Calendar Project updates

by Janie Nicoll, 16 Nov 2008

On Thursday Amy Marletta came out to Callendar Park again and together with the generous cooperation of Irene and George Dickson, we set up a projection in the vestibule area on the ninth floor of Leishman Tower. Amy has been making a video which she wanted to experiment with, so we blocked out the windows and projected the video onto the doors, walls, and plants in a variety of configurations. I documented this with my digital camera, and got some interesting shots.

Once we had achieved what Amy was looking for we went inside and persuaded Irene to try on a pair of Gold glitter shoes, that feature heavily in the video. George was keen to try these on but found they were too small for him, which was a shame.. I also tried on a pair and very natty they were too. We took more digital images of the video playing on Irene’s widescreen TV, while I left a trail of gold glitter across Irene’s living room carpet, in my quest to get the best shots. All this gold seemed rather appropriate as gold has been a recurring theme through out the residency in artworks Alex and I have both made in “Meddle With the Devil” and “Garlands”, at the Park Gallery.

Mandy Mcintosh has lent us a rather lovely knitted tank-top for the project , which was enthusiastically received by the group at the last meeting on Tuesday. At least four residents wanted to try it on and Lottie who, up-until-now has been unwilling to get involved in this project, immediately pounced on the idea of wearing it. Irene is also a very keen knitter and brought out a huge box of knitted items for a sale of work, at the Community Centre. It was obviously many hours of work involved. For this project Alex has proposed a Falkirk Walk of Fame like the one in Hollywood.. Its making me think of the idea of a “Credit Where Credit’s Due” section for the Village Voice … or a New Years Honours List for Unsung Contributions to the Community. Irene would definitely be on my list.

Lindsay Perth and Helen Beurskens have been paired up and seem to be having an interesting collaboration, as Helen is a really lively character and apparently a bit of a hoarder to say the least. From what I hear Lindsay was having a good old rake through Helen’s record collection and I am looking forward to seeing the artwork that she comes up with. James McLardy has been teamed up with Mary Johnstone, who also seemed to strike up a good rapport. The intention is to get those artworks photographed this week, along with an interesting construction piece by Cath Whippey, a hanging painting by Tommy Grace and a sculpture by Kenny Hunter. Hopefully its all going to make an interesting set of artworks and documentary images.
Inevitably, I need to get my ideas together for my own artwork and as I get more involved in the documentation side of things its all becoming clearer what i am hoping to achieve, but as Alex likes to say “More of that later”......

Amy Marletta is involved with the artists’ collective Ganghut, who have just launched a new Project Space, at the Scottish Sculpture Workshop. For more information check out www.ssw.org.uk