What’s in your inner residency?
Caerus has focused so far on the externals here– photos, communication– because that’s our job. We provide a play house, a structure for the game. But I found myself thinking about the inner residency of feelings. Let’s ignore both art process and art products for a moment of Kairos time. What kind of feelings do you want from your residency?
That question, for me, actually generated this whole project. I wanted to create a state of freedom of emotion within my art. I sought long periods of time to devote to my art and a sense of informed companionship. I wanted more freedom from everyday life and an overt focus on artmaking. I wanted to “live” in my studio as a home of my art.
The feelings? Well, the flow of creation and the excitement of new ideas. Beauty. A steeping in symbol and myth, one of my great driving desires. Physical creation with color and form. A sense of wildness, of travel, of the new. And time, time, time.
I realized that this is what I want in my life as a whole, not just for a couple of weeks. But for now, I’ll aim to consciously intensify my saturation in these elements.
The word residency comes from reside. One of its meanings is “to be vested, as a power or right.” It’s root means “to remain behind”. It means to re-sit, to seat yourself again: in your heart, in your art. “Sed” has connotations of seat, staying, ground, foundation, settle down, saddle, nest, to calm down.
What’s in your private artist residency?
Lilies at the Getty Villa last week. Original photo by Suzanne Edminster.
Caerus Art Residency 