Picture this: it's Monday night. I'm sitting on my bed, my back propped up with pillows against the wall, and my computer warming my lap. Under the laptop, a fleecy blanket covers my lower half. Under the blanket, I wear leggings, and big woolly socks pulled up to my knees. I'm wearing a floral dress of one pattern, and my warmest knit sweater of a completely different (un-matching) floral pattern overtop. On my head, I wear a stripy winter headband.
My house is cold.
But it's within these conditions that I start to do some research. I need to take the next step with my life sculpting, but I'm not quite sure where to start. I know I want to go to life drawing classes, and I know I want to focus on producing a lot of figures quickly. Beyond that, I don't have much of a style or concept figured out to push it any further.
Time to hunt for ideas.
I start by looking through a couple ceramics/sculpture books from the library. Since I'd already bookmarked a couple things of interest, I look at them again. But I find ideas aren't springing up from that, so I decide to look up a couple of the artists online.
From there, I move on to looking at some videos on Ceramic Arts Daily. I come across this one of artist Gerit Grimm.
Her style is very fun and whimsical, which is very much unlike my own, but something I admire. It gets me thinking about Sara and Stephanie and all those lovely Gabriola girls, who are wonderful artists with very cool styles that I love. Stephanie takes ceramics classes with Mariko on Gabriola and raves about her work, so I take a look at her website.
http://www.feedlotstudios.ca/
It's the colour and the whimsy and the detailing that draws me in, again things I don't use much in my own work. I drink it in. Mariko then directs me to Black Bird Studios, and artist Paige Kearns-Coull, who has a similar style.
http://blackbirdstudios.squarespace.com/
And then I'm wanting to use these things somehow to inspire my own work. But how can I interpret these things to make them my own? What exactly about them would fulfill what I'm looking for? How would I add different elements to my life sculpting?
Earlier, I came across these Linda Ganstrom pieces, which seem to answer that last question to an extent.
http://www.lindaganstrom.com/smallworksgallery.html
Her nudes sit atop structures or objects, the two elements working together beautifully. They're a little darker than the previous fanciful photos I was looking at, but in a way I can relate to them more. They still incorporate lovely colouring and detail through the texture of the clay itself as well as the glazing methods. They intrigue me.
So I brainstorm some more, and one thing that I remember includes the very inspiration for the title of my blog: a poem I wrote in second year (2009) about the process of working with clay.
My brain is now stewing with many more ideas about what I might like to pursue, but I won't spill the beans about them all tonight.
For now, I'll leave you with the poem, "Creation." It is meant to be read in three ways: the left column alone, the right column alone, and the two columns combined, line by line. This was based on the structure of a poem we read in class, and very difficult to achieve. It's not perfect, but I really enjoyed working with it, and was happy with the final product. Enjoy!
Creation
Bring up the lie with
layers of damp dirt grass at your back while
in your agile hands you hold the sky
the soft grays falling slowly
under your spell with no interruptions
time aligns like birds on a wire
the spiral you invent
like a deck of cards to form
locking molecules stars of constellations in your mind
with strength to reinforce something that isn’t there
to fall into step like my convictions
as the wheel turns about illusion and how
wet and waiting the world winds
half truths
into shape out of neurons
dent and fold to form
the wet and wanting thoughts
earthly ideas
upward simple silhouettes
creation in my eye
