Below is the draft version of my book chapter ‘Towards an Emergent Knowledge of the Margins’ which is going to be published in the forthcoming Emerging Landscapes: Between Production and Representation, (ed.) Eugenie Shinkle, (Ashgate Publishing, 2012). The chapter draws on my involvement in the art project Urban Retreat and ideas initially generated within my prose-poem ‘Making Room for Manoeuvre; or, Ways of Operating Along the Margins’, in Manual for Marginal Places, (closeandremote, 2011).
- emma cocker
- Operating under the title, ‘Not Yet There' my practice is characterized by a state of restlessness or wandering that serves as both subject & motivation for my enquiries. Writing & text-based work are used to explore models of practice – & subjectivity – which resist or refuse the pressure of a single or stable position by remaining wilfully unresolved. My work interrogates the critical (& often resistant) potential within experiences or conditions such as failure, irresolution, boredom, deferral, hesitation, incomprehensibility, inconsistency & stillness. Whilst my practice tends towards the essayistic (embracing the potential of the essay as a ‘tentative effort’ or ‘trial’), I am increasingly interested in performative, invitational, propositional & even collaborative models for producing texts. Processes of condensation, extraction, fragmentation, listing, footnoting, cross-referencing & appropriation have become critical methods for attempting to produce speculative 'openings' rather than drawing conclusions, or for appearing purposeful whilst remaining without clear or discernible intent. I am a Senior Lecturer in Fine Art at Nottingham Trent University & live in Sheffield.
