Glue skinning - a post human process
Thoughts on a glue skin
I apply the glue
Cold wet sensation on my skin.
I hear my breath
It makes me aware of how cold the rest of my body is
The glue stands white, bright white, like liquid silk against my pitted skin
It is not unpleasant,
A reminder of childhood, playing with glue, letting it dry on the skin only to be able to slowly pick it off.
Oh! The feeling of picking off the dried glue! Like a scab that you can't leave be
But the patience needed to let the glue dry is interminable!
Time when attended is much slower than when ignored
I can feel the glue digging deep into my pores, sucking, suckering, becoming part of me for this brief moment in time.
My bodily self is now also other,
My skin wrapped in a second skin.
Where less glue lies I see the structures of my epidermis, the lines which are slowly being imprinted into this new post human skin begin to emerge
The coolness weighs down on my hand and focuses all the energies of my body to this small area,
The rest of my body has a lightness as I become fixated on this small section on my hand.
The edges are becoming translucent now, I have the urge to pick.
I wish I had spent more time applying the glue carefully as there are gaps
The stillness has made my fingers turn cold, the glue feels like ice
Some old glue from past sessions sits unnoticed on my skin, like fish scale glistening
I am becoming mermaid, in the electric light of my studio.
I think of my skin as I sit here waiting, paused in suspended time
The pause not only in time to allow for embodied thought, but as my skin cells continue to shed from me, this small area is ‘glued’ shut.
Suspended from its bodily process.
The weight and coldness of the glue pins down my hand,
My fingers are really cold now! They desperately want to be freed!
The thicker glue is slowly revealing the shapes below, like a photographic plate emerging into the light.
I wish I had put the heater on.
I pause.
I breathe.
I feel my leg on the chair.
The edges are finally drying.
A creep inwards of tightening glue on my skin is driving the desire to start to pick.
The itch of a scab asking to be removed.
Pick, pick, pick.
I leave it.
My whole hand starts to wriggle, helping the glue skin to unhook itself, wanting the glue to unpick itself!
I pick.
Slowing pulling at the outer edges. The dried glue curls up and softens as it reacts to the heat of my fingers.
I pick and pull, my hand wriggles, wanting to be free of this lecherous material.
My skin is pulled upwards as my glue skin is pulled upwards.
And as the last sticky tendril is released from my skin, I breathe.
How satisfying!
As the glue skin revels in its freedom, the light penetrates through its translucent surface and the intricate lines are revealed.
A suspended story in this tiny fragment of glue.
My skin.
It is quite beautiful, and I am drawn in and pause to look.
I apply the glue
Cold wet sensation on my skin.
I hear my breath
It makes me aware of how cold the rest of my body is
The glue stands white, bright white, like liquid silk against my pitted skin
It is not unpleasant,
A reminder of childhood, playing with glue, letting it dry on the skin only to be able to slowly pick it off.
Oh! The feeling of picking off the dried glue! Like a scab that you can't leave be
But the patience needed to let the glue dry is interminable!
Time when attended is much slower than when ignored
I can feel the glue digging deep into my pores, sucking, suckering, becoming part of me for this brief moment in time.
My bodily self is now also other,
My skin wrapped in a second skin.
Where less glue lies I see the structures of my epidermis, the lines which are slowly being imprinted into this new post human skin begin to emerge
The coolness weighs down on my hand and focuses all the energies of my body to this small area,
The rest of my body has a lightness as I become fixated on this small section on my hand.
The edges are becoming translucent now, I have the urge to pick.
I wish I had spent more time applying the glue carefully as there are gaps
The stillness has made my fingers turn cold, the glue feels like ice
Some old glue from past sessions sits unnoticed on my skin, like fish scale glistening
I am becoming mermaid, in the electric light of my studio.
I think of my skin as I sit here waiting, paused in suspended time
The pause not only in time to allow for embodied thought, but as my skin cells continue to shed from me, this small area is ‘glued’ shut.
Suspended from its bodily process.
The weight and coldness of the glue pins down my hand,
My fingers are really cold now! They desperately want to be freed!
The thicker glue is slowly revealing the shapes below, like a photographic plate emerging into the light.
I wish I had put the heater on.
I pause.
I breathe.
I feel my leg on the chair.
The edges are finally drying.
A creep inwards of tightening glue on my skin is driving the desire to start to pick.
The itch of a scab asking to be removed.
Pick, pick, pick.
I leave it.
My whole hand starts to wriggle, helping the glue skin to unhook itself, wanting the glue to unpick itself!
I pick.
Slowing pulling at the outer edges. The dried glue curls up and softens as it reacts to the heat of my fingers.
I pick and pull, my hand wriggles, wanting to be free of this lecherous material.
My skin is pulled upwards as my glue skin is pulled upwards.
And as the last sticky tendril is released from my skin, I breathe.
How satisfying!
As the glue skin revels in its freedom, the light penetrates through its translucent surface and the intricate lines are revealed.
A suspended story in this tiny fragment of glue.
My skin.
It is quite beautiful, and I am drawn in and pause to look.