Tuesday 12 November 2013

MOCAfest After Party: International Community (& reflections)


I was commissioned to photograph the MOCAfest After Party at South Kilburn studios, run by OOMK, Disseminus and Rumi's Cave. It was a pretty cool event with a great line up. I especially enjoyed the spoken word perfomance by Mark Gonzales and Jamal Raslan. Other performers included, Abdelkader Saadoun (Algeria) Tasleem Jamila (USA) Native Sun (UK) Sukina Pilgrim (UK) Asif Sinan (Pakistan) and Iona FT (Nomadic Soul). I found it quite hard to take decent pictures for this event, the lighting wasn't great and there wasn't much room to manoeuvre.  

It was quite strange being in this creative space with all these incredible artists and poets and change-makers. It was great (esp as I'm still phoneless) to catch up with mates, old and new; to talk to people, to share a few ideas, exchange some stories, but I don't know why, I felt so disconnected throughout and almost as though I wasn't really there, and that these people weren't really my people, even though I consider myself a writer and artist and poet. I guess that despite being involved in the art world for many years now, I still feel like it kind of eludes me. Deeper than that, I guess I still just feel comfortable in my difference / or separation, creating art for arts sake, not necessarily to share or change things, which isn't really a good thing. 

I remember throughout the night I kept going outside, to just breathe. There in the studios, surrounded by a myriad of loving friends, and inspiring people preaching nothing but love and goodness, I didn't feel like it was where I was supposed to be. Or that I connected with this 'scene.' I remembered then something Franz Fanon once wrote that stuck with me '---we reach the universal, through just one human being' or something along these lines, and its truest truth I've ever known, for me anyway. 

Ah, I don't really know what I'm talking about. I guess I've been thinking about my blog recently and have been wandering what it's really for/ or worth. I started it up a few years ago for myself, to keep track of myself and my own life and my own journey, which always seems to be speeding along in such haste and fervour that I have never really been able to just process. And I feel like maybe it's become part of the problem, the problem of me not being able to just process or be.

Now that I'm more disconnected than I've ever been, I've been thinking about whether or not I should stop posting on here. I'm not sure if there's any point in it. I mean, sure it may connect people to me, but it doesn't connect me to anyone/ it doesn't really connect me to myself. I'm at a really strange point in my life (as ever) where I'm once again beginning to question EVERYTHING. In particular, my intentions for doing the things that I do. Hmm maybe it will become clearer one day...certain things... who knows....Anyway I don't really like the pictures I took so I'm not going to share them, accept the one below of my sister looking in from the outside- it kind of just summaries it all...