11.10.23 | Practice-based research methods for artists with Jonathan Kearney
"After change, we can't go back to the previous moment." This is a quote that I wrote in my notebook during the lecture given by Jonathan Kearney. This talk was a new starting point for me, in a sense that it made me feel more connected to what I was doing here and now - this MA course, this journey as an artist and immigrant.
During the lecture, we were told that, in reality, research is messy; only when you start researching, you start realizing patterns and new things. With time, things get better and we start to understand more about what we're doing. This marked me deeply: give time to time. I have my own time, and that is okay. Another point discussed was about how the pratictioner should allow uncertainty, confusion, surprise or puzzlement, since sometimes important things can emerge from these moments.
I've always felt like I couldn't separate myself from what I do as an artist, and to hear that doing art perhaps is "not what you have done", instead, "it's about who you are when you're doing it" (to change something in the world, somehow), inspired me a lot, in the sense of understanding a balance between controlling and letting go.
"The research is so present, in the moment, immersed, not out from it", as the lecturer said. And, just like that, I feel as I should be immersed in the present time to be connected with my life and my practice, to be able to create a balance between being human and being artist.