During week 11 I decided to take another trip to London for some additional inspiration. I went to Columbia road flower market, the Barbican Conservatory and the white cube Bermondsey to see Tracey Emin’s exhibition. I went to Columbia road flower market to take photographs of the plants and flowers as well as a way of experiencing the nature part of my project. Despite it being probably the busiest street on a Sunday morning in London, there was still something rather enjoyable about the process of walking through a busy street surrounded by beautiful blooms. I think flowers can give such simple pleasure! In terms of the Tracey Emin exhibition, I felt it was relevant to the chaos aspect of my project. Her work in the gallery space was exploring key themes including memories, loss, pathos, anger and love. There is something rather chaotic about the artists work, displayed in her brush strokes and loose style whilst the topics explored within her work are also reflecting this chaos as she can be overtly sexual and crude sometimes, exploring the female body in an open and expressive way.

Alongside my trip to London, I also went to the 3 talks on Friday 8th March. The event involved 3 speakers discussing their creative practice followed by informal tutorials in the afternoon. The 3 speakers were Jon Emmony, The creator of ‘Dazed Beauty,’ the editor of ‘Volt Magazine,’ Rui Faria and Fashion Illustrator Sue Dray. This was a very interesting, insightful and beneficial day. I enjoyed listening to the 3 professionals as it introduced new ideas and inspiration. In other words, Rui Faria discussed his magazine Volt Cafe and how it isn’t bound. I really liked this idea and therefore it may be something I consider for my FMP. Furthermore, I found Sue Dray particularly engaging. During my time at Fashion Scout, volunteering as a backstage volunteer, I came across her fashion illustrations and saw her working as an artist in residency during the catwalk shows. Lastly, Jon Emmony spoke about his work for Dazed Beauty. I was interested in his work as is so different to what I have done before and my work style. Jon spoke about his digital work which was interesting. He played some of his films which were very technical and digital, exploring the ideas around the anonymity of the internet. However during the films, the music being played is classical. I really liked this combination as I think it made such an effective juxtaposition within this work. In other words, having classical music to accompany his highly digital work introduces a humanistic element to something which can be quite cold, such as technology.

During week 11 I also continued doing some reading for my research. I have been reading The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben. The book explores the way trees communicate with one another. It turns out that trees are quite social beings and reflect many humanistic qualities. In the book, the author talks about the social network or otherwise known as the wood wide web, where he draws upon scientific studies to discover some fascinating facts about trees. This is very relevant to my work of natures calm and chaos. Although we may laugh about tree hugging, there is something so restoring about visiting a forest, being surrounded by the trees and listening to the sounds of the wildlife and you.

During this week, I continued my research on the environment/ nature. I explored wild swimming, aided by the BBC 4 programme with Dr Alice Roberts called wild swimming. I wanted to explore additional ways in which we source the idea of calm through being at one with nature. I also wanted to explore the chaos within nature in relation to environmental/ eco concepts so I explored rewilding prompted by George Monbiot, eradicating ecocide by Polly Higgins, trend watching and Extinction Rebellions work. In contrast, I also explored the ideas around slow living through researching into slow craft, slow food as well as the Scandinavian culture and how it mimics much of the slow living lifestyle.This then prompted me to look at comfort. I am interested in exploring notions of comfort with the ideas around being comfortable in our own skin, being in touch with nature and the beautiful chaos within this.