When it came to presenting the findings in the academy for the exhibition, I had a clear idea in my mind as to what I wanted to present. Transferring the documentation to the gallery space was not a straightforward process, however, there were several issues which I first needed to resolve… My grand ideas of using the toilets as a place for ‘art outside the gallery walls’ or employing a fortune teller for the private view, had to be reined in and will be reserved for next year when we are the more prominent cohort.

Similarly, I had a dilemma regarding just how much I wanted to ‘say’. By developing the narratives the way I have, I came to enjoy using my imagination in a playful way and encouraging others to interpret things the way they wanted to. Always careful to leave subtle clues and allow others’ imaginations to ‘fill in the gaps’, when presenting such a body of work to the public – many of whom would not be familiar with the style of my blog – I became conscious that there was a danger of giving too much away.

And finally, I was not confident enough about the short documentary I have made, to have it projected in the gallery, and preferred more intimate presentation via a laptop (with the accompanying soundtrack on the actual dictation machine I used during the readings) although clearly this is an area to explore for future practice. I have embraced new technologies in terms of my website, which has been an online exhibition of sorts with elements of collaboration, in terms of the comments submitted.

I do, though, feel I have reached a balance in the physical installation I have ultimately produced.

Because I was creating a semi-fictional world, I wanted to present objects as if they were artefacts one might find in a museum, so borrowed some display cases and offered a fabricated cataloguing system for the objects related to each narrative. I have read that what I have created, could be described as alter-modern (being as I am, an artist working with super-modern themes with text and image across time and space) but throughout my journey, the concept behind what I have been doing has been key.

The art I have presented is not quite objectless, but is based on a mixture of fact, fiction and memory, scribbled notes or fantastic ideas. I was also keen to encourage at least some participation by viewers, even if I wasn’t letting them ‘in’ completely, and my submission fits the description given to conceptual art following the 1960s, by Daniel Marzona:

“At a stroke, art was understood as a special form of information, which was often presented as a combination of photography and text.. the beholder was now finally being urged to take part in the art actively, and often at considerable expenditure of effort…”[1]

The main body of the piece is quite minimalist, with traditional display methods underneath randomly-hung frames. My desk, notice board and reference books are there in the gallery too, to recreate my working space and hints at the processes I have followed, allowing viewers some access at least to the methods I employ, whilst the recreation of a fortune teller’s booth table, complete with free fortune cookies and fortune teller fish, is another playful gesture of involving members of the public in my story.

Ultimately, this work presents my version and others’ interpretations of events from the past and in the future, so it should be recognised as a collaborative piece, even though many of my colleagues were unaware of their input. The installation’s title is ‘Halfway to Paradise’ because Billy Fury was a regular visitor to Blackpool fortune tellers related to some of those whom I myself frequented, but also because I find myself in a state of transition in many areas of my life, not least in transcending from a gloomy past (Unlucky for Some) towards a brighter future (which, as many a palm reading told me, is In Your Hands). A rejected alternative was the song lyric “The past was yours, but the future’s mine”[2].

Where I go from here is an interesting question. One small project I have already begun to undertake is mapping the findings of the seven readings and then log their resonance or otherwise what happens in my everyday life. This has already started (indeed, some of what I was told has come true this past week) and will be documented in a diary that will last exactly one year. In this I will also keep a record of every horoscope that I read during that time.

Another step I have tentatively taken is to document the responses of other people to what they are told by fortune tellers. The first experiment of this type gave rather unsurprising results, as during a return to Morecambe, my girlfriend was told almost exactly the same during a reading as I had been by the same fortune teller a month previous. I must then decide how to interpret this – either the fortune teller says the same thing all the time and makes up more than I do; she saw me coming and wanted to join in the game by giving false information; or, our fates are similar and we are simply meant to be together.

I will also be writing a second series of short stories, based on people’s interventions in my future, following what I have been told will happen to me. These will be more difficult to create, but perhaps allow more theoretical foundations, especially if I continue my wider reading around the subject, on issues such as synchronicity, self-fulfilling prophecies, time travel and spirituality. 

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