Wednesday 30th November
After doing some work in the library on my “Practice in Context” I then went into the studio and worked a little on the polystyrene bullet mould. Simon Lewandowski gave me some information on a Canadian Artist Brian Jungen who works with Nike trainers, totem poles and base ball bats. I had a tutorial with Chris Evans at 11.20, it wasn’t entirely useful. He liked the bullets but was questioning the fact that I had put a full stop behind the work; he also drew a comparison between mine and Simon Starlings process. I had not previously, consciously made the connection. But once I had been reminded of his existence I remembered looking at his work over the summer and had realised its subconscious effect on my thought process. I need to keep better notes.

Chris argued that he liked to be left wondering about art, asking questions and not being able to get it. That wasn’t necessarily the point behind the bullets I argued, if they are to mean anything then they must be accessible to anyone yet still be an interesting concept in their manufacture and arrangement. Their is no point in trying to ask an important questions of the viewer if 99% of the viewers don’t even understand the questions. I agreed with Chris on certain things but not concerning the recasting of the metal found in Verdun.

Chris commented on the ply bullets and was impressed that I had produced them by hand, without the aid of a lath. He said they were great as studies but did not really go further than this, I totally agreed. The baseball bats caught his eye but they are not far enough on to be of great interest yet. I need to pick out my text and design a rack for them to be displayed upon.

I spent the afternoon working on some personal projects. A blown up photo of the aftermath of Weatherby races for Alex’s new house and James Birthday card (I have turned him into James Bond)
Hammam was going through his slides for his Slade application and he invited me and Dave to look. I then went home followed by work, which was shit.

On the way home I stopped off at Alexs to help him sort out his broken shower. Duncan and Bob (Alex’s ex -house mates) were there, as Alex had been ill. We went to B&Q then Duncan tried to fit the shower. Back to B&Q to replace a broken part before back to Alex’s and then back home for a butty followed by bed.

Tuesday 29th November
Useful day yesterday. Spent most of the day except lunch in the casting rooms over the road. I made new sprus and mixed new moulds. I managed to Poor another couple of moulds that were set from the previous week. I didn’t expect any results as the previous ones from the same batch had failed due to the sprus being to thin. One of the two worked however and I can put this down to 2 things.

Firstly the sprus were slightly bigger and second the metal was hotter as I had heated it for much longer due to Kevin being distracted by other students.

The one Spru that worked produced three lovely bullets, gold at the bottom and top, but black and deep purple in the centre. At first I thought this was the colour of the metal but I now believe it is the effects of the burnt-out wax. I will now photograph and produce more. I may decide to leave these on the sprus as they remind me of plants or new shoots breaking the surface.


On the way home I managed to get a response out of the clergy of north Leeds and arranged a meeting for tomorrow at lunch. St Marks has not yet been sold and not yet received planning permission, Hope remains.

Work followed by home and note taking out of "Art in Theory 1900-2000". I made notes from several writers and artists before starting to read extracts of Franz Marks "forward" to the planned second volume of Der Blaue Reiter and found a deep resonance with our present time.

It was only after reading this that I discovered Marc had been killed in action in Verdun. I sat and pondered this startling coincidence for a while and then was unable to take any further information in. I went to bed.

Monday 28th November
Yesterday was a good day. Sat with John the technician in the morning discussing my silly idea of making 91 life sized bullets/ monuments to go in a church for the end of year Degree and situation Leeds shows. Where as everyone else said "forget about it, not possible" John said nothing is impossible, their are only things I haven’t tried yet". He spent the next half hour taking me through the process, materials and even sketched out some designs for moulds. I now had a step by step plan of what I needed to do.

First step is to make a polystyrene bullet 20mm smaller than the final piece. Then fill out a technical assistance document and get this approved. Whilst I'm waiting on the paperwork I can cover the polystyrene in a 20mm skin of plaster, then once finished apply a coat of fibre glass. take off the coat of fibre glass like a Sheaf then plain down the plaster by 10mm all over followed by another layer of fibre glass. Again remove the layer of fibreglass intact and then build a jacket for the lager fibreglass mould placing the smaller mould inside. a system of measured bolts will keep the cavity at around 10mm ready to pour in a kind of resin. And this is how I will make the bullet.

Lecture in the second half of the morning from Chris Taylor, all about book and work presentation and design. Got some great ideas for both my practice in context presentation and also the end of year catalogue.

After Lunch I cut out and glued together the polystyrene ready to shape down, then spent the rest of the afternoon making wax bullets ready for Tuesday and fitting them to sprus again, across the road.

Work and many phone calls from creditors, will need to return home to resolve (temporarily) so I did. Shit end to a good day.

Saturday the 26th and Sunday the 27th November
Spent the day in the library working on the context in practice and doing some Christmas shopping. Went to see Alex in the early evening and we went for a drink. Started at the
Adelphi next door to the brewery, moved on to The Grove, looked in at the Britannia and then walked up the hill into Beaston and went into the Imperial. Got back to Alex's and was feeling incredibly sick, called a cab and left my phone on the back seat.

I spent Sunday visiting cab offices in south Leeds to see if they had picked me up the night before. I eventually found the right one on Dewsbury Road and at 3.30 established contact with the cabi who, thank god! had my phone. Paid him to bring it to me in Chapel Alerton where I was watching the football.

Dropped Alex off and went home, ate and then went out to the cinema to watch Pans Labyrinth. Very strange very sad.

Friday 25th November

Spent the day working on a mould ready to try some fibre glassing. Will have to wait until Monday when John is in however, as he is our resident sculptural genius.

Got some work done but got more value out of the conversations with Hammam, Mat the Sanfransiscan and later with Dave (the technician) and Kate from my year. The mornings lecture was cancelled so I found Mat in my space rolling cigarettes and asking about my work. Mat was carrying a book on Phenomenology with him and we began discussing how man interprets history and how we see our place within the Universe. Hammam could not help but over hear and saw this as a chance to flex his intellectual muscles. I was busy talking about my work and how I was trying to explore some of mans failings. How history repeats itself and the cyclical nature of man (the human condition).

Hammam interjected and said History does not repeat itself but rather through human constructs we interpret it as doing so, I disagreed. I put forward the idea that history repeats because at the core of all history is man and we are unchanging in our failures. Hammam accused me of being too Marxist in my views and that History is too complicated to boil down in this manner and that the many layers and influences that go into creating any one situation can not be repeated. I agreed in part but resolutely argued that when all these layers of actions, events and circumstances were filtered through, at the heart and in every corner there would be the human failures as represented by the seven sins, mans timeless qualities. To my surprise Mat jumped in and said he agreed with me. Hammam did not look so convinced. Mark Twain would have put it slightly more eloquently.

“It is not worthwhile to try to keep history from repeating itself, for man's character will always make the preventing of the repetitions impossible.” (25)

Or, as Hammam some time later informed me, “Mark Twain said something about History not repeating itself but spoke of “History Rhyming”.
In the afternoon I got talking with Kate about the TT which I was trying to organise a visit too for my father. We soon started talking about our practice and the subject soon got on to the environment and what the future held for mankind. Her father has always worked in the oil industry and so this was a subject that informed her practice. Again as in the morning our conclusion was that because of our inability to stop wanting and consuming man was destined for an enforced change, total. Everything would have to change to ensure mans existence and this would also incorporate a cull, natural disease, super bugs, war or environmental melt down.

“Many too many are born: the state was created for the superfluous.” (26)

If this view of the world seems a little pessimistic then please refer yourself to Foucault who reminds us about the fragility of human history and of man as a recent construct when he concludes “The Order of Things” by telling us,

“If those arrangements were to disappear as they appeared, if some event of which we can at the moment do no more than sense the possibility – without knowing either what its form will be or what it promises – were to cause them to crumble, as the ground of classical thought did, at the end of the eighteenth centaury, then one can certainly wager that man would be erased, like a face drawn in the sand at the edge of the sea.” (27)

Dave overheard our discussion and explained that he had not understood that this was a driving force in my work. We discussed different ways of representing this idea/ question. Dave suggested some kind of machine programmed to destroy itself with an option not to. The machine would never choose not to. Nice idea but a little complicated as I know nothing about programming machines. I had just finished reading Simon's work and this sounded similar to one of his works which never the less was interesting but not where I was trying to go.

When writing about his “ArtistMachine” Simon informs us that:

“Like all artists it is infinitely needy and pathetically dependent upon others for its continued existence.” (28)

And Simon also reminds us everything we do eventually ends up as “Landfill”.

I explained to Dave that I wanted the bullets in the church as a reference to the worship of destruction and monuments to man, and therefore my failings. I suppose what I am looking for is Absolution through Absolutism. If I could destroy everything I owned to achieve this then I would. Michael Landy has already done this with “Breakdown” An inspirational piece of work. Surely I need to destroy the casts in order for there to be a “Vita Nouva”?

----------------------------------------------------
(25) Mark Twain in Eruption (26) Fredrich Nietzsche “Thus Spoke Zarathustra” pp 76. (27) Michael Foucault "the Order of Things" pp 422 (28) Simon Lewandowski “The ArtistMachine” pp3

Thursday 24th November

What a waist of a day. Woke up in a panic as soon as I realised I left my car illegally parked at millennium square, quick taxi and no ticket thank god.

Spent the morning recovering and trying to work. Cancelled work that night with a plan to stay in the studio and work instead. The plan was foiled by Hammam who entered fresh from Paris and would not stop talking about women.

I left, went home and then went out to see Alex, Duncan and Jake. Went for some shandys in Chapel Alerton.

Wednesday 23rd November
It all fell apart yesterday. I tried casting the bullets in metal and the sprus failed. Back to square one and making all new bullets from wax.

Spent the morning in the dark arches, at least now I have seen the space. Went to work and then fell off the wagon (not that I was on it) in spectacular style.
Got home at three in the morning. Couldn’t afford to go drinking but I did anyway. German beer festival followed by the Victoria Hotel followed by Mojos.

I need to escape Leeds. I read an interview with Hurst last week. The reporter asked why Hurst had stopped drinking and Hurst replied "I’ve seen that movie". This statement stayed in my head for some time.

Tuesday 22nd November
I will do yesterday in reverse as my head is somewhat fuzzy this morning.

Left Alex’s new house late last night after watching Celtic beat Man U and was at work before this.

University had been a day of little progress. I had made shelves for my bullet template in the afternoon, at lunch I had gone for a walk to try and find the reverend of the local church as he was not answering his phone. I had also paid a visit to the space in Headingly "25" or some such thing. Full of fucking hippies. In the morning I had done something but what, I can not recall.

I had started the day at the library and been in the studio at 9 ish. I tried contacting Igloo but again no direct response just messages left with secretary. Ah now I remember, I cut out and glued my bullets together and also watched my film of our failed art heist with Dave.

Monday 21st November
I forgot to say I submitted a proposal to situation Leeds, we shall see what if anything comes of this.

Spent the first part of the morning talking to Hammam about his chair and the meaning of his work. Griselda Pollock was passing and couldn’t help becoming involved. She asked me whether I liked the piece, I said I did. She thought it was quit a departure for him.
I spent the second half of the morning discussing life, politics society and the future with Dave in the wood shop while I cut out a stencil ready for the afternoon.

I spent the afternoon cutting out and making a large bullet. I then ruined one of the baseball bats by cutting into it and then painting on it as a test. It didn’t work.

Home, work, home, bed.

Friday 18th November
Friday was spent discussing my work with Alex in the morning, who had sent me an email the previous night about my show suggestions and had then stopped on the way into the lecture to have a chat. Something he has never done before. 10 minutes later he picked my name out of hat and we were partnered up for the morning. We never got to see or discuss his work as it was at home.

Lunch I met with Vince and Kevin. Kevin needs to change jobs soon as he’s given up with the management across the road. Vince was on good form and invited me to the Liverpool Biennial the following Wednesday.

I bought cakes from the fourth years and polished up the baseball bats using bri wax. I stained them in the morning. Tested one with Mahogany and Pine base and one with just a pine stain.

Went shopping for all the picnic food for me and Jamie followed by work and then home to iron and pack.

Saturday was really good fun. Jamie had a good game and played his heart out, had a chat with Penny, very unusual. After the footy I took Jamie down to the driving range where he took several pounds off me on the putting green. We ate and then watched a bit of Chingford town rugby union. We drove over to Enfield and cued for Bond tickets and got the last two seats. Bond would have been proud. After the film, which was great fun, we had some more food and then got an ice-cream on the way home.

All in all a wonderful day. Next time I see my son he will be 9. Saturday night I stayed at my parents ready to see Sami and the boys as well as my Grandfather who is still recovering from pneumonia. Had to meet Olwen, mums younger sister, for the first time in 6 years. Olwen and I used to be very close; I would eat out with her in London, leave the office and meet her for lunch or dinner. We made some kind of peace under pressure from my Grandmother. Until my mum receives an apology from Olwen their will be no real peace, and rightly so. Families are great.

Drove home and met Alex at his new home in Beaston. Helped him do a little unpacking and helped drink a load of beer and had a smoke with him. Got in a taxi and went home where I collapsed in front of the tele before retiring to bed with blurred vision.

Thursday 17th November
After the Library I went into the studio and played the video of me taping up the window.

Click To Play

I then went for a walk down the road to find the university Chaplin. I spent an hour with the Chaplin both in his office and then in my studio talking about my work, conflict, history, faith and the world in general. I explained that I was an atheist but was also honest when I told him I was beginning to question how people are going to survive without some kind of faith.

Mat, the Chaplin gave me the contact details of the relevant C of E people in Leeds who may be able to help regards space for "Situation Leeds". I already have one space earmarked but now need to talk to other people about St Marks and the Church at Hyde Park corner.


Spent the rest of the day bringing the baseball bats to a fine finish. A quick visit home followed by driving to the airport to pick up the folks and break the news to my mother of her father’s illness. Took them back to mine, watered and fed them and then said goodbye as they drove back to Cheshire and I went off to work, an hour and half late.

Home followed by bed and no sleep. I couldn't stop thinking about my studio work.

Wednesday 16th November
Library at 8 and studio at 9. Coffee, collect my DVD (that was burning overnight) and then a quick sit down with the paper and Band of brothers "The Day of Days" episode. All the men in the vicinity including myself, Hammam and the three technicians stopped and stared as we watched the Normandy landings rein-acted for our entertainment. War is to men as flames are to moths.

Over the start of the year I had brought a number of different films in to play whilst working. “A Space Odyssey 2001” was one of the first films to be played and the Screaming Monolith was in some ways a starting point for my thought process for this years work. The Monolith in Kubrick’s film seems to represent “A new beginning” or “Vita Nouva”. A stage of development or catalyst for change. Instigated by an alien force. Arthur C Clarke’s novel gives us more detail of how the monolith is part of a vast alien computer of which the Human race is a product.

I got busy with the second baseball bat and by the end of the day had both somewhere near complete, as far as shape is concerned.
At lunch Hammam beat me at chess and then I went across the road to the metal casting workshop. Kevin hadn’t had chance to do anything again so I finished the sprus and mixed the casting liquid.
Kevin dropped one when moving it but it only took several minutes to make right and clear up the mess. At 3 I returned to the studio and completed the baseball bats. 4 o’clock rolled around and I made my way to work.












Got a phone call from my big sis, my granddad was very ill and she wanted to let me know as I would need to tell my parents when I picked them up from the airport tomorrow night.
I used to spend a lot of time with the old boy but then we started to wined each other up. We played golf twice a week, I was 17 and he was 75 yet it still became a little too competitive. He’s my granddad so I can’t say too much, but he’s always been a hard man, maybe just a product of his environment?

He once told me a story about how he was around a friend’s house when he was in his early twenties. There was a group of them playing cards, all were Durham miners. My grandfather dropped a card and bent over on his chair to retrieve it from under the table. In the candle lit gloom of the back room he saw what appeared to be a small football rolling around under the table, as he strained his eyes to see what this strange mass was he realised that it was in fact a large pile of cock roaches huddled together for warmth. Like I said, the product of his environment.

England plays tonight.

Tuesday 15th November

Last night I finished work and returned home, dug out my trainers and jogging gear then looked at them as they lay on the floor. I slumped onto the bed stayed there in thought for several minutes then went down stairs. I am ashamed to say I watched the beginning of “I’m a Celebrity” before going to bed. I managed to ignore the impulse to buy some beers.

It was raining in the morning so I drove in to school. I started work on the baseball bats as well as burning copies of films I had made and borrowed. The film I had borrowed was from a friend of my fathers from Amsterdam. Back in the 80s he had made a film about the squatter’s movement in Amsterdam and its fight against the government. The same guy had looked after my father for several weeks in 1984 when he had stayed there as a representative of the N.UM. Several weeks before my father’s visit, I too had been their guest. The baseball bats in that way were connected to the film. I had remembered the scene of the baseball bats lining the corridor of a squatters bar, all racked neatly one after another, each accompanied by a gas mask. Over those weeks I travelled on a Dutch barge around Holland using Amsterdam as a base. I experienced many new things and most importantly I experienced another way of living. We held up supermarkets, jumped trams, frequented illegal bars and visited galleries. I was only 8 but I was given the job of running the bar on the barge and some mornings, when I was up before everyone else (as 8 year olds always are). I would steer the boat whilst the guy usually doing this (a Yule Brenna look a like dressed only in Y fronts and wellies), would fill his pipe and watch.

Much of my political opinion is formed from my experiences that year. The illegal arrests, beatings and detentions, the travel restrictions, mail opened phones tapped, houses watched and family's split (no I must have got that wrong, that couldn’t happen here, not here in Britain). It is my political opinions and love of History that form the foundations of my work. The experiences of 1984 taught me a lot about the limitations of the governments power. My social roots were soon forgotten however.

“Just look at those superfluous people! They acquire wealth and make themselves poorer with it.” (22)

Would have been an accurate description of me in my 20s. It took me years to realise once more that

“Truly he who possesses little is so much less possessed: praised be a moderate poverty.”(23)

Bullshit! Being broke is no joke. I can however recommend a bit of hunger to anyone who is finding life unfulfilling, lacking stimulus or just struggling to motivate themselves.

“Ill gotten wealth ensures the soul consumes the blood” (24)

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(22) Fredrich Nietzsche “Thus Spoke Zarathustra” pp 77 Paragraph 3 (23) pp 77 paragraph 7 (24) Goethe’s “Faust” pp 110. Faust talks to Mephistopheles.

Monday 14th November
Slept in after the alarm went off despite going to bed before ten.


Library followed by studio and then into the practice in context seminar. Sometimes I think im on the right track with this and other times I think I couldn’t be further from the point. Spent the second half of the morning discussing the show.
I had a small argument with some of the members of the third year show. I was accused of not contributing.












Hammam said he was suffering similar problems in his year and suggested we do a show together, maybe even get others in a similar predicament involved as long as it worked as a group. We shook hands but I doubt that he meant it.

Spent the rest of the day making ply baseball bats.

Left collage at 3.30 and went off to work. I had to ration the bin liners as we still hadn’t received the order I placed. Oh the heady world of cleaning.

Friday 11th November
Started the day brightly and walked into school. Had a talk by Simon Lewandowski about his interest’s influences and some of his work, and got to ask some questions.

It was good to hear someone talk about there influences being something other than the prescribed texts of philosophy and art history and critique. Simon enjoyed Fiction as much as anything and one particular book stood out “The Third Policeman” is a book which I read over the summer. A curios book that I should read again when less committed to other tasks. Simon made particular reference to one part of the story where one of the Policemen shows the main character a series of boxes he is making, each smaller than the next each fitting inside the next until so small as to be indiscernible to the eye. The halving of halves, is a task without end.

“Six years ago they began to get invisible, glass or no glass. Nobody has ever seen the last five I made because no glass is strong enough to make them big enough to be regarded truly as the smallest things ever made. Nobody can see me making them because my little tools are invisible into the same bargain. The one I am making now is nearly as small as nothing.” (18)



Popped across the road at lunch but they were all busy, so bought some paints and returned to the studio to try out some of the black and white images on the test barrel.

Left James and Hammam in the studio playing chess, now a regular occurrence. On the way back home an obscure memory was triggered by god only knows what and I thought of the baseball bats I had seen racked up in Amsterdam in 1984 and how each bat was accompanied by a gas mask. Really rather an interesting idea. I surfed the net on the job seekers computers at work looking for baseball bats and gas masks. I will make the bats from layered ply like the bullets but will have to buy the masks I decided.

After work I picked up Jake and then went around to see Duncan. Duncan’s life long mate Neil was there. I hadn't seen Neil since I had made his partner cry. After seven years in her company and several incidents where I felt that she had deeply insulted me I had made an effort to stay clear until a night down the pub and I was forced to sit next to her. I was very drunk and became abusive at every utterance from her mouth. Not my finest hour and frankly made myself look a bit of a dick. The irony is that the discussion was about a list I had compiled off all my transgressions and how I wanted to use it in my work somehow. The list contained 72 transgressions or things I later realized I had regretted or simply should not have done, by the end of the night the list was up to 73.

Saturday morning I spent in the library followed by spending some of my Euro millions winning down at maxi Chinese restaurant while reading this months copy of Artist News Letter. I then walked home and went to the Showcase to watch breaking and entering. How gay am I, I thought. Saturday night alone at the cinema watching a chick flick. Still it kept me out of the pub.

Sunday morning I cleaned the house and car, ready for a flying visit by the parents on the way to the airport and Prague. Took them for dim sum and green tea. Dropped them at the airport and then went down the local to watch Liverpool get stuffed by the Arsenal. The new landlord is a Glaswegian and supporter of the Hoops. We had a good chat, his name is Kevin. Kevin had lived in Leeds for 5 years and this was his first time running a pub. He had that stone grey parlour that only Glaswegians can carry off without actually being dead.

“The Britannia” is on the wrong edge of Holbeck and there is always an interesting mix of Africans, White bread Yorkshire, settled Gypsies, alcoholics, prostitutes, criminals (selling moody goods) or just gangs of rowdy drinkers and sometimes me. An ambulance arrived and the medics disappeared into the ladies, half an hour later they wheeled out an unconscious woman. She looked about 60 but given the neighbourhood, she was more likely 40 and a regular of “The Britannia”. Despite the incident all of the punters carried on about their business. One of the bar staff enjoying a day off got up and collected the mop and bucket to help the landlady clear up whatever mess had been left. If there was not so much abundance in Britain at present I would call upon words from “The Road to Wigan Pier” to help put this existence into some context. Holbeck is however still made up of the type of housing described by Orwell when he wrote.

“Towns like Leeds and Sheffield have scores of thousands of back to back houses which are all of a condemned type but will remain standing for decades.” (17)

Houses that are now unaffordable for nurses and teachers. So these are different times, albeit some of the problems of the 1930s remain. Nietzsche might possibly summarise modern Britain as follows.

“I call it the state where everyone, good and bad is a poison drinker: the state where everyone, good and bad loses himself, the state where universal slow suicide is called life.” (18)

Ok so he’s not actually talking about the first entry in the Oxford “Alphabetical book of Poisons” (Alcohol) but he is talking of that which goes hand in hand with this problem, and I’m sure when he used the term “Poison” , Nietzsche knew full well its multiple meanings.

“The state is the coldest of all cold monsters, coldly it lies, too: and this lie creeps from its mouth “I the state am the people”. (19)

There are many ways to poison the mind of the people. In the age of the internet, the tirelessly hungry 24 hour news, marketing, PR and political spin the people are attacked from all quarters by the state message, “be frightened, be afraid you have comfort and wealth and others want to take it from you”. So when in my work I ponder why it was so easy for the state to take us into an illegal and barbaric war some 90 years after the 1st World War I need not look any further than our duplicity through ignorance and fear. If the world is to change then people must change and throw off the suffocating system that restrains us. First though, we need to sober up.

“Only there where the state ceases does the man who is not superfluous begin, does the song of the necessary man, the unique and irreplaceable melody begin.” (20)

Ensconced in a small remote cottage on the Isle of Jura, Orwell produced a work of fiction that says all you need to know about our current State. The eternal war with Eurasia, the ever-present big brother watching through cameras, the double speak the rewriting of history and the paralyses of fear.


“WAR IS PEACE
FREADOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH”
(21)

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(17) George Orwell “The roar to Wigan Pier” pp 23 (18) Fredrich Nietzsche “Thus Spoke Zarathustra” pp77. (19) pp 78. (20) pp 77 paragraph 7 (21) George Orwell “Nineteen Eighty Four” pp 7.

Thursday 10th November

The alarm went off earlier than usual. I ignored it and fell back asleep. No run this morning but I would make up for it by walking the 4k to and from school. Unfortunately I slept in so was in a rush and jumped in the car. Still, I meant well. I will try again tomorrow.

I had received an email whilst in the library, it was from Hong Kong. She says she will be in England for January, that she has meetings at the Metropolitan University and London and would like to see me if I have the time and if I can behave myself once she leaves. I bought a phone card with the paper and made a call.

I spent the morning working on a film I am making out of images from my life, particularly the past 5 years. Each image is set at 0.00.02 seconds, so that they blur into a continuous stream/loop. I am trying to recreate the sensation claimed by many to be experienced in near death situations.

Click To Play

As I get older death seems to be everywhere and more often than in the past I start to think about my own death and what I will leave behind for my son if it comes sooner than hoped for. After starting the film I visited the “Paranoia “ show being held at the Leeds City Art gallery there was a video piece in the show that also used still frames at high speed to generate the illusion of movement and speed that disorientated the viewer. The film was backed by contemporary Chinese folk music. The film drew me in and spurred me on to continue with my own work.

Its funny how certain images stand out for certain people. Hammams first question was "who is the blonde in the bikini up that tree". My friend’s wife I told him.

Finished polishing my last bullet and did some tests on the large Macket barrel that sits on my studio floor. I keep returning to multiple images. In this respect I am very much the product of my age and the technology that extends my being.

The large scale monument will only be possible if the right location is found and I have still received no word from the Church of England and the diocese of Ripon regard St Marks Church. I will dress up next week and visit there office next to Patrick Studios. It is harder to say no to some one face to face than electronically.

At work that night the caretaker had brought in a portable TV and watched all the soaps whilst complaining about being forced to watch them when at home with “The Wife”. I left him to it and went off to read.

Home and bed. I should have been down the pub but I phoned and made an excuse about being skint. I need to get back into shape I thought. Maybe tomorrow I will make it out for a run.

Wednesday 9th November
Usual routine followed by a good chat with Dave, Pete and Hammam in the morning and helped bring in a load of wood with Pete and Dave. I made contact with the Dioceses of Ripon later in the day, about St Marks Church. I await a reply.

Worked on finishing my last wooden bullet study and got it covered in Bee wax before popping across the road to Leeds collage of Art & Design. I managed to get 15 bullets fixed to sprus ready to have the liquid poured in and set.
Kevin reckoned next week I can start casting. I met an Iranian guy who loved the work I was doing, he knew about the types of bullets as he had been in the army and was a keen marksman. Told Kevin I would call in for a pint later in the week.

Back in the studio the topic of conversation with the help of James and Hammam was back on women. Hammam was still telling anyone in ear shot about his weekend conquest, a Yorkshire Jade Goodie. Hammam maintained that to find a beautiful sexy adventures intelligent woman was akin to finding the Yeti. I disagreed citing my last relationship. Before I knew it I was leaving the studio very depressed and feeling like making a phone call to Hong Kong.

Work was ok; I surfed the net and read the paper. Tracy (a bulldog of a woman with a woody woodpecker laugh) told me all about how she is bleeding out of her rectum and what the doctor did to her with a camera, to much information, I thought. Home, a bit of tele and then bed.

I will get up early and go for a run, I thought.

Tuesday 7th November
Life can be a bit of a Rollercoaster. Library at 8 studio at 9. Quick chat with Hammam and Dave who both laughed at the 3rd year degree show name, and then laughed some more.

Meeting at 10 with Andrew Clay at the Round Foundry. Andrew Gave me loads of information about the collection of buildings and their owners and who to approach for projects in the spaces outside.

I left feeling very upbeat. I then went to China Town but no one there new the landlords contact details. Apparently the building is earmarked for demolition anyway.

Went back to Uni and had a chat with Dave who again put me off attempting anything too big. The long and the short of it was he would rather see me return to a project from last year and start casting models.
I thought about this long and hard and realized that when he said my current project was not as clear as last years he was right. I still hadn't worked out what I was trying to say or the question I was trying to ask. I spent the afternoon in a small amount of despair as I cast wax bullets ready for the following day.
A ray of hope appeared on the way home as I turned the car near St Marks Church (abandoned) I took a quick look and decided this was the venue I had been looking for.

Work was shit so I decided to spoil myself with a steak dinner and several beers. 2 beers in and I started flicking through initial notes I had made in the summer about things that were on my mind and which had been the starting point of my current project. All of a sudden I gained a lot of clarity about why I was pursuing certain ideas and not others and what it was I was trying to ask. I quickly wrote down a few words, which were as follows;

Man has ceased to believe in a higher being and placed his faith in science, a science funded and driven by the military machine. Our new higher being is money. War makes money and drives science forward but what now that our environment is changing. Have we started to create our very own living Hell?

Once this was noted I picked up Marshall McLuhan again and read the passages I had marked out.

"Readiness for war characterizes contemporary social systems more broadly than their economic and political structures which it subsumes." (14)

He continues on the following page;

"The corporate word from the old men from Iron Mountain is that war is an inseparable feature of the economic establishment." (15)

McLuhan then points out the vicious circle we have gotten our selves into when he writes;

"The Old men of Iron Mountain have not a clue to the origins or persistence of war as a quest for that identity that is always threatened by technological innovations. They are quite aware of the vast research and development activities that are accelerated by war, but it has never occurred to them that the innovations resulting from this research and development are precisely the ones that obliterate the identity image, indispensable to peace and tranquillity among nations." (16)

I retired to bed slightly drunk and swollen from red meat.

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(14) Marshall McLuhan “War and piece in the Global Village” pp 116. (15) pp 118 (16) pp 120.

Monday 6th November
I had a good day yesterday despite first having to go up to Middleton to return the keys I had taken home by mistake.

Seminar in the morning was fun despite my initial fears that I had returned to playschool. Emma got us all making things to wear from copies of our work and then forming shows and making us think about the process involved in putting a show on. I luckily ended up in a group containing two foreign students, which is always more interesting than the locals (me included) Prague I’ve been to over a decade ago when they beat Russia in the Olympic ice Hockey final, that was a hell of a party. Sanfransisco I have not been to, but I am sure it’s more interesting than Leeds. I then sat in on the year meeting for our degree show and was disappointed by everyone’s acquiescence into banality.

Had a very useful session in the afternoon with Emma and students from my year and studio. I was made to think about this Blog and also about how to work in more information about my practice without it seeming contrived or convoluted. It was interesting to hear some of the other students speak. Our studio seems to have a good group of people.

Anyway I had to cut the love-in a little short as work beckoned. Work, food shop, home telly, bed.

Friday 3rd November
Friday was a good day. Studio was busy despite it being reading week. I got some good clean bullets made of jewellery wax ready for my visit across the road to call for Vincent and Kevin. Left the bullets in Kevin’s office and then took them both for a pint.

In the afternoon I took some of the fourth year girls from my studio, down to see the Physics Barn space.
On a second visit the space looked more appealing, and I wondered weather I had made a mistake in not taking it immediately. We shall see.

Got in touch with SJS who own the Egyptian building and received a polite "sorry but nothing goes on in the building as it’s structurally unsound" answer. Spoke to a contact at the Round foundry and he said he would meet me at 10am on Tuesday.

Friday night was work and then home. I let the women finish early as they all had family fireworks to get back for. Packed my bags and collected up all Jamie’s Transformers ready for Saturday before knocking myself out with a couple of beers.

Had a great day on Saturday, after football we went for Tapas, their was nothing on at the cinema so we bought fireworks and went to play football. Once we finished playing at 5 we started to light fireworks. We both enjoyed the rockets the most until one nearly blew me up with a premature explosion. Comic, lemonade and pocket money followed by home. I had taken a pound out of his pocket money for telling his mum a fib. We kissed and said goodbye.

Penny said I could take him to the football from now on as it was during my contact time anyway. This was something I had suggested several months ago, but then that was before she was pregnant again.

Drove to Liverpool, bonfire and fireworks gone but still some scouse left stewing in the pot. Cooked over two days. Robs Staff/ Pit-bull cross, waited at my ankles for some scraps which I obliged with until Robs wife, Linda said he’d already had 3 bowls. No wonder he resembles me around the waist.

Everyone was disappointed I had not brought the DVD of me and Rob attempting to steel a Banksy door from a disused building in Liverpool. The Liverpool Echo ran the headline “Forget Klimpt, Art thieves eye up Slater Street door”(10)

Click To Play

Had some interesting conversations, Linda’s sister Julie had just had two boob jobs. Julies husband Carl, had just seen a woman killed when she got sucked off the platform, the draft catching her umbrella and sending her onto the tracks where she was hit by the oncoming train. Such is the fine line between life and death. I retired at 3am and left the entire older crowd still going at it until 5.

Woke and took the Dog for a walk on Crosby sands. Just me, the shivering dog and a hundred or so casts of Anthony Gormly. “Another Place” by Gormly is another of his works like “The Angel of the North” that seems to strike something within people. Gormly, whether intentionally or not, has started to have a slow effect over my practice. More and more I have started to work through a sculptural process.



“The reason I went to sculpture was to escape words, or to communicate in a physical way.”(10)

Since my work with the Yorkshire wildlife organisation at Spurn Point my most successful and fulfilling projects have been site related, not specific. As prescribed in “One Place after Another” by Miwon Kwon. (11)



“What is this work that I do? A kind of mad DIY ritual for one in which I am the alter, the sacrifice and the celebrant, trying in some pathetic way to make something of my life: to make the moment matter, an act of resistance against amnesia and the way that moments have of disappearing into oblivion.”(12)

The idea of making a sculptural object or objects to be placed in an environment where the viewer may not be expecting to find them interests me deeply. Through Gormley’s success the surprise is mostly gone yet the impact and the audience involvement are not diminished. The world is the Gallery.

“The subject of sculpture has to be being: what does it feel like to be alive? Set aside all ideas of representation and replace them with reflexivity. We have to allow for a heightening of awareness that links the act of perception with being itself. The perception of art is similar to that of nature. When you stand beneath a mature oak, or looking at a glacial lake, or at a mountain, there is the sense of being held in the presence of something that is greater in terms of time and more resilient in terms of space, rooted present, and present-ness of that perception enters into your being. I think works of art aspire to this condition of present-ness and so can endow the viewer with this heightened sense of self.”(13)

Liverpool has now supplied a number of influences to my thought process. One not already mentioned was the untitled installation of upturned boats in St Luke's Church by Slovenian artist Mattej Andraz Vogrincic.

Spent the rest of the day watching Sky Sports only getting up to fetch the papers and my breakfast. Watched the Hammers beat Arsenal followed by Tottenham dish up Chelsea before returning to Leeds.

Got home and went to bed.
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(9) Liverpool Echo November 30th November 2006. (10) Antony Gormley “Learning to Think: Sculpture as Physical Intelligence” pp1 http://www.antonygormley.com/ (11) Miwon Kwon “One Place After Another”. Kwon believes that a “Site Specific” work must have three types of site specificity. Phenomenological, social/ institutional and discursive. The institutional is a bridge between the phenomenological and the discursive. (12) pp2 paragraph 5 (13) pp paragraph 13

Thursday 2nd November
Didn't get into university until after 8.30. Printed off all my emails associated with the course and put them in a nice ring binder. It made me feel efficient.

I Started work on another Ply bullet that I had left overnight to bond. Had an argument with Hammam about how his year group behave.

I got an email from Hong Kong, short and not so sweat. I would rather correspond occasionally and let her know I am getting on with my life. I have neither the time nor the energy. She has made it clear that I do not offer her a secure enough option to leave her current situation. The worst thing is, she is right. She has been very good to me in other ways. Tried to educate me, by buying books by Foucault, Baudrillard McLuhlen and Siad, taken me places and told me things. She would come and go as she pleased 4 months here, three weeks there, a month in Thailand, 2 months in Vietnam, a couple of weeks in Scotland a cumulative year in England and few days in Wales. Not enough to be real. Once the PHD was completed the chances of us spending much more time together were always slim. I will not phone her until Christmas.

I decided to look for a venue in the afternoon and scoured the run down buildings around the city centre. I am interested in run down buildings because they would provide a better context for my work than a white cube space.

Home - Work - round to the lads to watch the footy and a couple of beers. Dropped Jake home after giving him his Star Wars Transformer for his birthday and he gave me some money for another friend. By the way Jake is 33 and a great friend. Jake collects still boxed Star Wars figures he now has a full set of the original figures in the original unopened boxes. What ever gets you through the day?

Wednesday 1st November
Woke up after a shit night’s sleep and went straight into the library. I didn't feel so good all day and by lunch time I was in a bit of a slump. After lunch I went across the road to see Kevin and he showed me how to put together some casts and how to use the wax injection machine.

Home - work, a brief conversation with James, nothing to report except mum has arranged for him to go out on the Saturday night so asked if I could return him a little early, no problem I said, which was not strictly true. I had planned a bonfire night but it is not for me to decide. I said I would meet him at Hoddeson to see him play football on Saturday morning at 10am and then go out for the day.

When I got home I thought fuck this and went down the pub. The Grove Inn is on the edge of Holbeck (the good edge) hidden under the shadow of the new Sky Scraper. Their is always live music on and often musicians will just sit in one of the many snugs and just play. I parked myself in the non smoking room for some privacy and spent a couple of hours drawing designs for a giant bullet.



Got a call from Rob (an ex work colleague and close friend) who invited me over to his bonfire night party in Liverpool on Saturday night. Rob is an exec for a large telecoms company. We met working in London for Pilkington Glass and he moved in with me when James Mother left or was thrown out, depending on who is telling the story. We lived together travelled together and got in lots of trouble together and even though our lives now travel on vastly different paths we still see a lot of each other, top bloke.



When the leffe Blond started to take its toll and make the ruler twitch I decided to head for home and bed.