Construction Project Day #15
On day 15 I wanted to dramatically reduce the amount of materials I used within the work to a bare minimum, so I decided to employ just two light bulbs and two rolls of paper for today.
I changed around the coloured light pairing between the three primary colours in order for the saturate hues to take on the secondary colours.
The paper almost resembles fabric because of its semi-translucent quality, allowing just enough light to seep through and highlight the space around.
As with previous works, I am interested in the balance between partly illustrating the working mechanisms and allowing the viewer a glimpse of how the light radiates, therefore highlighting parts or part of the gallery or space that is never normally recognised and demonstrating colour theory in action.
Construction Project Day #14
Lots of people have been interested to hear whether working in such close proximity to my mum in the studio affected what either of us made on day 13. It was certainly a healthy exercise as we naturally give each other confidence in the work we make; obviously we are fans of each others works and big advocates of each others practices.
I only need one comment or sometimes even just one word to spur a new idea for a work. As was the case for this particular work. Mum said; ‘you should think about cables’… and off I went, happily sitting on the floor of my studio twining white electrical cables around a stem of timber. The results are below in a series of photographs.
Having another person is also a big help in terms of manual labour. As you can see in the last few images I used one of my pre-exsisting large mirrors to balance to lights on top of. This mirror was used in one of my installation works in my solo exhibition ‘Chroma’ at BLANKSPACE in 2012. It is bloody heavy and needs two people to lift it.
I have been wanting to use this piece of mirror since this Construction Project began as it is ready-made and available already in my studio. Measuring 4ft x 4ft and backed onto a timber frame it is a lump of a thing, so thank goodness my mum was here to help me with it, so at last I can include it in a work.
In terms of how I helped her… well, you would have to ask her that question. All I can think is that at the moment I act as a constant support for her as she picks up her practice after a little necessary break. She is working on a series of small postcard collages, cutting shapes precisely and repeatedly into 4x6inch cards and placing them on top of each other to create a juxtaposition between the two.
Construction Project Day #13
Day 13 and already nearly two weeks of new ideas and making. From this time already my studio practice feels much healthier and my work is developing rapidly. I am enjoying getting in and spending time in my creatice space at Rogue Artists’ Studios, I have used this facility more in 2014 than ever before.
Today I invited my mum (Jenny West) into my studio to work in the same space together for the day, we both need encouragement from each other every once in a while – mother/daughter + artist-to-artist feedback is great. Mum/Jenny has been a practicing artist all my life, even undertaking a artists’ residency at The Whitworth gallery when pregnant with me.
Drawing has been the main focus of Jenny West’s practice for the last twenty years. “Initially the process of drawing was necessary to explore, plan and invent sculptural forms in order to prepare for their construction in three dimensions.” Recently she has developed drawings which exploit the mathematical perspective and geometry of domestic objects, to produce delicate spatial drawings. By working directly onto the walls of buildings, unfolding and extending images out into the space with thread and wire, the work, no longer confined to illusory representation on a flat surface, has physically interacted with the fabric of the architecture leading the viewer on a journey through real space.
While she took over my desk making drawings/collages, I used the studio floor and walls to make further developments with my light-work. I added elements to my original construction – as you will be able to see from these photographs.
As the day progressed, I added and transformed the wall-based work to become a floor-based work:
ps. I do realise these are very Batchelor-esque. My mother was kind enough to point this out!
Construction Project Day #12
Today in the studio I decided to STRIP it down to just my fluorescent lamps, using them to make shapes of light in an attempt to simplify my arrangements and build sculptures from them as formal structures.
My first arrangement shows two triangles, one on top of each other, held up only by one clip against the wall of my studio. The top triangle consists of the primary colours and the bottom the secondary colours. The lines of the top and bottom triangles correspond with their complimentary colours, i.e. red and green on the left.
My second arrangement was wall-based, yet protruded out into the space. Held together by a single white fluorescent stick (not switched on), this piece allowed the viewer to move around it, get behind it, gauging it in a completely different way to the first piece. One of my favorites of today’s work.
I then made a suspended triangle, which started life as a floor-based piece. I suspended the stick-light triange from a cable attached to the studio ceiling. The weight of the lights against the fragility of the single cable holding the structure up offered a tension between the two elements.
On another day, I would be interested to trial another simple shape, watch this space…
Construction Project Day #11
Once again, I insist that I only show images of my work instead of any writing in this post, so as to not inflict any readings the work may give you.
I think it is clear from the photographs the process I took on day 11 in my studio at Rogue.
