SUSANNA CANDLIN – Artist

Today was characterised by a dramatic thunder storm overhead with a torrential downpour, which produced a sort of weird, damp, indoor apathy in me. The outdoor tentacles which I had been strengthening and attaching to the walls/windows had to be brought inside pronto, and their joins kept collapsing soggily. Everything was floppy, including me.

Back to Courtyard Arts: I had time to kill in the morning waiting for various joints to dry, so removed the clay from a few of the workshop sculptures. Laura finally found the time in her incredibly busy schedule to work on her own sculpture.

Frances came round bringing Chris’s poetry book back, having read it all through (‘Not the way you should read poetry’, she said) and not wanting to keep it for too long. She loved it.

Just before the storm hit, I had a visit from curator Kristian Day who has been to Hertfordshire University to give talks about surviving in the art world (it can be a dangerous place!) and who ran the Broadway Gallery in Letchworth for several years. He is now independent and full of inspirational ideas about connecting curators with other curators, artists with other artists, and utilising abandoned exterior and interior spaces for art projects; he is a big champion for local artists and will always try to help if he can. He loves interconnectivity – and here he is amongst the interconnections.

He left as it started to teem with rain, saying ‘I’m from Hull’ when I entreated him to stay until it blew over.

I watched my outer tentacle from inside, having covered it as best I could…

…but when the storm reached its peak, I rushed outside, prised it from the window and brought it inside. Bits of it were collapsing so I shored it up for about the third time today. I was very wet.

I saw the drama from the window…

…and watched as every few minutes one of the awnings shed its load.

I left with my outdoor pieces safely indoors, looking longingly through the window.