After a fairly quiet summer, things are getting busier work-wise. You know the type, full days with multiple meetings scattered around London and a pile of emails to answer when I get home. Though I can't moan. I'm the kind of person to responds more quickly when things are coming a mile a minute. I like being busy, or as my fellow poet Lemn Sissay says 'I have a full life'. Last year around this time I did a lot of evening workshops on combined arts projects. I'm happy to have the chance to do that again this year. In a couple of weeks I'll start on a project called Fast Forward, it's a collaboration between All Change and Sadler's Wells. Using dance, literature, music, photography and film, a group of artists will design a series of workshops focused on the future of everyday life for young people in Islington. I'm really excited about this, especially being able to help young people create speculative fictions and new realities.

I think imagination is even more important with the darker and colder evenings approaching. For me, it'll probably be listening to audio books on the underground journey home. Or sitting on the Southbank scribbling ideas for poems, before it's too cold not to be wearing gloves and heading home to finish. And if it's freezing, I'll just be chilling at home watching a dvd.

What is it for you? Are you a snuggle up and read a book time, a dancing around the living room person? How do you keep the creative heating on in the colder months?

Comment back, let me know.

Peace,

Yem

I'm writing this post on a train home from Havant to Waterloo. This evening, I gave a short presentation on 'Blogging - The Art of Success'. The event was a double bill, with myself and Alison Braverstock sharing the stage. Hosted in a small church a couple of minutes away from Havant train station, a collection of artists, writers and generally blog-interested people attended the event. It's the first time that I've shared the bill with another speaker on blogging. And I think Cibas made a good pairing. I'm new to Alison's work, and I like her message of empowerment. Her talk was packed with examples and also beautiful quotes. My favourite was 'If you want to do something in life, it is important to be slightly underemployed'. Brilliant. This is so true. I know that personally, my best ideas often come at a time of boredom or in rest periods between projects. Coming back from China has been mixed. In one sense, I'm inspired and motivated to create new work and connections. However, I'm also craving some of the chill time I had in Shanghai & Fujian. My London task is to find the middle point, or at least get used to switching between the two extremes :)

Thanks to everyone who has posted comments on my China photos, especially Bevaristo, Brrnrrd and Miss Dee. Lovely feedback, I'm very happy. So I've set up a side-site dedicated to my photography. I'll still be posting on this blog, but the new site (www.photo.yemisiblake.co.uk) will just have photos. Enjoy!

A few days before the trip, I bought a new lens for my camera, a 50mm 1.8. A lovely little device, which is great for low light settings. However, when I got to the shop, I found out that the auto-focus function on the lens I wanted wasn't compatible with my camera. So I had to make a decision. Do I travel to China with bog-standard out of the box lens, and when I get back, save up an extra £200 and get the perfect auto-focus lens or just buy the manual focus lens and take it with me. I bought the lens! And it was the best decision I could've made.

Without the opportunity to point and shot, knowing that the picture would come out how I wanted it, I was forced to take more time. Really think about how I wanted the picture to come out. With the process being a lot slower, there were some picture opportunities that were lost. There were wonderful surprises. Here are two of them.

Shanghai Motorcyclist

Shanghai School Girls

How are you? I hope the summer has treated you well. This is my first update in a little while. Just a quick update to let you know what's been happening and what'll be coming up over the next month.

1. CHINA 400 - An Exchange of Future Leaders

Between Sept 13-23, almost one hundred 18-30 year old artists and facilitators travelled to China with the British Council for a cultural exchange around creativity and cultural innovation. I was one of those lucky people. Over the course of our trip we met leaders and practitioners in theatre, design, cultural policy, contemporary calligraphy and other fields. As well as being there as professionals, we got a good chance see tourists sites too. A highlight for me was bamboo rafting through Wuyi Mountains, and karaoke of course!

Over the next few weeks, I'll be publishing my china experiences on my blog through pictures and text.

http://blog.yemisiblake.co.uk

Check out some of my pictures too!

http://tinyurl.com/yatauzu

2. MyPlace Hornsey Road Baths - A Creative Consultation

Over the last few months, I've been involved in a creative consultation with a combined arts organisation I work for. All Change, commissioned by Islington Council, employed 14 young advisors to consult with Islington's local community on their hopes, dreams and exceptions of a new youth performing arts centre that will be arriving in the borough in 2011.

I was one in a team of artists who worked with the young advisors to creative new and exciting ways to survey residents of varied interests and backgrounds. The consultation ended in a performance by the young advisors on Sept 4th.

Check out the project blog for more info...

http://hornseyroadbaths.wordpress.com/

3. Havant Literary Festival

On Sept 29th, I'll be speaking at the Havant Literary Festival on Blogging and the Art of Success. Here's a bit of blurb, do come down if you're around.

Special guest speakers Alison Baverstock, author of ‘Marketing Your Book: an Author’s Guide’ and resident blogger for the Artists’ & Writers’ Yearbook, along with Yemisi Blake, Emerging Artist in Residence at the Southbank Centre 2007-09, and adviser and contributor to the Poetry International Festival blog, will talk about their own experiences and offer new ideas and suggestions.

Poets, novelists, journalists and anyone with an interest in writing including artists, designers and performers are welcome to attend. Admission FREE, places are strictly limited, booking is essential.

http://havantlitfest.wordpress.com/

Thanks for reading, see you soon!

Yemisi

me@yemisiblake.co.uk

http://blog.yemisiblake.co.uk

Flying Out

Flying In

1. Bernardine Evaristo's Hello Mum

Next year, Bernardine Evaristo's new book Hello Mum will be published through the Quick Reads programme. It's a short tale of murder and heartbreak after a teenage boy is stabbed and left bleeding on the street. A few weeks ago, I sent Bernardine some pictures I'd taken for my hoodie project. She thought something similar would suit the cover of her new book and sent them to her publishers. They liked it, and the final book cover was influenced by my photos. Pretty cool, right? I'm looking forward to reading Hello Mum next year, it'll be published in March. Check out Bernardine's blog for more info.

2. Jon Madison's Portrait of a Portrait

I spotted some great shots by Jon Madison on the Flickr Blog. The hoodie pic is my favourite.

Recently I've digging around my hard drive, trying to organise my photos. I spotted this one of my nephew Ky dressed as a pumpkin for halloween. It's a favourite of mine.