Propped up against a body pillow, liquids accessible at all times, bed table over my lap, un sure whether I will even be able to touch my practical work today. Worrying because I have quite a lot I want to do before the exhibition. Worrying won’t help. Dissociated so that the pain doesn’t register in my head. I’ve written a draft of my Unit 1 Assessment. I question whether I am built for any kind of productivity. I know I am. I’m barely sleeping.

Organisation is key here. Trying to balance caring for myself and my artistic practice. Laughing to myself that the piece I’m trying to create is about the fact I struggle to get out of bed at times. The irony will get me through.

I know a walk will help but that takes up time, and once that time is taken, there is often a sleep which takes more from my day. And then when does creation come into play? Anger, lots of anger which is hard to not misplace when it is felt so often and swallowed down. I don’t want to be an angry person.

The love is always there, the more I fight the pain the more the love disappears. I have to face it and surrender, or I will never feel the love. Never feel the connection to the universe or others. There is such temptation to scream at the world when the pain takes over, I believe it is my task to feel the pain and not allow it to make me bitter, to not allow it to transmute into the pain of others. I am broken and that is ok.

My new therapist told me I came off as ‘chilly’ towards her at times in the session, I know what she’s referring too. I disassociate, I come out of the world for a moment, I have a blank face and a lack of feeling. On standby. Being present has been too painful so I disappear. I must release myself of this addiction to switching off. I don’t even know where I go.

I’m attached to the idea of being ‘healthy’ of being ‘productive’ of being someone that can be ‘on’ in the least human way. My body refutes that, and causes me to rest. Rest all the time. rest rest rest.

INPUT:

Songs I’m listening to today: TIGERS BLOOD- WAXAHATCHEE

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

I’ve added a rough line to where I want to sew the black line trailing through the yoga matt. Struggling with the bedsheets today, they are large and I need to organise space/iron things, I don’t have the physical capacity to do so. Planning over the weekend to use my parents dining space to iron and sew the pillow case to the main bed cover.

Then I can proceed with sewing the black thread in a spiral and writing on the journal entry. For now maybe I focus on the journal entry whilst my bodies not playing ball.

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.

JOURNAL ENTRY FOR INSTALLATION PIECE

The terror that I cannot do much for myself but lie down, I become object,

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.