This exercise was mind mapped before I recorded any daily routines, I don’t really have any obvious daily routines so there was no really strong contender. I thought perhaps something I do regularly may work as a source of images, purple cabbage is a remarkable colour to play with so I recorded making sauerkraut, this didn’t seem to fit the bill however.
Neither did eating breakfast, this just seemed contrived and a bit embarrassing as well as really awkward to take photos of.
I settled on making a cup of tea, this is probably the closest I get to a routine, actually it almost approves ritual, I have recorded the process in my sketchbook in more detail.
I eventually settled on a concertina book format for the images, I tried to use a range of papers that would tell the story of the process and evoke something of an air of calm and relaxation. I used a combination of handmade papers relating to the tea ingredients, these were quite heavy so I added some airiness with drafting film, also some sections of a monoprint of a teapot and flowers . My intention is to put it in a mesh bag -like a teabag would be to stop it unravelling and to add something of the tea ritual to opening and reading it.
I do feel that actually the end product is a little clunky, using a square viewfinder to crop the images abstracts them a little and I would stick with square images but simplify the pages .
I was underwhelmed by this body of work, I was a little bit stymied by finding a routine to use, I think that this just made the work a bit forced, deciding to use a cup of tea making was the best choice for me – perhaps it’s a bit more ritual than routine, however it still seemed like hoop a jumping exercise even though I managed to find some interesting shapes in the photos that are sketched . I could enlarge and abstract the images further to find elements to pursue further.