A quick note
I haven't updated in a while mainly because my camera has apparently been stolen, or lost beyond all attempts to locate it. And I refuse to use iphoto to take pictures of my work. However, my boyfriend (the guy behind Days Run Away) recently acquired an old digicam, and we're ordering a battery charger for it now. I promise once that's up and working, there will be a very large series of updates.
Not already~
So I'm behind on my blogging already. No surprise there. Got a lot of new pictures of the hair-chair, formalism, wood, ect. But I'll start with the photos I just got done of some pieces you've already seen--Ken, the Crafts department designated photographer did a shoot with everyone, and the photos look about ten times better than the ones I take, Consequently, the pieces look way better! I've already talked about them in earlier posts, so just enjoy the nice pictures.
Okay, so onto the new. The Hair-Chair is complete! After many packages of weave and lots of giving everyone in the studio fake rat-tails and extensions, it's done.
Unfortunately I don't have any shots between primed and this, but it got three coats of red enamel, and I made a slip cover out of a loosely woven black fabric. The chair is made of some sort of fake leather, and I knew sewing through it would be almost impossible. It was a bit of a challenge, because the screws were rusted shut, and I couldn't take the chair apart, so I had to directly handsew the cover onto it, then sew the weave directly onto that.
I was using hair elastics and bobby pins to keep the excess hair out of my way.
Finished shot--I teased the hair to make it fluffier and stranger, and so it didn't just look like straight lines of hair.
The back--I left it hair-less on the back, partially because of monetary concerns, but also because I think it gives the viewer a frame of reference--you can see what the chair used to be more clearly.
For all you hair-phobics out there
Not sure if I mentioned it, but I'm taking Intro to Wood right now--our first real assignment was to make a tool, so here's my little two-handed comb-thing.
It's all hand-planed, hand-finished white ash with black milk-paint on it.
And...finally formalism. I got into a bit of a fight with my teachers on this one--I assumed by formalism they just meant "considering line, color, shape, ect" which is what I did in my samples, but apparently they were much more concerned with "process based working." That is, work on something without planning and letting the process dictate the outcome. I've tried to work like that my sophomore year, and to be honest, I was bad at it, and didn't find it very interesting. You generally either get a lot of little units or a blob.
But I won't ever let it be said I don't finish my assignments the best I can.
So I took my jar of little triangular clips (from when I clip the seams on my t-shirt quilt) and bodged 'em together with the tiniest stitches possible.
Jar of bits.
More little bits
Connecting the bits together starts to make this nubbly thing.
Yep. They think it's fantastic--I don't get it?
Oh well. More updates later--on TIG welding, Plasma Cutting and PVC robot building~
Okay, so onto the new. The Hair-Chair is complete! After many packages of weave and lots of giving everyone in the studio fake rat-tails and extensions, it's done.
Unfortunately I don't have any shots between primed and this, but it got three coats of red enamel, and I made a slip cover out of a loosely woven black fabric. The chair is made of some sort of fake leather, and I knew sewing through it would be almost impossible. It was a bit of a challenge, because the screws were rusted shut, and I couldn't take the chair apart, so I had to directly handsew the cover onto it, then sew the weave directly onto that.
I was using hair elastics and bobby pins to keep the excess hair out of my way.
Finished shot--I teased the hair to make it fluffier and stranger, and so it didn't just look like straight lines of hair.
The back--I left it hair-less on the back, partially because of monetary concerns, but also because I think it gives the viewer a frame of reference--you can see what the chair used to be more clearly.
For all you hair-phobics out there
Not sure if I mentioned it, but I'm taking Intro to Wood right now--our first real assignment was to make a tool, so here's my little two-handed comb-thing.
It's all hand-planed, hand-finished white ash with black milk-paint on it.
And...finally formalism. I got into a bit of a fight with my teachers on this one--I assumed by formalism they just meant "considering line, color, shape, ect" which is what I did in my samples, but apparently they were much more concerned with "process based working." That is, work on something without planning and letting the process dictate the outcome. I've tried to work like that my sophomore year, and to be honest, I was bad at it, and didn't find it very interesting. You generally either get a lot of little units or a blob.
But I won't ever let it be said I don't finish my assignments the best I can.
So I took my jar of little triangular clips (from when I clip the seams on my t-shirt quilt) and bodged 'em together with the tiniest stitches possible.
Jar of bits.
More little bits
Connecting the bits together starts to make this nubbly thing.
Yep. They think it's fantastic--I don't get it?
Oh well. More updates later--on TIG welding, Plasma Cutting and PVC robot building~
Rusty, rusty rusty
A rusty week--both literally and figuratively. I've been scrubbing rust furiously with coke and vinegar off the bottom of a barber chair, and I've been easing back into the idea of actually having to fufill assignments.
But before all that school junk, the -final- roundup on my winter break projects.
The quilt keeps on keeping on. I swear it's going to take several years to finish the top, let alone quilt it.
The eye-ball skirt is finished! Eyes might be second below horns for motifs that I repeat a lot. Thanks to my matey Astrid for the dramatic modeling!
That placket is a total mess on the inside, but it looks pretty clean from the outside, and it works.
Hand quilted bottom hem. I'd see stuffed, quilted hems in a book of historical costumes, and I liked the way they held the shape of the skirt.
Eyeball border made with some odd upholstery trim I found at Jo-Mar.
I've also been working on these portraits since the beginning of the break, and I'm hoping I can continue to work on them in my spare time. Eventually, I'd like to make a quilt of all the characters I've ever come up with--like a giant character map.
Annnd on to work designated for school. Wood is nothing photo-worthy, learning how to hand-plane, Metals is basic mess-around welding.
Advanced Fibers--Narrative Object. The idea is to take an existing object and modify it to give it narrative, or create an object with narrative qualities.
The Sketches:
I actually really like all three ideas, and I want to do all of them eventually, but for this project, I choose Option #3, because, well, my mate Astrid found a barber chair in back of her building! How could I resist?
Here it is as of yesterday, when I was priming it. It had been sitting outside for a while, and the metal was badly rusted. No picture, but I've just finished putting the first coat of red enamel paint on it.
And Projects--Formalism
Ho boy, not my best area. Forget any and all content, context, meaning or narrative. You're only allowed to think in terms of color, form, shape, line, and texture.
Ugh.
Anyway, just making some stupid little samples right now, nothing interesting yet.
Exploring some ideas with color and geometric shapes.
But before all that school junk, the -final- roundup on my winter break projects.
The quilt keeps on keeping on. I swear it's going to take several years to finish the top, let alone quilt it.
The eye-ball skirt is finished! Eyes might be second below horns for motifs that I repeat a lot. Thanks to my matey Astrid for the dramatic modeling!
That placket is a total mess on the inside, but it looks pretty clean from the outside, and it works.
Hand quilted bottom hem. I'd see stuffed, quilted hems in a book of historical costumes, and I liked the way they held the shape of the skirt.
Eyeball border made with some odd upholstery trim I found at Jo-Mar.
I've also been working on these portraits since the beginning of the break, and I'm hoping I can continue to work on them in my spare time. Eventually, I'd like to make a quilt of all the characters I've ever come up with--like a giant character map.
Annnd on to work designated for school. Wood is nothing photo-worthy, learning how to hand-plane, Metals is basic mess-around welding.
Advanced Fibers--Narrative Object. The idea is to take an existing object and modify it to give it narrative, or create an object with narrative qualities.
The Sketches:
I actually really like all three ideas, and I want to do all of them eventually, but for this project, I choose Option #3, because, well, my mate Astrid found a barber chair in back of her building! How could I resist?
Here it is as of yesterday, when I was priming it. It had been sitting outside for a while, and the metal was badly rusted. No picture, but I've just finished putting the first coat of red enamel paint on it.
And Projects--Formalism
Ho boy, not my best area. Forget any and all content, context, meaning or narrative. You're only allowed to think in terms of color, form, shape, line, and texture.
Ugh.
Anyway, just making some stupid little samples right now, nothing interesting yet.
Exploring some ideas with color and geometric shapes.
Just a little catch-up
I'm still plugging away with more projects at home, but seeing as I've left my camera at the studio, this post will just be a catch-up on the three pieces Astrid and I did for the "Production" project in Projects II.
It was a really good exercise in working together. One idea sprung another and another--the creativity it fostered was great. But I feel like conceptually, it was hard to keep it focused and together. Next time, I really think more time should be spent sketching and solidifying a unified concept and work-plan.
Dress no.1: Earth--muslin, gauze, cardboard, varnish.
Astrid made the beautiful cardboard top for this--I adore the way it looks, unfortunately, it ended up being more fragile than anticipated. My portion for this one fell through a bit. The knitted skirt I posted about last time was meant to go with it, and I spent a ton of time working on it, but in the end, it really didn't work together. The skirt you see on it now was a hail-mary 2-AM-the-night-before bit of work (not procrastinating on that, just I'd been trying to get the crystal done, it was due the day before)
Dress no.2: Sea--wool, garland, thread, fabric medium, silk, cotton knit
The most sucessful of the three, I think. The integration on the (very!) different parts and textures went way better then I would have imagined. I love the texture Astrid created with the felted wool on the skirt, and I'm really happy with the wool-and-fabric medium over the shiny square christmas garland I used for the top. It obscured it just enough--made it look like rough ice.
Dress no.3: Sky--silk crepe, coiled cotton gauze, cotton fabric, bleach.
Stretching the limits of dying (or at least, past my limits of dying.) Astrid dyed that beautiful gradation of grays, and I'm proud to say the black silk crepe was my dye-job--I've failed so many, many times to get accurate blacks that "failure black" is a color I've become very familiar with. And I know we both swore to never coil again, but there it is up on the bodice. Looks very pretty, don't know how well it'd hold.
All three dresses came out very beautiful, but I think the shifting focus and the fact that they aren't a sturdy as I like my finished garments to be means I'm sort of ambivalent about them. However, I do love a lot of the techniques that came out of the process, and I really hope that we can collaborate more~
This post has also shown me that I take awful, awful pictures of my work. I'm really sorry about that, I can't blame it all on my point-and-shoot piece of crap. So my belated christmas resolution is to take more care with photos of my work.
It was a really good exercise in working together. One idea sprung another and another--the creativity it fostered was great. But I feel like conceptually, it was hard to keep it focused and together. Next time, I really think more time should be spent sketching and solidifying a unified concept and work-plan.
Dress no.1: Earth--muslin, gauze, cardboard, varnish.
Astrid made the beautiful cardboard top for this--I adore the way it looks, unfortunately, it ended up being more fragile than anticipated. My portion for this one fell through a bit. The knitted skirt I posted about last time was meant to go with it, and I spent a ton of time working on it, but in the end, it really didn't work together. The skirt you see on it now was a hail-mary 2-AM-the-night-before bit of work (not procrastinating on that, just I'd been trying to get the crystal done, it was due the day before)
Dress no.2: Sea--wool, garland, thread, fabric medium, silk, cotton knit
The most sucessful of the three, I think. The integration on the (very!) different parts and textures went way better then I would have imagined. I love the texture Astrid created with the felted wool on the skirt, and I'm really happy with the wool-and-fabric medium over the shiny square christmas garland I used for the top. It obscured it just enough--made it look like rough ice.
Dress no.3: Sky--silk crepe, coiled cotton gauze, cotton fabric, bleach.
Stretching the limits of dying (or at least, past my limits of dying.) Astrid dyed that beautiful gradation of grays, and I'm proud to say the black silk crepe was my dye-job--I've failed so many, many times to get accurate blacks that "failure black" is a color I've become very familiar with. And I know we both swore to never coil again, but there it is up on the bodice. Looks very pretty, don't know how well it'd hold.
All three dresses came out very beautiful, but I think the shifting focus and the fact that they aren't a sturdy as I like my finished garments to be means I'm sort of ambivalent about them. However, I do love a lot of the techniques that came out of the process, and I really hope that we can collaborate more~
This post has also shown me that I take awful, awful pictures of my work. I'm really sorry about that, I can't blame it all on my point-and-shoot piece of crap. So my belated christmas resolution is to take more care with photos of my work.
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