Category Self & Identity

Ambivalence

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

In A Test of Memory I question my paradoxical nature.

Is it an undesirable trait because it displays a lack of consistency and predictability? Does it make me an unknown quantity, fickle, unreliable, or even hypocritical? And specifically, in terms of the art world, how does this relate to the need to establish a defined and consistent style for commercial success and gallery representation, in creating a brand? I asked Perplexity AI what it thought.

In a nutshell, it’s not the paradox which is the issue but being unable to accept it. Embracing paradox is linked with greater creativity, psychological growth and is a realistic way of understanding selfhood in a complex world. It is the basis of dialectical thinking: two truths which seem to conflict but which both accurately describe you or your situation e.g. being independent but needing connection.

According to Kierkegaard, the self is essentially a tension between different poles and the process of becoming is learning to live with the contradiction rather than to abolish it. In fact, problems arise when the paradox turns into a chronic self-contradiction that seems unresolvable, which is often tied to perfectionism or all-or-nothing thinking. It creates a state of ambivalence. As long as I genuinely value and am honest about my paradoxical nature, then I am not a hypocrite or lacking in integrity. I need to accept both parts of myself and embrace the tension the paradox creates; to ‘develop the container large enough to hold it’.

In terms of the art world, whilst a paradoxical nature is an asset for making art, it is not for selling it. It does not fulfil the desire for consistency, recognition and stability. So, what is the answer?

  • Distinguish between practice (paradox) and brand (the curated external interface). Curate consistently eg strategise the release of work; lead with one voice whilst nurturing the other.
  • Be like Gerhard Richter, developing separate and opposing lines of enquiry which never merge – be distinctly one thing, then the other, do not mix them and become a muddy average.
  • Have a consistent conceptual narrative – make the paradox the subject matter itself
  • The Trojan Horse is an extension of the first bullet point: pick a lane and develop it and once you have a foothold introduce the other, pivoting under the guise of evolution.
  • Most importantly, don’t suppress the shadow side, and keep feeding it.

That all makes sense. So, how do I feel about it all now? A bit better, I think…

Clay!

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

I missed our final session, so I watched the video.

It was raining and I didn’t fancy going outside to get some proper clay, so I used my daughter’s physio putty – a silicone based non-Newtonian liquid which changes to a malleable solid with pressure. I made a little bowl.

Thinking about it, it’s very much like me: it becomes resistant when pressured, will embrace change temporarily but generally just wants to revert back to its natural state.

The exercise of feeling the material with awareness and the subsequent discussion with Alexis Rago on his experience of working with clay was particularly interesting as I’m currently researching materiality, in particular, Malafouris’ Material Engagement Theory – the act of making is a lived and relational state of becoming in which selfhood is enacted and transformed through the ongoing dialogue between the maker and the material.

You’re Turning Into Your Father

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

‘And what’s wrong with my father?’

’Nothing. But I didn’t marry him; I married you.’

It was our 23rd wedding anniversary yesterday. Neither of us is the same as we were 23 years ago and nor should we be according to K H Tan’s Fluctuational Identity Theory, ‘FIT’ (The Dissolution of the Self: How Ontological Instability Reconfigures Identity, Ego and the Nature of Selfhood, July 2025).

In his thesis Tan proposes a framework for understanding selfhood as a dynamic process of becoming that never achieves stable being. He argues against the notion inherent in Western traditional thinking that there is a stable foundation which grounds identity across time and change: a stable and unified self. This traditional way of thinking raises numerous fundamental issues eg how much change can happen before original identity is lost on a cellular and psychological level? When does the self come into existence? Conception? Birth? When does it come to an end? Brain death? Bodily death? It is not only incompatible with the dynamic, temporal and relational nature of existence, but our attempts to achieve a stable identity in an unstable reality could also be the cause of conflict, unhappiness, and the persistence of suffering in trying to control what cannot be controlled, the anxiety of trying to predict what cannot be predicted and the exhaustion of trying to maintain what cannot be maintained.

He is not promoting the idea of ontological instability per se, and he rejects the idea of chaotic instability (random fluctuations without pattern or direction) as these are incompatible with the coherence and continuity implicit in personal existence; we need to be able to recognise ourselves in order to be able to function. Instead he argues for creative instability. The self is not a thing that has experiences, but the ongoing process of experiencing the self; with every experience we integrate our past, our present and the possibilities of our future. It is a process of maintaining patterns while introducing variation and at the same time the self remains recognisably oneself while becoming other than what it was. The self undergoes ‘inter subject becoming’ – it is not a pregiven entity that enters into relations with others but emerges through and as a result of these relations.

He sees instability as a positive condition which encourages growth, creativity and meaning-making which would not be possible if the self were a fixed and stable entity. He considers fluctuational personas eg parent, friend, spouse, citizen, as genuine modes of being as opposed to roles and temporary performances, and as such negates the idea of authentic and inauthentic personas because all personas are genuine expressions of our capacity for becoming.

He advocates aiming for the middle ground. The more we try to define our identity the less capacity we have for growth and transformation, and too much self-awareness can lead to psychological overwhelm. Conversely, complete openness to transformation and abandoning any attempt to understand ourselves leads to a loss of any sense of identity and the continuity necessary for coherent existence, as well as disconnection from experience.

Achieving accurate self knowledge cannot as a matter of logic be achieved: we cannot bridge the gap between who we are and who we understand ourselves to be. He sees this area of misrecognition as being a ground for new possibilities of selfhood; it can become a creative force that helps us to become what we see ourselves as being. He gives examples of considering ourselves to be more creative, more confident than we are, and how this might lead to us ultimately having these attributes. Presumably the same could be said about negative attributes, but he doesn’t deal with these in any detail.

He compares traditional approaches and FIT in terms of personal development and growth including education and the effect of technology and algorithms on digital identity, psychological health, political and social implications, and human flourishing. He posits that FIT provides the framework within which we can better understand and navigate the challenges of contemporary existence.

It’s certainly an argument for revising the vows of marriage to reflect not only a change in financial status and health, but also in selfhood. Our wedding vows were in Italian and we haven’t the foggiest what we agreed to.

You Can Take The Girl Out Of Essex…

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

So, you’re an Essex Girl!

No, I’m not from Essex (I’m not really from anywhere). A pejorative term used to belittle a certain group of women, used so much in everyday speech that it earned itself a formal dictionary definition: promiscuous, unintelligent, materialistic and lacking in taste. It was only 5 years ago that Oxford University Press eventually relented to a petition and agreed to remove the term from one of its dictionaries – the one used to teach foreign students English. A member of the Essex Girls Liberation Front, the campaign which spearheaded the move, is conceptual artist, Elsa James.

Elsa James (image: Tessa Hallmann http://www.greatbritishlife.co.uk 22/08/25)

Nowadays, I don’t really give two hoots. In fact, I often don the mantle and wear it with pride, even though it’s not really mine to wear. I still don’t understand why it’s the only county which has given rise to such a term of speech. Once you get out of ‘London Essex’ the countryside is beautiful, just like its neighbour, Suffolk, a landscape favoured by Constable, and the accent is so totally different from the stereotype.

I was in a local bookshop the other day and was looking at their maps when I noticed that they had a bundle of OS maps on sale, and, as if by luck, they had Landranger Map No 167 ‘Chelmsford, Harlow & Bishop’s Stortford’, so I bought it.

I lived in Essex with my parents on and off for about 12 years. I couldn’t wait to leave; it was on a road to nowhere and I spent the school summer holidays, which seemed to go on forever in those days, sunbathing in the back garden with cooking oil, reading Jilly Cooper novels and dreaming of finally breaking free and moving to London or somewhere else equally as exciting, perhaps one of the destinations of the planes that I used to watch leaving trails across the big blue sky.

I’m not sure why, but my old school isn’t on the map (the map is not the territory). It definitely still exists. It should be where the 08 is. I had to travel over half an hour on the 311 bus to get to school; the bus stop was right outside my house, which meant that rolling up my school skirt to make it shorter had to be done with expert precision as the bus pulled up at the bus stop, just in case anyone was watching. Then up to the top deck where you could smoke, with my small stash of cigarettes which I had pilfered from my father’s packet of Rothmans, left on the side in the kitchen.

It was an all girl school. There was a boys’ school across the road, KEGS, and in the fifth year there was a lunchtime club, Senior Christian Fellowship, to which the boys from across the road could come. It was the most popular club.

What has Essex ever done for us?

  • Grayson Perry went to KEGS: he left a few years before my time. He went on to do his foundation at Braintree College of Art. That’s where I wanted to go, but didn’t. We both got out, by different roads, and to very different destinations.
  • Ignoring the obvious ones, there’s The Prodigy, Depeche Mode, Yazoo, Olly Murs, Jamie Oliver, Maggie Smith, Helen Mirren, Damon Albarn, Richard Osman, and Robert the Bruce, amongst others.
  • Colchester is Britain’s oldest town.
  • It has the smallest town (Manningtree) and the largest village (Tiptree, home to jam-makers, Wilkins & Sons).
  • Southend has the world’s longest pier.
  • The world’s oldest wooden church is in Greensted.
  • It has 350 miles of coastline, second only to Cornwall, and the most islands of any county.
  • Chelmsford is the birthplace of radio.
  • The Mayflower was built in Harwich.

But even so, I still don’t think that I’ll ever go back and live there.

I’ve taken myself out of Essex…

Wayfinding

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

I think that I’m finally getting some clarity. Or maybe I’m seeing connections and signs where perhaps there aren’t any, but it seems to make sense, in my head anyway. In my second tutorial, Jonathan commented that he had a sense that it was all leading to something (the first sign).

So far during this course, trite as it may be (although Jonathan has assured me that it is essentially what art is about), I have been concerned with understanding myself and my place in the world as a practising artist. I’ve been working from memories, guiding me like a compass on my exploration, probably slightly off kilter, as well as my day to day life, thoughts and feelings. I have been trying to concentrate on the process as opposed to the result (a sign), experimenting along the way, and producing very few finished pieces of work. I did feel uneasy about the lack of finalised output, but no longer. I’ve been on a dérive (our session on Guy Debord being another sign).

In my Study Statement I question whether it is actually possible to ‘find myself’. Kierkegaard thinks not, in the sense of a static and unified concept, for the self is constantly being formed not just by reflecting on the past but also by engaging with the present; it is in a state of becoming, in a state of flux, something I have said I feel on several occasions in this blog (a sign). I accept in my Study Statement that I can only hope to know myself as at a certain point in time, and that reflection is something which will have to be a continuing process. Something else I have mentioned on several occasions in this blog, to fellow course mates and to Jonathan, is that I feel like I am a different person to the one that started the course back in October last year (a sign); I have changed and I will continue to change – to become.

Recently, I’ve become interested in the subject of maps – the comment in my Unit One feedback that I seem to be engaging in a process of mapping jumped out at me (a sign). That led me to start thinking about maps and the process of mapping and map-making, experimenting with cartographic symbols and mark-making. The subject of maps is a huge one but during my research I came across the philosopher, Korzybski, the father of general semantics, a central principle of which is that the map is not the territory (rather like the image is not the thing: Magritte’s Ceci n’est pas une pipe (I used this idea with my red telephone at the Interim Show (yes, another sign)). In short, our models of the world are abstracts of reality, and do not represent it. This is a principle I’ve been trying to be more mindful of since I read about it – my map of the world is not the same as everyone else’s, so we can be in the same situation or look at the same photograph but have our own very different experiences and interpretations of it (our sessions with the photographs being another sign). Something which is blindingly obvious, but which I don’t always appreciate.

This then led to the notion that geographical maps themselves do not reflect the territory in the sense that there is abstraction and subjectivity in the production of all maps: the size of countries and borders can be manipulated for political and social ends, the purpose for which a map is intended can determine what is included and what is left out, viewpoint and projection can distort the world view.

Mercator Projection

Authagraph Projection

The Authagraph Projection is considered to be the most accurate flat representation of the world. It highlights the distortion caused by the traditional Mercator projection in terms of the size of Africa, South America and Greenland, amongst others.

I have been reading a lot about cartographic theory, a discipline which has only become a thing relatively recently. There is lots of disagreement about what a map is and the separation between the artefact of the map and the process of mapmaking and mapping. Post-representational cartographic theory does what it says on the tin – it argues that maps are not the territory but actually create the territory, are in a state of flux and are constantly changing, and theorists have moved away from the idea of a map as an artefact, but as being performative and processual, and always in a state of becoming.

Whilst working, I have been reflecting on past events and experiences, but whilst doing so I have been conscious that my recollections are probably my version of the truth; that I am my own unreliable narrator. I have been interested in memory for a while, particularly as to its probable unreliability and its potential to be manipulated. The way memories are formed and retrieved means that they are not fixed archives, but are constantly being formed and reformed with each retrieval; they are in a state of becoming.

The link between selfhood, mapping and memory is the concept of the state of becoming: ontogenesis. In my research paper I want to explore ontogenesis in the context of autobiographical artistic practice because it is the essence of what I am trying to do. In my experimentation and production of unfinished work I am engaging in the process of mapping, changing and becoming, relying on my memories which are also in a state of becoming but how can I represent this in a visual form which is also in a state of becoming? Hopefully, by the end of the research paper, I will have a better understanding as to how it can be achieved, if at all.

That’s the plan for now anyway, although I may change my mind, in my state of becoming.

Carbon Dating

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

During my tutorial Jonathan mentioned carbon paper.

It brings back memories of a time when it was the only way to make copies, of secretaries putting a sheet between the top and bottom copies when they typed. Those were the days when the most technologically advanced piece of equipment in the office was a fax machine, which would regularly spew out reams of documents on thin, shiny paper, the print fading away to nothingness over time, thus requiring photocopies to be made, just like some present day shop receipts, so I’ve discovered.

So what to do with it? Recently, I have been reading about map-making and the act of mapping, considering the difference between the two. Contemporary cartographic theorists consider the process of mapping to be of paramount of importance, the creation of the artifact of the map being just one step in the process. In particular, psychogeographic mapping seeks to represent how individuals feel about the place they are in, a process in which subjective experience is prioritised over factual accuracy. Artist, Christian Nold, who uses a bio-mapping device to record individuals’ changes in emotional state, creates emotional maps of places, and one I’m particularly interested in is Brentford Biopsy because I used to live next door in Chiswick before I moved out of London. The project was undertaken in 2008 before areas of Brentford were redeveloped, and it’s really interesting to see how people felt about the area: it reveals so much more information than you would get by simply looking at a map: a map details the historic buildings and the riverside, but not how people respond to them, their view as to how they should be dealt with in future development, and how it actually feels to be there.

So, I’ve decided to embark on some emotional mapping of my own, not in relation to a sense of place (that may come later when I revisit my grandmother’s village) but of my day to day life. The bonus is that it means that I have to make a line everyday which will hopefully lead me to doing other making. I have drawn the contour lines using carbon paper (I‘m currently thinking that they may be too dark and overpowering, but we’ll see how it goes; it’s an experiment after all) and each one relates to an individual day.

I’ve already started, and it should take me up to the 12th of August. I’ve had to invoke some rules. There are three colours which represent three emotional states which I assess at the end of the day; green represents a neutral emotional state, orange positive and blue negative. Obviously within the generalised emotional states is a whole range of different specific emotions, but I decided just to keep it simple. Each line starts from the contour of the day in question and ends by going off the sheet otherwise it may be associated with more than one day. I draw each line for no longer than two minutes. I had thought about allowing myself however long I felt I needed and varying the intensity of the line depending on how I felt, but decided that would over-complicate things. The map will give an indication of how often I was in each emotional state over a period of time. I’m now thinking that I should have had another map on the go at the same time; not just to depict frequency but also depth of emotion. Maybe next time, if this works out.

I also found some watercolour paper which I had used for an unsuccessful cyanotype and experimented with it. I like the intensity of the colour against the blue background, and the way the coloured in areas look like countries on a map of the world.

The groupings of colours also remind me in a way of the Art Emotions Map which has been produced by Google Arts & Culture and the University of California, Berkeley, which I’ve spent a bit of time exploring and which reminds me of one of our Miro boards. My husband suggested that I could do something similar relating to life experiences, with getting married to him falling within ‘Wonder & Awe’. Oh, he does have a sense of humour!

Making A Face

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

A piece of carbon paper between two pieces of printer paper, a pen lid and a mirror. One minute of blind drawing.

I liked not being able to see the marks I was making, to lose all sense of where everything was, going back over areas and redefining without knowing it. I like the quality of the lines created by the carbon paper.

Reusing the same piece of carbon paper created an all-encompassing image.



Computer Says ‘No’

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

If I were a laptop I would say that at the moment I have no RAM, my processor is kaput and my operating system doesn’t support updates.

I’m not in the right headspace to have to think about a research paper. The more I think about it the more I just want to make, but my chunking approach to life means that I have to deal with this before I can entertain anything else.

At the end of the day, it’s just a draft – a draft is inherently subject to change.

What intrigues me? Initially it was the fallibility of memory. Then it was maps and the act of mapping. But do either of these interest me that much or are they just a passing fad? Is there anything which will make this exercise a pleasure and not the chore I suspect it will be? I’ve decided that I have the attention span of a gnat, that I am fickle in that I am interested in something intensely for a period of time and then I get bored and move on, that I am impatient and probably at times a bit lazy – isn’t life too short to have to work at making sense of academic writings which seem to have been written in such a way as to make them inaccessible to anyone but the most ardent of readers? I’m increasingly of the view that if you want me to do something, make it easy for me; that’s the approach I adopt with others.

Rubbing It Out

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

Following on from Solitude, I decided to try and develop it further.

I used flipchart paper again, as it was easier to manhandle it over the obstinately curved wire fencing which I used for the grid effect. A downside was that the grid is a bit off kilter, but nonetheless I like the grid and the lines of coloured automatic drawing – it reminds me of map grid lines, a road map. I explored trying to have some figures behind and some in front of the grid. Not sure I succeeded and I am in two minds about the light figures.

I decided to have a go with soluble graphite sticks using heavyweight cartridge paper.

I wanted to get away from the soft diffused figures and experimented with hatching and rubbing on a textured surface. I sprayed with water and held upside down to create some streaks and drips. Not one for less is more, I drew some green and red lines and then thought it would be interesting to see what kind of a random pattern would be created by drawing dots at the intersections of the lines.

I still didn’t like the dark figures at the bottom and so to try and break them up a bit, I coloured in some random shapes like I’ve done previously using different marks in my monochrome doodles.

I really don’t like it, and I’m struggling to find anything positive to say about it other than I like the idea of the lines and the dots at intersections emphasising the concept of connectedness and the idea of multiple figures in the background; the idea of all those who have come before, and of inheritance (Bus Replacement Service)

This time I left out the water, but I still used the water soluble graphite stick which had a purple tint to it which isn’t apparent in the photos. I don’t think it is as easily blended as normal graphite.

I much prefer this one out of the two. I’m starting to wonder what it would be like on a painted ground or even using thin layers of oil paint gradually building them up. Or am I done for now?

Bus Replacement Service

Kate McCalmont-Woods Leave a comment

I was planning on going into London yesterday to catch Donald Rodney: Visceral Canker at Whitechapel Gallery (as well as revisit the Cardiff audio walk), and Linder: Danger Came Smiling at the Hayward, before they close in the next day or two. But what I forgot was that it was a Sunday on a Bank Holiday weekend, a perfect time for railway engineering works. A bus replacement service would almost double my usual journey time, and so I decided to stay at home. Instead, I had a look on Whitechapel Gallery website, to see what I had missed. There is an interesting piece on Rodney by Caleb Azumah Nelson, particularly on their relationships with their fathers.

Rodney had, and ultimately died at the age of 37 from a complication of, sickle cell anemia. He was in the midst of a sickle cell crisis when his father died and he was unable to attend his Nine Night.

In the House of My Father 1977, photograph (Image Source: http://www.whitechapelgallery.org accessed 5/5/25)

Made from his own skin, the house is held together with small dressmaking pins.

This is the first piece of work by Rodney which Nelson encountered, purely by accident:

’The strength, not in the structure, but in the vulnerability of exposure, his open palm an invitation into his heart, his family. With this gesture, Rodney suggests, this is who I am, this is who I might be.

How does the self come to be? And how do we make space to be our whole selves? … a condition he would have inherited from his father, who would’ve inherited it from his father before that. Their selves, our selves, folding into one another: we contain multitudes. And what else do we inherit? And how do we carry around these inheritances, how do we make space for them in our lives?…’

At the time he was reflecting on his own relationship with his father:

’… wrangling with the things he cannot say to me, or doesn’t have the language for, the many rooms in the house to which I do not have the key…’

He finishes his piece with:

’I believe Art gives us a space to be honest, to confront, to dismantle, to reassemble. To imagine. Visiting and revisiting Rodney’s work reminds me that other worlds are possible. It reminds me, that even in the face of continued crisis, it is necessary to dream. It reminds me that , even in the face of death, we must continue to inhabit many rooms, to hold space where we can be honest, where we can be our whole selves. Where we can feel alive.’

So many thoughts have come to mind:

  • The idea of inheritance and how we find a space for it in our everyday lives. To me this feels like a burden not just in the physical sense of belongings, and ‘stuff’, but to the extent that I might feel defined by it: I don’t want to be, I want to be my own person steering my own course independently of what has gone on before, but I can’t ignore the extent to which others have shaped me. Last weekend, I lost count of the number of times friends commented how my daughter is a mini-me or the spitting image. No, she’s not. She’s her own person, living her own life. But, inevitably, I will have had an input into who she is, even if it’s just a matter of genetics.
  • I have inherited my family history from my parents. I used to spend ages looking through the family photo albums talking to my mother about the contents. I feel an enormous responsibility to pass this knowledge on. It’s a burden. My daughter is not particularly interested. Maybe it’s an age thing – as we age we need a greater understanding of who we are? Or maybe it’s a digital thing, we don’t have a physical record of our lives lying around the house to prompt an inquiry and so the questions never get asked. Sometimes I think that I should write it all down in case she’s ever interested, and other times I think that I’ll take it all with me and free her from the burden.
  • I think that I’ve been dismantling myself over the last few months. I’m not entirely sure that I’ll be able to reassemble myself, but maybe a few left over bits here and there wouldn’t be such a bad thing. I could even write my own instruction manual.
  • The child/ parent relationship: I remember the moment when I realised that my parents didn’t know or have the answer to everything; that they were human. It really stopped me in my tracks.
  • The idea of the house with many rooms; our ancestors folding into one another; the self containing multitudes.