"Wire Play #2" - Final Project Spring 2015

The Final Project for the semester began with the intention to create a 3D sculptural version of a Joan Miro painting.

Miro was a Spanish Abstract Surrealist painter whose playful imagery I find very appealing. A Miro inspired work was just a starting point; and as always my profs encouraged me to push the idea further. That is the mantra that I will continue to hear until I am able to do it all on my own. I ended up making use of the many, small, found objects that I have acquired over the last four years. The title "Wire Play"" references one of the sculptures made for the  13 Sculptures project.

Most of these found objects were picked up off the street while walking from my home to the grocery store. Its a two mile round trip and there is a particular side street that is what I call a "target rich environment" for found objects. Any time I walk down that road I'll find two or three interesting items. The copper wire came from a classmate who was cleaning up her studio space and giving away odds and ends.  Even though we had three weeks for completion I had to work out conceptually what I wanted to do, and then assemble it. I spent a few days just experimenting with different objects in various combinations, knowing that I would eventually hit upon the "right thing" to do for this project. This took longer than expected, and I felt pressed for time. It seems that there is always one project each semester where I get hung up a bit. I have to continue working on how to "get out of my own way".

During the critique my classmates commented that the piece referenced things that were: "botanical" or "robotic". Some said, "satellites" and even "UFOs".

This last photo is my favorite for aesthetic reasons.

 

A major donor and patron to the sculpture program sat in on our critique and commented that my piece was "interesting" and "cute".  "Interesting" is always good; but "cute" is not! I wish she had come by to visit us when I was presenting "Artifact" a few weeks before. I think that was my most successful piece this semester.

When everyone's final grade for the semester was posted, I got one of the few solid A's. I feel lucky and pleased for my first semester to end on such a high note.

A Gift from Above

Easy Pickings

Extraterrestrials have appeared several times on this blog because it's a fun subject that offers many comedic possibilities. See past posts here, there, here again, and once more.  In this week's post we see that these off-planet visitors/trespassers/invaders have come up with a better method to obtain subjects for their experiments. Perhaps they are feeling a bit guilty about the whole "abduction" thing and see this new protocol as being a bit more like having "volunteers".

This cartoon first saw the light of day a number of years ago. I have a cousin who saw it in print somewhere and promptly displayed it upon her kitchen refrigerator door, unaware that I was the creator. While visiting her a few months later I noticed the toon, solved the mystery as to its authorship, and thanked her for the compliment.

For my international readers; here in the States the kitchen refrigerator door is a place of honor for displaying children's art works, and favored cartoons. It is high praise indeed to make it onto the old 'fridge door.

If you enjoyed this week's cartoon then please share the link with other folks. Your feedback and comments are always welcome.

Circles In The Field

Since I was a wee lad, I have always been fascinated with what have been called "Earth Mysteries". These are such things as; Crop Circles, UFOs, Bigfoot, Yeti, Lake Monsters, and so on. There have been mistaken I.D.'s and quite a number of fakes over the years, but this does not account for all of the sightings. There is still so much that we don't know about our own planet, and my mind remains open to possibilities. There is something to all of this, and the big question is -- what? It would be quite satisfying to get some definitive answers within my life time. Then I get to smugly say that I believed it all along.

Today's cartoon title is taken from a song by my favorite progressive metal band, Galactic Cowboys.