Moulds, Molds, Bears, Giant Babies and The Cautious Emergence of The Weirdly Absurd

Well, I've been doing the usual thing, neglecting this blog and manically experimenting/pottering. 

Allowing that it is possible to potter manically of course - I'm taking the view that it most certainly is. .

The trouble is, as I have probably mentioned before, is that my focus shifts so quickly between projects and ideas that I am into a new idea before I have blogged about the last one. Then eventually, the weight of unblogged about things becomes so great that my Blogger's Guilt kicks in and I try to feature about ten ideas at once. 

Oh well, so be it ;-)

So, first up - You remember the plastic model railway figures from my last post? Course you do. I have made a few more little surreal scenes using them, (in this case some very nice hurrying passengers) and a few very pink plastic babies I came across on the internet (of course). Combined with an image transfer of one of my digital fake-cell-structure creations and a few other bits and pieces this interesting little scenario came about. It's called "Try to ignore The Babies".

Taking this post to be a vaguely logical progression, I considered said plastic babies and wondered how making polymer clay moulds of  them might work out. Polymer clay does seem to be pretty good for mould making. Non-flexible ones but that is OK. This Baby/Alien piece was made using crude impressions from one of the moulds I made. With some crackle effect technique and additional glass beads. (I was given a box of various small beads from a friend. I didn't think they were the sort of thing I would be using but as it happened they found a place)

One mould led to another, this time using a couple of model railway figures, which, my creative process being what it is, resulted in some pieces with a very different vibe. Using inks and Ren wax etc etc helped.

As is the way of these things, before long, some of my little plastic animals got roped in to the mould making frenzy. These two little Red Panda head drops came about that way. 

And this Bear pendant. All interesting stuff I thought.

And moving skilfully on, like a smooth radio DJ style link, talking of bears, I made some bear images using a rubber stamp I acquired, and taking sort of multiple, artily out of register monoprints from the stamp's impression on poly clay, which I coloured up in various ways. 

I used one of these images as the background for this piece called "Big Bear, Good Dog" ;-)

Moulds from the heads of various plastic figures I have had knocking around for years came into the equation also, to somewhat creepy effect. Only somewhat, as the absurd tends to trump the creepy; in the work I do at any rate. Here's a couple of spike beads and drops to emphasise my point.

The more observant amongst you will have clocked the strange image at the top of this post. This was me trying to mix and match heads and bodies ;-) The body is from a mould of an unpainted pottery dog blank that I acquired from who knows where, ages ago, and the head is from a plastic motorcyclist. the result is like some very odd artifact from an archaeological site somewhere. No idea idea where that 'somewhere' might be though. . .

So that's me for the moment. Other stuff will no doubt emerge from my fevered brain as this strange time of Covidiosyncratic Groundhog Days grinds on, and on.

Oh well, and talking of 'well', stay well!

best, 

Jon x

Manic making. . .

Well, so much for stated good intentions. . . 

I have departed from my plan to lay off the component making and maybe do some larger more complex things. 

Aye well, given a choice between backwards or forwards, I will find a way of going sideways. . . That's just the way I am.

What I have actually been doing is somewhat manically making even more organic textured components these last couple of weeks. 

In my defence, the intention was to get a pool of draft listings together so I can add a couple every day or so while engaged in other stuff, like endeavouring to earn a living. You know, that stuff. . .

I'm sort of getting there, but the temptation is to add lots of items to the shop at once 'because it's there'.

I need to resist this.

I did, however manage to play around with multiple textures, as in the groovy limpet like thing above. The texture in the middle was from a kind of hard wormcast found on mussel shells and the like, and the other texture was from a digital image made into a texture sheet and a further texture stamp or roller made from that, then impressed round the outside. That was fun, and it came out looking well organic and crusty. But mainly I followed the simple rolled texture sort of fascination. . .

Some of the things below are in my etsy shop, and some aren't but will be in the next few days I should think.

I made some basic rolled texture beads influenced by a pic of some neolithic beads I saw on pinterest. 

Some strange organic fungoid alien bean shoot dangles.

Some satisfyingly crusty drop charms. Which have obviously been lying on the sea bed for about 100 years.

some entertainingly spotty blue beads, using the outrageously intense colour that is Indigo alcohol ink. That stuff should have a health warning ;-) I love it, but cleaning the brush very thoroughly afterwards is advised.

Some square texture beads.

And most recently, some more organic spike things that remind me both of seaweed and of microscopic creatures somehow. . .

At some point soon I will take my own advice and take a break from manic making. I would like to produce some more considered work as well as my more instinctive reactions to the material that my most recent work has been at root. 

Jon x

Psuedoshards. . .

Anyone who might have come across my work will probably have noticed that I like to make things look a great deal older than they really are. I have always liked the patina that age and use, or neglect come to that, gives to things, both natural and man made. So I age things up a lot.

This especially applies to me image transfer work. All those 'little squares' I wittered on about in a previous post. I love the way that an object with a brand new, digitally derived pattern or image, that could only have been made in the last ten to fifteen years, as the technology didn't exist before then, can be made to look as though it has just been dug up from an archaeological site somewhere, where it had lain for 200 years. I say 'somewhere' as the pieces in question resemble ancient artifacts, but you can't quite put your finger on what era or geographical location they seem to come from. They exhibit 'ancientness', and tap into whatever idea of ancientness we carry in our minds. They are the manifestation of an idea, rather than the reality that idea was formed by. I hope that makes some sort of sense. I could go on. . . and make even less sense, but I won't. 

So, as you can see by the pictures, I have been taking this idea a bit further. I have always liked broken shards of pottery, and the fact that (in the UK at least) they turn up in the ground almost everywhere. In cultivated land I should add. Little bits of blue and white pottery turn up in ploughed fields, allotments and urban gardens, not to mention washed up on beaches. I used to joke that there was a Victorian society whose object was to scatter broken crockery in every field in the UK. You could imagine the special outings they had. . . ;-)

So I made some 'Psuedoshards'. Fake shards made from polymer clay, with my digital images on, distressed to high heaven in my usual manner. I really like them. And judging by the reaction of the nice people on Facebook, so do others. They seem to fit the zeitgeist of a certain section of the jewelry making fraternity sorority. . . I am really looking forward to exploring this avenue further. So keep an eye out for these shards turning up in my shop over the next few weeks and beyond.

Best,

Jon x