Looking backward, moving forward

Ann Mansolino

Concord, California

February- March 2015

Looking backward, moving forward

It's difficult to believe that my four weeks here are nearly over. The time has gone by so quickly -- which seems strange in a way, given that the experience in many ways has been about slowing down, finding peace, and making art from a place of internal and external quiet. How can such an experience speed past me? How can a slow pace feel like it's gone quickly? It seems impossible, but maybe when creativity is flowing at its own pace, when one's activities connect with a sense of place and the rhythm of time there, the passage of time isn't as conscious, as labored, as it seems in normal life. In light of that, who would want to return to normal life?

Despite being a photographer, I've spent much of this residency working with book projects. In the last couple of weeks, I've built on the first object I made here, which I posted images of earlier -- the book that was a house. I've now created a second one, tall and winding, twisting upward, toward some idea of home. It's made from pages from an old manual for building houses. Perfect.

I also created another book using plastic animals and pages from an old dictionary. I love the way the lion moves through the book (or the book moves through the lion), and the way the structure of the book allows the animal to double back on itself, to follow itself round in circles:

I've enjoyed transforming existing books into new objects, and approaching bookbinding more playfully, experimentally, and sculpturally. The time and space to explore new ways of making that differ from my usual processes has been valuable.

And now I pack up -- all this art and more (yes, there is more... too much to show in a blog post) -- and prepare to move onward. I'm tremendously grateful for the opportunity to be here, to have been here. Every once in a great long while, you find exactly what you need -- and the quiet time to work on art, to rethink my own creative process, and to spend time in nature has been exactly what I needed... and didn't know I needed until I was here.  I will try to take that peaceful immersion in creativity with me when I go, and to continue what has begun here, wherever I might find myself in the future. 

-- Ann Mansolino

www.annmansolino.com