Woman of Steel
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InspirationJohn chamberlain“I think of my art materials not as junk but as garbage. Manure, actually; it goes from being the waste material of one being to the life-source of another.” - John Chamberlain
I was inspired by John Chamberlain instantly due to the abstract aspect of his pieces as well as the colors. Critics often thought that Chamberlain's aim was to reflect American consumption, but this was not true however. Chamberlain chose to use waste materials because they were cheap and he enjoyed collecting, it made me want to collect something that was generally made of cheap material and turn into something great. I was also intrigued by Chamberlains aesthetic as an artist. He loved to challenge himself as well as challenge tradition, he strove to make something out of the ordinary which is exactly what my intentions were.
Charles RayI loved the aspect of the bending of metal and it intrigued me, I began to look into other artists to perhaps draw more ideas from and I stumbled upon Charles Ray who is a sculptor who portrays people and objects in unexpected ways. I enjoyed his pieces because they included the metal aspect that I instantly loved, but also had a definite meaning to them, they were not abstract like John Chamberlain's pieces.
Connecting back to African ArtI had the idea to make a fertility figure which was made to stand for fertility in women and to promote fertility (which is something I drew from Charles Ray and his unexpected figures). There typically were no faces on these figures due to them being made 26,000-21,000 years ago which means that the sculptures did not have mirrors in order to even get a glimpse of themselves. The childbearing or fertility aspects of the bodies were also always accentuated and enlarged in order to place emphasis on the fact that the pieces were made to promote fertility.
After figuring out that I wanted to do sculpture, I searched online for African sculpture and came across an artist named Al Farrow. I instantly fell in love with the shapes of his figures, especially the elongated legs. The piece with the wire around it really caught my attention and the idea to create an entire form made of wire came about.
Ideas
Since the piece assigned was meant to be an ephemera piece and my piece was not something that could disappear or dispose of itself, my ephemera aspect would be the photos that I take it in since the piece would only be in that place for a short period of time which is the point of an ephemera piece. Below is a list of places that I could use to set the tone of the entire piece:
MeaningWomen are meant to be soft because of their roles as mothers, they are nurturers, caregivers, housekeepers, etc. They have all of these roles to take care of others throughout their lifetimes. Through all of the care that they give and the things that they deal with, it comes along with hard situations where women have to be strong for themselves and even for the ones that they love while putting their wants and needs on the back burner. Women often take a backseat to their own lives because the wants and needs of those that they love are sometimes more important to them. Women are meant to be strong, but delicate at the same time whereas men can be strong all the time and not have to care about other people. What if the same were true for women? What if women got to follow their own dreams regardless of what others said and didn't have to worry about the thoughts, feelings, and opinions of others? Women wouldn't be as strong as they have to be today. I chose to portray the strength of women, who if you asked me are a million times stronger than the men who control the world around them.
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SketchesI began to sketch with African elements such as exaggerated qualities that were known to be shown in fertility figures. I knew that I wanted the shine on the outside to represent flawlessness that the African sculpture contains.
My sketches contain aspects of African figures which is what I essentially wanted my whole piece to resemble. I played with line in order to create such as the nipples. By experimenting in my sketches, it got me thinking about how I would manipulate the wire to create the figure and all aspects of it that I wanted.
MaterialsI used the steel wire to shape the figure, I used 16 and 14 gauge wire to build the initial form because it was a thicker wire. As I continued to wrap and build form, I used an 18 gauge wire as well as a 22 gauge wire because they were thinner and manipulated more easily. I used the barbie doll as a reference in order to have something to look at while shaping the form.
Making the PieceI struggled with getting started so I started to look up how to make a form out of wire on YouTube. I found these videos which consist of making a basic figure but not actually starting the figure. I then found the other two videos which were patterns, I felt these to be useful in creating different parts of the form. By using the patterns I could add dimension as well as texture and a more interesting aspect as a whole.
Unable to figure out exactly how to start the form, I simply started. I made basic 2-D forms out of the wire and figured that I could just build up the form in order to make it 3-D by wrapping wire around the 2-D form strategically. PhotographingI had a few ideas as to where to photograph the piece and how I was going to do so. I had to consider how the surroundings of my piece when I photograph it because it could change the overall meaning and the places that I chose all had different effects. Each background and object gave my piece a new meaning and that was my intention. Photographing the piece in different ways allowed me to play around with meaning and ultimately find new meanings for the piece. .
ReflectionWhen reflecting back on my piece as a whole, I realized that I was really hard on myself for no apparent reason. I was really frustrated that I couldn't get the proportion right on my piece but I realized soon after that the proportion wasn't supposed to be perfect. Fertility figures are meant to be disproportionate and I was failing to realize that at first. I also could've gotten the wire around the form in different areas to be tighter and more pressed to the body in order to make the piece look more clean.
Some things that I did well on include the overall inspiration and how my inspiration affected my meaning. I believe that the meaning of my piece was very strong which made my piece be more than a pile of bent wire. I also feel that I did well in photographing my piece with the objects/scene that I chose to place my figure in. Overall, I feel that I was successful in creating a mixed media, ephemera piece with a deep meaning, made even deeper with the use of photography, despite a few struggles that I had while creating it. |