end of year exhibition

i got bored when i was in the country. this is what i did for the 3D sculpture part of visual studies

the front piece is a warp of plastic fishing line, which is tough enough to handle a weft of bramble and gorse stalks. for those not familiar with gorse, it's prickly as hell and almost impossible to weave with. you really need a shed about 20 cm deep to expect to not be snagging warp threads while using it. the warp was a chaotic mess by the time i'd finished using the gorse, the brambles were very little trouble on the other hand

and this is a flower, think i had a picture up of this in unpainted state a while back. as you can see it's made out of gardening wire and masking tape

the tutors thought the straw hanging all over it was intentional, something to do with the interface between nature and artifice. the truth is i ripped the wire out of a tangle of weeds.

the suit is sort of an idea i had for aggressive textiles. textiles that harm rather than heal, y'know. the next thing i'm wanting to work with is razor wire, but it's quite expensive (about £44 for a 10 metre roll, and i think you might need a special license), so i might settle for barbed wire for the time being. it's completely frivolous of course, and has no practical applications. it occured to me you could wear sharp stuff to demonstrations and the police wouldn't be able to grab a hold of you, but then you'd hurt innocent passers-by and fellow protestors, rather self-defeating. fetish-wierdos might go for it, but i don't want to get into that market

just a bit of fun really. surprisingly enough you can actually run in that suit.

Comments

Meg said…

You CAN run in it? Yes, it is surprising! What next for you - what are your summer plans and where are you going to do it in?

2 June 2010 at 20:59

Andrew Kieran said…

sadly enough i'm just looking for work. in thurso, of all places

what a sorry state of affairs eh? gotta go back round the hotels again, competing for KP work with bloody children

2 June 2010 at 23:39

Trapunto said…

The outline reminds me a bit of samurai armor. I really like the way the petal shapes look, painted.

3 June 2010 at 19:14

Avalanche Looms / Susan Johnson said…

Razor wire? Aggressive textiles. Edgy ideas, and very good ideas. Not baby blankets, surely. Textiles need to be more than what everyone thinks they are. Also, your weeds were intentional--you could have pulled them out.

A while back you made a project, my favorite, before this suit, your rya signal flag. Was it Man Overboard?

19 July 2010 at 18:02

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