Kim and Joan, detail from 11/15/05

The Conversation
 
In November 2005, Kim Mosley and Joan Lipkin decided to have a daily conversation for nine months. She would write. He would draw. Sometimes, he would write, too.

(Kim: When I was alone in college I met a friend who used to say "we must have gone to the same high school" referring to some connection that we seemed to have. She claimed that it was a line from Shakespeare. It was only recently that I was able to do a text search of the old guy and realize that she had pulled a fast one. In any case, I have, however, always believed that understanding has to do with sharing common experiences. Joan and I did actually go to the same high school and grew up with so many shared experience, but we were separated by many years and never knew each other.

I tend to search for ridiculous truisms. The kind that even someone you love will not give you a reason why they are wrong. I'm interested in then formulating an argument to show that they are true. Sometimes in the drawings I tend to push Joan's buttons with these ridiculous assertions (that I actually believe) and it initiates some interesting discussion.

In any case, as this project continues we are starting to synchronize. My drawings are not just about what Joan writes, but they are my reactions as well. In the same way that we respond in a verbal conversation first with an acknowledgement and then with a "but," the drawings are hopefully more than illustrations but rather dialogue.

This collaboration is for me an opportunity for growth. Working together we are creating a gestalt where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. I do not know exactly where the work comes from, though I'm glad that my drawings come out of my pens the way they do. I do know that the connection between Joan and myself has been an inspiration.)

Friday, December 23, 2005

For my part, I am interested in the discipline of daily writing and conversation and to see how my relationship with another person and with myself unfolds over a period of time.In addition to the text of my own life, I see this as an opportunity to reflect and chronicle what is going on simultaneously in the wider world

I am also interested to see what sorts of things our different mediums spark in each other.

This project speaks ideally to my long staging commitment to public and civic dialogue. In this piece, I am committed to being as open and honest as I can, even when it means taking tremendous risks and truly exposing myself.

That level of honesty and vulnerability, that stripping away at pretense and defensiveness is where the truest possibilities for communication, growth and art lie.

Joan Lipkin

Thursday, December 22, 2005

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Dear Kim,

Thank you for breakfast this morning and for the drawings It was a treat to be with you and to catch up. Although it seems as soon as we catch up on one topic, it morphs into another and so we never do. Catch up, that is.

It is a slippery slope. So really, catch up is an absurd expression that has no basis in reality. Maybe I should say that we ketchup, or even relish, instead.

It is 4:48 PM on a Sunday afternoon. I have just returned from rehearsal with The DisAbility Project. Much discussion about a new piece are developing that deals with violence, and whether we should offer some hope at the end of the piece or let the futility settle in as a kind of challenge to the audience. We talked for a long time and I asked everyone to check in with their thoughts.

Sara Burke, the choreographer with whom we are working asked if people's discomfort with the piece also had to do with the fact that it brought up feelings over Lisi's death. Most of us attended a memorial service for Lisi one week ago today at the Friends Meeting House in LaSalle Park.

Everybody raised their hands. I have to give Sara serious credit. She sat and listened to various people talk about the ways in which they are uncomfortable with the piece without defending or justifying her choices. That is a hard thing to do and yet for some art forms, especially ensemble generated performance, it is essential.

I wonder if you are interested in feedback about your work. We have never had that conversation. Do you want to know what people think in response to something you are doing or the way in which you are doing it? Especially if you are trying to convey one thing and they see something else. If they do not get your intent, does it matter to you? Would it make a difference in what you do?

How do you feel when someone gives you feedback, especially if it is unsolicited? Or do they? Maybe it is a different situation for me as the work I do is much more consistently public. Performance in some senses does not exist without an audience to see it and reflect it back, even non verbally. Do you think that drawings exist without someone besides the artist to see them?

Is this a difference between genres or private and public or even intent?

Joan

Sunday, Nov 13, 2005 5:10 PM

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