The Herbs. Process and Nostalgia
The latest series in my food collection launches this week and focuses on some of the fundamental flavour advances in cooking, herbs. The food collection is far different from my usual artwork, which focuses heavily on Theory and conceptual ideas. Sometimes my mind can only hold onto so much information and overflows or fogs completely. I can not process everything I've learned so need an outlet for feeling rather than thinking. Some of the areas I am interested in and concerned with are phenomenology and photography. In other words, the experience of photographs be that making them, viewing them or the sensory experience. And this particular Series has been reflective of this.
Not just the obvious sense of smell being aroused when composing the images, but before this. The cool air and rain on my skin when I hop outside to gather the thyme. The sounds of the scissors snipping the stalks of each plant. This sound unlocked a great and immediate sense of nostalgia and comfort in me. I wonder why.
The sound of scissors is reminiscent of Geese and Ducks snipping at grass and throws me to the edge of Roath Park Lake where they graze in groups. But that wasn't quite it. A blurred memory of a white bird eating, no…Gathering herbs? Was it a swan? No. A puddle duck. I am transported back to a white fluffy rug that nestles between my fingers and toes. My neck is cranked up towards a small television. The VCR whirrs as the tape is rewound to the beginning of the recording. A woman folding away her watercolours, runs home to escape falling rain. A rabbit, a set of letters and a cup of tea awaits her. She (Beatrix Potter) introduces us to The Tale of Jemima Puddle Duck.
People say an ‘A picture is worth a thousand words’ but those words are going to be different to each person who views it. An image is an image but we all bring our own meanings to them. For me I see this collection and I hear them. I hear the story, the theme song of the show and the geese eating the grass by the lake. I re experience my memories or new thoughts are triggered such as “what should I cook for my dinner tonight” or “how well on my Dried herbs keeping?” To others the activity of cooking may not be a creative practise they care for. To some, the delicate nature of the herbs may be aesthetically pleasing against their blue back drops. But to me, it is the dead, sharp and sudden ends of the trimmings that become my punctum. They pierce me with a longing, nostalgia that I can only convey through a simple additional quote from my youth.
“May I ask you to bring up some herbs from the farm garden to make a savory omelet? Sage and thyme, and mint and two onions, and some parsley. I will provide the Lard for the stuff- lard for the omelet,” said the hospitable gentlemen with sandy whiskers.
