I started this year feeling a bit blah sometimes you get that feeling you have done it all before and my year ahead of me felt like that as I racked my brains to think of new subjects to work on, I had some kind of artists block. One day I just took myself back to bed and decided I needed to think as Winnie the Pooh says 'Something Comes from Nothing' or ex nihilo.
As I lay there I really thought about how I felt about things people, art, my town the next town, the town Id just visited, the treadmill we get ourselves on, the daft way our life is presented on social media the thought we think we know everything about each other yet we know nothing.
I really thought about the feeling I get now walking about in a city that used to be the center of an industry but is now presented as heritage, the frustration of knowing how thriving the department stores were 'back in the day' and how desolate they are now a shadow of themselves presenting Instagramable experiences to lure in the tech-savvy. It's the same feeling I had in the mid-1990s when I realised the trade I had worked hard to learn was being replaced by computers and sent overseas.
We are at a crossroads in our towns a moment before they are turned into either a preserved museum of the past full of coffee shops and gift emporiums or into housing. We are having the last gasp at convincing the population that shopping is fun but in truth, we all know that if we want an item we just type in the words and there it is not many have time to seek out and search.
If you have been standing a stall this year you may have felt like an exhibit in a zoo people are coming for the show but are they coming for the goods? Sometimes they do and bless them!
I have found my sales are coming from different sources this year mainly online inquiries and you all maybe have found that too.
What are we to do? We can't change progress and we shouldn't want to it is all about adapting to new things and I certainly have had to do that in my life. I still think folk are spending money but they want to do stuff see things and experience events its time to change.
Funny what comes out of nothing! It is precisely these thoughts that have led me on a new path of learning this year, I just wanted to know more about the human race and understand from what has happened before and see if I can work out what may happen next. It is not enough to stay the same we have to evolve and my art will also evolve although where I don't know yet although I am learning that the subjects that I want to write about are not what I thought they would be social justice issues have begun to surface as my main interest.
So 2018 has been a slow year of change for me full of letting go and new beginnings I'm still not doing facebook and learning of the way they are using our data I feel I made the right decision but of course, I'm on Twitter and Instagram @ruthgrayimages and I'm happy and that is the main thing in life and feeling quite calm and excited for the new year.
So something has come from nothing and I thoroughly recommend taking to your bed and doing nothing for a while I think its called 'mindfulness with thoughts' because stopping and working out what is important to you and really taking a wide-open eye view of the world can really be enlightening!
See you next week! Itll be an experience! See below.
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