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Usually I start the day by swallowing an activated light bulb for thirty minutes, which really helped me regain my figure after the pregnancy. I mean, the first thing we did before he was born was scrub all the outside from the windows in his room because we didn’t want him to be alarmed by things that could stare at him. It’s so important for children to be creative, which is why I always wanted him from a very young age to dig holes as deep and as wide as he wanted in his room, because my favourite book of all time is Holes, and everything happens for a reason. It was hard to get my husband on board, in fact this idea distressed him quite a bit as this meant destroying part of the property he had worked for decades to acquire, when I mention anything even as mildly distressing as digging holes in his house he puts on his motorcycle helmet and boom he’s done for the day and it is simply impossible to talk to him; I had to remind him I was the one who was renting out her real estate decreasing her market and so on and that I’ve been the one doing all this scot free so the least he could do was let his own son, A.K.A. HIS tenant, dig a few HOLES in his house, because where else will he sleep and how else is he meant to know the value of hard work if he doesn’t dig a few holes in every square inch of his floor. He was on the verge of putting the helmet back on, he was that distressed, so I compromised which I is what I did to every liveable inch of skin on my body and asked if our son could dig one fucking hole in his room and he said yes, thank the lord, but only one two metres wide. I wasn’t about to let my husband get away with so much while I got so little, so I asked if we could call our son ‘Holes’. Even before I asked the question he had the motorcycle helmet he wears when under duress back on, and he turned toward me and nodded in my direction: I took that as a yes: all I could see in the film-tinted visor was the room and me, stretched dark. So I set to work immediately: I painted Holes’ room black because that’s the colour of a hole, I bought some reinforced baby gloves so he could get started immediately and hung them up on a hook in his room, labelling ‘HOLES’ HANDS’ next to them in black ink, some baby goggles, labelled ‘HOLES’ EYES’ and a facemask, labelled ‘HOLES’ FACE’. To be honest, the first few years were quite boring, I don’t think Holes really took it seriously. As a matter of fact he could barely pick the spade up, and just rubbed the floor with his hands. Eventually, Holes got with the programme, and began striking the cement floor with the spade. After doing this for about seven years, he finally managed to crack it: I was so proud of Holes! I would come in every day, hearing his spade hit the soil, seeing him a few inches lower than he was the day before, and I felt truly fulfilled. Then I walked into Holes’ room and I could not see Holes at all. I went up to the hole and saw Holes fifteen metres down. He asked ‘How’s the weather up there?’ and I laughed; he’s going to grow into such a charming young man! If I scrunched up my hand and held it over the hole, it would cover him entirely. Then he was the size of my thumb. I stopped being able to see Holes at all about five months ago. If I’m very quiet, I can hear his spade on the earth like an engine starting and it’s like this hole is breathing.

Text commission and performance by Will Jamieson

Curated by Elaine Tam and Judith Nezri
in collaboration with Goldsmiths University Photography department

Sponsored by Thistly Cross Cider, Virtual Orchard, Emily Fruit Crisps, Print4London

Stour Space
7 Roach Road
London E3 2PA