Maybe I am trying too hard?

I had another day at class where things just did not come together well.  I had been working on the jam jars, trying out different ways of using the hand made labels.  They just don't really do it for me.  Ok, but not brilliant.  Not punchy enough and the message is unclear.

 
I had my second tutorial with Steve.  He made some valid points, but unfortunately I don't have the answers to the questions he raised.

Statement artwork needs time incorporated into the work.  Decorative artwork does not.  Time is not apparent in my drawing.  When working in polemic (political stance/narrative) it needs to show you have worked with it, or the audience can just reflect upon it.  I am not a banner waver, but I'm not sure what I am trying to achieve.

Some artists are making a statement via process (eg Caren Garfen and Caroline Bartlett, in Cloth & Stitch at Salts Mill) but I am not doing process art. Their work is very time consuming and this is part of their message.  Mine is not about time consuming process.  Own work is not labour intensive.

Find a site.  Find ephemera associated with the site and work with this.  Does text come into it?  Women's letters.  Women's shopping lists.

Use what is important to make it more relevant/powerful.

Represent servitude via tools/hours.   (I thought I had done this with the Yokes piece last year).

Choose items with symbolism.  Reflect on Yokes and invest current work with that feel.  Look at other artists' existing material to gain power.

Draw different images.  Current images selected are not good enough.

Use text.  Don't be too literal.  Shopping list and its provenance

Not impressed with sketches of gloves.  Suggested I draw several different garments and draw in different linings.  Marry man's coat with women's imagery on lining and vice versa.

Feeling quite downhearted.  Just as well I am not staying in to dwell on it today.  Going to V&A to hear Alice Kettle speak about her practice, then Jim and I are meeting up to go to see Strangers on a Train at the Gielgud Theatre with Laurence Fox, Jack Huston and Imogen Stubbs.