Print three. This piece has a reference back to the world but is a functional object of another kind, a record. The first two print runs were made by the thing that produced the means to create the image. In this piece the image relates to the means of production in terms of context, in that the record is part of the industry of the person in the image. Just in case you were wondering, I did not draw the doodle on the table, nor did I situate it there deliberately. It’s serendipity I suppose, or well coincidence anyway, whatever. But the spider as in ‘spiders from mars’ fits well with the Bowie image. But the real point of making this image was to try out the record as a likely object for the etching process. The grooves picked up the ink very well and the use of needles and scrapers to create dry point lines and tools to burnish areas worked well. I did another test pressing using the other side with many variations of tools and I have worked out which tools work best; luckily I happened to get it right for this image. The label was a problem to remove and I found that there are other options to work with the label if it will not easily remove by using a collagraph approach. More to come with this technique I think.
I talked to a student the other day who had reservations, I think, about blogs, as it is difficult sometimes to gage response. I suppose because there is often no analytics, unless you are working on blogger or similar, but if someone is really engaged in what you put up and do respond then you can get useful feedback. I see what he meant though, as you are not sure if anyone is looking, if there are no responses. I got a couple of great comments providing references on my last blog, but mostly that’s a bonus, as I think that blogs are good because when trying to explain your ideas with enough clarity for others to read, it helps bringing clarity to yourself.
I have been reading through Barthes again and in his ‘passion of the sign’ he separates the sign and the index within a socio-political context, and talks about the index as fixed and the sign as having a ‘relative mobility of position’ (within the system of referents, that is, in language). Interesting theory, and in thinking about how to reference this in the blog I had to clarify how that is of use to me in my work. I have used found objects before, but usually I am interested in how the object from the everyday situates within a context of found images that speak of a technological age or perhaps a resistance to it. Resistance is perhaps not the right word, but perhaps catalyst is a better term. I like to play with associations and my previous project which I am revisiting, Tracing the Everyday, has an intention to make associations that are somehow plausible and yet divert or paly a discursive role in completing the work, bringing us back to an everyday real rather than a loss within a deluge of images, which we have today.
I have made a test pressing from the photo-screen that Glen prepared for me and in next session in the print room I will set about the main body of work that Simulacrum is intended to be about.
