Covering the wire: notes

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Notes

-The skin of the mask is not smooth enough. Plaster of paris does not work as a filler because it is too brittle, and papier mache cannot be sanded. I think the best thing is to continue to add layers of very thin paper so the ridges formed by their edges isn't too great

-There must be a product that is like a sort of thick cream which can be used in these circumstances, to provide a smooth surface to craft items, but what exactly I don't know. It can be quite messy experimenting with these things, but perhaps pva mixed with plaster?

-I shall also add eyelids and better the nostrils.

-A possibility I didn't explore is to use cloth- muslin, I guess, over the wire.

-The wire I used is too thick, so that large "knots" are created when wires are joined.

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It's very enjoyable seeing the "personality" emerging from the mask. At what point is the thing finished?: the suggestive roughness of the mask in its current state is evocative.

Wire faces, masks; toys and art; labels

Earlier

Later

It is quite hard work shaping his copper wire to form an armature, which will be the basis of a mask: the wire ends are sharp and can cut your fingers wickedly. I think these armatures need a bit more tweaking, especially around the moth.

It is also quite hard to work the wire in three dimensions to make a good face shape. I think perhaps using wire netting might have been an easier option.

I find with these craft pieces that often in their earlier stages they are more striking, weirder, and as they progress they become less suggestive and more like mere toys. I intend this mask to be quite realistic. I think the more realistic masks are, the creepier.

What is the difference between a toy and a work of art? I suppose a toy is necessarily restricted in intention, while that of an artwork is diffuse, though its purposes are first of all aesthetic.

I love the interactivity of masks; they cross and confuse the boundaries between toy and artwork, between serious and silly like nothing else I can think of.

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Regular visitors will see that there are now labels at the bottom of the page, making it much easier and fun to find things on this blog.

Painting in the digital age

Essentially my expressive tool is the Internet. I spent yesterday working on some new paintings, aware that it wasn't the painting itself that mattered so much as the digitalised image online.

There are really six steps-

1. painting
2. photographing the painting
3. editing the photo
4. sticking the photo online
5. adding a commentary
6. interacting with any commentators

Knowing how to photograph art is absolutely crucial. Steps 4, 5 and 6 are analogous to exhibiting a painting in an art show.

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Paint itself is such an excellent expressive medium that its hard to find anything to replace it, though I have tried, because paint is messy and paintings take a lot of space. I don't sell enough work so the paintings pile up and after 20 years take up considerable space.

Painting over old canvases is one solution but there always comes a point where the painting you've got is so good ti shouldn't be painted over- it's too painful

I have been experimenting with wires and paper cutouts to make art that has an inbuilt impermanence, to avoid the pain of having to destroy something you love. But, as yet, they have proven unsatisfactory. The wire sculptures remain wore, the cutouts are too obviously paper- these media don't transport me in the way paint does.

In Canada, Collaboration and Wire Sculptures

I've abandoned a collaboration with a Canadian, where she was supposed to provide me with photos, which I'd use as a basis of stories. She wasn't really pulling her weight and her photos weren't really good enough. I'd entertained a sort of fantasy that I might be able show her rapidly how to produce better images, but that notion turned out to be false. Ergo, it was futile to continue.

There are a couple of the stories here- there were supposed to be eight.

This is often the way with collaborations- people enter them without really thinking about whether they are really committed or not, and it turns out to be a waste of time.

I think the appeal of collaborations is that it offers a relief from the fairly lonely business of making things, and you can believe that one person at least- your collaborator- is eager to see what you come up with. There is also the idea that the collaborator brings skills that you don't have to the table.

But in fact it is rarely like that- often one or other party doesn't deliver the goods, or is only really interested in the collaboration as a vanity project. And in my case, I am a much better photographer, so depending on her was a waste of energy,.

In that respect the experience was good, in that it has helped me see that I know an awful lot more than I realised.

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It is great fun making these little desk-top sculptures, balancing the bits of wire and photographing them. The act of balancing things is enormously pleasurable. I wonder why?

Wire world

Working with wire to make simple sculptures, like drawing in air.

Initially I'd intended these wire structures as armatures for mobiles, but having started playing with the wire it seemed more satisfying to keep them clean and simple- the wire itself is so lively and expressive.

Slow week

It has been a doleful week. My lack of energy worsened by the coldness of this apartment which seems to have the effect of immobilising me close to our one, tiny bar heater: flats in Southern Brazil don't often have heating, even though it's always quite coold in the winter.

Anyway, with a view to shifting my conception of what art production is onto the digital age, I cleared out old photo files from the computer. I installed the counters (below)- though for some reason I do not really trust them. And I continued work on the mobiles, cutting out more shapes and considering better how to use them- including a wider varierty of shapes and experimenting with flash, and different coloured filters.

The thing is not to lose the naive, folk art feel of the cutouts in the course of photographing them. If the photograph is too highly manipulated this gets lost and the result is like an overproduced live recording of a performance.

You can see the work so far, here-

http://www.flickr.com/photos/28509471@N05/sets/72157621606358902/