I had started a few weeks ago sewing together used cotton wool pads when removing my nail polish from my nails. However as this process isn’t done everyday it is quite a slow collection to get going due to the perhaps the once a week occurrence it happens. Due to this fact, unless I paint my nails far more than necessary, I doubt I will have enough to make the intended glove. Unless I paint and remove the polish for the sake of it more often; but then surely it is pointless as to why I am creating the collection if it is forced and not natural. As I doubt anyone does it everyday.
Perhaps if I had thought of an idea like this earlier on in the year I would have had enough. Time the degree show comes I may have enough. I’m not sure, but at the moment I’m not really feeling it’s doing anything apart from staring me at the face that I’m probably not going to finish it… Maybe it is not as strong as the other pieces I am collecting because of the sparse amount. Or due to the fact they are just not working how they are at the moment. I think they were working a lot better as arrangements I had on the wall. However due to the recent board idea, there wasn’t really room unless I had bigger boards or crammed them on which then would lose the effect I wanted, and because of the randomness they would occur they would disrupt the pattern. Maybe I could sew them into my arm chair? But then would this be too obvious? I think so.
I feel my eyelashes and contact lenses are working well placed on these boards for everyday. However I still have a bundle of eyelashes and contact lenses I began collecting earlier on before I decided on this board idea. I still want to do something with them to display them so they can be seen out of a pot. I don’t want them to be contained in anything as I feel that loses the effect if they’re secure and contained. The true abject cannot be seen. I want them to be in the open in a space like the contacts and eyelashes on my boards, invading the viewers space.
I decided I wanted to have them all scattered or arranged on a clear shelf. So from a piece of perspex I had, I asked the technician to help me make a shelf as I didn’t really know how to go about it, apart from to attach the shelf to two brackets. Reuben suggested I could use the heat machine which heats up the perspex allowing it to be bent into the desired shape. So one half would be the shelf and one half screwed to the wall.
I’m not sure as of yet whether I will even use this shelf but felt it could work effectively so is something I will try out once in the space.
Another idea I have had is what about if I arrange my eyelashes and contacts in the cabinet. What effect would this give? I did touch on this idea earlier this year with scattering contact lens cases, contacts and hair in there. However I feel perhaps I could explore this a bit further now I have a clearer idea of what I really want.
I have been constantly creating these boards as every day goes by from the remains of my skin on wipes and cotton wool, my hair contacts and eyelashes. I am really happy with how they are looking. I can’t wait to get into my degree show space and put them all up. It has surprised me how many eyelashes I appear to lose everyday! I don’t think you realise how many you actually lose until you begin collecting them.
I feel once I have created all 30 boards and mounted them upon the wall they will hopefully look very effective and give the abject feeling and show this repetitive daily routine over a month of my collecting. I need to make sure I measure the distance between all of the boards and work out where to place the top row and the bottom. How far up the wall do I go? I feel this is something I can’t really do until I get into the space and work it all out.
I decided to create a piece of work using a bed sheet. The plan was to use a clean white bed sheet, go to bed wearing fake tan as I often do, leave it develop overnight which would create a piece from the pattern of the colour left on the sheet from where I moved in my sleep.
I feel this does relate to the abjectness of my work. However as it is only faintly coloured, the viewer would probably have to get up fairly close before realising it was covered in fake tan, if they were to even realise this is what it is. So I feel this does work in that aspect, as it is showing this subtle abjectness i want. However I don’t really know if it actually says anything as a piece? Perhaps it doesn’t really link as well with my other work.
I don’t feel this has turned out as successful as I first thought or wanted it to. I’m not sure it really says anything unlike my other personal collections. Perhaps it is due to this not being such a collection like my other work. Maybe if I had a collections of everyday I wore this tan it would link better. I don’t know but I’m glad I tried this idea out, I just don’t think it has anymore to give.
I have covered my arm chair now in a super king size flat sheet. It took a while to work out how to do it and still now I am not really sure I tackled it in the right way. Perhaps it would have been better if I had cut the material into sections and do each chair part separately? However I decided to use the sheet as one whole piece; staple it around the edges and tuck in and staple where the chair changed shape.
The arms ended up being frilly from where I had attached the sheet around the edges. So I decided to add some stitches in to make it look a bit neater. At them moment I am going to leave it like this until I find either a better way to sort the arms out or to enhance the arms so they look better. I decided to cover the seat in a separate piece of material just so when the viewer sits down it wouldn’t tear. I am hoping to sort out this chair completely soon so I can get on with entwinning the hair.
