In April I took part in this 30 days 30 works project with the 12ø collective. A month long project to make a work every day, meant to be a playful way of engaging artists with their practice and encouraging experimentation. It could not have been better timed, with most of the world finding itself quarantined on the 1st April, they had a higher uptake than usual. For me having been working so furiously on something that was abruptly cancelled, it seemed the ideal time to participate in something lighter and change my focus.
I liked the way it was open, you could choose to respond or not to the daily prompts, to be as active or lazy as you choose. I found the prompts sometimes fun, sometimes silly, sometimes thought provoking and I enjoyed getting a new brief each day…try cheating today, make a work that takes 5 minutes, what does a failure look like to you?
Sometimes I focused and completed something I had been thinking of. Some days I was inspired. Some days I was lazy. Some days things didn’t work out. But what was interesting was to follow my thoughts and my actions. I played with video which I don’t usually do. It was good timing, finding myself at home, schooling children, with limited resources and time I had to be inventive. Some days the action was mostly in my head but it helped to push me to play and experiment to think about the way I make work.
I am used to working within my confines, my limitations, my family responsibility, my skill, material availability. It is good to dream and think and it is good to work with what there is. It is good to be pushed to think in ways you wouldn’t. And it is good to participate. I enjoyed seeing the other works. I especially liked the presentation, low-fi, like Instagram as it used to be, seeing the most recently posted first works first.
A month is enough! But it has given me some food for thought and material for action.
