Printmaking and Sculpture

The casts printed on with inked leaves to create that 'tatty', imperfect look. Final doll is painted with reversed colour sequence, complete with a suggestive smatter of red near the head area to symbolise its status as a 'victim'.



The following are just prints straight off the roller after they had been used over the leaves to coat them in ink.

Research

Looking at the red maple leaf and leaf prints.






The thickness and texture of this piece are really strong.

The half which looks as if it is disintegrating is really eye-catching because it reveals interesting spaces and patterns with the 'remains' of the leaf.

I really like the collage style of this one. It's interesting how there is the small hint of a Chinese/Japanese character within the leaf.

Looking at leaf designs in the textile of Japanese clothing.

Printmaking and Sculpture Idea

Idea for sculpture: Unlike the smooth, carefully crafted dolls, my plaster casts are imperfect. The front and back sides are not perfectly aligned to both show the way they do not 'qualify' as well-crafted pieces as well as movement (viewed from different angles, they don't appear completely static due to the shift in the seams). It's a statement about how if you don't conform to the 'regular', to what is expected of you, you fall short, hence the reason for my final cast to be incomplete (I filled the mold halfway with normal mixed plaster, and filled the rest with plaster which was more watery, so that the base of the model would turn out 'flaky', giving a damaged or deteriorated look, incapable to stand on its own like the rest). There is a total of 5 dolls, which will be arranged to stand in a circle, indicating the progression towards the final 'degeneration'. The dolls which are standing represent society which is not perfect in itself, hence the imperfection of the seams, yet the circular formation implies the pressure of society as it 'looks down' upon the odd one out. I think I shall paint the broken doll different to the others, to make the point more obvious. I will be keeping with the basic contrast of red and black - black for the head, red for the body. For the last doll, I could swap the colours around, to make it appear that it has been painted 'the wrong way round'.

Idea for print: I will be using print on the plaster casts, since I don't want them just to be painted. I want something which will leave a mark on the plaster and yet not give a solid look - something which will leave white spaces to represent the 'holes' in society (the lack of smoothness in the colour will mirror the ugly going-ons). I really enjoyed experimenting printing using leaves previously, and I am particularly interested in the red maple leaf, which is symbolic of Japan. Since the style of the original model is based off the Japanese style of wooden dolls, using leaf prints (I can use other types of leaves if I can't get maple) on the casts seems appropriate. Also, the arrangement can be seen as a comment on society, using the country Japan as an example, regarding the pressure to conform.





My object is similar to the Japanese wooden dolls.

Note

Note: The problem with using a blog for an online sketchbook, is that people can easily steal your stuff. It wouldn't be so bad if the exact same images weren't used for the exact same purpose.

Printmaking and Sculpture

Here the Gelflex is being poured into the second half. I made a mistake on the second plaster jacket (it was too small and didn't meet the edge of the first plaster jacket) and time was running out so Rob helped me to tape the two plaster jackets together securely before pouring. It's lucky my chosen item is relatively small! At least I've learnt a lot from making mistakes.. I just found the process hard to get my head around at first!




Trying a hand at making a Gelflex mold. This is the first part to the two-part mold. I built the bed of clay around the item and here it is propped up and ready to have Gelflex poured into it to form the front half of the mold.

Printmaking and Sculpture

More print experiments.

Printmaking and Sculpture demonstration