Urns...?

This was an experiment in combining transfers with illustration. One of the artists I looked at for my paper was Grayson Perry. I really liked the way he combined illustration and photos onto ceramic vases. It got me thinking about urns since I have been spreading my moms ashes and working with themes of death and mortality. I figure and urn would be a good platform for bringing all these things together. The only problem is that I don't really know much about ceramic or how to make an urn. hmm...

From the other side

I made a series of transfers from photos of places where I've spread my mother's ashes. The image is reverse from what I saw and photographed because it's supposed to be from her view on the other side. The images are distressed and worn to emphasize time and mortality.

Banshee Lake

Our teacher told us about this lake where supposedly there was a banshee sighting 30 years ago. So of course we had to go check it out. To get there you had to walk further and further into the country away from town and the roads got progressively smaller and rugged. When we got there it was really still and quiet. Like, too still. Then we heard this noise and turned to see a horse staring at us. A moment later another appeared and ran up to us. It was really odd. Almost as if they were trying to protect us from going any further. On the way back to the house, we stopped in a graveyard and played around with long exposures and light painting. Well, Ben did. I just watched and took a couple photos on my phone using me flashlight to illuminate a headstone.

More with glass

I started playing around with the seaglass today since the sun came out. I like the idea of light shining through it so i put some of the glass on a sheet of plexiglass and held it up to the sky and photographed it from below. It was kind of hard to see what i was doing though with the sun shinning in my eye. So then I tried scanning some using the film setting so that light would shine through. Those came out pretty cool but I was limited to the shape and size of the scanner window. I had more leeway with the ceramic pieces cause I could scan them as normal, but I kept them in roughly the same size and shape as the glass one.

Sea Glass

Finally! I've found what I've been searching for on the beach just about everyday since I've been here. Sea glass. Proper sea glass that's been polished smooth. I didn't realize the full significance of it to me until I found. You see, it's the perfect metaphor. When one experiences tragedy, it's like a glass is shattered into pieces and thrown in the sea. Then it's pounded by waves and sand and rocks like the cycles of grief, sadness, anger and frustration. Eventually, pieces wash up on the shore and the edges are no longer sharp and painful. They've been worn down and smoothed. But it's still in pieces. You're never really the same again. It just hurts less.
So far the glass that I've found on the beach hadn't been very worn down. Most of it looked like it had just been broken. But we had some rough wind and weather the last couple of days so that must have drudged up some good glass. Another metaphor...nuggets of awesome appearing after troubling times.
I really want to try to do something with these but I'm not sure what. I also found some cool pieces of ceramic with print on them.

Catharsis

The past couple days I've spent some time painting 4 squares. (really wish I brought my acrylic paints from home) I originally started them as a ground to put type and maybe a transfer of some of the photos i've been taking. But then they started to become their own little abstract expressionistic paintings. the scribble texture is reminiscent of Celtic knot-work, but it could also serve as a metaphor for my convoluted thought patterns.

I had the opportunity to talk to the dean of the school, Tim Jones, about this work and after some discussion it came out that the exploritive art process I go through is a way of working through my emotional issues including dealing with the loss of my mother. He suggested I take a big piece of paper and go to town with marks and scribbles. So I did. And it felt good. But the end result isn't necessarily what I want to be known as my body of work. I think it's something I'll continue as an therapeutic exercise to help me loosen up and get out some aggression. But I probably won't exhibit any of it...unless something amazing does come out of it. They're more about the process than the end result anyway. They also look better as photographs then in person for some reason.

Tim also showed me another creative cycle map to help me through the process.

Bambi's Revenge

We had an assignment to subvert a story or myth from our childhood. I had a hard time thinking of one until a couple nights before it was due. Out of nowhere I had the idea to do Bambi. I guess I can kind of relate to Bambi's loss of his mother. Mine wasn't shot by hunters but she was taken from me far sooner than she should have been. And I've felt a mixture of sadness and rage since her death and sometimes I wish I could declare war on cancer. So I guess that's where I got this idea of cute forest animals acting out in violence. It's a nice little ironic twist. I had a lot of fun drawing it. It would make a pretty fun project to do a whole coloring book of subverted Disney tales. Not sure if Disney would sue me for something like that though...probably.

Mono-fail

Well....I tried monoprinting but i didn't really have the right ink or equipment to make it work properly. So I ended up doing some acrylic painting. I found some squares of mdf board to do four small paintings. I'm going to try combining text with them as i mentioned a couple posts ago. I have 2 started already. One is going to have "I see Heaven in every sunset." I'm not sure what the others will be just yet but most likely more 6 word stories. I also might combine transfers with it as well.

Monoprint

I kinda realized today that I haven't really being doing much work that is responding to the landscape. I'm photographing it, and staring at it in awe, but I haven't really been creating anything that takes it a step beyond and connects me to the land. So I had an idea of using kelp and other things from the sea to make monoprints. I haven't really done monoprints before so it'll be a bit of an experiment...but that's how I roll anyway. From there I might work on top of the print adding text or photo transfer. I guess we'll see how the monoprints turn out. More on this later.

Ideas Brewing

The past couple days I've been coming up with a couple different projects. First of all, I am going to continue spreading my mom's ashes and making a documentation of it. Not sure how I'll present it as an art piece or even if i'll present it. I think it's just an important thing for me to do.

The sunsets are part of my search for a connection to Heaven and my mom. I'm trying to photograph the sunset each night at around the same time (between 9 and 10:30pm) but i've missed some nights and not every night is a worthy sun set. I'm not entirely sure what form the final presentation will take just yet.

With this search for Heaven I had an idea about interview people, possibly kids, asking what they think Heaven is or what it looks like. It could be an interesting social video project. And the next in that series would be an investigation into what is a "family." And questioning/challenging the traditional ideals. It would also be a way of trying to find peace and finding a way to deal with the disruption within my own family.

But on a more lighter note. I want to continue with 6 word stories as funny little truisms. This is a more immediate project that I can work on starting here and finishing back home. At the moment I'm thinking of things being very text based so looking at artists like Jenny Holzer, Ed Ruscha...I even like the use of text from one of the artists we saw today in at the Galway Arts Centre, Stephen Brandes. This also gives me a chance to exercise my humor so i'm not getting too depressed with thoughts of death and afterlife.
Another funny project is my flow chart/concept map on the creative process. It was suggested to me that I could make other concept maps for the other problems that I've been working through.


I've also been starting to think about my artist statement. Most of my work since I've started school could fall under the topic of lost & found, in various contexts of meaning. This could still be applied to the ideas i'm working on now. Being lost, experiencing lost. Searching, trying to find....myself, my path, my mom, etc. This may lead me to using Alice in Wonderland for my altered myth/story project for the space and place art history class. Possibility. What other stories involve being lost? Wizard of Oz?
more on this later.

Home is where my Mother is.

Another 6 word story and part of our mapping assignment for our art history class. I've begun to map the places that I've spread my mother's ashes, including places here in Ireland. It's become a therapeutic project. I'm reconnecting her to the land and sea in places significant to her as well as myself. Back home we still have ashes at the house and some buried in the cemetery of our church next to her father. We spread ashes down in Maryland near the house her parents had and in the bay she loved sailing in. These are places I have loved as well and are just as much a part of my childhood. And now spreading the ashes in Ireland is important as I told her I would take her with me on this journey. She loved visiting me when I went to Scotland and she wished she was able to come to Ireland...and in this way I have brought her here...though not the most ideal situation. But in various spots of beauty and peace, I've sprinkled a small bit of ashes, seasoning the land with her spirit. And I feel like I'm giving a piece of myself as well and connecting us both with the land and sea.

Sunset Ballyvaughan, Irleand July 5th, 2011 9:20-10:10pm

I see heaven in every sunset.

Ballyvaughan, Ireland June 26th, 2011 10pm(ish?)

Ballyvaughan, Ireland June 27th, 2011 9:49-9:57

Ballyvaughan, Ireland June 28th, 2011 8:53-9:16pm

Aran Islands (Inishmore), Ireland July 2nd, 2011 9:19-9:30pm

Ashes to ashes...

Even though I'm a very humorous lass, there is a strong serious side to me. There's still a lot of emotion and pain in dealing with my mother's passing that I need to find ways of expressing. If I'm going to do any serious work it should involve her in some way. After our trip to the Aran Islands, I think I may have some ideas of how to do this.

First of all, let me say that the land and seascapes on the Island are so freaking amazingly beautiful that it almost makes me feel inadequate as an artist cause I could never create anything of such grandiose beauty. But that's silly cause of course I can't compete with nature. Seriously though, at every turn there was something amazing to see. The cliffs facing the sea made me feel like I was at the edge of the world and the sky seemed so infinite. Not to mention the light here is just magical, especially this time of year cause the sun doesn't set till around 10pm. And luckily we've been blessed with pretty nice weather so far.

But back to my mom. She would have loved the island, as she would have loved the Burren and the rest of Ireland. She was really excited for me that I was coming here for study abroad and sad that she wouldn't be able to come with me. But I told here that no matter what she would still be me. I carry her in my thoughts and heart everyday and will so until the day I die. But I also brought her physically here in the form of her ashes. As a way of returning her to the earth, places she love and would love to be I've begun to spread some of her ashes. We already buried some near my grandfather and spread some in the Chesapeake Bay. I brought her to the Aran Islands and spread some of her near the old light house on top of the hill and in a peaceful inlet (that we're just gonna say is the seal colony even though it was the next inlet over). I'm planning to spread some more of her around the Burren and maybe if I end up other places, like Fanore Beach. One of our assignments to make a conceptual map that connects us to the landscape so I'm going to map out the places I've spread her ashes. Not entirely sure what form this map will take just yet.
Branching out from this mapping idea and the 6 word sentences, I want to come up with a series of six word stories involving the feelings I have about my mom, her death, heaven, missing her, etc. Again, I'm not sure what form this will take but I kind of like the idea of glass etchings, if I can get the stuff to do etchings. I could also try continuing with the transfers. Here are a couple of the six word stories that I've thought of so far:
I see heaven in every sunset.
Tired, cranky and miss my mommy.
Always with me in my heart.
I returned you to the sea.

I feel good about these ideas. I think it will be therapeutic and give me a direction with purpose.

But now for some photos of amazingness. They still don't do it justice though.

Cheese

It's been said before and once again confirmed that humor is one of my best attributes and that I should embrace it more in my artwork. So that's what I'm going to try to do. I guess I've been shying away from it in my grad work because I afraid of it not being sophisticated enough. But I think it's just a matter of finding the way of presenting it so that in the humor there's still an element of fine art. This is another one of my hang ups. I think my background in design might be a key in helping me figure this out. More on this later.

A Series of Six Word Stories

One of our assignments from our studio instructor was to come up with 3 six word stories. This is what I came up with....

The answer is always "more cheese."

(2part story)
It's not how well you draw...
...It's how well you can conceptualize bullshit.

Where would we be without Google.

Expanding on the last two posts...

Collection. I went for a walk along the coast and picked up pieces of glass and ceramic that had been washed ashore. I'm a little disappointed that the glass isn't very polished from the sea but there are still some interesting pieces. Not really sure what will come it it besides just a collection.

Trans. I started with the prefix to see what I could get out of it. I was building off the transfer ideas I've done before and them being transparent or translucent. I was trying to think of some other words that connect with what i'm doing and going through, transformation-changes in my life and studio practice, transatlantic-coming across the pond to Ireland, etc.
So I've tried to apply that to my work here. So far it's been really frustrating. I found some large chunks of glass from probably a window and wanted to transfer some of the photos i've been taking since I got here. This proved a bit difficult because the glass transfer process is a bit more complicated than just transferring to canvas. Heat is an important factor. I used my hair dryer. But even still, the removal process needs to be somewhat delicate as the acrylic medium can peal right off the glass very easily. I did manage to have some success but now I'm facing my common issue of "now what?"

glass transfers

transfer to paper works great

attempting acrylic skin from acetate