I awoke to a cold yet optimistically dry day, but as yet no plans. This suits me fine as I like to keep my days like a blank canvas, awaiting the brush strokes of action. At the end of the day you might of created a Rothko or indeed a Kandinsky, the cards are to be played, it's how you play them thats important. This day could be defined by art critics as a child's painting, full of spontaneous creation and naïvety, a day of geographic exploration, of adventure and wonder.
After Lunch I had this overwhelming sensation to get out. Not just the flat but leave this place for a while. I grabbed my coat and left everything in the distance, I didn't know where I was going, there was no pre-determined route, I just wanted to walk and carry on walking. Nothing mattered but the journey. I guess I just needed some space, some time away from predictable paths with pre-set-meanings. There are fewer and fewer free, undeveloped spaces left in the world where we can let our bodies and minds run free, almost every place you can go belongs to some person or group which has already designated a meaning and prescribed use for it: private estate, shopping centre, motor-ways, classrooms, national parks. And our very predictable routes through the world rarely take us near the free areas that do remain.
But because the world has so little free space left in it, and the circuitry of our everyday lives never takes us there we're forced to go to places like Alton Towers, Disneyland for any semblance of play and excitement at all. The real adventure our hearts crave has been largely replaced by fake adventure, and the thrill of creation by the drill of spectatorship.
As I left the confines of the town centre, it dawned on me that I had no clue of the geography of my surroundings, there was never any need to! Following my usual paths to work, the pub, the club, Tescos etc. Why would you need to diverge from these unless it was truly necessary? The truth is this situation is stagnant and banal, one that bodes well to boredom and a loss of creativity. New paths inspire new practice and new practice inspires new paths. With this in mind my new aim was of exploration.
My travels took me through places of great humility often laced with humor considering the randomization of aesthetics seen along the way. From town I ventured through; beaches, a graveyard, coastal paths, a golf course, a caravan site, a site of derelict houses, someone's garage, a visit to a garden centre, a school and a few housing estates (each with different class connotations) on the way back. The sky's opened and downpour commenced half way through my journey, but for some reason it didn't matter I was having to much fun to let it dampen my spirits. But what was interesting was how each environment provoked different emotional responses.
A phenomena called psycho-geography. The study of specific effects of the geographical environment on the emotions and behavior of individuals. A perfect example of this was the profound effect built up areas and particularly the main road in this case had upon me. Just after the visit to the garden centre, I only realized it after, but I felt the rain more, my shoulders raised as the cars zoomed past and had only blank thoughts, I felt apathetic and restless. This said the opposite can be expressed in terms of reference to the golf course or indeed coastal paths. The violence of concrete is profound and hidden. The aesthetics of culture, consumption and decomposition do very well to keep it this way.
The violence subsided a little as I turned off, deciding that a main road must be avoided at all costs and before long ended back in town. Sitting down at home, legs tired but smiling. Achievement, adventure, pleasure and 4 hours of pure-subjectivity gained and nothing lost.
"If your heart is free, the ground you stand on is liberated territory. Defend it"
Kisses.
Gregory.
xoxoxox
