After focusing on my upcoming exhibitions including the MA Work In Progress show it was really good to spend half an hour catching up with my course mentor Jim Cheshire today. Discussing where I am and the direction in which I am taking my work has helped me focus.
'What am I armouring?' being a critical question I have to ask myself over the next week along with how I aim to move my work from its current 2d state of panels to the 3d installations through which I intend to express my ideas.
Why 3d? Is something I ask myself repeatedly. During my BA the focus of work became about producing elegant vessels with flawless surfaces, that were tactical to handle, but did I want to continue making vessels? The answer to which is both yes and no, vessels are clearly useful items, that fit neatly in the home and are suitable for most galleries, but to get my name out there as a maker and to challenge myself through the MA programme I feel a strong desire to produce something more visually stimulating that involves the viewer, encourages them to touch (which is something forbidden by most galleries).
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| 'Caermonialis' 170mm x 300mm Smoke-fired porcelain panel. |
I also would like to see how smoke fired pattern behaves over segments, does the pattern become fragmented?, is it easily defined?, what happens at the edges of each segment? Up until now I have only smoke fired an image/design on a vessel or a large flat panel as shown, so this in-itself will be an interesting experiment.
My next mentor meeting is September 12 at 11am, my aim is to present three pathways for further exploration and to use the meeting to discuss their merits and pitfalls before embarking on the start of my major project.
This meeting will take place after the MA exhibition has begun on September 9th so will also provide an opportunity to review the work I have submitted and receive feedback from Jim who will have attended the opening night.