INPUT:

Songs I’m listening to today: GNX- KNEDRICK LAMAR

Film I’m watching: ANOTHER ROUND- THOMAS VINTERBERG

Song I’m learning on guitar

Trying a new one with a slightly harder strumming pattern

OUTPUT:

PHOTOGRAPHY FROM WALK

CURRENT PIECE

Piece One: Oil on 120×90 canvas

WIP

Piece 2: Installation Piece

Edit: I want the thread to trail all the way back to the beginning of the spiral, completing the circle, acknowledging the endlessness of recovery

I received all the parts for the installation idea in the post today, the main issue I’m needing to solve as quickly as possible is having enough room in my studio to create it. I have a feeling, that from now up until the exhibition I will need to jigsaw all my furniture into one side of the room so that I have enough space to lay everything out.

I want the sheets and pillow cases to be hung on the wall, the thread to trail down to the yoga matt on the floor. Indicating they are in different realms. Need to check with Jonathan that I’m not dominating the space too much with my work in the exhibition

My plan is:

• Unfold the bed set
• Draw a rough outline of where the wording will go
• Try to roughly estimate how many words in a sentence will need to be thoughts and how many leading to feelings (see if I can actually accomplish this idea)
• Otherwise I need a spiral line on the sheets
• Let it flow off onto the yoga matt
• Figure out what size writing I will need
• Sew black cotton line along the spiral
• Write the sentences in black fabric paint
• With the time left
• Draw similar offerings as the ones on my small canvas’ and paint onto sheets and yoga matt.
• Figure out if you can include the hiking boots and the trees, how would that look.
• My main focus at the moment needs to be the installation rather than the painting although I’m really enjoying that. The installation is the piece that I will be showing.

Issues that are coming up so far are the very act of clearing the space, my body is tired and arthritic, another area where my practice can be hindered. But the work cannot begin until the space is cleared and furntiture is moved around.

Slow and steady.

Piece 3

Random idea that I’ve run with buying two cheap empty glass female form vases from Shien

The idea is to have them side by side, one filled with ‘ideas, thoughts and feelings’ whether these are represented by small balls or actually written on small bits of paper

One is completely empty and the viewer is invited to add their own, showing how many people choose the empty vase, the empty woman, the woman who has no thought’s feelings and ideas.

A piece of writing, on the allure of the ’empty’ woman, to be filled with knowledge and emotion. Top line idea, I have no idea if it will translate or not. I have no idea whether these things will even arrive, I’ve never bought off shien before

Future idea

Note: I really want my own Voynich manuscript that I’ve created. This will take a long time to create so possibly should be think about this now.

NEXT PIECE INSPIRATION

Moodboard of these symbols

Along with the works of Hilma Klint and taking inspiration from the Voynich Manuscript visually, I want to use symbolism from books such as ‘Women who run with wolves’ and the most recent text I’ve read ‘addiction to perfection’.

KEY SYMBOLS

1. The Demon Lover – Represents the inner critic, toxic perfectionism, and the pursuit of an unattainable ideal.

Healing: Recognizing its false promises and embracing imperfection.

The Demon Lover

Arthur Hughes

Rama Spurns the Demon Lover

(‘Rama Spurns the Demon Lover’, 1913. )

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Warwick Goble

2. The Body (The Starving Body) – Symbolizes disconnection between body and soul, manifesting in eating disorders or numbness. Healing: Reconnecting with the body’s wisdom.

3. The Hollow Woman – A woman who has lost connection to her soul and intuition in pursuit of perfection.

Healing: Reclaiming inner life and embracing imperfection.

4. The Wise Old Woman (Crone) – Represents deep feminine wisdom that comes from accepting life’s imperfections.

Healing: Learning self-trust and intuition.

Crones. © Asma Istwani

Old Woman Seen from Behind,
by Vincent van Gogh.

5. The Clockwise Spiral – Symbolizes external growth, structure, and order. Potential danger: Leading to burnout if disconnected from inner self.

6. The Counterclockwise Spiral – Represents deep inner transformation, dismantling old identities for rebirth.

7. The Chrysalis / Butterfly – Transformation from suffering to wholeness, requiring patience and surrender.

Maria Sibylla Merian, 1679

8. The Snake – Represents the body’s wisdom and feminine instinct, urging trust in intuition.

9. The Moon – A feminine symbol of intuition, cycles, and accepting change.

10. The Ocean / Water – Represents deep emotions, surrender, and the unconscious.

11. The Dark Night of the Soul – The necessary crisis before transformation, requiring faith in the process.

12. The Black Madonna – Symbolizes the rejected deep feminine power, intuition, and sensuality.

13. Fire – Represents purification, destruction, and transformation of false perfectionist ideals.

14. The Womb – A sacred space for inner gestation, emphasizing patience before external action.

15. The Golden Shadow – Represents repressed positive traits such as joy, creativity, and spontaneity.

16. The Voice of the Soul – The inner truth often suppressed in perfectionism.

SYMBOLS WITHIN THE TALES

1. The Handless Maiden – Represents a woman’s loss of power due to external control, requiring reclaiming her soul.

Celeste Woods

2. The Fisher King Wound – A culture’s loss of the sacred feminine, needing restoration of balance.

3. The Bridegroom Who Would Not Eat – Represents the starving soul in perfectionism, urging self-nourishment.

4. Bluebeard – Symbolizes the destructive Demon Lover who kills women’s creativity, requiring rejection of perfectionism.

Bluebeard illustration by Guillon for an edition of the tales by Charles Perrault published in Paris in the late 19th century

5. Lady Macbeth– Used to discuss the destructive pursuit of power and perfection. She interprets Lady Macbeths actions as embodying negative aspects of the feminine psyche when it is disconnected from it’s nurturing qualities

Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth

1889, John Singer Sargent

Each symbol represents a step in the journey from perfectionism to wholeness, urging the balance of feminine wisdom
with external achievement.