ARTISTS TALKING

# 3 [14 March 2008]

It's been over a week since I last wrote. I'd decided to try for weekly postings. However Neve has been ill with a cold this week so everything ground to a halt. I feel so far from being an artist at the moment. I read other blogs and think I'm hanging on by tiny threads. 

Today I meet  Agnes' teenage mums and dads. I've tried not to get stressed about it, I came up with a simple idea to outline their pregnant bodies. Then to use this as a focal point to discuss what they feel on the outside and what is going on for them on the inside. Dad's will do the outlining to get them involved. I also selected a few photos I'd taken of my pregnant body as an attempt to inspire them to celebrate their transformations. Although I discussed this with artist friends who think perhaps I'd intimidate them. I'll leave it open to my own intuition. I'm writing as Neve slowly dismantles my shelf of diaries. It feels ironic that she opens and plays with what I performed with whilst carrying her inside me.

I'm writing this blog for me. This morning it has replaced my morning pages. However it feels very different from writing in a soft book by the window. There is a sense of writing for an audience. An sense of 'people out there'. This is restricting my writing for fear of rambling on about myself. 

I'm not normally short of words to write I think I'm going through an awkward shedding of a skin.  It reminds me of the story of Inanna hanging from a hook. I'm not yet off the hook that from giving birth. I still hang in suspension searching for my identity.

I'll post a photo of my performance to remind me that I have a creative vision. I'm not resigned to baby carrying and talking forever. 

# 2 [5 March 2008]

Celebrating my memories of my pregnancy is central to this project. It now seems so far away that I forget lots of things about it. I forget just what an enjoyable time it was, I forget how alive I felt, swimming in the sea through the winter, enjoying feeling the life wriggle inside me. It sounds cheesy now, but it was important to be in touch with that tiny person growing inside me. I'm so glad I took such alot of photos of my growing belly. I want to look through them but I can't find them at the moment. They're buried in some file somewhere. I'm going to join Agnes' group of teenage mums a week on friday. I'm looking forward to meeting them and seeing their pregnant bellies!

I'm not sure whether to take photos of my pregnancy with me. I don't wish to bombard them with too much visual information on my first visit. It maybe more important to simply meet and get to know them. I guess they will all be excited to see a baby, I need not worry about much else. I'm excited to meet them too. There is such alot of potential in working with them. I want to get them taking photos of their bellies. We could borrow some digital cameras and get going soon. But I do need to sort out some funding before I put too many hours in.

# 1 [2 March 2008]

Mothering Sunday

It's exactly 9 months since Neve was born, a fitting start for my blog. I'm beginning a new project with the photographs I took during my pregnancy. They've been waiting to be put into Final Cut Pro to make a time lapse. I haven't yet found the time to do that, but I'll have more time now that Granny will look after Neve every Monday.

Agnes (my friend, Doula, mother, NCT teacher) has some contacts for me at the Royal Sussex hospital. I want to show the Time Lapse on the Maternity Ward. It seems appropriate since women don't have much to look at after they've given birth in hospital. I remember looking at the ceramic hand and foot prints thinking there is only stuff about babies here, nothing about pregnancy. We need to be able to celebrate what we go through as new mothers. We go through nine beautiful months of pregnancy, then childbirth and then we have this little person.