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Writer's pictureftownend

Preparing for the Tate Exchange weekend

Tate Exchange - EATT

“Catering for the needs of myself and others”


To do - Thursday 1st Feb:

Write a shopping list

Collect tupperware from friends

Check on cutlery

Text friend about borrowing yoga mats


Anagrams of the Tate Exchange

(And understanding methodology)

Hang that tat

Cheat the neat

Tea at the tent

Gent at the teat

Can he

Axe the heat

Of the extent

Hang the extant tax

Neatened chat

Hat tang

Cat gene

Get the net

The gate

The Tate.


On catering for myself and others

And I wonder about the plasticity of my brain

And the volume of the packaging

The ebb and flow

Of food gathering and preparation

Of information travelling from left to right,

Dice that generate random numbers

To determine the quotient of self-care

On this ship


Companion Species

My collection of plastic spoons

Has exceeded maximum numbers

And he tells me

It’s no good,

They get scuffed

And the scratches hold bacteria

But my intestinal flora, I beg

Is no defence for dirty cutlery, he says.


A sample (or dissonance)

smashing,

crushing,

grinding

mixing

stuffing

slicing

boiling

roasting

examples

of actions that take place in my kitchen.

On Serving

Non-commercial,

Time-based,

Food

As a powerful medium

Is a question of taste

Where the exchange is

Personal then public.


Making a Meal Of It

The process of making (art) always involves:

Considering,

Planning,

Counting,

Deciding,

Scribbling,

Journeying,

Selecting,

Placing,

Paying,

Returning,

Unpacking,

Putting in the fridge,

Timing,

Preheating,

Washing,

Preparing,

Chopping,

Boiling,

Stirring,

Seasoning,

Cooking,

Tasting,

Coordinating,

Checking,

Serving up,

Calling everyone,

Waiting,

Eating,

And clearing up.


Order and disorder

Catering and creating

With the same letters

And intentions

Of self-care and

Others to consume

And spit out

And begin all over again.


Self-nurture

I make my packed lunch the same as theirs

With the same treats,

So I do not feel left out.


Interoception

Is what I do

A self-signalling

Of inner experience

To be translated laboriously into

A series of hand-drawn brain scans

On my bedroom wall.


Yoga lesson?

The first state of meditation is what?

We all look blank

Concentration, she answers

And I desperately try to remember the pose

she has just demonstrated.


Untitled

The subject in the car today is crisps

And they discuss the meritocracy of various types and flavours

Till we arrive

And just when I think the subject has been exhausted

It is reignited on the way home

With a comparison of same flavour, different brand.


What is your practice?

An artist,

A writer,

Researcher

Soul-searcher

Rearranger of disorder

Interceptor of artificiality

Expert in fakery,

Mimicry, denial

Dysfunction

Community worker

Serial shirker

Teacher

Reacher into the void

In the dead of your sleep

Parental responsiblity

Not to be confined

Delineated by your mind’s

Images of who I am

Pinned out

Pegged out

Stretched to the max

As tiny and invisible (at home)

As is humanly, robotically possible

And a voice

Like a baby’s cry

So precisely articulate, so infinitely loud

So painfully thin and rich that it hurts

To hear, that it’s best sometimes

To not listen at all

What am I?



A Shared Meal

hostile hospitality (from Latin ‘hospes/hostis/hospital’)


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