Moments Workshop Series [Modern Art Oxford, 2023]
I developed the Moments workshop series in collaboration with Boundary Encounter’s resident artist Harmanpreet Randhawa, and the other 2023 Platform Graduate Award nominee Helen Kohl.
The Moments workshop series encouraged a considered set of encounters between the boundaries of our individual artist practices and the community. Through Moments we aimed to develop a conversation about a practice of care: which focuses on seeing, listening, playing and creating together without judgement or set expectations.
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Assorted Moments, September 24th: In this workshop we drew from our interaction with the natural and urban Oxford, collecting items and moments of interest on our walk from Modern Art Oxford to The Kidneys.
Whilst at the Kidneys, we played and arranged the natural materials found before us (stones, leaves, soil, etc.). We also discussed and experimented with the technique of ‘frottage’, which is when you place a piece of paper on a surface (such as a tree trunk) and rub a graphite pencil or crayon over the top to record the pattern. Some items and the frottages will be collected in preparation for Unfolding Moments, the second workshop in this series, which commenced the evening of 19th October at 5pm during a MAO Late.
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Unfolding Moments took place in my exhibition space on 19th October during MAO Late from 5pm. People interacted with the collected items (leaves, dust, etc.) in the exhibition space by placing them on the overhead projectors and moving them around to create new shadow compositions on the wall. There were also be a number of photographs from my personal archive, printed on overhead slides, which could also be placed on the projectors.
Together with Harmanpreet Randhawa, we practiced drawing from the shadows by placing tissue paper on the wall and tracing around the outlines of the shapes created. The drawings were hung and arranged throughout my exhibition and people were invited to contribute at any time.
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The final instalment, Holding Moments took place on the 20th October in the basement of Modern Art Oxford. Helen Kohl invited participants use the pressure of their bodies to shape a plaster-cast time-capsule. The plaster took around 20 mins to caste, so she invited participants to get find a comfortable position which they could sustain. This encouraged a natural, meditative state, where participants were still and talked quietly. Some even took a peaceful nap.
Simultaneously, I documented the experience through field recordings and photography. Photography becomes a vessel in itself which captures the theatre of 'holding’.
