A few years ago I made a Barbie tree from a basic wire structure. I added some dolls that I had partially painted with green and orange paint, and who had pieces of broken mirror glued to their body parts. I think this may have been my attempt to deal with body dysmorphia. I’m not sure if I actually have body dysmorphia, but I have a limited ability to know what I look like, probably related to something I know I “have”, which is prosopagnosia, the inability to recognize others by their facial features…unless I know them really well. Even then, if someone I know really well dyes their hair, or shows up where I’ve never seen them before, I just might not recognize them until I hear their voice.
Anyway, a few years ago I made a Barbie tree, and it has been sitting on a high shelf in my apartment, gathering dust. I never look at it. In fact, it scares me a bit, with all its broken mirror bits.
Also, I find that people who see this tend to feel sorry for me; but I just find this funny, so maybe there is something off about my sense of humour. Well, I don’t really care, but I don’t need to keep this any more.
And I really don’t like Barbie dolls. As you can see.
Today I decided to dismantle it. I did this in the kitchen, as you can also see.
I also decided to record the dismantling, and put it here, because really this is my only diary to speak of, and I guess I’ll continue to keep this diary until…I can no longer write or do art or take photographs.
I think she might be a Disney princess.She looks pretty good on this little stand, so I’ll keep her for now. Also, I like that her lower right leg is made from a mirror shard.She has the best face, so I’ve decided to keep her. And hair. I’d love to have hair like that.Even if I cut myself a fringe, I still wouldn’t look like her.can they be recycled?I’ve decided to keep the stand because it can be repurposed.
it’s quite odd to see many of the figures that I have been working on over the past six months sitting in the window of the local art gallery. I’ve tried to keep the exhibit dynamic by moving the figures around among the three plinths, onto the floor, and onto the four wooden crates in the window.The wire-only figure on the right is a new addition, created since the exhibit went up. And the wire figure on the far left is another new addition, also created since the exhibit first went up.
Pottery
This piece is entitled “open” and is the first coil piece I tried. I think of these two vessels as “monstrosities”, and when I told one of my instructors that I thought of them in that way, she suggested I make a third one. So I did.The third monstrosity is not yet complete, and to be fair, I don’t call them “monstrosities”, but instead have entitled them “One of Three”, “Two of Three”, and “Three of Three”. “Three of Three” closer look.“Three of Three” base, which will need to be retextured. These vertical coils are meant to represent underwater grass, and I like the way they swirl and twist around one another.
I gathered together these five items and MIGHT make an assemblage from them for FIN 140, Creative Processes.Bacon Grease on the bottom of a pan.
I made two more entities this week. They each have a set of wings, although it’s difficult to see them in these pictures. More to come.
Last year I saw some art that used sausage casing…hmmm…I can’t recall who the artist was, so I’ll have to look that up and update this post later, if I can find her.
I want to use sausage casing for the wings on this second entity, so before diving in, I did a test.
I grabbed a random piece of wire and twisted it, also randomly.
I then cut off a piece of sausage casing from one of the strings of casing, dipped it in water, and wrapped the casing around part of the wire, to see what would happen.
The casing immediately became very difficult to handle as the water made it very slippery. Next time, a bit less water before wrapping it around the wire, and maybe use tweezers to handle the wet casing.
I dabbed a small amount of blue acrylic paint (Golden transparent phthalo blue green shade high flow acrylic).I like the way that the blue infuses the cracks of the sausage casing. I think I’ll try doing the same thing with some watercolour paint to see what the difference is. I left this to dry overnight.This is what the dried sausage casing with dried acrylic paint looks like this morning. I like the look, but will also try using watercolour paints to see if I can get a subtler look. Sausage casing infused with watercolour cobalt blue hue is a much better fit for the entity. Entity is painted and one wing has been added. Paint will be repainted and details added. Entity is painted.
Entities on a Window Sill
This morning’s rising sun looked great on the entities on the windowsill, casting shadows on their bodies and reflections onto the window behind. Well done, Sun and Entities!The orb of an interior light fixture reflects onto the window, providing a backdrop for the entities.
Lyre-Making Progress
I’ve found a couple of squashes to turn into gourds, and one, or both of them, will become a lyre. I also have a set of eight strings ready. This project will likely take me a year or longer. Updates kept here.
The Skateboarder and the Angelfish
I made this watercolour drawing in 2019. Here’s the armature for the first maquette. The long term goal is to create a life-size sculpture, using duoMatrix-G. Right now there are two test pieces of duoMatrix-G sitting outside to see how they fare in the weather. This armature will be covered with Plastilene, which will allow me to change the configuration of the arms and legs because as an oil-based non-drying clay, it will not harden. After I decide on the position of the body, I’ll make another armature with the “final” posture, and use LaDoll clay and work on more accurate body proportions to see how it all works together.Here is the armature with some Plasteline on it. The pants need to get narrower at the ankles. I can work on that on the next armature, as well.
I don’t actually have much new to add this week. I started school AND I was really tired so I took too many naps.
But, I did “finish” the cowpoke, and here are some photographs of the cowpoke, and then some with the cowpoke and opera singer.
You can just see one of the spurs in front of the green. I had to embed the cowpoke’s feet into a bed of stones, all held together with glue gun glue. The boots feel apart at one point, so I also had to rebuild them. The belt buckle has an “A” on it, put there not to stand for my name, but because the capital letter “A” is so fun to paint.
I modelled the hat on a stetson that I saw on the Stetson webpage. I like how I managed to keep the ears sticking out of the hat. Everything is really rough, lots of cracks, uneven coloration. I’m torn between thinking its not good enough and thinking that I love the imperfections, that anyone playing with this cowpoke will not only be in relationship with the “toy”, but also will be aware that there was a “maker”, also with imperfections.
I have a thing about “perfect” toys, mass produced or not.
Here the cowpoke is about to lasso themselves an opera singer. shadows and reflections…After I put the cowpoke and the opera singer on the shelf to marinate, I started to make a little wire dog. Under the wire dog are two paint brushes marinating in coloured water. Bad bad.I also pulled out an armature I had made a couple of weeks ago. I had planned to return to this AFTER making the horse, but apparently I’m stalling on the horse (haha, unintended pun).I added a skipping rope to the blue figure and hung it from a lamp. I’m really drawn to those “ropes” and hanging figures…because they move, or have the potential to. As soon as I picked up the clay for this figure, my fingers immediately started to work differently as they applied the clay to the body. I wasn’t as focused on defining the limbs; rather, I started by creating clothes on the figure. It felt really different, and maybe that’s why I needed to sleep for a few days before returning to the figures. I embedded a tiny stone in the figure’s chest. Well, um, I really like doing this. Glad I found a retirement hobby…but I also have another hobby in retirement:
DIGRESSION in which I received the following TM:
LATER:
Interesting to note in the above screen-shot that all but one of my crypto choices are (were) in the red. Also interesting to note is my total investment is just over $200. I know my limit!
BACK TO THE MAIN STORY:
ART SCHOOL STUFF:
So, I went to my first class in FIN 140 this past week; our first assignment is an assemblage. Here is what I have done so far to get ready. We are to gather up 4 – 5 non-precious objects, do an object analysis, and then bring them to class with various connecting devices such as string, tape, glue.
(I’m taking two classes this fall, and I suspect there may be some competition between what I WANT to do and what I HAVE to do for my assignments. Lots of naps.)
Object #1. Found in a ditch, and is apparently a connector piece to hold together sections of temporary fencing. I love my ditch finds. Object #2: A doll I bought at a thrift store several years ago. I have a box of such thrifty dolls, and I pulled her out for this project because she has a very weird face.Object #3. I don’t know what this is really, but I think its for gas lines. Or maybe water? I like it because those two black things move. And because it has the word “no” on it…heh, or likely that’s the word “on”. object #4: this is a tiny bottle I found on a beach. It may be too small for this project.Object #5. A thrift store find several years ago, I like this because it still works. It too might be too small for the project. Object #6: the top of a much longer bottle. I forgot to take a photograph of the whole bottle because I got distracted…as I will demonstrate below.Doll looking through bottle #1Doll looking through bottle #2Doll looking through bottle #3
And then, because I was into taking photographs of the doll, I kept going…
Poor thing is merely a repro. But she has a great face and doesn’t seem to mind her status as a repro. I detect a slight smile on her lips, although her eyes look a little deadened.I wonder what is in the light in the middle of her eye?
Okay, enough with the doll already. But I’m putting these pictures in here to remind myself (if I ever read this again) that I tend to get carried away with figures, especially human (doll) figures. Because yeah, I had a lot of fun on Friday night taking those photos.
Because I have quite a bit of human hair, and because I’m currently working on model figures, some of which have hair, I’ve been curious about how to best add the hair to the figures. Last week I made the opera singer, who has long grey hair, but I just fumbled around with attaching hair to their head. I thought it might be a good idea to find out a better way (better ways?) to work with hair. The following video is a start in that direction. It actually looks really easy.
Spätblühendes Künstlertagebuch 