filling space 2

Here are some photos of the new studio. I really love it. Probably I would live there if I could.



It kind of boggles my mind that I actually have two studios at the moment. Not much more than a year ago I was borrowing Lauren's spare room and garage while she was between flat-mates.

I'm not really using the old studio right now, though. But it still has an awful lot of my stuff in it.




I am too tired to write any more, it was a long day in the studio. The show in Darlinghurst goes up next week, i'll be taking my work up saturday, to install monday and tuesday. Here are a couple of the things that will be in the show (in the new studio, of course).

maths and masquerades

Sorry i've been making more calculations. In the last two posts I tagged 17 people. With that as the starting point I figured in only 7 rounds of tagging ( only if everyone actually did the tagging, of course!) 410 338 673 would be tagged. In eight rounds, it would be 6 975 757 441, or six billion, nine hundred and seventy-five million, seven hundred and fifty-seven thousand, four hundred and forty-one. Crazy!

That's enough maths for now.

In the post before last (confessions x 12) I posted some pictures and said I would tell you what they were.




They are the decorations made for the Project fundraiser masquerade ball, FABULEAUX, last month. The ball ended up being lots of fun, and it rose money that Project really needs. There were some awful moments before it got underway when it looked like it might be a total disaster. I won't go into detail about that.



We had a lovely Bollywood-style dance troupe, marvelous drag performances, great music from The Fast Falling Fortunes, as well as incredible acrobatic wombats and some spectacular two-headed hula hooping (the hoops, of which there were many, at least 20, i think, were actually 'hulaed' around where the two heads met, the second neck, if you will; the extra head was on top of the usual one) courtesy of Circus WOW.

And there was musical chairs, of the fund raising variety. We fined people as they got out. There was a good prize, though.



And of course, hanging above it all were my decorations. There were a lot of them, unfortunately i did not get the chance to take photos of them all. There are a few more photos of the decorations here.
Not long after I began hanging the decorations, one by one, I was struck by a brilliant idea. Well maybe not genius, but it saved me an awful lot of time fooling around up a ladder. I tied the decorations onto sticks, a few on each stick, which i then placed between the beams of Project's industrial-style open truss ceiling.
Some folks liked the decorations. I liked the sticks.

malleable fiction

Some odds and ends sitting on the window sill of my studio. Lots of them use the crumpling i've been doing a lot of lately, combined with papier mache. I called them FICTILE MEMENTOS. I like the word fictile, it sounds to me like it means 'fictional' but actually means 'malleable' or 'formed of a moldable substance' and is often used in relation to pottery. These two meanings aren't so different really, both imply a constructed entity, one of them , perhaps, a little more tangible than the other.



Some of these pieces were in a group show at FIELD in Newcastle a little while ago -

fits!

Hurrah! Now i can fit a decent size photo in landscape orientation in a post. Not being able to do that was a nagging irritation to me. Lucky i didn't have a fit.

Still a few very minor changes to make. Probably it'll only be me that notices.

changes

Making some layout changes to Spectrescope, so things may look a little weird for a little while. Of course, i may not like them and end up back where i started.

This is a book thing that's going to be part of a bigger thing.




'I watch the ripples change their size
But never leave the stream
Of warm impermanence
So the days flow through my eyes
But the days still seem the same...'

newly crumpled

A new way to crumple! Well new to me. I am sure serious crumplers know all about it. I have found very little instructional information so it's an assumption, but a pretty safe one i think.
It involves turning the thing inside out repeatedly and creating a fold each time. These ones are made with sewing patterns, and wax.



Previously my crumpled things had all been variations on the technique used for the piece in my last post.

exchange (Bundanon)

Hisako was very interested in the origami crumpling i was working on at Bundanon. She gave me some of her calligraphy that she said was 'practice' or 'mistakes' to make 'something new.' So i dyed the paper and made it into a crumpled piece. Had no wax (or saucepan for the wax) at that point.

We ended up deciding that some workshops for one another would be a good idea. Hisako taught us about calligraphy (shodo), which, i discovered, is extraordinarily difficult,though very enjoyable. Sunanda and Dhaneshwar gave some cooking lessons. And i did origami crumpling. Which was a bit of a challenge because i'm still learning.



In my Bundanon studio; Sunanda Khaduria, Dhaneshwar Shah, Hisako Tsuzuku and Hiroshi Tsuchiya. Unfortunately i didn't get any close-ups of the pieces that we made, but you get the idea.

It took me a few days to figure out exactly what it was i was doing when crumpling. I showed everyone how to make a simple 4 pointed form, like this -



The fewer the points, the easier; four is also visually effective and often looks better than eight or sixteen. But it's enough to be interesting, and the structure can stand on its peaks, or in the outer 'arms,' like the one above.

By that stage i had found an old saucepan in Sunanda's studio and had bought some wax during one of our weekly trips to Nowra, so we dipped the pieces in wax, and i assisted with the shaping as the wax hardened. I was very impressed with everyones work, and they were all rather pleased with themselves, and i was quite pleased with myself, too!

Hisako became quite devoted to crumpling, this is one of the pieces she made later on, with a bit of help with the wax -



I was very taken with this one, so took a few photos.
Hisako's enthusiasm was quite a thrill for me, I had the feeling that maybe, just maybe, i had played a part in another artist (one i greatly admire) finding a new way of working, a new avenue to explore.

I am still working with Hisako's 'mistake' calligraphy, she was very generous! Some as collage,
some 3d things. At some stage there'll be pictures.

dirt paint

Bundanon is very sandy. A nice grey sand, though sometimes red. I collected some to mix into a kind of paint, with a bit of paste and glue and sometimes a bit of gouache. Made a nice texture.

For this book i used some of my 'dirt paint'.

The photo below sort of shows the sand, peeking through river stones and casuarina needles.

crumpling

I have been trying out some ‘origami crumpling’ – I saw some images of pieces made using the technique, and found a youtube video showing the process. I had to try it! Have a look at the video. I wish I could crumple like that guy. I find it more difficult than the usual origami – much more awkward and unwieldy. But I will keep practicing.

There is very little information on the net about the processes and techniques involved. At least I found very little, considering the wealth of information about origami generally. There are lots of amazing photos though. Google origami crumpling! Have a look at the work of Vincent Floderer.

This piece is made from an old sewing pattern. Tissue paper or something similar is needed for crumpling, so patterns are perfect. Not sure yet what i am going to do with my crumplings. They may develop into some sort of sculptural pieces.

book standing up

book standing, originally uploaded by me-jade.

a little folded book with some machine stitching

oscillium asylum omnibus 2

oscillium asylum omnibus, originally uploaded by me-jade.

oscillium asylum omnibus

oscillium asylum omnibus, originally uploaded by me-jade.

oscillium asylum omnibus - finally

oscillium asylum omnibus, originally uploaded by me-jade.

Finally I have some photos of my sculptures at 4A. My computer is still not fixed (though I’m hoping it will be soon) , so instead I begun the tedious and slow process of burning them onto cds – tedious and slow because the other computer I have to use is very slow and the burning program keeps crashing on me. But at least I’ve got them. Well I’ve still got another lot to go, but I’m nearly there. It has made me appreciate my own computer, aside from those rotten USB ports. And by the way Canon ‘support’ still hasn’t contacted me. Slackers!

Anyways the name of the work is OSCILLIUM ASYLUM OMNIBUS: SPECTRAL MONSTERS OF USELESS WORDS. They are made from various types of paper, including shredded documents from my local council as well as fabric, thread, wire, plant materials, spakfilla and latex surgical gloves. Some of the paper is folded, some is papiermache.

from The revolving theatrum

from The revolving theatrum, originally uploaded by me-jade.

This little piece (about 12cm high) was in my show at Wollongong City Gallery last year......and is now in the collection of the very lovely Vivian Vidulich (i can't emphasise enough just how lovely)

Oscillium Asylum

oscillium asylum, originally uploaded by me-jade.

This little piece is called OSCILLIUM ASYLUM (EPISODE 1).
It’s made of papier mache, various fabrics and threads, wood, wire, pages from printed books and mixed media, maximum depth 36cm.

It was one of my pieces in a show at Project Artspace, (in Wollongong) LIMINAL PERSONAE, which is going up to gallery 4a in Sydney next month. The exhibition was/is curated by the lovely Lauren Brown and Moira Kirkwood……Laurens blog, She Sees Red , is really really excellent, (and she is an awfully good artist), so have a look! When the details of the show are completely definite, I’ll post’em.

In case you’re wondering, the word ‘liminal’ means ‘of the threshold.’

I was making the piece at the same time as making the Desolation Row sculptures, so it kind of fits with them, in terms of the processes and techniques used, and the ideas that informed its creation.

An 'oscillium' (in latin) was a mask (of Bacchus) hung in a tree in a vinyard to bring luck / a good harvest. It would swing in the wind, and this led to the word 'oscillate', which seemed appropriate, as the piece hangs from the ceiling….if there was a breeze, it would swing!
This also seemed to fit with its puppet-like appearance, as well as having an interesting link to the origins of the word 'personae' which, in its original form, referred to the masks used in ancient Roman theatre. So there is a definite theatrical theme.

I also feel that the work had certain paradoxical qualities….the wheels are immobilized, and so useless. It looks like it might like to fly away, but it is tied up with string, so it can only go round in circles, or swing too and fro. The piece is playful, but slightly ominous.

This is the statement I submitted for the publication accompanying the show;

‘Vacation or evacuation, fight or flight, sanctuary or suffocation, suspended animation, an atrophied acrobat.
It could swing either way. Who is pulling the strings?’

The ‘asylum’ bit seemed appropriate for its rather paradoxical associations. Supposedly meaning sanctuary, the experience of a mental asylum generally being anything but a pleasurable escape (or at least thats what i'm told..haha). And the same is often true in the case of asylum seekers….a detention centre is hardly a sanctuary, or a safe haven.
And so you cannot tell if the sculpture is happily floating, or ‘strung up’, unable to escape.

The piece seemed to fit nicely with Liminality, too. It looks like it could be in some kind of transitional state, neither here nor there. Sort of like it might metamorphose at any moment.

double bind?

round the double bind, originally uploaded by me-jade.

I came across a strange thing the other day whilst googling myself to see if SPECTRESCOPE came up (it didn’t). On the second page I came across a ‘result’…. somebody elses blog…so of course I have a look, and find a picture of an artwork that had won me the Meroogal Womens Art Prize last year, ‘Round the Double Bind.’ (illustrated above) This in itself was not especially strange, the prize is run by the Historic Houses Trust of N.S.W and the piece is now in their collection, so it is easy to find a picture of it on the net.

What was strange was that it was that the blogger was a Christian man from Nashville (his blog is WonderDawg); his blog had nothing to do with art, the post my work was illustrating was titled ‘Double Binds of Men’ and was about mens issues in relation to the Church. I imagine he had googled ‘double bind’ and lo and behold, found a picture to illustrate his blog! It is a little ironic as it won a womens art prize and I am certainly not religious in any way, shape or form! He has acknowledged me as the artist and given it the correct title, so I will not complain ….it was just such a strange thing to find! And coming from what is, to me, such a far-flung kinda place.

I suppose he never expected that I might come across it…I suppose he will never read this, but then again....i came across his post, so you never know.
I have a habit of linking odd things together myself, as any readers of spectrescope would probably realise, so it seems only fitting, I suppose, that this strange linking has occurred with my work, despite me!

desolation row photo

desolation row @ Silvershot, originally uploaded by me-jade.

just an illustration for my last post. This is one of the tallest of my sculptures.

book book book

another book thing....this one is made by 'splicing' two concertinas together, and adding a few bits. (sounds a bit like genetic engineering, eh?)

honeycomb book detail, originally uploaded by me-jade.

folded paper on fabric collage thing

folded paper on fabric collage thing, originally uploaded by me-jade.

this is kind of a test posting from my stuff on flickr.....the picture is a scan of a little textile piece, with folded paper.

books books books

I make lots of books.....books to look through, book sculptures, book toys. There's a lot of stuff i like about books and about making them. The books i make tend to fit into the category of artists books.....some are books to look through and touch....others are more sculptural. I make 'one of a kind' books, though i have plans to make an editioned book....or two or three...


The meeting of public (or published) knowledge and private intimate experience is something especially interesting about books and paper, i think. To 'make a booking', bookeeping and 'on the books' seem to imply something official.... Yet the diary, sketchbook and journal are books, too, and are all very intimate personal things....and books are generally read alone. And of course books are circular (at least the traditional western codex is), or that is the shape they make when opened, the pages radiating out from the spine. This fits nicely with the book being a medium for circulating information.





I first started stitching paper about 6 years ago...it was by hand then, i only got my sewing machine around 2 years ago. Binding books often involves stitching paper, and that's how i came to add the stitching as part of the drawing, if you know what i mean. The text transformed to textile.

I like how it makes the flat surface textured and 3d, for a long time i have been fascinated by other peoples fascination with the illusion of depth given to a flat surface...i think i like making 3d collages partly for this reason.


Lots of my books are like toys...things to play with, or like puzzles....Sort of reflecting the 'problem-solving' process of making and 'reading' art, or something like that. Textbooks and literature are 'pulled apart' and reconstructed as something playful and tactile.