Intro to 3D

When going into the second week, I was feeling more confident and expressive with myself and also the way I brought out and created my work. However, the physical element of the carousel was put into effect and subjects of change are never my strong suit but I grew to cope with it as weeks went on.

Introduction to Craft (Play)

Upon settling into the domain of 3D, I was formally introduced to Kath (Course Director) who described herself as a Maker. During this time, I had no idea what maker was an art form but over the course of this week and weeks to come I found out that I, in fact, was a Maker myself. This knowledge allowed insight into why I wasn’t so intrigued by traditional art styles but found more enjoyment in fiddling and crafting objects in unorthodox ways. How I came to this insight however was what I did when introduced to the concept of craft, the simple concept of taking random materials and turning them into something else, and using it to create things I thought would be a laugh to make. This consisted of mainly plastic straws, a few bundles of wool and a bit of patience and coiling, all combined to create these weird flexible shapes that almost resembled cartoon bubbles. Something that would soon spark an idea that would last a lifetime (Seriously I can see myself being 70 still making these things for fun).

Continued Craft + Marega Palser

When considering how I would continue this craft and how to extend it, I wanted to set myself an experiment. The experiment was to see how small I could make the shapes themselves without cutting away at the straws themselves. This meant seeing what effects these shapes will take when subtracting the total amount of straws used by one until I would only get to one straw. After conducting my experiment, I found that once you started to take away the number of straws used, the shapes themselves would get more sturdy and constrict themselves to a certain shape rather than stay fluid and flexible. This allowed the idea of turning shapes with 1-3 straws to be used as foundations for Jewellery/Accessories (based on their structure and size) whereas shapes that contained more than 3 straws would be used as foundations for Lanterns, Lampshades and Baskets (Based on their fluidity with shape and size).

During this day of continued craft, we also got the chance to go to an artists exhibition who uses Dance, Movement and Cartography in her artwork. Marega Palser has worked as a freelance dancer, performer and choreographer for the majority of her life but in recent years has been using a combined talent of Dance, Fine Art and Printmaking to create these intricate, delicate pieces that map out Swansea in unique and breathtaking ways through fluid movement. Sadly we were not able to see her in action but it was still fun and informal to experience her work and process.

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Paper Cutting Workshop

For our second workshop of the course, we were given the insight into the art of intricate Chinese paper cutting taught to us by a guest lecturer all the way from Bejing. Now due to my problems with dexterity and lack of skills when it comes to scissors themselves, this workshop was a tricky and infuriating experience, to begin with, but once I threw away my worries and began making cuts on my own accord I found myself having more fun. For example, the set of three paper cuts were meant to be butterflies but I somehow managed to make 2 bats and a moth just from sheer random luck.

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Extended Craft + “On Paper” Exhibition

Now once I picked up my new method of craft, where I wrap and coil wool around straws, I kind of went a bit overboard and started making sets of coloured pack ranging from 1-4 straw-bound pieces. This allowed me to explore colour sets and combinations to see what sizes fit what colour and having multiple colours of the same size allowed insight into combinations of sizes to make complex shapes in the future.

We also got the pleasure to visit the “On Paper” exhibition in the Glynn Vivian which was an exhibit of multiple different artists who have crated a piece mainly comprised out of paper. This gave me the idea to respond with the format of one of the pieces by adding my preferred choices in their own individual way within that format to create a in-depth overlaying composition.

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Glass Workshop

At the end of the week, We were able to attend a Glass workshop which we created our own glass cubes out of individual glass panes. These glass panes were sand etched with a design of the shapes that my straw creations constricted themselves to. Each side corresponding to a side of a dice with the shape indicating how many straws were used to make the unique shapes. Inside the cube I have placed my first creations when introduced to craft which were my small voodoo style man made of tooth picks wrapped in string along with a scorpion made of paperclips also wrapped in string which I have come to name “Kenny and his pet Steve the Scorpion”.