Week 4

This week I've begun a four week rotation through four workshops all designed to help me make my decision which medium I want to focus my studies on. This week I've been working on the first project titled Object. Which is a 3D/sculpture based workshop.

We began on Tuesday by being presented an object we then in groups of four had to study and brain storm about the object, below is a photo of the object and below that is a photo of the brainstorm of ideas. The object was literally a plastic bag made rigid by air pockets, with a small opening at one end with an egg inside.

Once our group had exhausted our efforts and collected all the ideas that we could from this object, we highlighted the words/ideas/concepts which appeared the most from which we began to develop our own sculpture. The words which we primarily focused on were:

• Maternal
• Sanctuary
• Nest
• Protective
• Dependence
• Fragile

In response to these ideas, as a group we produced a sculpture, the production of which I've documented below using everyday materials. The idea is that it represents both a box and a nest, as a way to convey the idea of maternal safety, and sanctuary, yet the materials are frail and delicately balanced or suspended from an equally frail branch, therefore trying to convey the idea of fragile.

Below is the finished sculpture, which I personally don't like, however the concepts behind it I find really interesting, however I don't think this sculpture successfully conveys these ideas. Also this was really the first time I've worked in a group when producing art, which I felt uneasy in as it was an entirely new set of dynamics. you have four creative people together all producing entirely different ideas, which is good as it gives one an appreciation of how people think and work, yet it can also be annoying as it limits your own ability to chase and develop your own ideas. Therefore I didn't really like this.

For the remainder of the week I was then set the task to continue working around the project Object. To do this I decided to begin working on the theme which I had been re inspired about two weeks before, Distorted figures to do this I bought air drying clay and decided to begin exploring the concept of internal omens.

To do this I gave clay to several friends and myself and each of us had to sculpt a figure without looking at what we were making whilst thinking of negative thoughts. This had interesting results as we all roduced human figures very crudely, but the concept I was trying to get at, was that these figures are products of our sub conscious at a time when we are only thinking about our darkest most negative thoughts. Therefore this figures are the mirror images of our internal omens/demons therefore these are our demons.

Ryan making his demon (above)

Anna making her demon (above)

My Demon

Ryan's Demon

Anna's Demon

On Sunday 11th, I watched Donnie Darko for the first time which again strongly inspired me to keep working around the theme of personal demons, but also about paranoia and how our demons remain with us throughout time. Below is a poster for Donnie Darko which I found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donnie_Darko