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Assessment Display and Project Statement

I have found the past four weeks of the SCM discipline equal parts challenging and rewarding, as I have pushed myself beyond my comfort zone to expand my skills and ways of thinking of sculpture.

I enjoyed working with the body and thinking about sculpture as an extension of the body's presence in space. I learned that drawing is very important to me in my practice, both as a tool for documentation and as a way of thinking about form and materiality. I have found myself continually drawn to spiralling, continuous lines, and natural forms. I have found I have a preference for repetitive ways of making involving the hands and fingers. For the past two weeks I was inspired by the sense of touch and the feeling of dizziness, and represented this using bouncy, spiralling wire forms that I have covered in inviting textiles with interesting textures. Overall, I think I use a very tactile approach in my work.

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On Friday, I took my wire sculptures in to the photography studio and photographed them using the DSLR. I used a black background to contrast against the colourful forms, and focused on capturing their form above anything else.

I began with the first, fabric sculpture. I took both wide and detail shots. I then moved onto the pink crochet version, and found that this looked better from the wider angle. In editing, I upped the contrast, and the flat black background makes this sculpture in particular look like a drawing, which I enjoy.

I then entangled the sculptures, and I really enjoy how they look this way. The wire allows them to become muddled up in each other, and they become one. The close up shots show the textures well. I look at these photos and want to touch the sculpture, which is good because that was my goal.

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Dorothy Cross Jellyfish

Above is a still from Dorothy Cross' 2002 film "Jellyfish Lake", which is a video piece looking at the idea of repositioning man in nature. Sarah mentioned Cross' work with jellyfish today when she saw me hanging up my drawing of my large scale sculpture. She said that the drawing is rather jellyfish-like, and I agree. It is interesting because in "Jellyfish Lake", the fluid, amorphous nature of the jellyfish is in contrast with the solid human form. Similarly, in my drawing, my sculpture looks quite floaty and ephemeral, while in reality the sculpture (though very very precarious), stands quite solid. Brown paper is a sturdy looking material.

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Richard Deacon

Richard Deacon is a British sculptor. His work often uses abstracted forms to suggest functions of the human body, so it is particularly relevant to the brief of the last two weeks. Sarah suggested in particular that I look at him in relation to the spiralling forms that he uses.

I quite like Deacon's use of form, and I see how it relates to my own. I also appreciate that he works in a wide variety of materials. I think his use of abstraction is interesting and relevant in reminding us that sculptures don't have to look like the things that they are representing.

In my research I also found that drawing plays a role in his practice, which is as always relevant to myself. I like his contrasting use of straight lines and organic, blobby forms. I think the contrast of each emphasises the form of the other.

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This is my completed crochet wire sculpture, and I am very pleased with how much I managed to get done in the time frame. It is difficult to get a sense of scale in the photo, but its length is almost that of my own height. I would have liked to expand upon it further, however I ran out of wool, so had to retire it at this stage.

If I had unlimited time/funds/materials/etc to make this again, I think it would be interesting to make it from a welded rigid metal, before adding the wool. This would, of course, not have the same bounce and movement as the wire, and I think this would create an interesting contrast alongside the wire version.

My plan for now is to get some proper photos of my sculptural work with Paul Tarpey tomorrow, and finalise my display for assessment.

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This week, I began working on a second sculpture, similar to my wire one with the fabric threaded through. I was thinking a lot about what Mike Fox said about introverted vs. extroverted sculptures, and wanted to create something that wraps in on itself, whilst still giving the extroverted impression of growing out into space.

I did this similarly to how I made one of my small colourful sculptures- I crocheted the wool around the wire, before forming coils that I further joined with crochet. This was a long process, but quite meditative at the same time. I will show its final form in a separate post.

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Yesterday morning, I finished off my drawing. I think this was a good exercise in terms of wrapping my head around the idea of my sculpture. I think on Monday, I will try hanging this piece from the ceiling to see how this changes things, and I am thinking about making a second companion sculpture using crocheted wool around wire. I think tangling two different textures could be interesting and increase the tactile appeal.

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On Thursday afternoon, I finished threading fabric onto my wire, and joined the end to form it into a continuous loop. I then spoke to Mike Fox about the potential for this piece, as well as the differences between an introverted and extroverted sculpture- do I want the piece to draw people in, or do I want the piece to intrude out into space?

We both agreed that it would be a good idea for me to create a large scale drawing of the sculpture before continuing, in order to best understand the forms and shapes involved. I think best through drawing.

After finishing my drawing, I decided to reposition the sculpture and draw this new composition over the top of my first drawing. I felt that this would capture its sprawling nature best and make the form less easy to track with the eye. I smudged the chalk as I went, echoing the spiralling forms.

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Antony Gormley (Installation)

Antony Gormley is a British sculptor, mostly well known for his large scale public commissions, such as The Angel of the North. Though he works primarily with the human form and his own image, Sarah suggested that I have a look at the above installation he created for the White Cube gallery. The installation consists of a room filled with spirals of welded iron, creating a labyrinth of swirls. The encompassing nature of this piece inspires me, and the forms remind me of the natural shape of the wire that I have been working with this week.

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I wasn't quite sure where to begin this morning but after looking at what materials I had and thinking a bit more about my ideas, I decided that creating some spiralling, swirling forms would be a good start, as a way to represent dizziness.

I began by threading strips of fabric onto wire. The wire I originally started with was a bit too thin to hold its shape well, so I much preferred the thicker wire i got from Chris. I like the texture of the fabric. It's soft and comforting (the strips are remnants from wool blanket production, so this makes sense).

The process of threading the wire through the fabric is slow and laborious, but Sarah raised a good point about how this really echoes the point of its creation. When creating work that is concerned with the body and its workings, it is fitting to choose a process that takes the time to get your body acquainted with the materials. It's like your own energy is being transferred into the piece that you are making.

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Today, we were introduced to our brief for the final two weeks of the sculpture elective- to create a series of sculptural responses exploring the 5 senses of the body, or the vital signs of the body.

We began with a mindmap exercise where we had to brainstorm words associated with 8 starting points:

Taste

Touch

Smell

Hearing

Sight

Respiration

Blood pressure/pulse

Temperature

We then had to pick which words appealed to us, and begin engaging with similar processes. Put brief involves us creating a sculpture that is at least the size of ourselves.

I liked the sound of Touch and Blood Pressure. I am a very textural kind of person, I'm drawn to nice feelings. And I have pretty low blood pressure, so the ideas of trying to represent fainting or dizziness associated with this interested me.

I went on to create this smaller mindmap of my ideas for some processes, forms, and materials. Unfortunately I didn't get to complete any further work this afternoon because I felt unwell and had to go home, but I'll make progress on it over the next 2 weeks.

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Drawing in Sculpture- Eva Hesse

After last week's drawing exercise, I wanted to learn more about how drawing can be important in a sculptural practice. I decided to see if there were any artists whose work I already enjoyed in the drawing section in the library, and I found a book called "Eva Hesse Drawing", edited by Catherine De Zegher.

This book was really insightful, especially as somebody already relatively familiar with Hesse's sculptural work. The variety of roles her drawing plays in sculpture is impressive.

Some function as exact plans for sculptures, such as the above for "Ennead" (1966).

Other times, simple sketches on paper were preparatory pieces for more realised drawings, which in turn may or may not have become finished sculptures.

Others drawings subconsciously inspired later works. For example, in the abstract colourful collage above, she plays around with layering shapes and creating solid, stackable forms. These are concepts that would be realised in her sculptural practice many years later, showing the interconnectedness of all elements of an artistic practice.

Overall, I really enjoy her loose, expressive linework, and use of abstraction. I think it gives a real sense of weight and depth, without being overly/directly representational. It is clear to see that her drawing practice and sculptural practice are coming from the same place with the same influences. It's just the medium that changes.

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After last week's drawing exercise, I decided I really wanted to document my large scale sculpture from Monday. It is flimsy and unwieldy, and likely will not survive long, so I thought it was important to document it while it's still together.

I enjoyed this process as always. I like to practice my drawing skills, and I think slowing down and taking an observational approach can be very useful in understanding the materials and forms that you're working with. I used a combination of chalk pastels and compressed charcoal for this drawing. As this week was focused on colour, I tried to observe the colours very closely. I ended up using shades of blues and purples for the shadows on the brown paper, which was unexpected!

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Visual Tension in Sculpture

Today, our brief was to work in pairs to explore visual tension in sculpture through balance and gravity. Grace and I were unsure on how to approach this brief, and began with some simple sketches. We then were inspired by the idea of a house of cards, and thought it could be interesting to see how high we could stack folded pieces of acetate.

The result was a bit underwhelming - counter to the brief, acetate looks much more stable than it actually is when stacked. It is also tricky to photograph well. However, the folded acetate reminded us of the folded card that Grace was working with earlier in the week, and so the idea formed to try to balance the cards using only their own weight and gravity.

This was a bit of a fail - we tried using sticks as counter weights, but the card was just too flimsy to balance properly. We thought maybe if we used something slightly heavier, we might have more success, and so tied each card to a chair. After a lot (a lot!!) of fiddling and perseverance, we got the chairs to balance on their front legs, and the card to balance at an angle.

This is the point where we started to push our luck- we wanted to see how many objects we could balance on the supporting strings before everything came crashing down. It turns out: a lot more than we expected! We ended up with quite a few sticks very precariously balanced, as well as cardboard and a few sheets of acetate. However, a final piece of acetate was the straw that broke the camel's back.

Overall, though i was apprehensive starting, I really enjoyed this activity and found it extremely interesting. The ideas of tension and balance are relatively simple ones, but one that can have a huge impact on audiences.

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Joe Hogan

Joe Hogan is a basketweaver who has been practicing his craft since 1978. Sarah advised that I look into him specifically in terms of how he finished the edges of these baskets.

The baskets themselves are made of natural fibres and woods, and the edges are finished with other natural objects such as twigs, bones, and animal pelt. These edge pieces are uneven around the edges. However, the neat, orderly weaving still slots exactly against the uneven edge, creating a sense of balance and harmony that blends the two surfaces seamlessly. These baskets are a good reminder of the importance of focusing on each individual aspect of creating a piece. It can be easy to get caught up in the middle part, the making, but the way you begin and end are equally as important as the process between.

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Sophie Barber "The Greatest Songbird that Ever Sung" (2019-2020)

This evening, I was scrolling through my camera roll and came across this piece that I saw over the summer in the "GirlsGirlsGirls" exhibition in Lismore Arts Centre, curated by Simone Rocha. I was struck by the similarities between it and my larger scale sculpture from Monday. The form is relatively similar (though a bit more angular and geometric), and the legs that it is propped up on are similarly thin and shaky. Even the shades of pink are very close.

Though this was a subconscious reference or inspiration on my part, I do think this highlights the importance of going to exhibitions and looking at art to be inspired by (a practice I've been neglecting a bit this school year).

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Small Scale Colour Sculpture (cont'd.)

After my paper sculpture, I decided to move onto exploring similar forms with different materials. I began where I felt comfortable: crochet. I crocheted a pink wool with some wire so that it would hold its form, and shaped it onto a bulbous nest shape.

Sarah then brought me down to Geraldine, where I picked out some fabric scraps in various muted colours that fit my preference for softer colours. I stuffed my cocoon with a light green that really matches the pink.

I then took some of the fabric scraps that Geraldine gave me in some cooler shades - blues and greens, and knotted/crocheted them with my fingers to form another similar form. I enjoyed this tactile approach, it was very much in my comfort zone to work with.