Yu-Chen is really open person, telling honestly about her personal life and it also reflects a lot in her work. She has told us (artist in the Chinese Arts Centre) about her development as an artist. She also told us her worries and struggles that she has had with trying to work and stay in this country, but also about other stuff that many of us artists face after graduation. Money worries, settling in the "real" world (I don't think I need to explain this part too much, we all know have learnt what that is once coming out from University), trying to figure out what is it that you are. It's not the most simple thing to figure out, even if you have got the medium clarified.
Today though I got an invite to go to a Taiwanese Breakfast Club that Yu-Chen is organizing every other saturday during 8 weeks period. Today was the first one and I was ever so excited to attend. I got e-mailed a menu before hand:
Menu: Sweet Potato Congee; Spring Onion and Pickled Radish Omelette; Seaweed; Tofu with Dried Soybean; Peanuts; Dried Cabbage with Carrots.
The Image is from Yu-Chens blog, which I will put a link on here at the end of this post.
I had nice chats with people at the breakfast working in different industries. The residency space in CHinese Arts Centre is so cool. It's a portion of the whole space, next to the gallery, with a studio space and a kitchen, and the best part of it is a little upstairs bedroom. There is metal ladder leading up there and it is like a little attic room with a tiny window looking to the street. Somebody described it well saying that it is like a cabinet you get in an overnight train. The best thing about it is that I heard that it's got it's own built bathroom as well. I don't know why I am raving about that room so much. It just seems like such a amazing way to do work. It's isolated and public at the same time somehow. I would love to work that way some day for a while. I think I will apply next year to do a residence.
There is a lot of thoughts in my head at the moment about being an artist and learning to be a designer as well. Both of the worlds are so attractive to me. I enjoy doing both kind of work, but I just have to find a balance and really have to master my time management. I also have to stop feeling guilty about not doing the other thing when doing the other thing, it's like having two lovers at the same time... or I don't know, two siamese cats who both want to be your favorite (?!)
My biggest inspirations and the things that I feel connected in the art world at the moment are
The Chinese Arts Centre
www.chineseartscentre.org
and Yu-Chen:
http://yuchenwang.com/blog/
http://yuchenwang.com/
Me and Yu-Chen share an interest in old machinery and one of my "to-do-list" has "Go to the Musem of Science and Industry" as Yu-Chen told me all about the old knitting and other industrial textiles machines that are there at the moment. It sounds amazing!
I also want to put my friend Joel in here, even thought I think he deserves his own post. He is amazing photographer and one of the most influential and closest(even though he lives in a different continent) people that I have in my life. Because of him I often question my existence as an artist and think about what paths to take. Hopefully I have more time to write about Joel soon.
http://www.joeljagerroos.com/
http://www.theresejoel.com/
Kisukiskis
Valpuri
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