The works during this residency have developed into a ‘series’ based on Corris and has therefore become a site-specific development of a new body of work. I’ve began to investigate spatial relationships between the organic and industry; using casting processes associated with traditional sculpture practice I’ve began to create a collection of casts in response to my environment and findings. After spending a large amount of time in my studio space at Maelor I began to discover unusual floor markings; and therefore using alginate taking direct castings of the surface in wax. Thinking of my environment and the welsh industry I foresee these initial castings as a development of a series of floor works; using an industrial material such as iron will involve a transformation of material. Iron has become a sparse material and a rarity to use in casting processes today; it’s hard yet brittle properties will form the basis of taking elements from welsh surfaces (grounds) and transforming them into cast iron works.
(Alginate mould process – taking a direct casting of the surface)
The Boyle Family’s Earth Studies are three-dimensional casts of the surface; recordings and documentation of random sites. The works combine real material from the site (stones, dust, twigs etc.) with paint and resins, therefore preserving the form of the ground and creating new interpretations of the environment; combining a powerful, conceptual framework with a strong and haunting physical and visual presence. The works bring into the focus the ‘human’ element and experience for the viewer gazing at large sculptural casts mounted on the walls of a gallery; and therefore emphasizing the scale of our everyday surroundings and environment(s).
The artist Cornelia Parker explores the potential of materials, focusing on their simplicity, the deconstruction and reconstruction of domestic, everyday spaces transformed into sculptural installations; therefore taking the environment into a gallery space. A previous work, a floor cast; Parker had often played ‘don’t step on the lines’ or Hopscotch while walking her daughter to school on a route that took them through the graveyard. These games rekindled an obsession with pavement cracks that had lain dormant since the artist’s own childhood. By pouring liquid cold-cure rubber into some of the gaps and letting it set, Parker was able to lift up this part the geography of the city that had been mapped out in stone many years before. The captured rubber cracks were upturned and then cast in black bronze. Placed on steel pins, they appear to hover just above the floor, creating an obstacle in the form of a petrified line drawing.
Pavement Cracks (City of London) 2012. Black patinated bronze
