Rosalyn D'Mello: A glimpse into the 'I' of an artist

Therersquos something magical about this old house I lsquom cohabiting with three artists at a residency in the HH Art Spashyces in Arpora Goa PicRosalyn DMelloAs a residency virgin I had only ever fantasised about the sheshyer thrill of waking up in a space where your only obligation was towards yourself where whether you created something or not was purely your prerogative making you accoshyuntable to no one else A week into my first ever residency at HH Art Spashyces in Arpora Goa run by performance artists Nikhil Chopra Madhavi Gore and Romain Loustau and I realize I could easily make the transition from virgin to residency whoreTo say itrsquos been idyllic would be a gross understatement Therersquos something superbly magical about this old house I am cohabiting with three other artists The rooms are austere the geysers need to be fixed and my pillow is flatter than Irsquom accustomed to But Irsquove never before so consistently slept the sleep of angels where I wake up rejuvenated full of vitality I enjoy the humdrum of conversation as I take my seat at the communal table upon a rickety bench that functions like a metaphormdashlean too much on one end and you run the risk of being toppled over making it more beneficial to sit in the middle a cautionary tale about the significance of containing onersquos ego of not letting your perspective become too lopsided There is a large garden and a lovely kitchen housed in what could have been a balcao and every morning there is the heart warming scent of coffee being brewedI feel myself beginning to thrive within this unstructured environment Irsquom balancing several deadlines alongside my own writing in a previously unimagined way Irsquom feeding off the energies of the many artists who drop in for drinks in the evening on musical tastes that are different from my own from artistic practices that compel me to look more ingeniously at the world and understand how to relate to it better For instance a layperson would use a scanner the way itrsquos meant to An artist plays around with its functions Sohail my coinhabitant decided to scan a glass of water in various stages of fullness and emptiness then he used a mirror then his phonersquos torchlight The effect was rather mesmerising All the objects in the house whether on the walls or on table taps embody such inventive interventions I guess thatrsquos what feels so astonishingly refreshing to me this sense of playfulness of caressing an idea and hitchhiking upon its ambiguous breadth unmindful of destinations of resolutions or results I am being encouraged to think beyond conclusions to allow space and time to imprint their dimensions upon my unwritten textsI think I know now why writers can be miserably poor and yet superbly productive because the joy of creating something sustains the soul in a way that no amount of wealth can Therersquos an inescapable high that you achieve from the intercessory act of making something out of nothing pulling real rabbits out of an imaginary hat from spending time immersed in reading and daydreaming and watching birds or the barks of trees or doing nothing at all except being Itrsquos an addictive buzz and I can see myself surrendering to its lureAbove all else Irsquove always thought of myself as a writer But Irsquom beginning to expand my identity to include being an artist Itrsquos new to me considering so much of my writing over the last few years has involved art criticism which employs a slightly different faculty The intimate glimpses that Irsquove had over the last 12 months into the artistic practice perhaps is affording me the privilege of seeking out room for transcendence in material that stems from text but ventures into other sensual territory particularly the performative I feel aware of a deep transformation that has been set afoot There will be no going backMost profoundly I am learning to embrace the possibility of failure Irsquom comprehending how to look at failure differently so it doesnrsquot elicit disappointment but nurtures a distinctive impulse altogethermdashto return with renewed approach and to contemplate fresh propositions This isnrsquot a revolutionary thought I know but it is redemptive To know that onersquos relationship with what one has created will always be in flux between one day and the next achieves within the artistic body a unique sense of surrenderThat is want I want to allow myself to be vulnerableAn entry by Virginia Woolf in her diary on Saturday 17 November perfectly validates my state of being ldquoA note despair at the badness of the book canrsquot think how I ever could write such stuff mdash and with such excitement thatrsquos yesterday today I think it good again A note by way of advising other Virginias with other books that this is the way of the thing up down up downmdashand Lord knows the truthrdquoDeliberating on the life and times of Everywoman Rosalyn DrsquoMello is a reputable art critic and the author of A Handbook For My Lover She tweets RosaParx Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycom