How have you managed to survive in the arts industry for so long?

I have survived making art for decades because I have been adaptable.

I have been a studio artist, have worked collaboratively with other artists, and I have worked with teams of people, and in theatre, and T.V.

Of those teams, I have worked with children, youth, young adults, women over 50, elderly citizens and everything in between.

I have worked with artists with the highest IQ’s to young people from ‘special schools’.

I have worked with large budgets or scraped through on almost nothing. I have known times of affluence and owned houses, to having only $10 in the bank and no assets.

I have felt part of communities and at one with my working companions, or alternatively have felt abandoned and alone with my cause.

I have felt creatively satisfied, or blocked and distressed by my output.

I have been recognized and acknowledged to being told the work was superficial and tokenistic.

But with all the good and the bad times, I have had the richest of experiences.

I have worked with some of the most astounding people. I have been moved to the core by their generosity, tenacity, and sheer commitment.

I have been moved by their creativity, and their trust in my creativity.

I have learnt so many skills, so many new techniques, and so many mysteries from their discoveries.

Above all I have learnt that it is impossible to make great art all the time, or to have perfect successes all the time.

When you make art for as long as I have you realize that it is like an ongoing series of pregnancies.

You are given the seed of an idea, you incubate it, sit on it, think and feel it, begin the trimesters, making, experimenting, and then finally you give birth to it. And like any child, you then have to stand back and see how the journey unfolds. Once it is out there all ownership is gone, and you must surrender and wait for the next seed to take.

Some people would say that working collaboratively is a compromise of your creativity?

Yes I understand that. There have been times when my desire to create a work, so individual and heightened in its personal vision, that I have been brought to despair and grief.

At those times I have known it has been either bits of my ego struggling with questions of confidence, relevance, talent, originality, or a desire to know who I am again. Whatever the reason, it has been the time to go into my studio and create something truly special and only mine, and in that process the underlying issue begins to unravel and I feel solid and one with myself again.

This is why many artists create their work, simply to see who they are again.

Working collaboratively has been a very different process for me, and one that I could never give up.

One of my passions has always been witnessing the diversity of human thinking and feeling, and watching individuals express that through their own work.

To see personal expression flow out of people, or to help people access that has been for me both humbling, and exciting, simultaneously.

Instead of feeling threatened, or self protective, I have been enamored and thrilled, at the individual perception, concept, image, colour, texture and style that has been expressed.

It is this unique diversity, within unity, that has fed me and inspired me through the difficult times.

That has not meant that I have not been obsessive about the technique, the quality of the final image, and the relevance of the final image in the global market. These are the questions you must ask, especially when making public and community art works that may be viewed for up to 20 years or more.

Hence I have had to become a broader artist, more skilled, more aware, more available, just to make this happen. It is a continual learning process that could never have happened in my studio alone.

For the art works to hold their own, long after their initial inspiration, development and making, long after the artists and participants have moved on is really the true challenge.

This is one that I will continue to face every day in my process, whether alone in my studio or working as part of a team.

It is all a blessing.

What is your method of approach in a community arts project?

Mostly the ideas flow from the community themselves, and you pick up on it, and re-present it back to them as a possible project. It is up to you as an experienced worker to bring all the threads together, and help the community fulfill their vision, however, in a highly skilled and relevant way.

If the work is just about process, then in some respects the final product is not as important. However, this is rare. In most cases both process and product must be considered as equal.

If it is a permanent work they are looking for, then you must work with them until the idea becomes unique, and plausible.

They give you the vision, you give them the tools.

Sometimes their vision is only vague, and then it up to the artist to collaborate with them long enough so that the original vision is expanded and made concrete.

It is called ‘milking’ an idea, work shopping, and discussing, and listening enough, so that the process naturally leads to the culminations of an idea and finally an artwork.

When you see all the ideas fuse together that is when the magic begins.

What a wonder it usually is, a complete statement having come from one or two small seeds.

POSSIBLE TIME LINE:

Artist meets community
Community tells its vision
Artist takes stories
Artist collates stories
Artist shares ideas that have been inspired by their stories
Artist and community workshop ideas

Ideas are then evaluated to find what is truly relevant to the needs of the specific community, while always baring in mind the external viewers.

Research, concept development and themes resolved
Techniques shown.
On going workshops developing artworks
Completion of artworks
Documentation of artworks
Installation of artworks
Presentation of artworks