TRAVEL DIARY

A weblog regularly updated by Jodi Rose.

Friday, November 15, 2002

1:19 PM
Posted by jodi rose

anywhere or nowhere
Hmmm. Can't quite remember who I am or what I'm doing. Something about sound.... and bridges.....? strange.
Looks like this will be a philosophical musing today, preparing for my talk on monday at melbourne uni - if you're in town email and I'll send you the details - reading susan sontag on the aesthetics of silence and wondering is a retreat into silence the only possible move for an exhausted art genius?? Not the silence of absence or mute indifference, but a silence rich with possibilities, a silence full of sound - a cagean silence in fact - a silence that allows space and depth in language. Yes I know it's all that wittgenstein and derrida going to my head!
Struggling to find a place in the mundanity of everyday life, retracing paths along once familiar streets, all too quickly fall into the habit of taking the same routes each time, partly I relish this repetitive occuring, after the last 6 months of change and new places it is reassuring to find myself back inside the map in my head, but it also makes me sad. I miss the sense of adventure, of heightened awareness, of constantly renegotiating my place, identity, reorienting my self. I miss being the new girl in town, and carrying with me that aura of far away places, I miss the easy camraderie of the road, being around people who are not fixed, but always mobile, floating above the concerns of 'ordinary' life, I miss being able to defer all my anxiety and commonsense to a time when I return 'home'. And I miss the insouciant confidence of american and european cultural centres, where movements are born and spread, any day you could find yourself in the midst of an auspicious significant moment, while here in aus 'we' always seem to be chasing after someone else, trying to catch up with what's going on elsewhere, following where 'it's' happening, discounting our own unique inventive creative hatchlings and cultural validity. Or is that just my lack of confidence revealing itself - no I think it may be a genuine reflection of a social personality and time.
I never seem to catch up even with myself, the lists of tasks to achieve, people to stay in touch with, exhibitions to propose, sponsors to contact, books to read - it's no picnic being a slightly grounded nomadic sound artist, I can tell you!