Almost done

Very nearly at the end of my second year at uni now, the final assessment is over, we've had the last lecture, just tidying up now and helping the third years get ready for their degree show.  The year seems to have rushed past extremely quickly, I have learned a lot but this has only highlighted to me how much I still have to learn.  Ah well, learning is good.

Photograph by Russell Smith

I didn't quite get what I wanted (i.e. free standing forms) from this final project; I ended up with one rather distorted free standing form, a set of 3 broken bits, and a rather nice piece which doesn't curve enough to stand by itself but miraculously slots together with the one that does.  So we took what I had down to the beach again, in rather better weather this time.

Photograph by Russell Smith

While I didn't manage to control the form I am pleased with the textures and the effect of mixing the wire with the glass.  And the colours are very me, and very in keeping with our beach, which 'my' colours always seem to be.

Photograph by Russell Smith

Photograph by Russell Smith

Photograph by Russell Smith

You might have noticed that I have credited my photographer; I did take some photographs but his were so much better!  And at least this time he had worked out how to use the flip out screen on the camera so he didn't have to lie on the wet sand...  He will be off to college in the autumn to continue his own artistic journey; you can see some more of his work here.

A decision?

As you probably know, the degree course I am on requires you to choose a specialism - the choice is Ceramics, Jewellery/Metalwork or Glass.  Very very difficult!  When I started I was fairly sure that I would choose metalwork and go on to combine it with my textile work.

But then I discovered that working in glass can give you all the elements of texture and layering that I love to play with in my textile work, and I was hooked!

This week we have been doing low-relief casting in the kiln, creating moulds by cutting up pieces of fibre blanket to give form and texture.  We layered cut pieces of fibre blanket and sheets of float (window) glass - if the pieces of blanket go right to the edge you can put them between the sheets of glass  to create gaps too.

My design all layered up and nearly ready to go - the edges just need to be trimmed.

In the kiln, surrounded by pieces of kiln shelf to keep it in place.

And this is how it came out!

Now, I didn't have this in mind when I designed the piece, but isn't it perfect?

Collagraph Printing

One of the great things about doing an art degree is that you get to try out lots of techniques not directly related to your core subject.

I have really been enjoying experimenting with collagraph printing.  Having worked so much with textiles I have bags full of lovely little scraps of textured fabric and fibres that I simply cannot bear to throw away, and making collagraph plates has been the perfect opportunity to put some of them to good use.

My plates are simply a small square of thick cardboard onto which I have glued little scraps of texture. Once the glue is dry the plates need to be coated with varnish to seal them - I use shellac because it's nice and thin and dries quickly.

Then it's a matter of experimenting with applying the ink - some plates work better with the ink applied to the high points, some work better with the ink applied all over and then wiped off the high points.  The ink is oil based and rather sticky - quite different from anything I have worked with before.  The paper is soaked, placed on top of the inked up plate and sent through the printing press and you never quite know what will come out the other side.  One of the trickiest things is getting the plate and paper lined up so you don't get a wonky print - I've had to practise that!

Cue lots and lots of photos -a bit repetitive - I hope you don't get bored!

I couldn't resist doing a bit of stitching on this one!  The next one I added some water based colour afterwards.

And I did some not-black ones too - although I wasn't very adventurous with the colour!

One of the other fun things is to put the plate through the press without any ink at all, to emboss it onto the paper.

 

And here it is with just a bit of ink...

I've been back in the print room today, I'm just waiting for a whole new set of prints to dry now...

Jewellery - Metalwork

The last stop on our trip round the departments was the Jewellery-Metalwork department.  Our brief for these 2 weeks was to create a ring.  I had great fun here - I had really been looking forward to having the chance to mix some of my favourite textiley fibres with some metal - and ended up making several ring-like things!

First off I loosely needlefelted some bits of fluff together - a mixture of wool and silk and linen fibres - and textured a little piece of copper to sit on top of them.  Now obviously I couldn't do any soldering with this little lot around without them going up in flames so I made the ring separately and then riveted the fluff and metal onto it.  A bit fiddly, to say the least!

Next I got out one of my very favourite fibres.  This is beaten kozo fibre, I think it is from the bark of the mulberry tree, and it has been prepared for papermaking.  It comes as funny little sticks but if you soak them you can gently tease them out into the most amazing lacy structures, which are quite stiff once they dry.  It can be a bit hit-and-miss if you want a particular size and shape, you never really know what you're going to get, but it's always beautiful.  I threaded my kozo pieces onto wire which had been soldered onto a ring to create this lovely pod shape.  This is definitely my favourite!

I do need to find a neater way to finish the wires together at the top though - again, soldering is out - maybe I just need to practice my wire-wrapping!

Having made these 'proper' rings I went on to have fun experimenting with my favourite combination of silk paper and wire.  I already use these materials to create the hearts I sell in my hypsela handmade shop but I had never managed to form the silk paper over a 3D wire structure without just getting into a sticky mess.  I twisted some wire into loose spirals to fit over my fingers and got out the silk paper... well the first couple of goes were my usual sticky mess, but evetually I discovered if I laid the silk fibres in the same direction as the wire it worked!  (well, sometimes...)

I know, a pretty strange sort of ring but a great discovery for me!  And lastly, another weird and wacky ring-thing made using the same technique...  There's no stopping me now!

Ceramics

Another long overdue post... this one about the 2 weeks we spent in the Ceramics department just before Christmas (I told you it was overdue!)

We were working with a porcelain based paperclay - paperclay is more forgiving for beginners like us since any air trapped in the clay can find its way out along the paper fibres during firing, rather than expanding and causing the piece to shatter or break in the kiln.

I spent quite a bit of time finding out how thin I could roll the clay - quite thin here...

... but rolling it out between layers of oiled clingfilm means you can get it really very thin!

Pushing clay through a sieve gave a really interesting texture, although it was then incredibly difficult to handle without crushing.

These pieces were all glazed with a clear glaze applied in the spray booth.  That was fun... the spray is quite high pressure and some of my pieces were so lightweight it was difficult not to fire them across the room!

We also had a go at raku firing.  The pieces were biscuit fired first in the kiln, then we glazed them with a special raku glaze. For the raku firing we used a small kiln built from fire bricks, lined with ceramic fibre and heated with a gas torch.

The firing takes about 30 minutes.  Once the pieces were glowing orange we removed them from the kiln (using tongs!) and plunged them straight into a bin full of sawdust, throwing in handfuls of extra sawdust to cover them and extinguish any flames - very smoky, this bit - and left them to cool.

Any areas left unglazed - like the inside of this vessel - are blackened by the raku firing.

Removing the pieces from the kiln while they are so hot puts a tremendous strain on them.  This vessel had a join around the middle which almost cracked under the strain - fortunately it held together and has been left with a rather nice metallic black line along the join.

I was a teeny bit more adventurous with the colour on this one, and I do like the way the purple has come out.

Hot glass - the results!

We got our pieces back from the hot glass day - very exciting! Here is my paperweight - it is purple, honestly... and so smooth and shiny!

One thing I have realised today is that if I am going to make more glass I need to learn how to photograph it properly - all you can see is reflections in these!

And here is the piece made from the sandcast mould of my indian printing block - also pretty difficult to photograph. The glass is tinted where the sand sticks to it, the darker spots are a few little bits of red glass frit I threw in to see what would happen.

It is just a lovely piece of pure texture!

Working with hot glass

I was really really lucky today and had the chance to have a go at working with hot glass at World of Glass in St Helens.  We had the chance to each make a paperweight and also make a sandcast of an object.  I was pretty nervous about it at first, but we were quite a large group and I was one of the last to have a go, so by the time it was my turn I was just impatient to get going and had forgotten all about the nerves!

The tutor gathered some hot glass from the furnace for me and I had to keep it moving, turning it all the time.

 

Then I dipped it in coloured powdered glass...

Heating it in between each step, and remembering to keep it turning steadily all the time. You do get very very hot doing this!

I shaped the paperweight using a very sophisticated piece of equipment - 6 sheets of folded soaked newspaper!

The finished paperweight is now in the kiln cooling down very very slowly.  I can't wait to see it!

London

I've been to London this week on the 'let's send all the first years to experience London' trip.  It wasn't such a novelty for me, having grown up just outside London and worked there for a while too - but it's lovely to go back.  Unfortunately in these days of tuition fees and (late) student loans not many of the first years could afford to go, but those who did had a great time.  We stayed for 2 nights and personally I was totally exhausted at the end of each day.

So, I went to the British Museum, the V&A, the new Contemporary Ceramics Gallery, the Contemporary Applied Arts Gallery, Tate Modern, and had a mooch round the craft and design shops in the Oxo Tower.  And we managed to fit in side visits to Liberty and Anthropologie, plus a little time spent stroking all the lovely handmade papers in Paperchase.  My feet have just about recovered now!

The British Museum is one of those places - like the V&A - that I have been to quite a few times and never managed to explore fully.  This time I discovered the Assyrian relief panels - I loved the amount of detail in them and that once they had covered the slab with detailed pictures they quite often went on and wrote the story right over the top - creating a whole new layer of texture.

I was pleased to get to see Ai Weiwei's Sunflower Seeds in the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern (click on the link to see far better photographs than I could ever take!).  I was sort of sad that we're not allowed to walk on it any more, but on the other hand I don't think it would have been  quite so impressive covered with people! The 100 million (yes, 100,000,000!) porcelain seeds are incredibly realistic, and have all been individually hand painted by workers in the Chinese city of Jingdezhen, where the people have traditionally worked in the porcelain industry.  There was a fascinating video showing the production of the seeds, how deftly they were painted - and how pleased the workers were to have the work, while not quite understanding why anyone would want so many painted seeds...  Well worth the visit.

I did allow myself just a little retail therapy... couldn't resist these sheets of handmade paper in Anthropologie...  I'm sure I can find something lovely to do with them!

Still Life in torn paper

Apologies for being a bit quiet lately... I am working on an essay so whenever I think I might write something I think it should be that!  Nearly done now though, I think...

This week at uni we have mainly been tearing pieces of paper into tiny pieces and sticking them to other bits of paper.  In the end I have quite enjoyed it in spite of the sore fingers - who knew tearing paper could get so painful?  The object of the exercise was to get us to take notice of colour values and I think it has been successful in that.

Before...

...and After

The course begins

T-shirt by TheShirtDudes on Etsy

Well, I have survived Freshers Week relatively unscathed...
I was spared the sudden realisation that I really am 'quite old' that hit some of my fellow mature students - I went through that last year so I already know! I think the worst part of last year was finding my teenage years counted as Art History...

I was pleased to discover that there are quite a few mature students on my course this year and I am not the oldest (although I may well be the second oldest) which is a totally different situation from my foundation course last year.

We spent the week on form-filling and getting-to-know-you team-building type exercises - I have learned a few names, spent a fun day on the beach playing in the sand, discovered that Wrexham people are very friendly and that there are far more shopping centres around the place than I thought!

Lectures proper start on Monday, when the second and third year students also return.  I am looking forward to starting, but anxious to see what the parking will be like with so many more people - I think I may be getting up very early on Monday morning, just in case!