Final tests and failures

Program complete.

So just a few more projects, and this session is a wrap.  Since the last post I've had time to get a few more fusings finished, pack the majority of my work up and ship it home, help clean the campus, fly home, and finally get some sleep in a bed that my feet don't hang over the edge.  As a class we also had the opportunity to get off campus for a day of taking in the glass side of Seattle.

Let's start with the final projects...

One of the things I really enjoyed about my work area was the sunlight that would come in during the morning.  The light refraction on the table is very beautiful, and something I want to keep working with.  Even going so far as to draw on the glass to make stronger marks/shadows on the table to help compose it a little better.

So this started with the bottle molds from before, now it was a matter of making some vessels in the hot shop and cold working them to a point of ease of removal for the finished piece.  This means using a thicker vessel than normal, so it would be more likely to hold it's shape as the mass of glass beads inside heated up.  So I was able to get away with some things I normally don't try to in regards to these vessels.  They were thicker, they weren't puntied, and barely cold worked at all.  The trickiest part by far was slicing them in half, especially for the long neck vase since all it would take is one slight over-caffeniated twitch to bind that long neck in the blade and snap it.

Once the pieces were sliced in half, I then had to remove the glass that was the bottom of the cup and the top of the foot.  This part took a little longer since the drill press was broken, as a result I had to do it by hand with a Dremel and diamond bits.  Once that was finished, then it was sandblast the interior, and notch the outside a few times.  Then coat the halves with an alumina oxide and kaolin clay mixture, once it was dry I could wire the halves together with some stainless steel wire.  After all of that... I could begin filling the interior with glass to fuse.  Since it was a test, nothing too fancy, but I wanted to continue to use some of the black powder I used on the last bottle mold, for some decorative elements.

Once these molds were filled, it was just a matter of getting them in the kiln.  Bring them up to 1275 and hold for about 20 minutes, then cool.  Sorta like baking cookies.  Anyway, I did quite think it all through and did have a minor set back.

I didn't figure on the weight of the top making the cup fall over.  It's fairly obvious now, thanks hindsight!, but at the time I was more worried making sure I could make the last firing schedule on time.  As objects I don't think they're bad... now that being said, it's not what I wanted, but again, they're not bad.  Since these it was a matter of sitting down and thinking about how to correct this mishap, which was easy to figure out... fire the damn thing upside down.  

One word that used to describe these was flaccid, which given the rampant machismo in any given hot shop, I find that statement very amusing.  The form itself is taken from a 16th century venetian goblet design and the whole fact it slumped over but retained its shape seems to be a good statement to a current predicament of studio glass these days.  That glass is being used for a more narrative conversation and the pursuit of perfection in technique is falling to the wayside.  Not that technique will ever completely disappear, but the shift of the paradigm is more noticeable now than it ever was.

So that's two...

Up next was the long neck.  This one I wanted to use for one of my manipulation assignments.  Yes we had assignments, and in a way it was good, it gave us something to focus on during the session so we weren't flailing around trying to figure out what to do.  The system to hold the mold was complicated, and there's always the "what if?" factor when trying something new.

So this was the result of what happened.  Not what I wanted, but not bad on it's own.  This object and the previous two were well liked by some of my classmates and some of the rest of campus overall.  Interestingly enough, this project I deemed a failure.  It did not turn out how I wanted, but that's why we do stuff like this... to figure that out.  Which I believe I have done, now I just need to test it again, and again, and again.  The prep work for the glass "mold" was the same as the previous two.  The housing for it was completely different.  This consisted of placing this vessel halves in a walled off sand pit and bringing the whole thing up to about 1350-1400 F.  The idea was that the alumina mix would be the release and I could pop these out and recombine them.

That did not happen... at all... even in the slightest.  However as objects they do reference the history of glass as a whole and have the potential to be displayed a museological works.  This brings to mind Joshia McHelny's earlier work, but only with a reference to the blown form and not the blown form; or it's fragments; being the final object.

That makes three...

So this is what happens when your embossing plate is too tall to run through the printing press.

The white highlights you see on the paper is actually micro-beads embed into the paper from the pressure of the printing press.

One of the last things I was able to do was a print run of my intaglio plate from earlier in the session.  Before the print run, I had filled some of the sandblasted areas with micro-beads and fuse them to the plate  The idea was that I could augment the embossment further than what plate could have done on it's own.  It did work, mostly.  The additional mass of the micro-beads cracked the plate in the press.  Normally that's the end of the run.  However, I did notice that in the first proof that the micro-beads were pulling off in the plate and into the paper.  At that point there was nothing to do but finish the run.  As the run progressed I started to separate the larger shards more and even remove some pieces of glass to change the print from whole to cracked at the end.  All the prints are impregnated with micro-beads and are "inked" in a way with light.  This was one of my favorite things I made the entire session.

Again, this didn't turn out as expected but the result is no less interesting.  I would even go so far as to say that if it had turned out as expected it wouldn't have been nearly as successful as a finished piece.  I was even able to tack fuse the plate back together in the kiln again as another piece, but it was barely together again.  Too fragile for transport so it didn't  get sent home.  

All together for the session I completed a half tone print (AP), and embossment run (1-6), 2 versions of the same intaglio plate, 2 bottles, 2 slumped goblets, 2 halves of organics(CMC) and glass with 1 vase, 1 piece with organics(flour) and glass, and 1 pulled billet.  For three weeks, I feel that's a good amount of work.  The intaglio plate is the only thing not getting shipped back to Ohio.  

Now to try and get a show arranged ohm the second floor of DSB soon.  A few more refined pieces after i get back might be good to throw in there as well, but that's dependent on how soon I have to present my findings for the faculty colloquium.  I believe that's in spring, but I'll know soon.

Now on to a busy summer...

So A LOT has happened since the last post.  Besides the new school year, did have an opportunity to work with a few artists this past winter break.  Danny White, and Tyler Kimball were both visiting artists at CCAD.  Incidentally, they were also both at the residency that Dawson had attended the previous summer... I'm starting to see a pattern, are you?

Tyler and Dawson

During Tyler's visit, I remember him and Dawson saying "You have to apply.".  Now, I know they were talking to the undergrads more than anything but it kinda hit me that I needed to do that as well.  Here I was, making some things, enjoying teaching, now some other things had to happen and that meant "applying".  Now, I also know they meant apply with applications to stuff... stuff being classes, scholarships, grants, anything really.  But, you could also read it as apply yourself.  Neither of which I was really doing, so I decided to apply myself to a number of things and it yielded big results.

Pilchuck

First and foremost, I asked Tyler if I could use him for a reference for the upcoming Pilchuck Poleturners union.  He said yes, and so there was that application going.  While hanging out on Pilchuck's website for that application, I noticed that a person I had met a few years ago in Japan (Ryo Sekino) was teaching a class on straight up glass blowing.  Sweet.  So I applied to that as well.  Before I left Pilchuck's website I also applied for a scholarship for a more experimental kiln-casting class with Anjali S. and Amiee Sones.  So I applied to a few things and waited.

What happened was pretty crazy.

Good news

I got accepted to Poleturners, I was put on stand-by for the TA position in Ryo's class (there needed to be 8 students for me to be activated), and I was accepted to the kiln class but didn't get the scholarship.  All good information to get right before before my Spring Break!  So as these acceptance emails were coming in, I remembered that CCAD has faculty enrichment grants available.  You apply, it gets reviewed, you might get some funding to better yourself and ultimately the school.  I got the application sent to me 4 days before it was due, and that last day I was going to be flying down to Florida and had a small window to get it sent out barring any type of delays.  In that time before the flight I had managed to hand write the majority of my grant application.  I finished writing it out, still by hand, in the airport waiting for my flight.  While in transit, I typed the whole thing into the form on my iPad and had enough time to read a few more times and tighten it up before landing.  Once on the ground and waiting for my baggage, I connected to the airport wifi and sent my application off with about an hour to spare before the deadline.  Technology at work for me.  I have never written out something that fast for grant before, but it paid off.  Roughly a month later I found out I was awarded all the money I asked for.  On top of that I also received word that Ryo's class now had 10 people into, so my status went from stand-by to activated.

Even more good news

Wow.

So I will be spending 2 weeks in Pilchuck for Poleturners, help with the turn over, spend the next 2 weeks as a TA for Ryo.  Once I get home, it's help to rebuild our casting kilns at CCAD. Then it's off to Pilchuck again to take Anjali & Aimee's class on kiln-casting.  Most of the funds have been provided for, so really I'm only spending about ~$1,750 of my own money to be on the mountain side working with glass for just over 6 weeks.  I'm so thankful to have the opportunity that sometimes I'm dumbstruck by the whole ordeal.  It seems surreal, but the reality of it is setting in VERY quickly.  As I write this I have less than 36 hours before I'm on the plane to this wonderful summer.

But the whole point is, it never would've happened if I didn't apply.

So thank you Tyler and Dawson, because of you two I'm having a summer I was only dreaming about before... thanks.

Melodic musings

So as this project takes shape, the more it has evolved, the more the reactionary component of this project has become important to me.  The more alive this project is becoming.  Literally.  The tunnel component has now served as a platform for this new organism.  The aspect of the tunnel will still be there, how dense the walls are something I am still working on.

The main structure will be more flowing, something that I was thinking about anyway, the question now is how am I going to make it "alive" without making it "carnival"?  Using Arduino circuit boards and centrifugal motors, activated by proximity sensors, I can definitely make this come alive.  The technology component is something that I had wanted to get into for awhile now, and this was a perfect opportunity to get way out of my comfort zone and push myself to really learn something new.  If this is successful then it will inform work for my thesis next year as I already have few more ideas for more interactive projects similar to this.  But why make the thing move/shake at all?  When glass strikes glass, there can be some wonderful sounds.  There is also the whole flight or fight response from an animal when threatened.  Here are some vessels from Friday that I strung up today.  I know the video quality is poor but it wouldn't upload otherwise, damn file was too big, and the sound is the more important here.

This sound isn't exactly what I'm looking for, but it's a start.  I did also make some solid glass rods as well, and I was hoping to have a sharper noise from the shape, but those will have to be redesigned. 

The structure, so far, is lending itself to marine crustaceans... deep sea organisms that are transparent from lack of sunlight.  With how the monofilament looks with the light on it, with some polished steel and aluminum mesh it is pupating into this very organic specimen constructed out of clean materials.  The glass vessels feel like eggs, in the way crabs or spiders will carry their eggs until they hatch.

Now it's just ordering some more monofilament, a bucket ton of #2 & #3 crimping tubes and about a thousand or so 5/32" eyelets. 

Happy QR Code Fun Time

Ok, I have to admit it, the idea intrigues me.  That could be from the whole "What's it gonna be?!" scenario.  It has that same feel of the toy in the Cracker Jack box.  The whole notion of being able to physically embed something into my work that takes you someplace else is... for lack of a better word, magical.  We, as artists, all want to take our viewers somewhere and we can do that.  For this code in particular, and it seems dependant on the QR reader you have, it either jumps straight to the video (which is the desired effect) or takes you to the YouTube dashboard to play the movie.

Linking this code with a piece about the body and what resides within has a lot of potential.  Being able to visualize that, a heart monitor, ambient sounds, something completely grotesque... gets me to think about what I see in the people around me, and ultimately in myself.