A Little Hope and Wanderlust

With one project now properly concluded, finally sewn on the backing fabric, I can now really start to concentrate on the new piece, 'Hope'. There was a bit of a stumble with getting the pace and flow of this piece, but I am starting to get somewhere with it now. Two letters are near complete and the shapes, and curves of the letters are working better, though I say that, and looking at the shot below I am still a bit iffy about the top part of the 'H' but we'll leave it for now and see how the other letters look before I start messing with it any more. It is yet more split stitching, and two colours merging into one another. 

Once all the lettering is complete then I'll start to look at the border, which I envisage to be made up of oodles of little eyelets, and star-bursts in various shades of purples, lilacs, and pinks. 

This week I even made my way back to the Royal Academy, one evening after work, to check out the newest exhibitions, 'Wanderlust' on the works of Joseph Cornell. One thing I would say, if you are planning on visiting it does involve walking  up several flights of stairs, frosted glass stairs...which for me wasn't the best thing to be walking down (not a fan of any glass stairs, frosted or not *shudder*). 

Now onto his work. I'll admit I had never heard of the man nor seen any of his work before. This I feel is somewhat of an oversight on my part as his works are extraordinary. In more than one ways. Fantastical and whimsical. Makes you wish you could lay your hands on just a fraction of his paper ephemera collection. The lengths he went to construct some of his works are amazing. I was especially drawn to 'The Crystal Cage (Portrait of Berenice), 1943, not least for the work itself but it was the layers of back story that he constructed around the story of the girl called Berenice. 

I also rather liked the astronomy based works as they pull me back to my love of maps and navigation.

If you get the chance, perhaps combine it with going to see the Summer Exhibition at the RA, go and take an hour out of your time to view. Oh, and take a minute to watch the video of a man boxing with a Kangeroo...

Additional links

• Peabody Essex Museum
• Wanderlust Exhibition

Lecture at the RA - Conrad Shawcross RA

Last Friday evening, 19th June, I had the pleasure of accompanying my mum to a lecture at the Royal Academy. It's been a while since I had been to one, the last being a couple of years ago on Turner and was held at the National Gallery. There is always that moment of anything post work that is a tad intellectual, if you are going to a. keep awake (post a day at work, and already a long commute) and b. understand it. I admit I was a little clueless on knowing who it was we were going to listen to an Q&A session on, I had failed to do any sort of research...so I was going in a little blind. 

The talk was with Conrad Shawcross RA a name, as previously mentioned, not one I had come across and as it turned out is a bit of a pity as I came away really loving and appreciating his work. The lecture/ Q&A / interview whatever you want to call it, was a lively talk with a man whose really rather quiet and unassuming. He was a pleasure to listen too. 

I really now also have a major appreciation for anyone whose willing to come up with the concept for a large scale outdoor installation. Especially one that involved 8,000 individually welded, tetrahedrons. The sheer number alone, not even factoring in the number of man hours to construct it, then ship and construct it, is pretty spectacular and that's even before you look at the final piece itself. 

The making of Conrad Shawcross RA's 'The Dappled Light of the Sun' from Royal Academy of Arts on Vimeo.

Back to the talk which was on his installation piece 'The Dappled Light of the Sun' which can be found in the Annenberg Courtyard at the Royal Academy. Rather impressive venue, and place to have such an amazing piece of work. Now I didn't get a very good shot of the piece, that beautifully shows the dappling shadow work, which amazingly looks more like the shadows of trees and leaves, than a ton of metal. However, this shot taken by the artist himself, shows it perfectly:

#dappledlightofthesun #conradshawcross #RA

A photo posted by Conrad shawcross (@conradshawcross) on May 25, 2015 at 1:48pm PDT

Of course, the work of creating the thousands of tets, wasn't just by the artist, and what was nice about the talk was Conrad's appreciation for the expertise and skills involved in the project, from the fabricators Ken Ware Engineers in Newark, with profiling by Cutting Technologies, and with his own going work with Peter Laidler, Structure Workshop (engineering design practice). 

What I find amazing, is that something that is made of weathered steel, weighs over 25 tonnes can look so fluid, natural and just beautiful. Think it's easy to forget that steel isn't something ugly, or just merely for practicality (construction) that it can be something that can replicate or be inspired by nature.

So if you get the opportunity nip along to the RA, whilst no location for its permanent home has been found, as of yet, I am sure a perfect place will be found for it soon.

It will also be worth keeping an eye on the progress of the new Francis Crick Institute building that is presently being built in King's Cross, London, as Conrad Shawcross won the commission to design an installation for outside the building. To quote from the 'The Dappled Light of the Sun' book, 'where the RA installation 'maps the installation of the tetrahedron over a sprawling horizontal plane, Paradigm (2016) takes up its vertical impetus'.

I am rather looking forward to the final outcome, it won't be hard to miss, and so I will certainly be making a point next year to go and have a look for myself. 

You can also see some of his work at Dulwick Park, The Three Perpetual Chords.