soo

This is part of my work for university and it's kinda hard to explain without the whole lot of stuff online. Tis all in the sketchbook and my blogging is most behind. These are texture samples that are going to be impressed into clay so I figured I might as well post them before they get covered in dusty crap just so I know what they looked like.

Our small contribution to BCB 2013

We visited Middleport Pottery as part of the Burslem weekend for the British Ceramics Biennial. The area in which Middleport Pottery is located is a bit...grim so when we stepped inside it was a bit like falling down the rabbit hole, which was completely awesome. 

We entered a room with three tables with clay monstrosities describing the pits where the fuel for the factories was fug up, the pottery factories which once made the city prosperous and the canal side along which the ceramics were distributed to Manchester, and from there, the rest of the world. 

There seemed to be rather a lot of cats there too :)

This is mine and Patrick's small contribution, which I'm rather chuffed with.

We helped contribute towards the canal-side, which was a wonderful experience. Everything was made by people walking in, picking up clay and morphing the whole story into existence. It was great to be able to just pick up the soft clay and work directly with the materials without having to sketch anything first.

The results look rather cutesy, like the things I doodle.

BCB 2013

Saint Mary's Church, Stafford

Further photographing opportunities with my grandmother in Stafford. Inspired me enough to FINISH MY COMIC ABOUT THE BEGINNING OF TIME AND SPACE. Yep, that's right, I finished it! and the portfolio is looking great. Just need to wait for boots to stop pissing around with my photographs and print them already, and then the work I've been doing since I stopped going to uni will be all finished and beautifully presented.

These are from a little photography adventure I've began to take with my grandmother. She's been submitting photos to competitions for as long as I can remember so it's nice to have the chance to learn from her experiences and strengthen family ties through art. She reckons the top two are my best ones, but I still can't help but like all the others. Think I might crop the top one and then have it printed out really big.

Links

Today I decided to google image search Crabtopus just to see what else is out there apart from my own bizarre little collages. Turns out that it was the best idea ever because I found loads of awesome pictures and websites, and I've picked out my favourites in no particular order:

http://galactagore.deviantart.com/art/crabtopus-92118311

• Crabtopus by Galactagore on Deviantart

I don't even want to know how this was made. Part of me hopes it's just awesome photoshop, but then if I knew for sure it would kill some of the magic.

http://darkwatersdome.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/octocrab-crabtopus-crustaceopod.html

• Katie Feldman from Dark Waters: Creature Design

Probably the most anatomically 'realistic' drawing I've seen so far. It's worth checking out her whole blog because her style is beautiful.

http://lolzdui.deviantart.com/art/Crabtopus-colour-practice-376060291

• Crabtopus, Colour Practice by Lolzdui on Deviantart

I don't entirely know what to say, this person is like my potential brain twin. They have weeping abominations and mutant shrimp.

http://jeffharter.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/octobot.html

• Crab Octopus Robot Thingy... by Jeff Harter

This guy does work for Disney. The stuff on his blog is fabulous.

http://www.creaturemag.com/happy-friday-adam-pryce-chief-crabtopus/

• Happy Friday Chief Crabtopus by Adam Pryce

Not sure I like the typography but damn that little guy is adorably creepy.

Fig II. The Sword-Wielding Crabtopus

There's no coming back from this, Fig II is well and truly glued down for good. I'm so proud of this little fella because it was originally my least favourite collage out of the series.

May have spelt Wielding wrong though... -__-

...and then I took up knitting

This is my first woefully-equipped attempt at knitting using a piece of driftwood I found on a beach in Llandudno, my fingers (because I had no knitting needles) and recycled silk I bought when I went to Macclesfield.

It still smells a little smoky because I made it round my grandmother's house while helping her out a couple of days this week and I'm not sure what it's supposed to be yet, but I like it all the same. It's nice to try things out your own way without receiving any kind of instruction sometimes.

A Male Cecaelia Contemplates Miasma

They're not finished but shitting hell I'm definitely moving towards a conclusion with my collages. Kinda silly really because originally they were only meant to be idea experiments but I fell in love with them a little bit. Here's the collection so far

Here's the first one, not completely finished but the most-completed so far. Love the old-fashioned frame I managed to find for it. Really getting on my nerves that it isn't quite centred and the brown paper isn't quite straight but I suppose that's my graphics roots ruining my life again. I haven't stuck it down yet so it can still be adjusted, just wanted to see what it looked like in a frame.

I think it needs more detail round the edges somehow but I love how the graph paper turned out.

Thinking about naming the project 'Catalogue of Creatures that Should Never Exist' but I'm hoping I come up with something a bit more catchy over time. I want them to look like a collection of specimens. Perhaps when I have finished these I can move on to creating 3D aspects to the project.

Trying to come up with fancy names for everybody at the moment. So far I got:

• A Male Cecaelia Contemplates Miasma
• Sword-Wielding Crabtopus (highly territorial, likes collecting shoes)
• Insectile Abomination cheers on its favouite team
• All-Seeing Sea Turtle Plays the Tambourine
• Satan-Powered Motor Trike and Rebel Jesus
• Cetus Rhinocerotidae (The Uncommon Rhinocerfish)

I am so inspired by the work I have seen lately and the people I have met that I can't wait to do more work on this. Might have to beat Lorraine up a little bit to get her to do some work too.

Jesus was a rebel

When Jesus went through his rebellious teenage years, he probably owned a satan-powered motor-trike, but luckily god forgave him eventually and had him hung on a cross to die slowly and painfully.

Building up ideas for another collage and part of the continuing collaborative work between Lorraine Bennett and myself. I forgot to take my scissors with me (I feel naked!) so I can't make the couple of tiny adjustments needed before sticking-down time (chop off deer legs beneath wheel, trim down elephant horn, get rid of jesus' straggling hair).

I need to work on the backgrounds anyways, plain white cheap-ass paper looks a bit rubbish, I wouldn't put it on my wall in that state, so I can't imagine anybody else would want to, let alone kindly give me monies for it at a craft fair.

Through the Grape Vine

My dad has a rare genetic disease that causes muscular dystrophy, and he likes to raise money by building planters and tables out of recycled wood for the charity-run NeuroMuscular Centre in Winsford where he goes for the specialist phsyiotheraphy that helps to make his life more bearable.

While helping my dad kit out their recently-built shed, I got talking to a guy who enjoyed building ceramic dragons and he highly recommended a place in Sandbach called The Potter's Barn. Website is a little bit terrible-looking but it actually seems like a really cool place to go with a huge variety of facilities. Plus, they do Raku firings. So tempting...

By the way, if you have a look at the NeuroMuscular Centre website, they have a pretty cool Design and Print section, created and staffed by designers with muscular dystrophy

Is it illegal to draw pictures of art?

While at the Macclesfield Heritage Centre to see The Button Project, I was told by one lady that I had to write all the names of everybody whose work I drew pictures of underneath each drawing and I was told by another lady that I wasn't even allowed to draw any pictures at all which is something I haven't come across before.

had to rush the bottom right drawing due to circumstances

When I asked why, she mumbled something about copyright and then another lady who was stood next to me started telling the other lady off for being ridiculous. I came away from the experience feeling rather confused and it left a sour taste in my mouth.

Is it illegal to draw pictures of art? 

The sad thing is that all I wanted to do was write more about the exhibition, and publicise it amongst my peers because the artwork was beautiful and looked like a collection of modern-day treasure. I'm hardly raking in profit (none what-so-ever) and it's for an educational purpose.

The experience was definitely not what I wanted to take away from the exhibit.

While in Macc, we met Rachel Grant who had the most beautiful research books and awesome interactive artworks. She posed the question "what makes you feel strong" and asked for responses to be wound together to make a cocoon of fragility and strength.

Landscape is bloody gorgeous up north.

Here is my inadequate doodle response. The two squiggles are cows from a very long distance, and I got distracted while drawing the wall bit.

Some kind of progress

Slowly starting to build up layers on this piece. We got my particular spin on illuminated manuscript, with all the letter forms taken from this old doodle from last year. Originally spelling "In the beginning" the famous phrase that begins a certain controversial old book, this is part of my attempt to recreate a science-based story about the beginning of the universe using religious visual language.

Not sure if it needs more doing to it yet but I'm liking where it's heading. Softened some of the rigid felt-tip lines with water to create a more organic look, to compliment the glass forms. Torn up graph paper, netting and stitching are used similarly to move away from the rigid outline of the squared paper. A lot of religious-based art borrows heavily from nature, so it wouldn't make sense to create an excessively man-made industrial-feeling piece.