And now… time for pirouettes

It is already end of March, it is crazy how time is going so fast this year. The MA is really full on and I do struggle from time to time to keep up with making work, essays and everyday life.

I have to start thinking about my dissertation, in fact I need to get a draft ready for the 28th April. I’m really not sure what to write about.

Being in a studio on your own is tough, it really is, I don’t think I have produced as much of work as I did last year during my last year in sculpture, or at least it hasn’t been much fun.

I have a lots of things that I need to catch up with, I also realised how wrong was to stop writing this blog, I know how much it helpeld me documenting and analysing my work for my degree show last year.

I’m missing the fun and the creativity of working with loads of people in the same studio, the busyness, the exchanges of ideas, improvised collaborations, jokes, stories, to see other random materials lying around, the love and the friendship.

I’m glad that I have logged back here and decided to start writing again. It is daunting to come back when you leave it for a while, I feel like I haven’t been serious about it, or that I failed in writing throughout my MA as I said right at the beginning but I’m back and it is already feeling good to be engage in my own dialogue.

Second part…

La pelea (The fight), feels like it needs a bit more work on materials and the idea behind. I think using dresses from dolls and fabrics in general was a mistake they look quite dull to me, quite like puppets… Classmates in the crit thought they had connotations of Punch and Judy, I agree, however I think they need to be stronger and perhaps more poignant. It needs to portray pain and agression, and this time I don’t want to make it humourous.

This month has been a proper UP and DOWN in my practice. UP because I have been pleased with the reception of “La Mujerzuela (The floozy)” from people. I know that there is more potential in playing with these objects and that keeps my imagination going. The Floozy has been accepted onto the MA & Other Postgraduates 2014 show early next year and she is very excited to go to Somerset for a month. It will be a good start of the year, hopefully it will continue like this.

I have also had my first group crit this month. I presented three pieces of work, “La mujerzuela (The floozy)”, “La pelea (The fight)” and “Buscando al monstruo (Searching for the monster)”

“La pelea (The fight)” and “Buscando al monstruo (Searching for the monster)”are three moving sculptures. I used the motors and structures from the Christmas toys that I bought in Homebase earlier this month and re-adpat them to a new character in this case, two hands and a monkey, using fabrics, a stuffed toy and a knife.

I was a bit dissapointed with myself as I couldn’t managed to make them move on a loop on time for the crit (although I spent until the last minute trying). They are operated by the lengh of Christmas song and by a press on button. After 3 or 4 trips to Maplin and around £80 on adaptors, soldering led and switches nothing was working. I must say that I have nerver done before any soldering and as I think I didn’t soldered well. Now I know how to do it properly so there is a hope in there! but the whole thing still might be very frustrating as there are so many elements and so much trial an error that it is easy to put you off from the whole thing… I nearly chucked everything away but I know that I need to persevere and learn more. I have the support from one of the teachers which is an expert so he is keeping a eye on the process. I just need to find the time to soldier a new switch board to see if this will solve the problem of the toy moving on a loop constantly or to be activated by a sensor.

I did these two pieces exploring the subject matter of domestic violence. I wanted to represent this time the female as the aggresor against the male. The “woman” was powered with electricity so it had more movement, the “man” had the batteries still so it had a slower movement. ( I will post some videos later) The whole thing just didn’t work, the way I presented them on the floor with all the cables visible…. I just wanted to run away and CRY like a baby but I had to defend my work too so I had to stik to it and fight the feeling of failure back.

Buscando al monstruo (Searching for the monster) is another work in which I try to find a monster which haunts me from childhood. The monster is a normal character but at times becomes very scary. My attempt was to represent someone who goes on a state of rage, in this case a man. The shacking head could be due to the large amounts of adrenaline and oxygen in the bloodstream which causes a person’s extremities to shake when in a state of rage. The monkey’s arms shakes frenetically moving the knife stabbing the floor. The fact that is carrying a knife in his hand makes it already something that needs to be handle with care as it could cut your skin, something that usually happens with someone with rage manegement problems, the victim feels that they need to handle them with touch and care, measuring words as something could trigger an attack. I think “Buscando al monstruo (Searching for the monster)” has potential and following the advice from one of my teachers I should seek for technical advise, fix it and then present it within a box, something that can represent entrapment. The monkey will activate himself through a sensor when someone approaches the cube.

continues…

Vision and more vision this week. My focus has increased and I feel that I’m making things happen (with great phsyical/mental effort!). The lampshades have finally arrived to a pleasure point where I’m happy with what I see and what I feel about it. It was pure luck? about finding the last two lampshades that complete the sculpture.

I have been wondering what means to be lucky these days? Do we pursue luck? Is it just “luck”? Or does luck comes from taking risks? The more risks you take the more chances you have to find luck? Like playing the lottery? I guess when I think the way I met my partner that has to define what luck is and all it was is, that I took a risk and got off the bus and went back to find him, walking backwards towards where I saw him first in the bus. Yes, I’m happy with that definination, it suits all I do.

Carnaval, 2013 has now another title which is “La mujerzuela (The Floozy)”. This work feels very right to the way I want to envisage my progress throughout my MA, it has a high standard for me and I hope this is just the beginning of a lot of new work. I definately feel like taking risks at the moment and making work to higher level.

La mujerzuela (The Floozy), a woman (to me), older perhaps, that has had a lot of life behind her, she is very wise and practically doesn’t care about anything anymore. She has thick skin, she has learned to put things in her back and move on, she kind of feels free about everything she does. She wants to be herself, she wants to be silly. She spends the day cruising around the house dreaming, with her pretty pink and cream feathery nightie on, with ambiente lights around the house and soft music, reading love letters from past and present lovers, imagining the lovers of tomorrow… Melancholy in its pure state flows around the house.

I guess when I look at this work it makes me think about women and about growing older, and cherishing your own self. It is about escaping from social prejudices, about pressures of being right all the time, about maintining your shape, about being in control, it is a bit of mockery about all these things. It is about relaxing and letting yourself go, in yourself and then to the world, about growing older and embracing every stage of it… about becoming more wiser, that’s it. It poses to me, a question for the future.

I have sent this piece to the MA & Other Postgraduates open call for the 2014 exhibition next Feb-March. I feel positive about it and I hope I will get a good response from the Atkinson Gallery, which it is where the exhibition will be hold.

Already on my pocket, Saatchi Gallery has approved this piece to be shown in their selected works reel show upstairs in their second floor, so it should be among other artworks from last nigh until further notice. Nice of Saatchi to do that.

And a lot more has been happening that I would love to write about it, but I have to keep moving. Only to say, regarding the kinetic progress, Richard Taylor, that I just bought a few Christmas motion toys from Homebase that I hope to strip down and re do some new weird costumes/characters myself. I will show you soon.

Happy Tuesday all.

The lampshades have now turned into something else… a ladyboy? There is something about this work that is quite disturbing and vulnerable, quite exposed, like being naked.

It shocks me, it does grab me and it does make myself wonder why this? I actually love it and I think it is succesful.

I love the “hat” and the way it hungs from the “head”, it makes the whole thing quite comical, quite relaxed, it is a bit like a portrait.

A very good friend of mine, the fabolous artist Carly Jayne http://www.carlyjayne.co.uk, has suggested that the body should come up a bit higher? Any other feedback anyone??

If anyone is reading this and this work is really grabbing you for some reason, can you please say? I need to see the response, first impressions about it from other people, specially from other people that don’t know my work. I will pay back on wishing you plenty of health.

This work is really tickling my brain, it feels so challenging…. it feels right and so wrong at the same time.

I still in the studio, forcing things out, giving birth to some ideas and crazy stuff… is it that crazy?

So much that I want to do… and tomorrow Friday, and I have plans to go to the cinema with my man and my daughter to watch Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 after school. I really can’t wait for this. Pay off for so much stress in the last few weeks.

World, good night.