LOCKDOWN JOURNAL: COVID 19.14 (Lina Bentley)
The heading sounds so brutal, I seldom use such terminology and wish for a future beyond Lockdown.
I was sent home from work on Monday due to being surplus to requirement and drove past a van with hand written signs, asking for volunteers to collect or deliver food parcels for the church charity. I reminded myself of the good that people do and wondered if I might go back tomorrow and help out. Upon arriving home, I sat down to unwind and wondered what to do with this unforeseen time on my hands. I looked at my phone and saw a WhatsApp message from Aire Place Studios. It got my mind thinking.
You may have heard of Aire Place Studios in Leeds, its members include visual artists, musicians, writers and creative, small business owners and I am new a member. I am also a full-time teacher at a district pupil referral unit and therefore I don’t frequent the studios as often as I would like. Due to the cancellation of workshops planned in the APS buildings, the charity has lost income used to keep the place open and started a crowd funder page to help keep afloat. I have also been given two days absence from the PRU and would like to raise funds for APS.
I forgot to collect my interchange paint brush handle from the studio before lockdown
I was earmarked to exhibit at Basement Arts Project in late summer of this year, but due to social distancing this may not happen and therefore I had the idea to change the composition of my piece named Aura. Intuitively, before the COVID-19 virus social distancing measures came into place, I went to the studio to collect some vital (to me) materials and brought them home where I felt they needed to be. Now I have time on my hands, I am using my dining table to create artwork on and would like to sell what I make to help the APS crowd funder.
As we are social distancing, I think now, more than ever, we acknowledge the fragility of human existence and wish for stability in our future. I know I am very lucky to be healthy. Every part of Aura was always a Wish because it was made of many wishbones, each pierced with a ring of silver running through, to suspend it in the breeze. We recognize a wishbone as being a standard bone, until you look at more than one and then you see each wishbone is individual in its detail and every silver ring forms in its own way to adjust to the arches. I’m usually cooped up in a classroom and due to social distancing, I’m adjusting to working from home and relieved to be practicing as an artist at home, even if it’s on my dining table.
