![sue pam grant @ muti gallery](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-content\/suepamgrant.jpg?w=850\")
<\/p>\nI really am a text geek. I mean, I know I’m supposed to be a visual artist and all, but it makes such a huge difference to talk about art; to hear others talk about what it does for them; to hear artists say what they were trying to evoke or explore; hell, most of the time, I don’t even know what I am doing as an artist until I’m forced to say it out loud, or write it down.<\/p>\n
So, I’m at this show, chatting to Clive and some lady that curated it, and I say, without thinking, “this work looks really sad and, I think, nostalgic, on some level.” It was just a gut reaction – and not one that you’d necessarily expect to hear about a bunch of photos attached to clothing patterns. But that’s how I felt, and I just blabbed (gotten me into trouble more than once, I tell you).<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
As it turns out, Ms Grant had a huge battle with cancer. The photographs she had taken were of her close family and friends, and she made the prints look old – treating them, always already, as fleeting (lost?) memories.<\/p>\n
I know on one level it sounds sad, and on another too personal for many contemporary trends of the day. I, on another level, like to think of it as a kind of sentimental deconstruction<\/i>, myself. Her current life is sacred, treasured; more importantly, the work also changes how we think of memory, construction of memory, stories.<\/p>\n
I mean, I’m sure she knew what she was doing when she placed these images on clothing patterns, possibly re-membering something she did when younger, possibly referencing that the pieces fit together differently, depending on how we see them, how we construct them ourselves. (you always manage to be PoMo without saying it, don’t you nathaniel?)<\/p>\n
I’d like to see where Sue Pam Grant goes next. I think this stuff is already working conceptually and aesthetically, but would be much more effective if she played with things like scale and texture even more. Really large, like how things around me felt when I was a child. Really small, b\/c we often feel smaller ourselves in the scheme of things, as we learn more. And maybe art that pokes, memories that weep, patterns that stick out in all the wrong ways….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I really am a text geek. I mean, I know I’m supposed to be a visual artist and all, but it makes such a huge difference to talk about art; to hear others talk about what it does for them; to hear artists say what they were trying to evoke or explore; hell, most of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-555","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art","category-south-african-art"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9blZT-8X","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1403,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2007\/02\/15\/ncad-joburg-art-media-art-calls\/","url_meta":{"origin":555,"position":0},"title":"NCAD, Joburg art, media art calls","author":"nathaniel","date":"15 February 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Sorry for the lack of postings lately, but as promised before the move to Dublin, that's just how it's gonna be (until such time as Bronwyn and Rat do the regular blogging they tentatively offered here; like most Joburgers, they're busy with more than a handful of things, so...).OK, catch-up\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"a-beeld.jpg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/02\/a-beeld.thumbnail.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":808,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2005\/10\/02\/he-has-been-gettin-round\/","url_meta":{"origin":555,"position":1},"title":"he has been gettin round","author":"nathaniel","date":"02 October 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Hey everyone: Sorry for the silence on my part; it's been a hektik while. My laptop broke (again), I was crazy with making plans for some new projects, my wife had a b-day, I went to Aardklop to give a talk, started teaching online again, blahblahblahblah. Have some exciting things\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "south african art"","block_context":{"text":"south african art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/south-african-art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2122,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2010\/07\/15\/on-generosity-and-making-art\/","url_meta":{"origin":555,"position":2},"title":"On Generosity and Making Art","author":"nathaniel","date":"15 July 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"I believe that artists no longer simply make images, they make discourse - they ask us not only to \"look,\" but to \"look again,\" to re-examine. Art is always dialogical \u00e2\u20ac\u201c I mean, simply, that it is in dialogue: with history, with other art and artists, with current events, with\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":409,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2004\/08\/22\/making-art\/","url_meta":{"origin":555,"position":3},"title":"making art, mocking artists","author":"nathaniel","date":"22 August 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Since last we spoke, I've mostly been working on editing some old video footage so that I can finally finish the odys series - started in 2001! This is to be part of my upcoming solo show at the JAG, but you can bet I'll put some clips online for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "me"","block_context":{"text":"me","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/me\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":289,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2004\/02\/03\/cool-people-i-found\/","url_meta":{"origin":555,"position":4},"title":"cool people i found","author":"nathaniel","date":"03 February 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"I think that today is \"really cool people I never met but have something in common with\" day - tho some of the people I am about to mention I have met, but I doubt they remember me. Of course, I'll stick to just mentioning a few people in the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":730,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2005\/08\/25\/aidsafari-by-adam-levin\/","url_meta":{"origin":555,"position":5},"title":"aidsafari, by Adam Levin","author":"nathaniel","date":"25 August 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Adam Levin next to his new book. Went to the book launch for aidsafari last evening. It started with its author, Adam Levin, saying something like, \"I'm really happy to be here tonight. No, really; you have no idea how happy I am to be here.\" (Bu-dum-cha.) I'm not sure\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "news and politics"","block_context":{"text":"news and politics","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/news-and-politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}