Beneath the Skin : First Experiments

The explorations are underway for my new project, ‘Beneath the Skin’ where I will be investigating our emotions and realising some of their essence in sculptural form. To find out more about the project as a whole, please read my previous blog ‘New Challenges” to get a clearer picture of what on earth I’m up to.

I decided to start my investigations with the feeling of ‘Chaos’ and although in some of my sketches I have experimented with colour, at this stage, my focus is really on the form. This is an update for you and a formal log for me of how things are progressing and my thoughts on the outcomes and tests. A kind of progress diary, I suppose, as I did promise to bring you along on the journey.

Chaos. Acrylic painting. Channelling the vibe.

Ideas around form. Acrylic, oil pastel & charcoal

My initial thoughts around Chaos, as you may tell from the sketches above, involve a swirling of overlapping energy, made of different but similar parts that oppose and intersect one another. Each part with it’s own direction that works with and feeds the others around it to create a final mass.

After getting a feel for where to start, I ventured into some clay experiments which is also just another form of sketching for me. These are some of the results…

1. Too Wormy

2. Too ribbony

Test 1, although I like the interaction between all of the individual bits that are kind of chaotic, I feel that they are too ‘wormy’ - especially with the indented marks I put on them! I decided that the ‘worms’ were too short to convey the energy that I’m after. Chaos often feels bigger than that. This brought about Test 2 which I felt was an improvement and a step closer to what I am potentially after, (I’ll know it when I see it), but this was too much like ribbons. I am happier with the longer length of the strips to create more of a swirling energy vibe but they didn’t yet feel powerful enough. Chaos feels powerful.

3. Thrown sketch

4. Exploring new ways

I moved on to experimenting with some new processes and methods of working just to see what energy and results they produced. This was also part of the intent for the project in the first place, to push myself into new ways of working, shake things up. So pic 3. shows a sketch that I made from parts that were originally thrown on the wheel, then cut and joined together. I like this more than the others as it has a more powerful feel to it. I made the individual parts much bolder and longer so that it’s hard to follow one line all the way to it’s end and I think that the evidence of the throwing rings makes it more dynamic too. The last picture is a small test of working on a form that is intentionally cracking as it goes around on itself. I like this idea and want to explore this further.

I will continue to work on these ideas, to-ing and fro-ing from sketch book to clay, and will post another update as soon as I have one. How does chaos feel for you? Is it a similar swirling energy? Comment below & let me know if any of those forms are resonating with your feelings of chaos.

Here is the link to my previous New Challenges blog where I explain the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of the project,. I don’t yet have the ‘what’ which is scary and fabulous in equal measure. I’m not sure what the end results will look like, but the journey is all the more exciting because of it.

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