So here I am, final lecture over, New Designers exhibition done, boxes packed for our graduation show (which begins on Wednesday at Candid Arts in Islington), practically done and dusted and I find that I am lying awake at night with a serious case of pot anxiety. This is ridiculous! I have no projects to make for, I have the summer ahead of me to relax, think about the future and bask in the sun and I am worrying about what to make.
The thing is, that’s just it! I have nothing to make for. I am dreading losing my direction. I need a project. But it is no good simply setting one for myself, it has to have a purpose. The great things about being on a course are that you have a clear direction and the camaraderie of like minded people with whom to share the experience. We are about to scatter to the four winds and I am missing us already!
I found a forgotten and unloved trial piece at the back of my shelf whilst I was tidying it this week. I was half way to the dustbin with it when I realised that it just might be the impetus I need to get going post-diploma. I am very aware that I have only touched the surface of so many interesting techniques in the past two years and that there are a great many which I have had to discard in recent months in order to come up with a coherent body of work for an exhibition. But the work which I made for my final semester is not exactly who I am. This is work in progress, it is only the beginning! Now it is time to haul out my note books and reject pieces and juts play with them. Something is going to lead somewhere and in the meantime there is so much to do – glazes to revisit, methods to explore and develop, processes to be integrated into ideas which have worked well but could go further. When I review the span of time ahead it is actually very exciting. There is so much to do and explore and this long lost reject is just the beginning . . . no time to sleep, better get making!
Bridget Macklin 