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<Wednesday, 18th August 2009>
I'm coming to America
Friday 2nd October i'll be crossing the pond again to San Francisco USA, talking at the first ever 'Pattern Design Conference' organized by the CFPD, and giving a Subtraction Cutting Masterclass at the Art Institute of California. All the event info can very usefully be found HERE. I'm dead excited.
Ship-shape & Bristol fashion
My eyes open, it's morning or afternoon,
i collect together the cups and glasses off the windowsill and around the room,
5 chocolate biscuits strategically placed around the flat widens my search,
i pick up the socks & underwear off the floor, the t-shirts and trousers
and sort them into piles to be washed or put away, i fold up the trousers closing the draws,
put the laundry in the bag, enter the lounge, clear my desk of Sunday newspapers,
put the magazines into piles, put the piles on the bookshelf, put the fabric back into the bags, and the bags back under the desk,
discarding paperwork i was working on last night that i no longer need, and gathering more cups and glasses along my journey,
bringing them with me to the kitchen, stopping only briefly en route to clear a small pile of paperwork in my pathway back into its box,
restacked neatly under the cutting table where it seems to belong.
I reach the kitchen, switch on the light, put the washing up in the sink, stacking plates, cups and glasses until the sink is full,
i then run a bath, water filling swiftly in the background, making me move faster,
i quickly make the bed, folding the blanket and positioning the eiderdown neatly, and puffing up the pillows.
i shut the clothes draws again, they open mysteriously, as do the kitchen draws & cupboards.
Rachel is on the Chesterfield settee looking after Treacle the cat, making sure she has no fleas.
i switch the bath off, choose my clothes to wear, a bright blue 'Mexico' t-shirt, pants, socks, jeans, pointy shoes.
I get in the bath, Rachels follows, i scrub us both down, wash my hair, get out and dry myself, get fresh towels, dry my hair & moisturize my face.
Then i water the lawn and vegetable patch, 8 watering cans full, which Rachel passes to me through the window,
the sun is shining, there is a white butterfly on the brocolli, caterpillars eating holes, and a bumble bee on the lawn.
Then i climb back through the window, straighten the bed, dust off the muddy footprint from the pillow, plimsole size 8, and close the draws.
I collect a few more glasses off the floor in the lounge that weren't there before, it's a battle i'm definitely winning, and return to the kitchen and fill the sink with hot soapy water, washing up, my mind wandering and dancing around the submarine teacups.
Then i clean the oven as the kettle boils, one tea, one sweet coffee, wipe down the sides, dry off the excess water,
empty the cat litter tray, add new gravel, and fresh water for the cat.
i put the wet clothes from the washing mashine in a bag to take to dry at the laundrette, and put in a second wash.
i bring the tea and coffee, sit down, get pen and paper, my day can now begin.
I don't choose to be active and organized, it's something i can't help myself being, like having a shakey leg, or other involuntary actions,
i am continuously on the move looking for something to tidy, organize or put away, and i can't rest until i've completed a full cycle. It gives me real pleasure.
We learn to play with toys, but putting them away, hiding and re-ordering them was always the better game.
We hold our interiors together in place, by our own energies, gravitational forces, activity and play.
A circle is NEVER a square with round edges
Crossing Devils Dyke
I went running on Wednesday evening with my brother, 5 miles across the South Downs.
It felt really strenuous because i'm used to running on the flat seaside promenade, on manmade concrete not organic matter.
Afterwards i felt happy and euphoric, my heart beat thumping hard in my head.
I slept deeply that night, had epic dreams and awoke with a cold.
Javascript Poet
<Wednesday, 12th August 2009>
Today i will add content and be working on the page layout of the site, updating as i go along. Good morning.
(Cats Cradle Over The Knee Socks by Free People)
Time to leave the city
Doesn't matter if things go my way,
doesn't matter if i lose more than i manage to retain,
doesn't matter if it leaves me exhausted at the end of a long day,
doesn't matter if it's unrequited,
doesn't matter if i sleep in fits and am sometimes awake alone,
doesn't matter if i don't understand every reference,
doesn't matter if friends or family don't get me quite like you do,
doesn't matter if hurt or pain awaits me,
doesn't matter that i can't think straight, can't get you off my mind,
can't imagine life without you now, can't see all the reasons you can,
can't stop myself craving your company, thinking of you, dreaming of you,
it doesn't matter.
The shops may all close down, the sun might shine or may rain,
i may not be as strong as i sometimes think,
my resolve might be more easily tested than should be,
i might be far from perfect, i might get moody or frustrated,
i might get short of breath, i might worry and feel undeserving or incapable,
i might throw more at you than you can catch or give back,
the wheel may come loose or hit an obstacle, the world may distract me,
the sun may keep me indoors, the love of your life might step from the shadows
and eclipse me, our hands might let go,
we may wake up on different days or continents, become strangers,
forget our faces, become obscure or fascinated by other things we can't share,
memory might bow down to new experiences and places,
BUT.... i wouldn't change a thing about this moment,
this day, this year, this time,
i wouldn't want to be anywhere different,
with anyone other than you, or wish i was better equiped for the journey,
that i'd said things differently, that i was any more or less than myself.
I fear nothing.
I anticipate nothing.
I take nothing for granted.
Everything is right and meant to be. This is it.
You and me, for as long as time allows.
Growing up, becoming more, sharing time and space,
and adding to each others enjoyment of EVERYTHING.
Life doesn't last forever, that's its fatal beauty, not flaw.
We choose to hold on, to give ourselves away, to dream crazy thoughts.
All these fleeting moments together are worth a billion moments apart.
These moments when we feel intense chemical desire and want, the minutes and hours,
are more valuable than a year or decade of life spent not wanting,
or feeling anything less.
Life is NOW. Life is this feeling.
It can't be counted, can't be slowed, can't be held back or onto,
can't be felt any other way.
Life must be spent, it must be fulfilled,
it must rise high and risk falling.
Love does save the day,
sorry to ruin the suprise ending.
Write your own future job description
The press focus is often very narrow. The same few bright sparks are continuously rewarded. So...
So here is the brief:
1) Sew a Sub-Cut garment using the SUBTRACTION RULES & REGULATIONS.
2) Take a photo at each stage of the garments manufacture, or sketch, or video.
3) Create a video using stop-motion, animation or time-lapse video showing the Sub-Cut garment constructing itself. A bit like THIS.
4) Upload the video to YouTube and send me the link. There are no winners or losers. I'll link to anything i like the look of.
<Wednesday, 5th August 2009>
This week i gained a garden.
Beneath the surface, submarine smiles.
Treasure in mind.
My dad was given this lovely picture book in December 1950, and it was later read to me as a child.
Here's a little taster.
'X' Marks the Spot
I discovered the only existing copy of my Royal College of Art MA Dissertation in the archives of the RCA Library in London, a document entitled 'Creative Retention' with a large 'X' on the front cover.
All 'theses of distinction' are housed there, exept mine had become lost since 1995 and i had no copy of my own. I didn't think i'd ever see it again..
I took two photocopies and sent one to Sandy Ericson at the Center For Pattern Design in California.
Although there is no digital copy, i hope she will reproduce and publish it one day, as it explains a lot of the theory behind Subtraction Cutting, as well as the motivations behind my early 'nothing nothing' label, the births and deaths of my various London Fashion Week labels, and indeed the existance of this very wednesdaywebsite.
Here's a small snippet :
"You can burn books, smash instruments, or bury clothing, but not the story, the music or the clothes design.
The design of a garment is immaterial and cannot itself be interred: There is so much more in the creation of a book or a garment than text or cloth.
To the author, a burned or lost thesis cannot be substantiated as evidence and so is forever a myth or figment, more creative and vital than could ever be present.
A garment of the mind has no appearance or style: a discontinuous garment with all the right details and openings, though never together at the same place or time.
It is a garment that is strangely animated with movements and gestures, some of which belong to the the garment, whilst others seem to have been mine.
Above all, it is a garment whose structure is an elaboration of its development: a garment in a perpetual process of being remade."
(Self-portrait photos from 1998 showing early 'Subtraction Cutting' experiments, before the launch of my first label 'nothing nothing'.)
Sub-Cuts and Sub-Plots
I am currently shooting a fashion reality TV programme with the BBC this weekend in London.
In the latest webisode i cut a Subtraction garment at breakneck speed in front of a group of young designers.
I always enjoy looking at the notes and diagrams the students make during my cutting classes. They look strange and fascinating.
Watch the BBC drama unfolding:
Episode 1: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blast/editorial/1_your_label_webisode_one/120224
Episode 4: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blast/editorial/4_your_label_webisode_four/128071
Episode 10: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blast/editorial/10_your_label_webisode_ten/154411
| i write you read / i play you sing / i sew you wear . . . |
i've been learning to draw again. It's been a while and i'm out of practice.
" When my daughter was about seven years old, she asked me one day what I did at work. I told her I worked at the college - that my job was to teach people how to draw. She stared at me, incredulous, and said, 'You mean they forget?' " - Howard Ikemoto
Local News:
after 2 years and £950,000 of refurbishment, the bandstand down the road has finally reopened with a blistering all-star line-up including the Patcham Silver Band, the British Legion Band, as well as everyones favorite the Salvation Army Band. Can there be a better music venue on the south coast of England ?
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All garments, video, graphics, websites and text are copyrighted to Julian Roberts (c) 2009. A lot of the images assembled above came from Google or somewhere, and are the copyright of their original owner. But their assembly together is very much my own doing, it's difficult to say really where creative ownership begins & ends, i'm certainly not averse to creative trespass. So no reproduction without permission, unless you're feeling subversive, punk.