There is something that i must tell you, and i don't know if i should. Surely i should keep this to myself, but it is important. Suddenly it is fundamental to my work. when i was 8 (?) my granny was diagnosed with alzheimer's. This is a degenerative disease that attacks the brain. The bottom line of this disease is that the memory forgets and then you die. It begins with you forgetting small things, then bigger things like where you live and your childrens names and the last time you ate, next you forget that you need to go to the toilet and wet yourself, as i said you are forgetting when you last ate and so now you are fed by someone, next it is how to move around like walking and so you slowly become bedridden, chewing and swallowing becomes a issue so now you are fed off purrees, you finally forget your voice - even your mumbles, now you forget how to even shuffle in bed so someone has to come in every so often and move you to prevent you from getting bed sores, all facial expressions go - you look blankly at everything, swallowing fluid to too difficult so it is mixed with a powder to thicken it, now you are sleeping all the time and awake for one hour cumulatively each day - this makes feeding time hard so you are fitted with a food tube, you are not waking up at all now and still as anything, the food bag is replaced with morphine and a saline drip, your extremities like your feet and fingers begin to go blue as you heart forgets how to pump blood that far - it just concentrates on the heart and brain, finally it forgets all and you are released. I would go and feed my granny when she still knew how to eat, and then later on i would sit in the room with her and watch her sleep. But because her brain wasn't there it was as though i was sat with an alive/dead body. It is hard to explain the presence in that room. There was just a living body, an empty shell. a house but not a home. She was simultaneously alive and dead. I suppose it was like someone in a coma. But she wasn't dependant on a oxygen machine, and we knew she wouldn't wake up. We were just waiting for sleep's brother, death, to take the leading control. For one to roll into another.
I was looking at one of my pieces and i thought to myself, you don't know if she is dead or alive, she is in a passing place. I then thought of my grandma - "have i just subconsciously made work about my grandma?" Freud's writings can be very true about how this stuff feeds into our minds and actions and how we often don't realise it. I have always made work about lost people, and those who suffer, and perhaps ultimately i'm trying to find where my grandma was lost to. And if she has found her way back home?
But as i said, i am unsure if i want others to read this yet. I know for certain i don't want my family to as they would be upset. But it now seems like such an integral part to my practice.
Yours,
Kerry x