Recently I
opened a collection of sentimental souvenirs from the early days of my
marriage with Jim Schoettler. The memories came flooding back and I knew
that meant stories ahead. And, I am working on those.
Rather
than waiting until the whole story has jelled I am telling vignettes of
the longer story as a way of collecting more bits of memory and quilting
them into a new fabric. Sort of like I work on my collages - bits and
pieces worked into a whole.
It is just the way I always work - - my process, so to speak.
In this video a small calendar opens the door for a flood of memories to start working.
When I make an art piece I photograph the stages. For this story I am taping bits as I work out the final structure of the story - - and the tapes give me a record of the process and the progress of the story.
Notes to myself as I build this story.
I am thinking of Luciano Penay, Chr. of my Masters (MFA) thesis committe at American University - whenever we met to discuss my paintings he would look - and then ask me - "these are the answers - what where the questions?" I am going to think about building this story in the same way. What am I reminded of? When and where and who? And how will I shape the finished story. How do you re-create those special moments when you were young? What really matters after all?
How do I work out a story and record my process?
Part of my process is the work I do between this Blog, then taping parts of the story and most importantly telling it to a group when I can.
HERE is a blog post I wrote when I began mulling over this stories in the calendar shortly after I opened the "memory" box and found it.
THIS post comes studying some black and white pictures that were also in the box They helped me to step back in place and time - at the time we were there - living our story.
