Today I attended Mick Melbourne's 'Blue Books' exhibition in The Wild Pansy Press Project Space in The School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies, Old Mining Building, University of Leeds.
'Mick Welbourn often makes work about swimming pools.
These swimming pool works are often blue.
Much of his work that is not about swimming pools is also blue.
People often mistakenly think that this work is also about swimming pools.
These blue books are not about swimming pools.'
The series of pictures that contribute to Welbourn's Blue Books originate from experimentation and production of numerous mono prints developed by himself. The work serves no particular purpose, bust instead satisfies Welbourn's curiosity and interest in the process itself and the distinctive qualities that can result from this basic printing technique.
When considering how to progress the work beyond a random collection of printed outcomes, Welbourn made the decision to edit, manipulate and order the images - employing the formal structure of the folio and codex in creating a linear sequence that is afforded by the books.
Printed from the exact same colour of ink, the work featured in the blue books functions as a complete body of work - as opposed to disconnected, individual publications - and thus allows for them to be displayed together as a 'surface' rather than singular units.
After attending Mick Melbourne's exhibition, I realised that some of the most interesting creative work doesn't need to meet a purpose. You can create work to satisfy curiosities, explore interests and create for the sake of creating - which is something I have struggled to even contemplate previously. Though the exhibition was small, its impact has been big on my thoughts regarding practice for the sake of practice.
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