations if you don't want it to be personal... though I will be trying to interview (anonymous) individuals into greater depth when I get back. Also tell me what you guys are doing for it! Would love to know! Please send replies as comments to this post, or as private messages to my Facebook account if you do'nt want anyone to see it... thanks! Miss you all, see you next week!!!! :D xx

The Puzzle begins...

At the moment I am on a two month exchange trip to Seoul, South Korea, I've been thinking about the brief set for my second year art Degree course back in Huddersfield... how it inexplicably links, yet does not quite fit with the slightly conceptually removed work I have been dabbling in out in Korea, and how this muddle of ideas within my head ironically makes my purpose seem all the more clear. Using imagery, context and references from the film 'Zabriskie Point' I intend (although it should be too early into the project to direct my ideas down one narrow pathway, but I am determined to do it from a sense of experimental duty to myself) to explore the difficult concept of loss upon the individual. The sense of loss spans over so many varied yet connecting themes; personal, the loss of family, friends, pets or even treasured possessions and role models; cultural, loss of tradition, icons or particular political, religious or social endeavours; financial loss, bankruptcy, economic depression; loss of health, illness both mental and physical, of memory, of independence; loss of spirit, or of self- esteem... the loss of oneself, or at least the misplacement of it can be the most bitter of all; of hopes and dreams, failure to reach certain goals, of not living the life which you had anticipated. Firstly, I want to explore these multi-faceted areas of Loss, through studies of psychological reasonings such as Attachment Theory and emotional well being to gain more scientific explanations into the mental processes of loss... then I want to determine more personal, qualitative data through recordings the memories and experiences of loss between individuals, and to ascertain through visual and text-based observations if there are any notable behavioral patterns and inconsistencies caused by 're-living' these memories and experiences (both of myself and of willing participants). I want to through loss into the open and attempt to DE-CONSTRUCT it... to piece together the fragments by breaking them apart again in different ways... though if I ever succeed, or even attempt to do so, in putting the pieces back together again widely depends upon what this experience teaches me about my own nature of 'dealing with loss'...