On Saturday I went swimming at 6am, well 6.11 to be precise. I was talking to one of my cold water swimmer Artist friends recently, about the compulsion for cold water. Few people I know really understand, I almost wonder if it’s a form of self-harm or masochism but as it makes me feel better in such a sustained way, I think not.
A few years ago, I fell into the habit of collecting leaves from the bottom of the pool. They fascinated me, the delicacy of their skeletal shapes, so fragile, undissolving in the chlorinated water. I made a series of cyanotypes for a while, hoping to make a whole project. The idea didn’t quite stick and I let the leaves go. I have this tension between collecting and discarding, all the time I seem to be gleaning ‘things’ stones, leaves, ephemera; both physically and in photos, saving them up for paintings that I don’t always paint.
Today I found a leaf on the bottom of the pool, heart or tear shaped, with a broken stem. I liked the colour; it reminded me of the tv ad for hand cream, I watched as a child, where a smiling woman massages cream into a dried crinkled leaf, leaving it supple, shiny and springy in her hand. Then, I noticed something black, floating within my sight line on the water, almost menacing like a huge dead spider, legless. It was a feather, as long as my forefinger but wider. I’m no ornithologist but I think it came from a crow or a raven, the huge black birds that perch up high, their blackness foreboding. These associations of ephemera hold my thoughts, make me write and make Art. I am not sure why, it is as compelling as plunging my stiff body into cold water most mornings at 6am.
Today I felt cold before I swam, and a little hungry; ludicrous as we ate after 9pm last night. I bought a small flask to hold a hot drink; this made the morning almost perfect. I ordered the flask after much pondering, desiring a plain minimal one, settling on one with a blue bird and plants on, they reminded me of Matisse’s collages and the flask matches my water bottle. Matching is very important to me and the reason why I am currently so fixated on getting rid of clothes, the ones that don’t fit within my capsule wardrobe fantasy. I think I must be finding life a bit too challenging to be hankering after blankness. Knowing oneself can be a constant work in progress, how to settle on who you are, what to worry about and what not to. I have left some groups too, unsubscribed from some emails, this week I want to decide which objects I no longer value enough to keep. This is hard. The stuff of life holds memories but sometimes it feels too much like a cacophony. I remember reading a book by Jenny Diski years ago called ‘Skating to Antarctica’, she didn’t skate there but the book was partly about her desire to experience the vast whiteness.
So the feather and the leaf. Last week I made a trip to London to meet a friend, one of my cold swimming Artist friends, it was her birthday and we visited at least 4 exhibitions. I was struck by the work of Eileen Agar, how diverse it was; she made paintings, prints, collages, sculptures, took photographs and her work was truly hers, despite being executed in a variety of ways. My four favourites were three collages and a painting; two with a woman lying underneath a leaf, one with a dog, her dog I imagine, a cheerful collage of a mask with a black leaf stuck on and a painting of the sea.
I wonder if hadn’t seen those pictures the day before, I would have taken such an interest in the leaf and the feather. This fascinates me, as though I am joining up the dots of my days in visual associations. Art ignites our curiosity in our everyday lives as much as in the Art. I often think of a spiders web, how it holds itself together with such strength and delicacy. A bit like how our lives do.
I’ll make something with the leaf and the feather soon.
All the Artworks by Eileen Agar can be seen at https://www.whitecapelgallery.org until Aug 29 2021
