Thesis Entry 1

Beginning by accepting the inevitable end. Faces no longer. Creative energies gone along with their hosts. And so, with the first sculpture of the school year I lament. Confronted by the loss of creative souls long since gone, released from the clutch of academia. Inspired by the remembrance of a couple fellows. Liam Jennings and Chris Alferman, both sculptors and workers of wood. In abandoned leftovers from the semester past resurfaced a wood and metal work by Chris Alferman. Compelled to recycle the materials and modify an idea I recovered the work’s metal appendage. Paired with a polished slice of wood similar in grain and softened edging to a slab Chris once used. In my modification wood accepts metal, giving to its weight. As a fallen slab of metal cradled by a slab of wood. Found Petri dishes filled with recycled saw dust from the wooden slab’s sanding accompany the metal slab. Their mounting pulls from the presentation appeal in many of Liam’s wooden works.

Intergraded wood, metal, and glass; a combination I find so soothing. A timeline of human technological progression, up till the age of steel. All processed yet natural in origin. Looking back through time reflecting on the past; so I lament, gather my self and start again.

Unacquainted material. Corrugated polycarbonate UV protective awning roofing (Sun Tuff). Lonesome 12ft giants standing erect at the back of a studio untouched for years longingly await for a creative soul to bring them to new life. A material for in-depth study through artworks at the crest of creation. One idea met the break of the wave. A curious material yearning to flex its stiff conventional posture, stretch along corrugated lines, and take free form. Rolling curvature. Slight altercations to the material’s form and function, while maintaining its installation method and identity as a sort of skin. A conservative manipulation to conventional construction methods. Cut out scrolling “French curve” shapes in plywood, spread about a foot and a half apart, 5’8” in total, create a mounting structure for the awning material. The mounting structure mimics conventional building techniques. 26” wide lengths of polycarbonate stretch across wooden slats and form to contours of the wooden armature. Completed the work is mounted on a wall and slightly above average human height, in hopes to evoke a sense of invaded personal space if the viewer treads near. The work will develop through progression.