York research

some images taken out and about in York. so much history, the whole pace is like a museum. Great sunny weather for exploring the castle walls and the ruins.

 

Armour research

 These images are from a current website/ company that make bespoke  Armor for re-enactment  and similar. Really good for getting ideas about shapes and construction. I'm not trying to.be historically correct, as it's more about the idea of what armour represents.

love the craftmanship on these gloves, not something I'm ready to attempt to make at this point. Its a real skill, I'm aware I'm making  sculptural armour, just an idea, I don't pretend to have the skill to recreate these things

Below are images I took myself on a research visit to Hardwick Hall. 

noting how the front and back plates are fastened together

Dress armour above

Civisl war armour below 

York Museum research

 Researching medieval artefact's and the curation of artefacts at York Museum in order to inspire my own exhibition display to maximise a museum aesthetic.

"Do you guys ever think about dying?"

 Barbie movie sends us into existential crisis! I didn't love the film but I did love this scene. I'm trying ideas around sugar coating language and visual language around death and grief. 

Aluminum sourcing

 Looking at cost effective way to make the sculpture.  In yhr spirit of sustainability I will put a call out on my social media and friends to donate used tomato puree tubes to the project. In the spirit of a deadline I also need to be able to source it myself and not relay on donation.

It would be easier to buy and use the sheets so I will see how they go but I do like the varistion in tone and texture I'm noticing from the tomato puree tubes.

cost wise

£5.31 for 9 tubes which is about the same amount of area as a pack of aluminium..plus you get tomato puree!

Direction

  Theres only 6 weeks till the exhibition. After talking with Tom today he helped me to focus on a direction of travel. Doing more work with the embossed aluminium taking traces from grave stones. Again working in the themes of print, traces transference.

He suggested making multiples and attaching them together. As a sculpture piece.

I like the idea of making something with them- a suit of armour?  Ambitious, maybe but the idea of a defence against death/ grief/ mortality.

Or just a big wall hanging?  Riveted or tied together.

For the moment I will focus in making lots of the small embossed pieces from places visit.

I'm going to York this weekend for a gig but also chance to research suits of armour, Vikings  ? Ritual and death and also go to cemetery there and make some embossing/ rubbings.

Be nice to totally recycle the the tomato puree tubes but I won't have enough. I've ordered some aluminium sheets from amazon. The copper I brought wasn't payable enough. I'm gutted as I wanted to to the patina effect that's not achievable on aluminium.

However I could rust the aluminium or treat it in some way. Or maybe the gold bright colour is going to work? 

Lots to play around with. Not much time so really focus on getting lots of aluminium pieces made now, I know the aluminium works well and also can get ample supplies at reasonable cost so will continue with this material as time to experiment is over.

I'm experimenting here with the copper toned aluminium, brought a pack of gold ad a pack of copper colour from amazon( I don't like the copper colour as its more of a red and looks tacky so won't use it for final project but it's the same material as the gold one so good for trying it's properties. I've traced from a grave rubbing to see if it would work better than a direct trace from the stone ( as the stone sometimes rips through the soft aluminium) however i don't like this tracing as its not a direct print and it didn't pick up the definition or texture so I'd rather risk a few rips and imperfections to gain the texture and authenticity of the direct print.

I will experiment with weathering the aluminium. I will also research suits if armour or other defensive structures or clothing that I could sculpt the embossed pieces into. Also look at the artist Tom suggested.