post script

Last Thursday, I gave my talk. I want to write a bit about it, but there really isn't much more to say than it went well.

In summary, I started by discussing my interest in writing about faith and spirituality, then I read from Glossolalia. Then I talked about where my current interests are (grief, messianism). I showed some slides and talked a bit about the installations I did at Lab Cab, Performance Creation Canadian Conference, and Initiation Trilogy. I spoke a bit about how I want to grow as an artist and how all the things previously mentioned have led me to my nascent project, which I also spoke a bit about.

There were about 45-50 people in the audience, about half affiliated with the CSRS, a few past students (such a treat!), and a swath of faces I didn't recognize. The questions that were asked were smart (some smarter than I could answer intelligently), but everyone was kind and generous.

I find it hard to tell if things like this go well. I think it did, and I hope for everyone in the lecture hall felt the same way.

expectations

This is a picture of my desk at the Centre this morning. I've just returned from Coffee Talk (Nazis in film, banality of evil, colonialism, Wag the Dog, Downton Abbey, amongst other subjects today) and have to buckle down, git'er done. I'm doing my talk The Voice in Your Head tomorrow afternoon (if you're in Victoria, please come!) and to be honest, I'm starting to freak out.

I haven't done much planning yet, and I need to. It's a big deal this talk. I'm to present for 40 minutes and then be open to questions from the audience for another ten minutes. If you read the description, I'm to be reading from and talking about the project I'm here to create. Unfortunately, I don't have much. I don't really have anything I feel comfortable reading from just yet. So now, I've got to figure out a Plan B.

I have ideas--read from Glossolalia, talk about the creative process--and these sounded/felt good until this morning, when the panic set in. I like to do readings. I'm comfortable and confident reading from my work, especially Glossolalia, but this isn't to be a normal reading and the crowd is used to academic presentations. I feel like a failure for not having the work I had hoped to have done.

Okay, enough procrastination. Send good vibes my way. I'm off to figure this beast out.

see you on a dark night

The brain is a remarkable instrument. When I'm in the midst of research, it makes connections on my behalf, ones that I wouldn't be able to logically reason out on my own.

I've been reading a lot about Ann Lee lately. I've been thinking about her strengths, her leadership despite her obvious difficulties: illiterate, anorexic, post-partum depression*, traumatic grief*(*my personal read on her mental state). Then last night, I heard her voice. It wasn't in my head, but my brain told me that singer in a video I've been watching a lot lately is a later-day Ann Lee. Would Grimes look and sound and be what Ann Lee would be if she showed up now instead of 350+ years earlier? Reason says, probably not, but I like that my brain says, absolutely.

research notes: Ann Lee

"Riots in the mid-eighteenth century tended to be about the price of food, and were often started by women."

from Ann the Word: The Story of Ann Lee, Female Messiah, Mother of the Shakers, The Woman Clothed with the Sun by Richard Francis

research notes: Ann Lee

"The fact that Ann's experience in this respect was normal for her time and class doesn't mean that she herself enjoyed it or approved of it. When she was in her forties, and far away in America, she had occasion to give advice to a poor woman called Beulah Rude, who had five children, hardly an unusual number at the time. `Five! Five!' Ann exclaimed. `When you had one, why did you not wait and see if you were able to bring up that as you ought before you had another? And when you had two, why did you not stop then? But now you have five! Are you not ashamed to live in the filthy works of the flesh? You must go and take up your cross, and put your hands to work, and be faithful in your business; clothe your children, and keep them clean and decent; and clean up your house and keep that in order.' One can picture the poor woman's dismay or even rage at being on the receiving end of such a tirade, particularly since the advice was coming a bit late in the day."

from Ann the Word: The Story of Ann Lee, Female Messiah, Mother of the Shakers, The Woman Clothed with the Sun by Richard Francis