Wedding Gift - Now Fired

Following on from my preceding post showing the pre-firing images (Another Wedding Gift - 14 December) here are some images of a commissioned wedding gift, taken from different angles and in different positions. The symbolic and significant elements include gestures of reaching towards each other and of finding togetherness whilst remaining individual, embracing, and the inner space, a greater ratio (relative to previously) of material mass to non-material mass, i.e. absence of clay (which was a key component of the brief). The piece measures approx. 50cm x 45cm x 30cm. Again, purposely not fixed permanently onto a base - i.e. no hole drilled in the bottom, piercing the form to insert a fixing to set the piece onto the base - so the piece can be positioned in a variety of ways (see post dated 04/01 'A Hanging Experiment'):

Another Wedding Gift

Some pre-firing images of another commissioned wedding gift:

The Spheres - Phase 2

Following on from the recap in the previous post, it's time to begin to log the progression of the second phase of the Spheres. 
Starting with some images; first the two new spheres separately and then introduced into the rest of the group.
The spheres have simply been placed in a formation to illustrate the new additions and the overall group, not with a purpose consciously to explore the 'placing in formation'; that will come later.

Two of the larger white spheres from phase 1 have left the group and gone their separate ways, having been picked out by two friends visiting, one more than a year ago and the other back in May. We had been talking in my studio about the whole project and they wanted to be involved in the 'social sculpture'. They took away the sphere they felt a particular connection with, and I will be asking them in the near future if they might be prepared/ready to relate something of their sphere's life-story. To be logged in a subsequent post ...

Just a Recap to Herald in the Second Phase of the Spheres

Dating back to 2012, the three posts that first set out my thinking behind the Spheres (I've left out most of the images here; to view those, click on the dates in the blog Archive list):

17 August 2012 (An Initial Glimpse ...)...into some of the things I've been working on these past few months:

straddling ceramics and sculpture, i.e. using the techniques used in ceramics to make sculpture

exploring Fragility:

Before firing, with the end of the final coil still intact

Post firing, with the end of the final coil broken 

Working with very fragile spherical forms, which will - and do - incur some damage during the making and firing, to reflect my inquiry into the subject of the fragility of life. The plan at the moment is to make a large number of these of various sizes, to form an installation ultimately. Each sphere represents a life and is made up of one continuous coil (usually in ceramics the coils in hand-built forms are cut to size and the individual coils are then superimposed, forming a stack rather than a spiral). The coil spirals in repetitive circles/cycles - expansion and contraction - reflecting the cycle of life; and the breakages reflecting the fragility of life.

I really enjoy the meditative nature of this work and am beginning to perceive this as a key element in what I do.

I joined a ceramics studio for a few months this spring/summer (hence, in the previous post, the images from the Ceramics Department at the V&A, which I visited on several occasions during that time) to explore the techniques used by ceramicists - and indulge my love of clay - with a view to using these in my sculpture work.
Very early on I began to want to leave the making process visible, not smoothing the coils out but showing how the object is made. 

28 September 2012 (A Closer Look at the 'Fragility' Spheres) My post of 17 August 2012 gave 'An Initial Glimpse' into the work I've been doing on the 'Fragility' spheres.
The first four spheres have test-fired well so I now feel the time is right to continue the process. I have grouped the four spheres together and the plan is to make several more and make an installation. All the spheres will be either white or black or a combination of the two. They will be of varying sizes. 
My primary concern is to let the material and the process speak and for me to be simply there as an aid:
- making the process visible. I use the coiling technique which is a technique used in ceramics, but ceramicists tend to smooth out the coils; I want the process to remain visible. The spheres are made up of one continuous coil spiralling upwards - again, normally ceramicists use a process  of cutting the coils to size and then placing one coil on top of another: cut to size, place, cut to size, place, and so on. I want this spiralling of one coil to remain visible too;
- inviting imperfections - cracks, uneven textures, small fractures, etc. - to reflect 'fragility', but more importantly to leave visible the way in which the type of clay I'm using behaves;
- the sphere, the spiral, expansion and contraction, growth and decay, all of which are universal.

These spheres are originally inspired by my consciousness of the fragility of life. These thoughts coalesced with my discovering and enjoying the delicacy of this new clay I was using, a delicacy that infers fragility. 
I initially intended to make this 'theme' a prominent element in the presentation of this piece (this is what I have tended to do in the past), but it occurred to me as I woke this morning that this would make the presence of me as the artist too manifest. The spheres must speak for themselves; the viewer must be allowed to/invited to connect with these spheres in their own individual way. So I shall keep the 'philosophizing' to myself (unless otherwise invited, of course!). Making these spheres is a deeply meditative process though, a process I very much enjoy, so the thinking is very much an integral part of the work. 
My plans for exhibiting this piece are beginning to come together. I have always taken delight in the way objects/sculptures that are grouped together function very differently from one object/sculpture on its own. These - very quiet, peaceful - spheres speak so much louder when they're grouped together. 
As I have said before, I intend to make a large installation with these and then show them in a way that sits  more comfortably with how I feel art should be shown: the prime motive being not the usual commercial one but endeavouring to bring something new, a new exhibition experience to the viewer. I'm also examining the feasibility of the concept of not having these spheres for sale in the usual way, but inviting viewers to take one away as a memory of their experience of the show - the experience being what I want to stay with people rather than the buying of an object/a commodity. This would be one of the spheres that speaks to them most, with which they find a particular connection. 
The idea that a connection is then created between these people, invisible, existing at a non-physical level. This could be taken further, with some of these people coming together after a year or so to share with each other the 'further life' of their sphere - how they, friends, family have enjoyed it, incidents around it, etc. - and they could bring friends and family who might also like to have one of the spheres. (This would mean I would have been making more in the meantime.) And so the connection continues to grow in depth and in scope, and another kind of sculpture would be beginning to be created, one that functions at a human/social level.
I also like the idea that the spheres themselves are building a life of their own, separate from me directly. This, of course, is the case with all art objects, indeed with all objects, with everything physical on the planet: nothing remains exactly as it is, everything is constantly evolving; we're just not always conscious of that fact.

3 August 2012 ('These Associations' by Tino Seghal) I came away from the Tate that day totally uplifted by the energy that pulsated between the people there, the joy of human interaction. As an artist mostly working in isolation, I find the materials Seghal uses, i.e. people and time, hugely appealing. What better materials to use? Universal; archetypal.

Having said that, in relation to my own work, I haven't come from a dance background - Seghal studied both Dance and Political Economy - so my form of expression is very much grounded in the 'making'. I enjoy the physical making process, the building, the shaping ... (and the writing about). I just need to find a way to reconcile this desire to make with this other yearning, not to add to all that 'stuff' that's being produced nowadays.

And, 23 August 2014 (Something Beautiful Happened This Morning) also refers to the Spheres.

"What People See ..."

Doris Lessing writes in her preface to The Golden Notebook:
"... this novel continues to be, for its author, a most instructive experience. For instance. ... I can get, in one week, three letters about it, from three intelligent, well-informed, concerned people, ... ... one letter is entirely about the sex war, ... the writer (of the letter) has produced pages and pages all about nothing else, for she ... can't see anything else in the book.
The second is about politics, ... and he or she writes many pages about politics, and never mentions any other theme.
...
The third letter, ... is written by a man or a woman who can see nothing in it but the theme of mental illness.
But it is the same book. 
And naturally these incidents bring up again questions of what people see when they read a book, and why one person sees one pattern and nothing at all of another pattern, and how odd it is to have, as author, such a clear picture of a book, that is seen so very differently by its readers.
And from this kind of thought has emerged a new conclusion: which is that it is not only childish of a writer to want readers to see what he sees, to understand the shape and aim of a novel as he sees it - his wanting this means that he has not understood a most fundamental point. Which is that the book is alive and potent and fructifying and able to promote thought and discussion only when its plan and shape and intention are not understood, because that moment of seeing the shape and plan and intention is also the moment when there isn't anything more to be got out of it.
And when a book's pattern and the shape of its inner life is as plain to the reader as it is to the author - then perhaps it is time to throw the book aside, as having had its day, and start again on something new."

I find this question of 'why one person sees one pattern and nothing at all of another pattern' a fascinating one. I think one answer lies in that what people see in a book and, more applicably to this blog, in a work of art is defined by their own experiences; their own personal story, their past history, colours how they experience and perceive the present. 
Which means that the work of art is 'alive and potent and fructifying'.
And that is what excites me in my work: the object takes on a life and story of its own. The object becomes paramount once I have played my part in the first stage of its coming into existence. First there is the - all important - material, which I 'manipulate' (i.e. work by hand) over a period of time, which gives rise to/begets an object, which then continues its own journey without me, entering into contact with other people and constructing its own story.
I, the sculptor, am not the protagonist in the object's story; the object is.
In a world where objects now litter our lives and our living environments, where they are seemingly merely accumulated for the sake it, an object with importance, with its own significance and story, is a wondrous thing. The only kind I wish to have a part in.

I wrote about this in previous posts: 3/08/2012, 27/11/2012 and 18/10/2012.

The View Point Changes Everything

In a previous post (31 August last) about the white clay cylinders series, I talked about about the shift from 'my initial focus on the clay coil itself, on texture, on the outer shape the coil was forming, the size of the cylinder and its presence when grouped with the others', 'light and shade, placing in formation/groupings' to a consciousness of the inner space.
My latest firing produced another six beautiful cylinders, making a grouping of 13 in all. A sufficient number to start exploring the placing or grouping element of the series. 
First I've played around with changing the view point:
viewed at
1) normal eye level and lower down, just below normal eye level, the grouping is about
     a) outer shape

     b) texture

     c) light and shade

2) above normal eye level, the grouping becomes about
     a) inside space; the higher above eye level the more just about the inner space

I've also started to play around with changing the formation itself, the way the cylinders are arranged: 
1) in a random size-based arrangement, the grouping is about placement and negative space, i.e. the space in between the cylinders

2) in ascending/descending size-based order, the grouping becomes about height:

Further exploration to follow ... (what happens when they are placed in a circle or spiral formation; or in a linear formation => becomes about time [as per a previous post?, etc.)

I find great enjoyment, delight, in the power of repetition, in other words using the same basic element - here a white clay cylinder - and repeating it, you achieve something very different by the mere act of repetition/multiplication, something hugely powerful; and the more extensive the repetition, the more powerful the impact.
This is something the Japanese aesthetic understands and uses extremely well.

Another aspect of interest to me in this series is that these cylinders can be either decorative ceramics or ceramic sculpture/art. I want to explore the point at which a formation switches from being purely decorative to it being Art. By which I mean that if you place two or three cylinders together on a window-sill for instance, it can be a decorative object or feature in the home (decorative ceramics as opposed to functional/utilitarian ceramics, since these are certainly in no way 'vases' as they, purposely, are left open at the bottom). What are the changes that need to be made to make it an art installation? One single cylinder becomes art if/because the focus becomes directed towards the texture and light and shade, and similarly a grouping of a dozen. Further thoughts and discoveries to follow ...

Foldings - A Bit of an Explanation

Time, I feel, to explain my choice of the term 'Foldings'. The posts of 16/06/2014 entitled 'Foldings I' and 23/09/2014 'Foldings II) show images of such foldings.
  
As always, the OED is proving very useful. I'm listing the definitions that are applicable the Foldings series:

folding, vbl. n.1

 1. a.1.a The action of the vb. fold in its various senses; a doubling together, rolling up, etc.; the result of such action. spec. (see quot. 1874).

   b.1.b A clasping, an embrace. lit. and fig. Obs.

   c.1.c Geol. The doubling up of strata; the result of this.

2.2 

 a.2.a The point or region of folding; the bend or depression of a limb; a sinuous part or curve of a range of hills, the winding of a valley. Cf. fold n.3 1 c.

b.2.b A fold of a garment, etc., of flesh, skin, etc.; †a lock or plait of hair; †pl. the leaves of a folding-door; also, †a coil or wreath of flame.

Draft partial entry June 2002

 ▸ Molecular Biol. The process whereby a polypeptide or polynucleotide chain acquires a specific three-dimensional structure; the specific three-dimensional (secondary or tertiary) structure of a protein or nucleic acid molecule.

I'm including this last definition for 'the process whereby ... chain acquires' ==> it is a self-generated/generating process.

Foldings II

A second in the Foldings series; at 80cmx43cm it is about three times larger that the first (posted 16/06/2014). The aim is increasingly to allow the clay to show more of its inherent behaviour, in addition to continuing to play with the light and shade and the different gestures generated with the folding:

Another Addition

Another addition to the (horizontal) black and white form-finding series. This piece becoming relatively angular and raised on one side (2nd image) - the outer side when placed in formation. This means that as the gesture evolves across the three pieces, the mood shifts, the movement swells from gentle undulation in the black piece to a more vigorous flow in the third (white) piece. There are some interesting negative spaces, i.e. the spaces between the pieces, arising as well (best illustrated in the 5th and 7th [last] image): 

Time will tell whether the gesture and mood seek to continue to grow in this vein ... 

The Validity of Ancient Eastern Philosophy for Contemporary Society

An interesting, albeit somewhat heavy-going in places, talk by Mami Kataoka, Chief Curator at the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, giving an overview of the history of Japan through art. Of interest to me in that it is relevant to my work: more particularly, she talks about Gutai and Mono-Ha, both of which lay at the origin of a major shift in my approach and process (as per posts of Sept. 2011 onwards - questions and discussions spanning from 25/11/2011 to 24/09/2012; and more specifically, related to Gutai 21/08/2012 and Mono-ha 24/08/2012) and which continue to inspire and shape what I do.

Kataoka also talks interestingly about "the validity of ancient Eastern philosophy for contemporary society" - minutes 45.50-51.60. In particular the concept that Yin Yang should not be seen as duality but balance.
I also connect with what she says in relation to our connection with the universe.

Click to view:
Curator Mami Kataoka on Contemporary Art in Japan

About Time

In my fairly recent post of 06/08/2014 Edmund de Waal talks about repetition and time: "repetition is very interesting, is fascinating if you make things, if you’re a musician … as soon as you put one thing next to another you’ve got a gap, you’ve got a caesura, you’ve got a pause … something that happens between them … if you keep going then you have to deal with time."
This concept of time in what he makes puzzled me for a while; I couldn't immediately see where time comes into it, and could only see a relevance in that he is interested in poetry and his placings of his pots in lines are, as he says, like poems - poetry, like music, inherently involving time.

I then heard, a couple of weeks or so ago, on the radio a reading of Adam Thorpe's 'On Silbury Hill':
"... time ... not viewed ... as abstract ...
... Time was merely effect: a fading flower, the sun touching the hill, a distant memory, an accumulation of chalk. ...
... time was not ... measured precisely. ...
... time is not what my watch says ... but a distance, the long strides between myself as I stand here and the drumming. ..."

I think, for me, that goes some way towards explaining De Waal's statement.

It's All About the Space Inside

One of those truly wondrous moments, this morning working on the white coiled cylinders series; the kind of revelation that is the magic of art, the magic of sculpture. To date, the cylinders have been about texture, light and shade, placing in formation/groupings, as per these images (taken following an experimental 'placing' session, hence the presence of other bits and pieces in the background):

This morning I was making another cylinder (the tallest one yet at 31cm):

when, about 10cm up, I became aware of a shift in my consciousness; from my initial focus on the clay coil itself, on texture, on the outer shape the coil was forming, the size of the cylinder and its presence when grouped with the others, to a very strong, overwhelming awareness of the space the coiling was enclosing.
It became all about the inner space. The coiling simply demarcating the boundary between the inner space of the cylinder and the outer space, the space above my workbench, the space inside the entire studio.
Interestingly, I feel that this cylinder is very different on the outside as a result. There is a harmony, a different kind of balance; it seems to relate differently to its surroundings, which I even perceive in the image above.
And below is a series of images aiming to illustrate the lure of this inner space. It draws you in, its presence engulfing you as your focal point descends, embracing you, holding you; emotions changing and intensifying the deeper you go:  

moving closer towards the inner space:

going deeper into the space:

This morning it became all about the inner space, but the white coiled cylinder series is and will be about both the inside and the outside.