Exhibition Launch Party!

Fine Art Statement 2008

Industrial machinery has an obvious mechanical function that can overshadow their machine aesthetic. The mill machines flaunt a functional, yet artistic production, revealing the design to be based on more than mathematical and scientific principles, taking on architectural considerations of space, volume, texture, materials, light and so forth. However I do not present my work as a mechanical form to represent the machine’s functional or intrinsic meaning and the work shies away from any social commentary on the industrial decline, particularly in the North. Furthermore it is not an addition to the critique on modern optimism in technological progress. The found objects and clay-work serves to address and contemplate the increasing variety of non-traditional forms found within today’s art world.

The clay-work has been primitively built and is devoid of any utilitarian purpose. Consequently performing an Aristotelian function, as the art audience is cathartically released from the pressures of an increasingly sophisticated and technological age. This psychological value is created through the work’s denunciation of technology and rejection of contemporary provocative art themes. The work’s ephemeral and unfinished quality, created through the use of unfired mud clay, wood and obsolete mill parts, creates an essential humanist quality that demystifies the artwork and helps incorporate the piece into an understandable and immediate language.

The cracks that appear after the clay has dried ruminates Duchamp’s belief in the importance of the ‘role of the accident’ in an artwork’s creation. Whilst the medium’s ductile pliability also acknowledges the artist’s personal style, their patte (‘paw’), which references traditional notions of authenticity and originality. However the work’s obvious compositional association to industrial machinery somewhat abstractly attaches the work’s ‘aura’ to the idea of reproducible forms.

The location of the exhibition in Armley Mills furthered the work, as I then wanted to create a completely disparate mechanical idiom, an ‘a-mechanical’ sculpture. The abandonment of the factory parts for clay and the final decision to not paint a black matte finish gives the installation of these artworks within an old industrial environment even more impact. The anti-functional aesthetic of the work emphasises the appropriation of the wheel, handle and cog forms. The strong symbolism between the work and the mechanical machines outside the gallery space almost allow the clay to have a sense of movement and to seemingly possess a mechanical function.

Possible Plinths for Final Piece

InDesign Course

InDesign Course, 31st March-4th April

Over the Easter holidays I took an InDesign course at the London College of Communication, as I have volunteered to create and design my exhibition group's catalogue. We are getting a special discount from the printing company because Catherine dates the boss' son but that is the limit of the help. This is the information for the layout:

Size- 148.5 x 105 mm. (A6) Portrait. Use Indesign if possible (though said if problem can use another) All images cmyk, 300 DPI (300 DPI- he said if possible- nearest) Colours- all spot colours to convert to cmyk Font- all font converted to outlines (so like an image not text). CS2 not CS3 version of indesign 3mm bleed is fine.

Notes from the course:
- White arrow highlights the content
- Black arrow highlights the box
- To make text flow- shift then click
- Text formatting: to change the layout of the master copy -> Layout -> Layout Adjustments -> Enable Margins and Columns (this skill is useful for 'boring' designs)
- Grid- makes boxes though the user has to make the text flow
- Select all= Apple key and A
- Colour and stroke icons
- Wrap around bounding box- makes the text jump, opp. is text wrap
- Object -> Text Frame Options -> Adjust text layout in a box- space between the border of the box for text inside
- To personalise bullets -> Glyphs and Tabs

... Notes follow in Sketchbook 2

Idea: Felt Making

I could use all the wool collected to make felt. Then perhaps I could print some images onto the material... I supervised a Felt Making Class at the gallery I used to work for, Dulwich Picture Gallery, and it was relatively straightforward.

A step by step to felt making felt

You will need a flat surface to work on, where it doesn't matter if it gets wet. (outside, floor, counter-top or large table) Place a large table onto the flat surface, and cover it with a piece of plastic.
Pull the clean wool into short sections.
Place these wool pieces evenly across the plastic. Lay them all in one direction,(vertically) overlapping each piece slightly, until you have a square about 35cm long. Repeat horizontally.
Repeat the layers of wool again. Make sure each layer alternates in direction, vertically/horizontally.
The top layer can be decretive, using different coloured wools.
Fold the remaining length of plastic over the wool.
Place the into the bathtub and roll the mat back and forth, working your hands evenly across the mat.
Keep the mat rolling in the hot water for x-about 3 - 4 minutes. It is friction that causes the wool to felt.
Remove the mat from the bathtub and place it on the towel. Carefully unroll the mat, and turn the felt 1/4 turn. The felt is quite fragile at this point, so be gentle.
Reroll the mat and put it back into the bathtub. If the water has cooled, drain the tub and add more hot water. Roll the mat again for x-about 3 - 4 minutes.
Turn the felt another 3 times, and reroll for x-about 5 minutes between each turn.
Test the felt by rubbing it with your finger. The fibres shouldn't move and the felt should be quite thick. If it is still soft, turn it again and keep rolling it in the hot water.
Remove the felt from the beach mat and rinse in cool water.
Roll the felt in a towel, place it on the floor and stomp on it, to remove the excess water. Lay flat to dry.

Photos of Bradford Industrial Mill's Storage Area

Following several emails and follow-ups with a councillor from Bradford, I managed to get hold of various industrial parts that were surplus, broken or unwanted. When I went to collect the pieces I was lead into this treasure trove of machine parts. It was so surreal to be walking through a narrow path created in the midst of these heavy-duty machines and piles of industrial parts.

Research Notes on Jean Tinguely

Jean Tinguely at the Tate Gallery
8th September – 28th November 1982
Alan Bowness and Richard Calvocoressi

- Neo-Dadaist who rejoices in paradox and ambiguity
- Kinetic artist who mocks the kinetic sculptures that place faith in new materials and up-to-date technology
- Belief that the only certain, stable thing in the world is movement, perpetual motion, change
- Interest in the immaterial/ breaking down the traditional stability of the work of art/ dematerialising static image or form into a continuous flow of movement and sound
- Sculptural works: scrap iron, old or obsolete mechanical parts, discarded household products, various familiar objects
- Often primitively built- unpredictable in action and devoid of a utilitarian purpose
- Some sculptures have digested and disgorged footballs, sprayed water, crushed bottles, smashed plates, painted abstract pictures, emitted agreeable or threatening noises, emanated smells or even destroyed themselves
- Real function of his work is irony- a parody of mechanical and human behaviour, a satire on production, consumption and waste
- His work performs an important psychological service by offering a release from the pressures of an increasingly sophisticated tenchonological age
- The object at rest in transformed into the mobile, the living work of art, by switching on an electric current
- Requires the viewer to participate- press the switch- establishing a relationship with the machine
- Terms his work, ‘meta-mechanical’- describes the irrational, imaginative, a-mechanical ends to which his machines are put
- Socially liberating aspect of this new contract between artist, machine and spectator
- Early machine work was based on a system of asynchronous gears that moved the various parts- bars, circles, rectangles- each part moved at a different speed, so it could be months or even years before the same configuration repeated itself
- Shifting relationships and infinite variations of chance in action- alluded to the fragmentary sensations and conflicting rhythms of modern life
- Tinguely’s interest in the potential of a rotating or spinning motion to challenge and alter formal appearance is central to his work
- His early work relied for its optical or kinetic effect on the spectator as motor rather than on built-in mechanical movement
- His work is indebted to Duchamp’s- his first open-wire constructions, which were operated by handles, recalls Duchamp’s preoccupation with the wheel and mechanical rotation
- His ‘Prayer Mills’ also bears a slight resemblance to Duchamp’s tiny but influential painting ‘Coffee Mill’ of 1912
- Duchamp’s optical machines, such as ‘Rotary Demisphere’, 1925, also caused Tinguely to research illusion and dematerialisation
- Also was intrigued by Duchamp’s questioning, ironical attitude to the value of art in the age of technology and mass communication
- Heavily influenced by Duchamp’s elevation of the role of accident in artistic creation and his almost existential belief in the significance of gesture.
- Felt art should have a direct contact with urban and industrial culture, its by-products and side effects: mass production, waste, advertising, violence
- By reintroducing reality into art, the intervention of the artist would often by reduced to a minimum
- Demystify art- simple, immediate language
- Tinguely disliked the schematic and finished look of Abstract Expressionist work- symbolised a misguided wish to immobilise time- by using unfired clay my work also lacks a finished, immortal quality
- Searched for an ideal environmental art, a fusion of sensory and motor experience within a unifying structure, in which spectator involvement assumes a crucial place
- Expendable or auto-destructive works of 1960-62- when large and often intricately assembled collections of disused machinery and scrap sprang into action and, after a frantic life of half an hour or so, exploded or set fire to themselves- almost nihilistic
- Reflected the Happenings- introduced movement and change, engaged most or all of the senses and demanded active cooperation, whether physical, emotional or intellectual
- Belief that scenes of violence or destruction would have a positive, therapeutic benefit for the spectator
- Mounting anxiety about the threat of nuclear warfare/ significant advances in computer technology as well as attempts at manned space travel
- Auto-destructive- a work of art which is ephemeral and which therefore has little or no commercial value
- Impressed by the junk sculptures of Richard Stankiewicz
- Stated that his work became more disgusting, when the museums became whiter
- Late 1960s- began to openly display the belts, pulleys and wheels which assisted the moving elements in his work
- Shone bright spotlights on his machines, throwing strong linear shadows onto the walls and creating a strange, spectral impression
- Had a romantic fascination for mean, worthless materials
- Deliberately used cheap, worn-out motors and gears which added to the chance effect- exploited the machine- demonstrated properties not usually associated with it, such as random movement, irregularity, disorder
- Almost nostalgic art- disregarded electronics and advanced technology
- Sculptures often moved erratically, often shaking themselves into paroxysms of cacophonous activity- air of improvisation
- After 1963, Tinguely began to paint his sculptural works a uniform matt black- depriving them of their character as an assemblage of recognisable objects rescued from the rubbish tips and attics of urban life- emphasised their formal, plastic qualities
- Matt black- work began to resemble pieces of nineteenth century industrial machinery
- Allowed the grotesque- a groaning/ grinding/ clanking progress- endlessly frustrated in the intent- metaphor for imprisonment as the work is weighed down by lengths of heavy chains which it is forced to carry
- Changed the speed of rotation so all sorts of visual and sonic patterns would emerge
- Early 70s, the work became more colossal, heavyweight and industrial
- Essential underlying humanism of his work, the range of emotions and sensations it embraces, from soft to loud, gentle to brutal, restrained to exuberant, reassuring to disturbing