Work in a week! and the Crit
During the first two weeks of studio we were assigned the task to take the content from our first discussion (with our selected lectures) and develop work that will have a semi formal crit, the following week. through out this time I'd done some photographic experiments found an interest with Rooibos tea and clay.
the following includes Lab experiments with rooibos tea clay from the lab that I have recycled (the offcuts of prior students projects works)
this is the mixed clay before recycling. All the clay I used came from the wet lab and combines clay form several locations in New Zealand and around the world.
After this photograph I continued to crushing the clay into powder with a mortar and pestle
Here I separated the two colours of clay, in case the tea affected them differently.
this was the process of me recycling the crushed clay. which i realised operated on its own in a very interesting way. It Gave A strong earthy tea smell, which was expected.
It then occurred to me how significant the process is to the project. watching the tea seep into the dried clay operated as an artwork itself, watching two earth from different spaces combine into one.
This is kneaded clay then rolled out, these small case studies where done to see how the integrity of the clay held up with leaves in it, and if the clay was affected in any other way.
Here I started to form pieces, with my book as a base just too experimented with shaping the clay in various way. Last year my favourite pieces was one that flopped in the kiln and i thought it changed the clay from being a type of canvas to an object itself.
The crit
For the Crit I decided to present two main objects. The first being the pool of clay and tea, I was really interested in seeing how it operated under "crit" circumstances and created such a strong smell the made the tea component unmissable. the second being the raw clay pieces residing on the chair . I want the work to be hyper aware of its surroundings, I don't like pretending that studio isn't there (some don't mind and thats ok, I just don't) and it amazing history. In the space i was exhibiting in, there was a pile up of older chairs and desks that seemed unused, and this chair stuck out. It looked so wise, all the experiences it went through were unmissable. once I installed the clay pieces, it looks like continents slipping off the chair, and strangely this very natural and industrial object opened up a lot of ideas in my mind.
the clay seemed so temporal, and impermanent, and is that not me of a student. I carry so much weight of history and identity into this space. But I'm just another body sitting one another chair that those like me sat before. I carry my hold world onto that chair, but its there and then it gone. without the chair flinching a muscle.
feedback form poorly scribbled notes
- The holes in the clay are like Holes in memory. Try other work with other opportunity. what happens when the chair is not there, and its a free standing structure.
- Theres a sense of sliding. that this figure is moving off the chair.
- brings the figure in a slip-age motion
- resembles fat
- theres a power body reference
- chair grounds and figures the clay, less abstract maybe
- the clay is like bone and ash
- tea is like blood
- theres a very bodily aspect to the install
-the blue chair
- its a very retro blue and is very institutional
- A body that produced the chair.
- Makes you think about the body's who do the labour of creating these chairs
- the clay is precarious
- look into artists Cameroon rund. produced in prisons.
- Artist - first nation - Patricia parimong her process might have resonance to the project.
- the work reminds of body fluid and embraces the frantic nature.
- theres a visceral reference
- what are the dynamics that exist between the two pieces? something to think about
- the smell triggers a very bodily experience and is very important to the work
- what about having an abundance of the tea?
- how is it commercially produced?
- when was the first production of tea?
- what are the logistics of time in relation to the tea and the clay
- temporal process
- labour
- what happens when the clay is destabilised?
- Artists richard wentworth
- With the chair gone is the structure displaced?