Laura Tansley’s Notes to Self (Trickhouse Press)

Laura Tansley’s Notes to Self documents an imagined future whilst preparing for the end of the present moment, and the rebirth of an entirely different one. To do this, she carries a kit with her, of Post-It notes, pen and pencil. She records her thoughts, captures the moment, these messages for a future self, fragments in time, as uncertain and ephemeral as the speculative parenthood that awaits her. 

In the introduction, Tansley describes her due date as a ‘full-stop’, a ‘point at which…creative work…might be suspended, or perhaps permanently changed, perhaps for the worse.’ It is refreshing to hear a woman talk about pregnancy and the potential of parenthood in this way, for this is the reality for many embarking on a family, particularly for the first time. What will I have to give up? What will I lose in order to pay for what may be gained? How does one creatively prepare for such a life-changing event?

Like many women embarking on an unknowable motherhood, Tansley clearly feels these potential constraints. As a means of marking this, and providing creative sustenance for her future self, she adopts a creative constraint, one both spatial (text that has to fit within the space of a standard Post-It note) and temporal – based on the immediate act of creation, with little forethought or planning, other than carrying this kit with her in a purse that later fits snugly in the pouch of the pram for her newborn. Perhaps these messages are for him also, first in utero, then in situ, as she creates her own prompts from the world around her. These scenes, often mundane and domestic, are rendered unusual and even enlightening in the way they are photographed accompanied by her Post-It words and choice of title: tweezers, mulchy leaves, wet washing on the line, a hair-clip, a long-discarded banana skin, a shopping list.

I rather hope Tansley has continued to categorise and capture her world (inner and outer) in this way. It would be interesting to examine how the imagined future self compares with the actual, and whether she found these ‘notes’ reassuring or alarming in their vulnerability. For all lovers of process-orientated work, Tansley has offered a new way of looking at the world and of creatively responding to constraints. As she offers in What’s Mine to Give: “This isn’t for you but it isn’t for me either but I’m the one telling you.”