Catch up with our Graduate Artist-in-Residence, Janet Tryner, as she reveals plans for her upcoming exhibition at Arcadia Gallery and shares some of her most recent work…
What have I done in November? I’m busy developing artworks and I’ve rewritten schemes for my exhibition at Arcadia Gallery several times!
I’m planning to have exhibition available to be seen and experienced in an engaging way whatever version of lockdown Coventry faces. This is an absorbing task, and makes me feel particularly vulnerable because, like so many parents, my child’s class could suddenly need to isolate, meaning that I will be trapped at home for most of the day. So far, we’ve only had negative test results and got back to (Covid) normality quickly, but knowing this could hit us whenever means organising a variety of contingency plans, as well as devising a number of ways for other people able to experience an interesting exhibition safely.
The good thing about all of this – and there is always a silver lining if you look hard enough – is that I have been pushed to develop my art in ways that I’ve always wanted to, to use augmented reality and geolocation technology, that I would probably have continued to procrastinate about otherwise. However, I’m not going to go into too much detail about what these are in this blog. I will be writing in more detail in blogs later in December and in the run up to the exhibition, and giving an artist’s talk with ArtSpace in January 7th. Still, I am posting fairly regularly all the time on Instagram and you can follow me there @anatomyofasmile. The exhibition is on at Arcadia 26 Jan – 7 Feb 2021.
Besides a lot of writing, November has been marked by projects put on hold over lockdown starting to move again which has been heartening. I’ve been exploring Naul’s Mill Park with local artist and producer, Tara Rutledge, with whom I had so many plans brought distressingly to an abrupt halt back in March. We are planning to create art soundwalks and are working out how to bring spaces alive in ways that are multi-dimensional and safe to partake in during our uniquely distanced current times.
Of course, the coronavirus dominates conversations as it does everything. But in talks with other artists I find that the tone more often takes a positive turn when we wonder about the future and seek to draw lessons to create positive actions and ways to move on in collaborative ways. This is despite all the restrictions we face now, which we know will continue to develop as we move slowly out of this period dominated by isolation and worry into another phase that will happen against a background of, quite possibly, scarcity and precariousness, but also of joy. I do frequently wonder if it is possible to ever achieve the plans I had before lockdown, however people are giving energy to spaces and places and ideas that they don’t normally have the time to and that makes this feel like an interesting time in which to make art, even if seeing it for real is often more difficult.
The images here are of current work, and the winter view from my studio:
Image 3, Planning and writing in the studio