Art Studio IIIA - Week 9
Week 9
Tues Lecture & Class
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Group Discussion - Installation
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Tutorial with Simon
Meeting with Simon to discuss the direction of the project. We talked about the neuron structures I had made, and the inescapability of the grief process. We talked about video as a medium for showing the making of the objects with close up repetitive motions, using the action to communicate the ideas. We identified a few areas of further research for video artists who explore the concept of grief and loss. The other area I talked about was how to incorporate colour or sound into the video work to evoke emotion.
Research
Shannon Te Ao - What was or could be today, 2019
This work is cantered around a swimmer, with a variation of different scenes focusing on the same action. The footage is filmed in the lake pictured in one of Te Ao's Nan's paintings. The painting shows how someone can know a place, yet still imagine it in a different way. "The idea is that you get a clear, not necessarily defined, visual reflection on what it means to live within a multiplicity and to be aware of that while you’re engaged in the world" Te Ao, 2019
Te Ao is interested in how we carry experiences, and live around them, not necessarily resolving them or them to disappear completely. How people live with the pain
This feels really relevant to my current experience of the grief process - something that will never be erased, but that you learn to live around - living within a multiplicity, particularly in relation to the redrawing of our neural maps to reflect our current reality.
Bill Viola
Bill Violas exploration of the universal themes of mortality, transcendence, rebirth are an interesting avenue for me to explore. His interest in the relationship between the body and the soul and how his depicts this, with the body often in physical extremes is relative to what I am currently looking at.
Nantes Triptych, 1992
Tripych featuring the birth of a baby, his mother as she was dying and a cental figure underwater.
Bill Viola, Ablutions, 2005.
Colour Video diptych, opening with two streams of falling water, with a male and female torso moving into shot and cupping/bathing their hands before fading away. Viola has described this a purification ceremony, with water and the cleansing of hands being central to many ceremonies with purification being the goal.
With my own work, the repetitive action is key part of the learning process - maybe by others the cleaning off of purification and therefor healing is seen as a necessity, whereas in reality the greif will always be there in some form.
Two channels of colour video, mounted vertically.
This works talks about the transition between two worlds - the outer world and the inner world, the daily world and the hidden world, life and death. In this work, the figure is ascending rather than descending, depicting an uplifting transformation.
This feel relatable to the experience I am wanting to communicate, with a large part of the grief purpose, not being seen and being hidden, giving that so much of it a daily learning process that takes place inside our very cells, our neurons which is largely invisible to the outside world.
Left - Bill Viola, Ascension, 2000.
Right - Bill Viola, Water Martyr, 2014
Colour & Emotions
Trees as memorials
There is local history of trees being planted as memorials, as well throughout history in many different cultures.
Locally, we have The Featherston Memorial Garden, Sixty-Eight Cherry Trees are planted to remember the Japanese prisoners of war who died in what is known as the Featherston Incident, Soldiers Memorial Avenue in Greytown, avenue of lime trees to remember local solider from WW1, and Memorial Oaks in Gladstone, to commemorate solider form the district who died in both world wars.
In Wellington the city council facilitates the planting of trees on public parks and reserves as a memorial.
Why trees?
Trees play a pivotal role in our very existence. Human and tree interdependency - the oxygen, carbon dioxide exchange, giving us food, shelter and materials to build with. When we pass, we go back to nature and become part of it, with the tree being a lasting symbol of that growth and change. In many cultures they are powerful symbols or resurrection and have spiritual significance
Cloke, Paul, and Eric Pawson. "Memorial trees and treescape memories." Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 26.1 (2008): 107-122
There is certainly a lot of further research into the cultural importance of trees as memorials throughout history that I can look into.
Methods
Raku Firing techniques
Having recently acquired a kiln, I now need to work out how to use it! I am currently looking into firing schedules for bisque and glazing.
Firing Schedules -
Making
The urn was made from the white stoneware with grog. The base was started with a coil method, to get the shape required, a roll of slab was used to build up the bulk of the urn, and then coil methods again used for creating the shape of the top and the lid.
I would really love to utilize the clay found at the lake, but at this stage I don't have sufficient time to process the clay properly, so its something that requires more time and experimentation with to get right. I am not sure the clay at the lake would be suitable for making a large item like this, but its something that I want to investigate further.
Handles were added to the sides with the idea if tying the lid to the vessel. At the stage I am using garden twine, but I think it would be more appropriate to use woven flax from our garden to add to the personalization of the urn.
This is something I will experiment with over the next couple of weeks.
In terms of finished the urn, at the moment it is unfired. This is due to the possibility of using this urn as an extension of the previous work of using the urn containing ashes as a containing in which to grow a memorial tree.
The other area I would like to explore is bring more meaningful materials into the work in the glazing process. Raku firing is a technique that feel like it could be appropriate using seaweed from the coast where Glen fished and wood/sawdust from our garden.
Clay from the lake
The clay form the lake, fired better than what I thought and held together well without cracking. It does give me optimism to investigate using this material further in the work. It may be that I can combine some if it with the bought clay, if it doesn't old up by itself.
The clay was really dark when I found it, dried to a light grey and after firing had turned a slight terracotta shade. This was just fired in the home fire, so would likely have only got to around 400-600c but it would be interesting to see how it goes being fired to a bisque temperature of 900-1000c.
Hanging Neurons
For this I tried different methods of suspending the neurons form the ceiling. Ideally, I would like the neurons to take over a whole space as a network but given the time frame it might have to be on a smaller scale for the time being.
This test was suspending with thick wool to try and give the same effect as the neurons with the labor involved with making plasterwire structures of that length. I think for me, seeing the wool hanging so straight takes away from the organic feel if the neurons, so doesn't really work.
During class we did discuss hanging conventions, and fishing line/nylon was mentioned. At this stage I am trying to work out a way to hang them without the line and making the handing part of the piece. If the space was small enough, there would be the option of connecting the structure to the wall, or possibly on the plinth itself.
Firing/Glazing/ Technique tests
I made a few more small maquettes to text our finishes and glazes.
I have just bought a kiln that I can use at home, a small 32lt, hexagon Cobcraft kiln. Its old and was cheap, but it should do the job. It is only rated to 1000c, so the clays and glazes that I want to us need to work within those parameters.
These pieces were bisque fired first. I thought it was to 900c, but I hadn't worked out how to use the kiln properly, so it turns out they were only fired to 600c!
Top Left - I vase shape was formed and then clay that had been soaked (from dry clay, ready for remaking into useable clay) was applied to the vessel to create rough and organic wave forms. String was tied around the top and then covered in the slip to create a rough string texture.
The other bowls were just simple forms to test the glaze I had available.
One was burnished and then some decorative forms carved in the side to test out how that technique would look.
The glazes used were all low fire as I have acquired a small kiln to use, but it is only rated to 1000c, so at the moment I am working within these parameters.
Glaze 1 - Mayco Elements - Malachite
Glaze 2 - Mayco Classic Crackle China sea
Glaze 3 - Duncan Clear
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