Could the grass remember? | Gall y glaswellt cofio?

Talking to Toril Brancher, artist, photographer and tutor based in Abergavenny has work in the collections of the V&A London, The National Museum Cardiff and private collections worldwide.

Cow Parsley 3, Print, 2012, 1.2 x 1.2m

CWP  I was recently perusing the five-ways.net website and noticed your work on it - yours really stands out!  The black in Cow Parsley enhances the delicacy of the flowers and foliage and has this ethereal depth that draws one in.  What led you into working with plants?

TB Thank you so much for your kind comments about my work.

The totally honest answer to your question is twofold:

The first part has to do with the death of my father - 25 years ago - and my deciding that dying was not so awful when you become part of the earth again - as soil for new growth …

I suppose in this my own ageing was (is) difficult so seeing the beauty in the decay is a hugely important part for me.

Then on the practical side; as the digital ‘thing’ happened - it coincided with my finishing my Masters - I felt a desperate need to have a regular ‘project’ that was practically possible AND involved my 6x9 (medium) format camera.

In between three kids and working, my garden was as far as I could get when the light was there …

The next step was the scanner.

CWP Seeing the beauty in decay and the hope in the regrowth is powerful, it's something that connects us all and the perpetual transformations can be unsettling yet provide a seed of hope.  The evolution of everything around us, especially the painful loss of other people we have strong connections to can mean we reassess our world view quite significantly, and though we would love to have that person we've lost in our lives, our response to loss can become something great in itself.

To be able to regularly create new work within our lives balancing work and family life, creating our own rhythms and practical ways to get it done is a very individual thing, in my case the available time and resources for creative work changes hugely from one week to another.

Your series I picked flowers instead , which includes the Cow Parsley image I’m looking at now - is intriguing and I wonder how you came up with the idea to try scanning flowers?  (404 words)

TB So, your question is why scan? The reason is quite lovely. At the time of my first scan I might not have been so conscious of the reason but looking back there are two people who were major influences. The first one I don’t know the name of. He, the artist, came to Newport University and gave a lecture, most probably when I was doing my MA. (Finished in 2001.)

Anyway, he the un-named artist, used an old flat-bed scanner around his garden. He would literally turn the scanner upside down, scan the soil and the images were amazing. I loved them.

Then a few years later (I was teaching at Ffotogallery and was also an occasional visiting tutor at Newport - one of my students from Ffotogallery had gone on to study for her MA at Newport) Leah Millinship was scanning her grandmother’s dolls clothes!  The grandmother was Italian, and she possibly made the dolls, definitely made the dolls clothes. The images were just exquisite. http://www.missiongallery.co.uk/the-space/leah-millinship/

If you put these two artists’ work with my constant thought that...‘if it’s not sharp it’s not a picture’!, there is a short road from struggling with medium format and focus (no auto focus) to the scan where everything is crisp. I still find this attractive. Although there are now loads of other issues of course…

And then there was a very early great success with the Cow Parsley.

I think now when I begin one of the scan works, my first ‘job’ is to see what it looks like.  It’s upside down and impossible to tell beforehand.  I’d like to think I’m starting with some knowledge, but I can still be surprised.  Currently I’m working on achieving depth.  But first of all, I have to find my relationship with the flowers….  It is all a bit weird.

CWP   Does the idea that plants are intelligent and sentient beings have any influence on your thinking and your work?  I’m especially thinking of your residency at Llwyn Celyn and the working title you had of Can the grass remember? (Or the rather enchanting Welsh: Gall y glaswellt cofio?)

TB  Ahh - how lovely it looks in Welsh! Could the grass remember …

The absolute thought behind the work at Llwyn Celyn!  This has been the guiding idea, but I have been weary of this being the only way to think about memory and connections with the past.  It all seemed rather close to cheesy at times.

To be honest I felt it is more about opening up to possibilities, other ways of thinking, so that you may discover something new? To share? I learned this from Richter and his notebook - will have a look in my notes and see if I can find them.

I feel it all takes a terribly long time at times, but the chore of the work finds me eventually …

I found the Richter notes - see below - It was a relief at the time and looking at this now it seems to sum up how I work …

Hope this answers your - very excellent - question.

Actually, not quite - but yes the life in the plants continue whilst I work with them - whilst I scan and they react to each other ….

Gerhard Richter

of course I constantly despair …
 but then I always have the hope that if I persevere …
 letting a thing come  rather than creating it
 in order to gain access to all that is genuine, richer, more alive
 to what is beyond my understanding

CWP That's wonderful!

What's on the horizon for you?  Have you any exhibitions, events, residencies, talks etc coming up that's open to the public?

TB  The only event I have is not really coming up, it’s in the autumn and related to the completion at Llwyn Celyn.

My plan for the moment is to create order with some of all those images I made into a book - hoping it will make some sense to a viewer.

This seems like the longest and slowest process, but - it is getting there …

There will be one large piece hanging permanently outside (under cover) and I am still working on this one piece …

Then I plan to continue with the glass containers to make work with plants grown in my garden. I buy seeds …

After the Llwyn Celyn is completed, my plan is to show more of the work made locally and further afield, so who knows how this will all work out...

To view more of Toril’s photography visit www.torilbrancher.com