Create > Take a Hike

Create > Turn Over a Rock

Create > Artist’s Selfie (Style)

Create > Estranged Object

Create > Color Cutout Portrait

Create > Block Pattern Portrait

Create > Hidden Structure

Create > Hidden Structure

Goal:  Create a structure with concealed elements

Catalysts:  

animate, empathize, fantasize

Studio Activity:  

Design and make a three-dimensional construction that ‘opens up’ to reveal an interior structure.  

Be inspired by Talwst’s unexpected scenes hidden inside jewelry boxes > https://goo.gl/aKZJ4g

Ornate jewelry boxes set the stage for tiny painted scenes filled with nearly-microscopic human figurines. The boxes are meticulously crafted by Canadian-Trinidadian artist Talwst, who uses mixed media to explore the narrative of art history in combination with elements of contrasting cultures. Although his vintage boxes may cast an ancient light on the scene, the boxes encapsulate a present day cultural commentary through their arrangements.

Be further inspired by ‘ROA’ > https://goo.gl/QXvLof

Belgian artist ROA (previously) just opened his first solo show at Jonathan LeVine Gallery in NYC titled Metazoa. The new series of mixed media works feature the artist’s familiar black and white depictions of animals painted on various cabinet-like furniture pieces that can be opened or shifted to reveal anatomical details. ROA often chooses to depict animals native to where he is working, specifically species that have been forced from their native habitats and now live on the outskirts of urban areas.

Create > Magnification

Create > Magnification

Goal:  Change the perceptual response to an object by making it larger

Catalysts:  

Distort, magnify, fantasize

Studio Activity:  

Select a subject for your sculpture that is normally quite small, such as a paper clip, nail clipper, wrist watch, electrical or mechanical parts, bugs, or other small creatures… Recreate the subject on a giant scale:  Make a soft sculpture by cutting fabrics and flexible materials, which are then sewn, stuffed, stitched, and decorated; or create a large rigid structure by using cardboard and tape and paper-mâché.

Be inspired by historically significant artist Claes Oldenburg > https://goo.gl/gqdJK2 > https://goo.gl/BjnkRr Claes Oldenburg is an American sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring large replicas of everyday objects. Another theme in his work is soft sculpture versions of everyday objects. Wikipedia

Create > Constellation

Create > Constellation

Goal:  Create a galactic-like sculpture composed of interconnected lines and nodes.

Catalysts:  

Repeat, connect, animate

Studio Activity:  

Using repeating small units (wood, straws, pvc, etc…) and different lengths of a wire or some binding mechanism, assemble a colorful 3-dimensional constellation.  Make it strong enough to stand on its own or hang and balance from above.  

Be inspired by architect Marc Fornes.  He and his studio created an interconnected pathway of tubular branches which appear like a large segment of bleached coral.  It is composed of over 4,600 strips of metal, each just a millimeter thick.  

Be inspired by Australian artist Corey Thomas.  He created Spinifex from local tree branches and other plant material.  

Ben Butler is fascinated by the complex structures that emerge from simple and delicate processes.  This phenomenon can be found in the elaborate systems produced by ant colonies to human cities, small quotidian actions accumulating into overpowering structures.  Ben assembled over 10,000 pieces of poplar wood into a matrix-like structure that coalesces into an unexpectedly mesmerizing array of grids.  

Check out New York artist Jason Hackenwerth, known for his organic and biological forms made from latex balloons.  The spiralling from is made from 10,000 balloons wove carefully into a 3-dimensional structure title Pisces from an interpretation of the legend of Aphrodite and Eros.

Create > Kinetic Sculpture

Create > Kinetic Sculpture

Goal:  Create kinetic art that involves movement of from in point of time and space.

Catalysts:  

Combine, change, animate, motion

Studio Activity:  

Create a 3-dimensional art form that: -flies, -floats, -grows, -moves, -radiates sound, -changes its appearance, -reacts with water, -reacts to light, -reacts to gravity…  Research kinetic art > https://www.google.com/search?q=kinetic+art&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 .  Look into the artworks of Alexander Calder.  Talk to technicians.  Go to flea markets or garage sale to acquire interesting found objects.  Think of the game Mouse Trap and then look at the cartoons of Rube Goldberg for more inspiration.  

Kinetic Concepts:

• Transformation = evolution, transition, change, mutation.
• Game = cooperation, viewer response structures, play.
• Homeostasis = self-balancing systems, self-organizing, self-seeking
• Teleological = self-destructing, consumable
• Auto creative = self-structuring
• Mimesis = of nature, ecosystems, biological

Be inspired by the works of Alexander Calder > https://www.wikiart.org/en/alexander-calder Kinetic art is art from any medium that contains movement perceivable by the view or depends on motion for its effect.  Calder’s mobiles > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_(sculpture) are 3-dimensional sculptures that move naturally or are machine operated.  The moving parts are often powered by wind, a motor or the observer.  

View the works of other kinetic artists:

George Rickey, Four Squares in Square Arrangement, 1969, terrace of the New National Gallery, Berlin, Germany,

Lyman Whitaker, The Twister Star Huge, a whirligig sculpture

Jesús Raphael Soto, La Esfera, Caracas, Venezuela

David Ascalon, Wings to the Heavens, 2008. Fabricated and brazed aluminum and stainless steel cable, Temple Israel, Memphis, Tennessee

The Bucket Fountain, Wellington, NZ

http://www.theartstory.org/movement-kinetic-art.htm

http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2013/03/amazing-kinetic-sculptures-by-bob-potts/

http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2012/02/wearable-kinetic-rings-mimic-the-flight-of-birds/

Create > Image of Humans

Create > Image of Humans

Goal:  Portray a human activity by making a symbolic wire sculpture.

Catalysts:  

Animate, empathize, fantasize  

Studio Activity:  

Portray a particular image of man; Man the Inventor, the Artist, the Sportsman, the Magician, the Hunter and so on.  Interpret the concept with wire.  Use any type or types of flexible wire (even a coat hanger will work) to create a three-dimensional sculpture.  Add additional elements to further emphasize the theme: clock parts, transistors, pills, ruler, map, mechanical parts… Mount the wire sculpture on a wood base and title appropriately.

Artist Profile:

Be inspired by the works of Rachel Ducker > http://www.rachel-ducker.co.uk/ British contemporary artist Rachel Ducker is well practiced in life drawing and with an appreciation of the human form and the emotional dynamics of human nature.  Originally trained as a jeweller, Rachel experiments with wire as a media for sculpting the human form, capturing something ephemeral, either emotive or active.  

Be  further inspired by the works of Gavin Worth > https://www.gavinworth.com/index.html

Visual Examples:

• 15 beautiful Twisted Wire Sculptures > https://www.boredpanda.com/wire-sculpture-art/
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