Too Much Of A Good Thing?

Firstly this is an admission.

What 'they' say about making work on your own is TRUE. It's hard. Not that I ever really doubted 'them'. Of course, that doesn't mean you (I) shouldn't do it. I always knew it would be hard. Maybe I even wanted it to be hard. I wanted to test myself, to prove I could do it by myself.

Except of course I can't.

I'm not talking about coming up with ideas and content. I'm not even talking about that painful process of forcing yourself to physically stand up and 'do' something. I can and I have been doing that. I am talking about feeling like I need to be Superwoman, like I need to do it ALL on my own. To go from being on my own at home, in the street, in life and also being on my own in the studio. And that is nobody's fault but mine. Because this is where it has got messy.

Being alone is fine. Making work on your own is fine.... Too much of anything is bad.

I have come to realise that what I need in order to be able to be productively and usefully on my own in the rehearsal space is to spend less time on my own (and in my head) outside of the rehearsal space. I haven't done that recently and I've come a little unstuck - and I'm not just talking about the show here. I've spent too much time listening to my own personal demons and not enough time being excited, challenged and inspired by others - in relation to my work and life in general, cos let's face it, it's all brain food. To enjoy the moments of easy breathing and comfortable interaction and relaxation. I've spent too much time focussing on the negatives, worrying about the possible outcomes of scenarios that may never occur and assuming the worst. By isolating myself in my life I lost the genuine pleasure of being alone in the space and playing. The project brief became another chore... Speaking with other artists I know that everyone falls a little out of love with their project every now and then so I am sure it will pass. I can also change the amount of time I spend alone without changing the brief. There are people supporting the show that I can meet with more regularly to chew the fat and talk things through with as well as getting in to the space as outside eyes to keep giving me deadlines to focus on.

This was always supposed to be about learning how I make work by myself. I think I just learned a valuable lesson, the hard way.

The sound of loneliness?

I'm thinking about sound for this Scratch. In particular the sound of loneliness.

Is it the lack of something or someone? Or is it the sound of the thing/person that you are separated from? Is it the noise inside your head when you can't stop thinking about someone you can't have? Or is it a noisy room full of laughter when you feel so sad?

Where are we most lonely and what does that place sound like?

In my first Scratch during Emerge I talked a little about the loneliness of being on a stage alone for the first time. At First in Three (Scratch number two) I talked about the use of tape and documentation/playback during the process and as I get further in to it, spending more and more time alone in big echoey rooms I've been thinking more and more about the sound of the rehearsal room and the empty space I am supposed to fill...

Today I've got toys and ways of capturing that. Now as Scratch number three approaches I'm thinking about playback, sound quality, presentation and aesthetics.