Kathy Pimlott

June 2006

Writing very slowly but writing. One recent poem came from going to see a film about the sculptor Steve Dilworth who until very recently lived on the Isle of Harris and took his inspiration and his materials from the landscape surrounding him. In the Q&A afterwards, I was very struck by Steve's ambivalence about what happens to his work once a piece is finished. He is a natural chatter and told stories about his thinking behind the pieces, many of which contain concealed items. I was interested to know how much it mattered to him that we, the viewers/consumers, knew about those secrets. His queasiness about ownership and fixed placement was also instructive. I came away with a renewed conviction of the primacy of the act of making. Nevertheless, you can read my subsequent poem, Stuff the World is Made Of, here. 

Yes, I like to be read. I have just had a flurry of trawling files and sending out poems to magazines and competitions. I would like to be a pure artist and derive all my self-worth from making but I'm not. I know that's where the true value lies, but I do like a bit of recognition.

I'm reading:

David Floyd's A Night at the Snooker (Hearing Eye) and Jake Wild Hall's Alanis Morisette (Broken Sleep Books)

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