After a long while! My impressions for the last three months...

Dear all,
I was really very excited as you all did see. But at the end it turned out that I was not a very good blog writer. I aimed to write daily first, then weekly, the it went off completely. Maybe it is better to collect to write. By the time theta i did not write, lots of thing happened. And nothing happened at all!
Let me explain myself. I was standing on the side of the river called London. The first time I came here I immediately jumped into the water. Then I was scared to hell and get out of it. I began to observe. Then I touched the water with my toe. Then let my feet in it. It stand in the water for a while. Then I felt the courage to go further till my knees. Then it came up with the tide and wrap around my belly. I am still standing, sometimes I put my hands in. Just to get used to it a little bit more. It is not too long that the stream will get me. But I did not surrender yet!
London is like the river Thames itself!!!

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As I was saying a lot happened. I meant it. But my memory betrays me often. So now I can write whatever I remember. The most significant thing was the exhibition. Dear Phil Baines and Judy Willcocks did an amazing job digging out the most precious pieces of CSM's museum and study collection. At some point, it was not the very beginning though not the end, I was involved to help with the project. I remember the first day I was in the archives, holding the beautiful books in my hand, letterpresses with wood engraved illustrations! I was seeing the Nüremberg Chronicle, a choir book from 15th century, an illuminated manuscript, and originals of many valuable names. What a stunning day it was. Then I went there often to help them to form the exhibition. Although I was completely lost two weeks, I was still engaged with it. At the end the more pressures days began as the exhibition opening was due. With a fews days intense work we could manage to finish all on time. I will add some photos later on. I am still not good at uploading my photos on time either.

This exhibition make me think of the act of collecting. The thing can be seen in the exhibition were the pieces from museum and study collection. That means they were not only used for exhibiting but also for teaching. At the opening Phil told the story of this collection briefly. It was initiated by London City Council with a budget of 200 pounds which now equals to like a million pounds. Then with foundation of the ....

The thing is that why these people invested it? Why it was necessary? It was really related with the social political and cultural background of the society here.

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Jessica Helfand wrote a letter to Fiona her daughter I guess about the death of print as Carson's book mentioned. The book is how graphic design changing the ground into digital platform. Helfand says that: "The print is not death, it is sleeping!"

Degree Shows of a Commercial Arts School

On 22th of May 2014 the first degree show of CSM opened at Granary Building at King's Cross. It took ages to construct the exhibition. I would like to say that it was a great effort to realise all these and well done everyone who made it come to life. The scale of the exhibition is huge and it full fills the building's ground and third floors. The degrees shown their works were; BA Fine Art, MA Art and Science, MA Fine Art, MA Phtography, MRes Art: Exhibition Studies, MRes Art: Moving Image, MRes Art: Theory and Philosophy. I do not know the exact number of the students but the exhibition was on a museum scale.

It is really hard to combine different themes and disciplines in one exhibition. And if the exhibition is this big in scale, it is hard to follow or capture the pieces individually. And when there is no common theme it becomes more complicated to watch. When it comes to a point that promoting a commercial structure, CSM is a perfect example. But with this exhibition it is not quite successful. Although the exhibition was presented as a white cube experience and professionally fitted, it was not whole and the works were not that quality I must say. And just because of the chaos of representation the good works could have been skipped easily. Some sites did have feeling of still under construction. The day after the private view before noon, most of the exhibition was abandoned and the videos were not on the run. It might be the night before party fused it. But as the period of the exhibition was short, everyday counts.

The context of the works were mainly based on violence and sexuality. This might well be the effect of everyday consumer society surrounds the students. Or it might well be the populistic attitudes to become a part of the system as they graduate. It was a little bit disturbing to see the tense context built on these themes. Or it can be that I constantly had to listen to the video that was from a audition of sex sounds when I was working at school.