Tutor: Jonathan Kearney Date: Tuesday 8th October 2024
I had my first tutorial of the year with Jonathan and my mum today. Not exactly a normal tutorial as it wasn't scheduled, and with the main topic of the conversation planned to be my mental health and how I was feeling post-surgery with the deadlines my mum sat in on this with me to help.
We discussed how I was feeling about the direction of my practice, research paper, unit 2 assessment deadline and the upcoming GROTTO print opportunity.
I had not looked at the research paper in over two years. At the time of taking the first gap year, my hope was that I could have some time to catch up on myself a bit from where I felt I lost time in my first year to my mental health, and when I would start unit 2 I would be so prepared it would be a breeze. I planned to have the research paper done and finished, having had the time to work on it without pressure and claim the lost time on it back, and feel comfortable in what I would be doing practically over the upcoming year and have an idea what my final show-piece would look like and how to get there.
Not the case at all. I started the year with my only knowledge being I needed to leave the animation where it was and looking at tube maps again seemed like a good way to go!
Jonathan assured me that the GROTTO print project was not necessary to the course, and so I could put that out of my mind for now and focus on unit 2 and the research paper.
For the research paper we decided that Jonathan would be my supervisor, and to not focus too much on the essay as that is only a part of unit 2 and the practical work is the main body of the assessment. I was concerned with how foggy my brain felt from pain medication and the deadline fast-approaching that the research paper was not feeling feasible, but was told that I had a previous ISA still in place that would give me an extra week and I could apply for extenuating circumstances for another week on top of that if I so wished. We discussed alternative ways of tackling the research paper - mind-mapping, voice recordings, presentations that would feel achievable with the circumstances, but I do not feel I would be happy with these and would find it more of a struggle to try and create a piece of academic writing in an alternate way than just writing it.
We also discussed my change of direction with the practical work from animation to tube maps. Jonathan agreed that this was definitely the right choice, and despite not being able to sit at a computer desk at the moment hand-drawings of the tube maps were just as valid as pieces of artwork even if I did not feel they were quite as polished as my previous tube map. That doing what I was able to at the time sat with the context of the artwork, tube maps about transitioning while my latest part of transitioning gave me limitations in what I could create worked.
While not able to sit at a computer and be updating my progress with blog posts, I can be making voice notes on my thoughts and feelings throughout the process ready to formally write-up and back date later on.
I felt a new-found sense of excitement about the project injected into me with this tutorial (that has definitely pushed me throughout the last month, as I write this up in November) and I am excited to get started with the project.
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