Waiting Room

Untitled     Ink, charcoal   2013

Made this the day before yesterday. Had not been to the garden in almost 2 months as they've been too busy. It was good to see it again, like a long lost old friend. The kind you don't need to constantly talk to and can just sit with,  sharing a rich, healing silent space together.

I post here the most orthodox work that emerged. The rest I will save for later.

Until next time, keep well in your spaces.

Spaces Appear & Disappear

Stratford Station 1       Photo by R Allen-Sherwood 2013

A thought-collage from a brief chat with Spanish architect Juan R.

Its difficult to separate form from space, or to think about architecture without thinking about space...

Rilke said something like “Every space in fact is an inner void. Our inner void that we all have

Stratford Station 2     Photo by R Allen-Sherwood 2013

JR - Space can sometimes have a deep resonance. They can arise a deep feeling in ourselves, do you know what I mean?
RAS -  Like when you're standing alone in the vastness of the desert?
JR - Yes, but it can also be in a tiny room. It’s a matter of feeling the space , perhaps.

Stratford Station 3       Photo by R Allen-Sherwood 2013

Sometimes space is so fragile, it needs a sensitive person to catch it, to touch it. 

Stratford Station 4       Photo by R Allen-Sherwood 2013

Some spaces in the city are so saturated, it seems to me they want to be born, to arise or expand but sometimes they can’t. For example if you go to Bedford Square, its a complete space.The quiet space, the defined space – and the city sometimes needs these types of spaces.

Stratford Station 5       Photo by R Allen-Sherwood 2013

 A type of space can also be created where people gather, or some situation that comes through. These spaces appear and disappear.

Stratford Station 6      Photo by R Allen-Sherwood 2013

 Light can also build a space very well. Light has a lot to do with space. It has the power of creating or transforming the space. Even a small window can completely transform one square space.

Stratford Station 7       Photo by R Allen-Sherwood 2013

 

Words by Juan R (except where specifically stated)

Photos by Rachelle Allen-Sherwood  2013

White Space

Exploring relationship /,   Ink, chalk, graphite, and pencil

I recently went to a talk about Zen gardens, given by Professor John White - the man who designed the Zen rock garden at Three Wheels Temple in West London.  Here is a small excerpt from that talk in the form of running quotes, alongside some recent experimental works I've been making - directly inspired by a few select small stones from Three Wheels. (With permission, of course).

Close-up detail ,   Ink, graphite and small stone

"Zen Gardens create a vast sense of calmness and space." 

 Describing a specific zen garden composition in Japan: "The smallest rock in the picture is the Alpha rock and the entire garden relies on this rock."

"You can make a zen garden with even one rock (and gravel)."

Drawing/  Ink, graphite and charcoa

"When the arrangement is right, there is no sense of scattering or cluttering of rocks. Wherever you are, is where you are meant to be." 

On the famous Zen garden of Ryoanji in Kyoto: "It is all about space. The rocks are merely measuring rods, Each one no more than a space within a space..."

Studies in relationship/  Ink

I'd like to end this post with one of Professor White's haiku poems, written specifically for a Zen garden in Japan which was designed around the idea of a flowing river:

Here in the still
the river races uphill.
No wave ever moves

Containaeity

Untitled ,   Ink, wash, graphite and charcoal  2013

"Who would believe that so small a space could contain the images of the whole universe?"

Leonardo da Vinci

Perec's Species of Spaces

Detail of sketchbook work   2013

In 2010/11 during my uni years, when I wrote my space poem in the form of a list (see post "Drawing Space"  http://stillmotionajourneyintospace.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/drawing-space.html), I was not aware, nor had I ever seen Georges Perec's Species of Spaces. So it was a great pleasure, joy (and relief!) to encounter his work. Many thanks to Juan, my architect friend, for recommending him. Here is an extract from Perec's classic book, a small gem of a piece entitled 'Space'.

"Untitled"   Ink, pencil, graphite, chalk & pen  2013

SPACE

We use our eyes for seeing. Our field of vision reveals a limited space, something vaguely circular. which ends very quickly to the left and right, and doesn't extend very far up or down. If we squint, we can manage to see the end of our nose, if we raise our eyes, we can see there's an up, if we lower them, we can see there's a down. If we turn our head in one direction, then in another, we don't even manage to see completely everything there is around us; we have to twist our bodies round to see properly what was behind us.

"Untitled"   Ink, pencil, graphite, chalk & pen  2013

Our gaze travels through space and gives us the illusion of relief and distance. That is how we construct space, with an up and down, a left and a right, an in front and a behind, a near and a far.

Elliptical eclipse on my studio table (ink, paper & stone)

When nothing arrests our gaze, it carries a very long way. But if it meets with nothing, it sees only what it meets. Space is what arrests our gaze, what our sight stumbles over: the obstacle, bricks, an angle, a vanishing point. Space is when it makes an angle, when it stops, when we have to turn for it to start off again. There's nothing ectoplasmic about space; it has edges, it doesn't go off in all directions, it does all that needs to be done for railway lines to meet well short of infinity.

Georges Perec  Species of Spaces and Other Pieces  1974

Questions of Space

 

Work in progress, detail   2013

I've been reading Bernard Tschumi's essay entitled,'Questions of Space.' Although it is aimed mainly at architects and building designers, his words speak deeply to me too, in my quest to understand what space is all about. Here are some examples:

"Untitled" (site specific installation)  Graphite powder, pencil & stone  2013

1.1   Is space a material thing, does it have boundaries?

1.11  If space has boundaries, is there another space outside those boundaries?

"Untitled"   Ink, pencil, graphite & pen  2013

 1.12  If space does not have boundaries, do things then extend infinitely?

Work in progress (digital image)  2013

1.13  As every finite extent of space is infinitely divisible (since every space can contain smaller spaces), can an infinite collection of spaces then form a finite space?

(B. Tsuchumi 'Questions of Space' / Architectural Association Publications )

1001 Ways to See

"Sunshadow Pink"   Ink, wash, marker pen & watercolour  2013

“Emptiness which is conceptually liable to be mistaken for sheer nothingness is in fact the reservoir of infinite possibilities.”
D.T. Suzuki