Beginning to create a dialogical visual relationship between Lego and crochet 

Summary of research My research is a practice-based investigation into how the dialogical relationship between mother and child affects maternal subjectivity and what are the possibilities for generating drawing projects from the perspective of the mother-as-artist through the mother/child dyad.

More in-depth explanation: In the practice of drawing I hope to create dialogues between myself as I become a split subject experiencing the world through being two (or three, or four!). This dialogical engagement as it becomes transmuted through form and process will be developed through both tacit knowledge of everyday actions of mothering as well as perceived physical actions of my children (movement, voice), objects they interact with (toys, devices, domestic objects) and their physical bodies (shape, form, line). It might also come from an imagined vocabulary of forms associated with growth, birth and nurturing in which the phantasies of the maternal body as it performs motherhood are visualised through biology and nature. The dialogic aspect will also structure the drawing processes and techniques that I use to interweave the two separate experiences: those of the embodied experience of my own body and those of perceiving my children’s embodied experiences and my interpretation of their own perception of my identity. By extension, and as an effect of having three children, identities and experiences become intermingled whereby it becomes impossible to distinguish the original source or identity. Here assemblage and incongruity become visual markers for what might occur as I hope to articulate a grammar or syntax for the fragmented maternal mind and body, to develop a practice which is true to the interrupted and unpredictable nature of what it is to care for children. I hope to use processes of frottage, embossing and collagraphs to create drawings on both sides of paper. I also hope to create hybrid forms which are merged from distinct vocabularies that interact with the body and embodied experience of the mother and of the child. I hope to merge different techniques, processes and forms of drawing to elicit dialogue. I hope to experiment with phenomenological approaches to drawing directly on paper and in the present to evince shape and form through tacit knowledge. Finally, I hope to experiment with VR and digital drawing technologies to create ways for digital and analogue drawing to interact. Repetition is a key factor in the processes I hope to use in drawing both to document movement and actions over time and is pertinent as it relates to the durational experience of caring for children. Here are some of the ideas as they are evolving within separate drawing methodologies: 1. Highlighting emergent forms as they are written in the language of my recorded diary entries and drawing these in ink, watercolour and pen to create autonomous drawings on A4. 2. Practice drawing forms using both VR technology (google tilt brush) and digital drawing pen and tablet. Drawing Ishy wrestling (copying his movements) and drawing domestic actions such as balling a sock. Then finding ways for these two different embodied experiences to interweave and connect. 3. Using frottage, embossing and collographic techniques to create geometric structures based on patterns of growth using lego and crocheted fishing wire. Using drawing and printing on both sides of the paper (creating a double sided drawing). 4. Taking a phenomenological approach to drawing the moment using techniques such as ‘blind’ drawing or ‘touch drawing’ to draw emotions and sensations of maternal embodiment.