Advanced Sculpture Workshop part 2
Summary:
This was the second week in the three week advanced workshop.
I chose to use random disregarded rags around the workshop and studios. The
concept being that the abandoned rags relates to negative human characteristics
such as abandonment, disregard, and neglect; and through the process of vacuum
forming creates new forms to reflect these ideas. These seem to now relate to
my animal menagerie, as these look like small critter like animals that could
reside around the coast or water, and therefore when removed from water these
animals dry up like husks, like an amphibian. Outside of the workshop I wanted
to continue using the abandoned rags theme, yet I wanted to make it relatable
to both the workshop theme of plastics and my own practice of combining hybrid
animals and ideas to do with negative human attributes. Therefore I went back
to the idea I had last week of creating a serpent like creature and decided to
make it from found plastics.
This was the second week in the three week advanced workshop, Below images 1-4, these are materials which we all brought to the workshop based on the idea of plastics. in this workshop we were instructed to use these materials or the process of vacuum forming to create sculptures based around our own practice and themes. Therefore I considered using the bin bags in image 4 to create random forms in the vacuum former, however this wouldn't work as the plastic bin bags would melt under the heat of the melted plastic sheet.
Therefore I chose to use random disregarded rags around the workshop and studios. The concept being that the abandoned rags relates to negative human characteristics such as abandonment, disregard, and neglect; and through the process of vacuum forming creates new forms to reflect these ideas.
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Below images 5-7 these are images documenting the demonstration of using the vacuum former, the process was quite simple, place the object you want to create a mould of in the press, clip the sheet of plastic into the tray above, pull the heater over the plastic hold it there until the plastic is malleable, the time this takes obviously deends on the thickness of the plastic.
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Below images 8-13, these are images documenting my first attempt, I initially wanted to use my jacket however this was too large to fit the machine, therefore I started simple I used a small cloth from the welding benches, with a 0.5mm thick sheet of black plastic. image 12 is the positive side, 13 is the negative concave side. I liked how the excess material framed the mould.
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Below images 14-17, document my second attempt these were several gloves arranged in the pile, however when the vacuum sealed the gloves under the plastic, the gloves were flattened too much that the mould was too shallow to be effective.
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Below images 18-21, this is my third attempt I found some string in the corner of the studio, I chose to use 0.3mm thick sheet so that the plastic would pick up the majority of the detail, therefore from now on I want to use these thinner sheets to pick up the details and contours of the fabrics that I find. Therefore images 23-25, here I used an old bag that Id left in my studio weeks before, the thinner plastic picked up the details of the bag really well, making it seem like wrinkles in dried skin. I chose to try using the same bag with thicker plastic just to experiment with what the form would look like without details, documented in images 26-27. Now that I've made it I far prefer the detailed version.
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Below images 28-34, I've continued random abandoned rags that I found using thinner plastic sheets the only downside to using these thinner sheets of plastic is that as in image 34, the plastic can become so stretched out that it can break easily when you remove the rag from the mould.
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Halfway through the workshop we were all given a induction in how to cook bio plastics from simple house hold ingredients, such as corn-starch, water, glycerine, vinegar. The down side is that this process is greatly time consuming, it takes roughly two weeks for a small amount of this plastic to dry out.
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Below images 42-49, I've decided to cut these forms out so that I could see them without the excess material. Iar prefer seeing these like this as these seem to now relate to my animal menagerie, as these look like small critter like animals that could reside around the coast or water, and therefore when removed from water these animals dry up like husks, like an amphibian.
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Below images 50-59, these are all the forms/beach critters that I've created.
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Below I tried to create a plastic mould of the mod roc mask I made. However this back fired as the plastic was stretched too thin that the vacuum broke therefore the mask didn't fully work.
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Below images 61-64, these are examples of other sculptures that made by the other students during the workshop.
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Outside of the workshop I wanted to continue using the abandoned rags theme, yet I wanted to make it relatable to both the workshop theme of plastics and my own practice of combining hybrid animals and ideas to do with negative human attributes. Therefore I went back to the idea I had last week of creating a serpent like creature and decided to make it from found plastics, Therefore I started by constructing the head which would be the main feature that I will keep and consider exhibiting with the body of work for my studio work. the head started similarly to the previous animal head sculpture that I made from mod roc, using foam board silhouettes slotted together to make the skull, I then used plastic bags (the rags) which people living in my accommodation block were throwing away to bulk out the shape of the head, this was then sealed in chicken wire so as to solidify and maintain the form, also so as it would be easier to connect to the body of the form. Finally I added a duct tape skin to the head. For the body which I wanted to be brittle as if it was a decaying corpse of some large sea creature which had been abandoned (abandoned rags/plastic bags), therefore I made a long serpentine body using chicken wire and cable ties, which approximately came to about five metres long, this was then sealed in an outer layer of plastic which was a disposable dust sheet for decorators that I found in the studio that was being left out for rubbish. This again links to abandonment, also the thin transparent material looked like a shedded skin, which again links to decay again linking to discarded rags. Below I have documented the construction of this piece.
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Below are photos of the finished piece, I decided to leave it half submerged in the water of a small pond in the woods behind where I live, the idea being that this is an abandoned water creature that is dead and slowly dying. The only issue was that the tail was so light that it simply floated on the water therefore I moved it and left it slumped in a lifeless position over the bank a couple metres away from the water. Finally I cut the head off as the most successful section of the animal and binned the tail as the water and mud had ruined the plastic sheeting. However as part of my animal menagerie this now looks like a trophy from a hunt which would be the perfect way to exhibit this piece.
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