What is no thing? If you were to do a study in no thing where do you begin?
I started with what no thing is to me. No thing is the great absence, it is the place of infinite possibilities, it is the space in between sentences and then the silence before the words you decide to speak are formed in your mind.
If I learned one morsel from this project, it is that no thing, is not nothing.
I started by studying silence. Listening to it, letting it wash over me. From there I played with movement that highlighted and played with the silence that was there. The constant was that silence was always there, holding and making space for ideas. I only needed to be brave enough to put something - anything - out there.
To speak about this project I feel I need to add a little subtext to who I am as an artist and what I believe in. I am here making art, making dances because often my work somehow has that rare capability to touch people or rather more often one singular person. I am here for that one person who comes up to me after a showing to say that they were really touched by this one movement or they felt something for the first time in too long. I am making art for those who need it.
No thing, a study.
No thing, a study of
the
absence.
Does that make you (the audience) angry? And if so why? Are you angry because you feel that your time was wasted? Because you didn’t like what was offered?
No thing, the reflection of the audience themselves.
What do you see when you sit in silence?
Are you uncomfortable? And if so, why?
What is the point of art if not to make you think and feel?
This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Joy Douglas. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.
Perception // no thing - a contemplation
by Joy Douglas
Feb 28, 2019
Jim Livingstone in Custer, South Dakota.
Perception // no thing - a contemplation
What is no thing? If you were to do a study in no thing where do you begin?
I started with what no thing is to me. No thing is the great absence, it is the place of infinite possibilities, it is the space in between sentences and then the silence before the words you decide to speak are formed in your mind.
If I learned one morsel from this project, it is that no thing, is not nothing.
I started by studying silence. Listening to it, letting it wash over me. From there I played with movement that highlighted and played with the silence that was there. The constant was that silence was always there, holding and making space for ideas. I only needed to be brave enough to put something - anything - out there.
To speak about this project I feel I need to add a little subtext to who I am as an artist and what I believe in. I am here making art, making dances because often my work somehow has that rare capability to touch people or rather more often one singular person. I am here for that one person who comes up to me after a showing to say that they were really touched by this one movement or they felt something for the first time in too long. I am making art for those who need it.
No thing, a study.
No thing, a study of
the
absence.
Does that make you (the audience) angry? And if so why? Are you angry because you feel that your time was wasted? Because you didn’t like what was offered?
No thing, the reflection of the audience themselves.
What do you see when you sit in silence?
Are you uncomfortable? And if so, why?
What is the point of art if not to make you think and feel?
This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Joy Douglas. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.