Evaluation
Throughout this brief I have revised my rationale a number of times, mainly due to constantly changing my mind about what it was I actually wanted to be doing. Initially I had a number of live client briefs arranged, and wanted to work in a way that allowed me to get one completed every couple of weeks to produce a body of work displaying a variety of my design and Illustration skills. However, due to my bad time management and a lack of motivation in certain areas (which ended up proving to me exactly what it is I don’t want to be doing) I didn’t follow my work plan through in the way I had anticipated.
The first client brief I did was the Illustration for Leeds Roller Dolls. After getting in contact with one of the coordinators of the team and linking them to an online portfolio of previous work I set up, they asked me to provide them with a series of Illustrations that could be used in conjunction with any text and titles they wanted to add. I spent a few weeks sending them examples of work and emailing back and forth, making any adjustments they wanted to my images. However, when it came close to the deadline they had provided me with I stopped hearing back from them and when I did hear back, it was last minute to say they had gone with another artist’s work. I understand this can happen when working for unreliable clients, but I feel this knocked me back early on in the project and made me lose a lot of confidence in my work. Originally I had planned to take the brief further by screen printing a couple of the images even once I had completed the work for the team, but I scrapped this and decided to move on to something else.
After this I decided I didn’t want to work on client briefs just yet, and so screen printed a couple of Illustrations for Paul Price to sell at a craft fair in the Hifi club in the city centre. I found myself enjoying something again, and realised it’s because it was a more relaxed, open brief and I didn’t have to compromise my style and typical gruesome themes. I used the subject of odd ingredients and unusual food as a theme (as this also related to a photo shoot I had recently modelled for and helped come with the idea, for a third year Viscom student). However the fair they were to be sold it had a very poor turn out due to lack of advertising and a high entry fee, so it was closed early. This was disappointing as it would have been a good opportunity to see an audience react to my work, and find out how many I could sell.
Following this, I had a crit with Graham and he commented on how he would like to see one of my Illustrations to come to life as a 3D object. This made me consider the idea of trying my hand at sculpture and casting again, as I used to enjoy being more hands on with my work. I spoke to Oliver Frend in third year as I had seen his sculpture work before, and he advised me to take a sketch of the turkey stuffed with fingers I planned to make down to the tutors in the 3D room and ask them for help. Andy and Dom were both very helpful with advising me on the possible ways of casting and constructing my sculpture, and they allowed me to get on with it myself in as many ways that I could, lending a hand along the way. I thoroughly enjoyed the learning process of how to cast properly, despite having a number of things go wrong, and felt like I was learning some useful skills in an area I would possibly want to explore going in to in the future; prosthetics and prop making. An important part on completion of my turkey sculpture would have been to exhibit it and have some form of feedback to note down. However, as the deadline became close I had to accept that it wasn’t realistic to expect to have it finished and on display in time. So, rather than rush it I carried on with the various sculpting processes and have decided that I will carry on with this as a personal project over the summer, and plan to exhibit my sculpture in July/August time in Brighton. The exhibition will be with 3 other art student friends, studying at various colleges around the country. We have found a couple of possible locations, one of which is an independent pub called the Hobgoblin in Brighton town centre that attracts a largely art student based crowd. However, the feedback I have received is that of Dom and Andy, the 3D technicians. They have expressed how impressed they are with my final sculpture, and that I’ve been learning and putting in to practice techniques usually only mastered in third year, which is a positive reaction.
One of the main things these briefs have taught me is that I need to build up more confidence in my work and in my ideas. I also need to start recording ideas in sketchbook form, as I always let me myself down when it comes to putting ideas in to action. Time management has also been a big problem for me, as I have dedicated four days a week to a part-time job this term and I have noticed the negative effect it has had on my work. That is something I need to reconsider when I start the third year of this course. One of the positives that have come from this brief is that I have re-discovered a love for sculpture and casting that had previously been forgotten. I plan to take me gruesome food sculpture project on in to third year, and hope to improve my skills to a much higher level.
The first client brief I did was the Illustration for Leeds Roller Dolls. After getting in contact with one of the coordinators of the team and linking them to an online portfolio of previous work I set up, they asked me to provide them with a series of Illustrations that could be used in conjunction with any text and titles they wanted to add. I spent a few weeks sending them examples of work and emailing back and forth, making any adjustments they wanted to my images. However, when it came close to the deadline they had provided me with I stopped hearing back from them and when I did hear back, it was last minute to say they had gone with another artist’s work. I understand this can happen when working for unreliable clients, but I feel this knocked me back early on in the project and made me lose a lot of confidence in my work. Originally I had planned to take the brief further by screen printing a couple of the images even once I had completed the work for the team, but I scrapped this and decided to move on to something else.
After this I decided I didn’t want to work on client briefs just yet, and so screen printed a couple of Illustrations for Paul Price to sell at a craft fair in the Hifi club in the city centre. I found myself enjoying something again, and realised it’s because it was a more relaxed, open brief and I didn’t have to compromise my style and typical gruesome themes. I used the subject of odd ingredients and unusual food as a theme (as this also related to a photo shoot I had recently modelled for and helped come with the idea, for a third year Viscom student). However the fair they were to be sold it had a very poor turn out due to lack of advertising and a high entry fee, so it was closed early. This was disappointing as it would have been a good opportunity to see an audience react to my work, and find out how many I could sell.
Following this, I had a crit with Graham and he commented on how he would like to see one of my Illustrations to come to life as a 3D object. This made me consider the idea of trying my hand at sculpture and casting again, as I used to enjoy being more hands on with my work. I spoke to Oliver Frend in third year as I had seen his sculpture work before, and he advised me to take a sketch of the turkey stuffed with fingers I planned to make down to the tutors in the 3D room and ask them for help. Andy and Dom were both very helpful with advising me on the possible ways of casting and constructing my sculpture, and they allowed me to get on with it myself in as many ways that I could, lending a hand along the way. I thoroughly enjoyed the learning process of how to cast properly, despite having a number of things go wrong, and felt like I was learning some useful skills in an area I would possibly want to explore going in to in the future; prosthetics and prop making. An important part on completion of my turkey sculpture would have been to exhibit it and have some form of feedback to note down. However, as the deadline became close I had to accept that it wasn’t realistic to expect to have it finished and on display in time. So, rather than rush it I carried on with the various sculpting processes and have decided that I will carry on with this as a personal project over the summer, and plan to exhibit my sculpture in July/August time in Brighton. The exhibition will be with 3 other art student friends, studying at various colleges around the country. We have found a couple of possible locations, one of which is an independent pub called the Hobgoblin in Brighton town centre that attracts a largely art student based crowd. However, the feedback I have received is that of Dom and Andy, the 3D technicians. They have expressed how impressed they are with my final sculpture, and that I’ve been learning and putting in to practice techniques usually only mastered in third year, which is a positive reaction.
One of the main things these briefs have taught me is that I need to build up more confidence in my work and in my ideas. I also need to start recording ideas in sketchbook form, as I always let me myself down when it comes to putting ideas in to action. Time management has also been a big problem for me, as I have dedicated four days a week to a part-time job this term and I have noticed the negative effect it has had on my work. That is something I need to reconsider when I start the third year of this course. One of the positives that have come from this brief is that I have re-discovered a love for sculpture and casting that had previously been forgotten. I plan to take me gruesome food sculpture project on in to third year, and hope to improve my skills to a much higher level.
Exhibition in Brighton
In August, Myself and 3 friends from London who are all studying at various art colleges around the country, are going to put on an exhibition. There are a couple of venues in Brighton which are a possibility, one of which is a pub called the Hobgoblin. It often attracts art students and would be a good place to publicly exhibit a mixture of sculpture, painting, illustration and moving image work. I plan to exhibit my turkey and a series of illustrations as part of this.
Filling the turkey with wax
Once I had the open cavity, I placed a thin line of clay around the base on the turkey and fixed it on to some white board. This was so there was a base to hold the red wax in that I was going to fill it with, and make it easily movable when transferring in to the metal plate I plan on exhibiting it on. Because there was a lot of space to bulk out in the turkey, I tilted it on it's side and poured large amounts of wax in every 20 minutes, to allow each one to cool. I also screwed up some scrap paper to put in and then cover in wax, to fill more space. Once I got to the crucial part of filling the front section with wax (the one that will be visible with the fingers coming out of it) I decided to leave it until tomorrow. This is because as I'd seen the rest of the red wax cooling, I realised the shade was far too bright to bed blood-like. In the morning I am going to buy some more crayons with deeper shades of red to add.
(colour testing various mixes of wax colour)
(colour testing various mixes of wax colour)
Creating cavity in the turkey
One of the main reasons I chose to cast the turkey in wax is because it would be easier to removed the back section of it when it came to filling it and placing the fingers in.
I tried slicing in to it using a scalpel and then using a saw to hack away at it, but this was a little too harsh on the wax and didn't want to risk slicing off the wrong bits. so, I got a small device from one of the casting technicians that gives off a constant flame that I used to keep heating the scalpel and other various metal tools, making it a lot easier to slice through the wax. The other more rounded tools were good to remove any bits of plaster and silicone that had got wedged in the wax, as I could use them to scrape them off then heat it up and blend over the blemished surface.
I tried slicing in to it using a scalpel and then using a saw to hack away at it, but this was a little too harsh on the wax and didn't want to risk slicing off the wrong bits. so, I got a small device from one of the casting technicians that gives off a constant flame that I used to keep heating the scalpel and other various metal tools, making it a lot easier to slice through the wax. The other more rounded tools were good to remove any bits of plaster and silicone that had got wedged in the wax, as I could use them to scrape them off then heat it up and blend over the blemished surface.
New coloured cast
After the failure of my previous wax and latex turkey cast, I decided to leave the latex skin out and see if a simple wax cast would be more successful. I also went and bought a load of wax crayons, which happen to work just a well as proper wax colourants, and mix a much warmer, brown wax colour. I started by mixing a light colour in one of the smaller wax melting pots, so it would be just enough for an all over thin layer of colour to swill around the mold.
After This layer has been poured in and cooled a little, I mixed a deeper shade of brown, which I used the heat gun to melt areas of the already existing wax layer in areas I wanted to blend with the darker shade. I then used the darker wax to pour in another couple of layers, followed by a layer or two of clear wax, just to thicken it up.
I left the layers of wax overnight to cool and dry properly. When I came back in this morning and removed the jacket and silicone carefully, I was very pleased with the result. I knew that it would be impossible to make a completely realistic looking cooked turkey, especially considering I started with very little knowledge in the various casting processes, but it looks a hell of a lot more desirable than my last one.
After This layer has been poured in and cooled a little, I mixed a deeper shade of brown, which I used the heat gun to melt areas of the already existing wax layer in areas I wanted to blend with the darker shade. I then used the darker wax to pour in another couple of layers, followed by a layer or two of clear wax, just to thicken it up.
I left the layers of wax overnight to cool and dry properly. When I came back in this morning and removed the jacket and silicone carefully, I was very pleased with the result. I knew that it would be impossible to make a completely realistic looking cooked turkey, especially considering I started with very little knowledge in the various casting processes, but it looks a hell of a lot more desirable than my last one.
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