On commission of an article to fathom a sharp uprise of doll art in London, I have found nothing concrete and have had no choice but to look inwards. Time to oil the squeaky door.

Lately, I’ve been on the hunt for deeper meaning. I’m almost certain it’s hidden in plain sight, so I’ve been paying extra attention to my routines. For example: I fake tan roughly once a week. For my upper body and legs, I use a green mitten; it’s green from old oxidised tanning mousse. For my face, I use Paradise Drops. My bum, I usually like to keep pale.

But this week everything changes. This week’s all about iconoclasm, renaming things, modern Rom-coms or Lady’s flicks, being more easily shocked, St Anthony of Padua, etc. I hope these small shifts in behaviour will clear up some stuffs academically & also make me tidier around the house.

Please bear with me as I muster up the courage to explain feelings of being controlled, wanting control, and discovering tenderness.

(i) Being controlled

^{Images sourced from eBay listings by Anna Plowden}

Blank Street’s recent seasonal matcha “The Miami Vice” is disgusting. At best it’s a fishy Piña Colada. But the more you drink, the stranger it gets… strong and gamey like an intense local sausage. If you have too much of it, you get restless and pervy. Still, it’s a good reminder of Who you are. And more importantly Who you are Not—a game many of us play on the way to our artists’ studios, which, to put it lightly, we cannot afford.

I played an iteration of this game on a recent sweet-monday/something-Tuesday. I was sitting on the bus, chewing gum. A mood- & attention-boosting oral fidgeting strategy which provides increased blood flow, alertness, stress relief. A pure, mindless way to ossify time. When I received this email:

“Are you out buying office items? Sophie is also out in central buying vases?”

Seemingly rhetorical. But then:

“Can someone explain why you are both out doing the same tasks? Hope there is an explanation, as this seems unproductive!”

Suddenly the world—pulsating, mighty complex, uttering, blushy and loquacious world—blinked. Slow-motion fatty eyelids wiped out cities to meet in the middle. Clumpy black mascara smashed like tectonic plates, ricocheted newness to the centre of my momentary understanding, and totally stripped me of context.

Clumpy black mascara smashed like tectonic plates, ricocheted newness to the centre of my momentary understanding, and totally stripped me of context.

Why am I out doing these tasks?

It does seem rather unproductive.

I could be having an ice cream, or thinking about stuff.

I could be doing almost anything else than what you have asked me to do.

Which, by the way, is sculptural, long-stemmed, seasonal flowers for the office.

It’s fine to fantasise about splitting your life in two; to daydream of relapsing with an ex, pretend you’re dumb, pull a sickie.

But the essence of your personality must remain fixed; its vision precise, full thronged, well aimed.

I told my friends, I told my mum, I told my shrink. I quit my job.

I wrote a list of pros and cons. So far goes something like:

“The part of my brain I can’t control”

Maladaptive behavioural patterns, flare-ups of inferiority, superiorly obstinate, poor impulse control, time and time again, a bouquet of somehow acceptable addictions, my losership, my potential, the flaky rashes of consequence, the profound sense of indifference stored in my bones like cold white butter.

“The part of my brain I can control”

My work.

(ii) Wanting control

^{Images sourced from eBay listings by Anna Plowden}

On my way to my studio yesterday, I sat next to two ladies on the train. One of them was the type of German I don’t like. Bohemian, foul shoes, speaks like she’s explaining stuff to a child. The other a Brit, also not my type. Soft-spoken and breathy. The German recently fell in love for a week. She said something so vapid, so lacking in spirit, I couldn’t even bring myself to repeat it. I’m always surprised by such bad taste. Given the vastness of vocabulary, the succinctness of free will, the network of interconnected cortical and subcortical nodes, the basal ganglia, the thalamus, etc. I tried to focus on the reddish darkness behind my eyes. On the ways in which pain might start to feel if it were endless. On fortitude and little bits of inoffensive food. But they kept talking. Tugging, yanking. I began to realise the importance of windows. Involuntarily, cress grew before my eyes. Then whole schematic diagrams: hospital notes, family histories, sceptics and all their disbelief, umbrellas. The Brit agreed with her wholeheartedly. I’m glad she could give her what she needed. It makes me feel less guilty.

Leaving at Old Street, and practically gasping for air, I arrive at my desk. Under it, in a box, are the five dolls my boyfriend and I have been making for the past year. 

Instinctively, I boss them round. Pathetically, I must admit, it makes me feel safe to have all five under my thumb. Sometimes I taunt them with stories of what it feels like to be real. I brag about holidays, hotel beds, heartbreak. I show them pictures and explain what it feels like to cry.

Sometimes I taunt them with stories of what it feels like to be real. I brag about holidays, hotel beds, heartbreak. I show them pictures and explain what it feels like to cry.

This doll was weaned very late; at times it’s hard to tell who’s touching who. He is stubborn, possessive, gentle, snobby, pure, astute, cruel and vanishing. Except, of course, he is none of those things. He is in fact completely empty. I made him up. Sometimes that makes me feel bad, but I find comfort in the fact he is not a glove puppet. There’s nothing crueller than that, our terrible hands inside of them. 

My friend Masha calls; she says:

“Slept at the studio. Oops. Need to get outside head and into the terrarium. Thinking of spraying the doll with self-defence pigment spray. Gonna stop halfway probably, shapes/volumes wise. Red too heavy-handed, right? To spray a military nurse with?”

Thank FUCK for Masha. Fiddling with her own puppets a few doors down. She’s so bright, she cuts right to the centre of stuff.

We hang up. I lock the dolls back in their box and turn off the lights. I leave feeling grounded, energised and more myself.

We all want control for different reasons. My father is a complicated man. Historically, he has been known to walk into a room, point at an apple and call it a pear. This had a damaging effect on my mother’s psyche, who sat for many years, like an old dog, barking at a door with no one behind it. I wake up every morning and concentrate on what’s in front of me.

I don’t know (precisely) what Masha’s problem is.

(iii) Discovering tenderness

^{Images sourced from eBay listings by Anna Plowden}

When my boyfriend’s in my studio, he’s in charge. Seriously. But I like it. I like being told what to do by him, and I like watching him handle them. He strokes their heads and tugs at their collars. I am often moved to tears by his goodness. His gentleness and his concentration. The way he returns bugs who have wandered in, back outside. He sits on my chair and turns on the little lamp, inspecting their bodies and filing them down.

Elsewhere in the building, everyone’s busy with puppets. There’s a slow-witted twin with a warty ventriloquist dummy, droopy-eyed and prominent overbites the pair of them; ambidextrous ballerina marionette number one and ambidextrous ballerina marionette number two all tangled up in a pile of rods and ribbons; a whole bunch of mannequins. There’s real skilled stuff from the floor below, some rattish guy who’s apparently an octogenerational puppeteer; china dolls with modern clothes on; rancid little boy faces and hair sewn in piece by piece, an overtly sexual rag doll.

If it’s a coincidence, it’s one of epic proportions. As though the ten million little gnats that make up the material of our existence have dissipated into loose swarms. 

I suppose. Sometimes we fantasise about being on the other end of it all. A colossal mouth at our window telling us who we are, what we like, why we like it. Bending our legs, thinking for us, stroking our hair, tucking us in. Hoping the room’ll fog up with somebody else’s breath. Or that the world’s about to blink us out… our maggoty little lives,  shrinking and howling and perfectly empty. 

Blank Street’s new seasonal matcha, the “Harvest Chai”, now contains oat milk and sweet potato jam. 

I’m more than happy to surrender control so long as someone handles us tenderly.