New Studio, New Work ... New Year
Have spent November and December settling into the new studio space I have for the Residency at Harcourt House, doing research, planning/plotting/scheming (i.e., orating out some if the too-many ideas I have for work!), and generally ... well, nesting!
My predecessor, the remarkable David Janzen, left the AIR Studio in great shape for me to move in; freshly painted walls, swept, spic-and-span. My thanks to David for such a lovely welcome (although I do miss having him 'over the wall' as my studio buddy)!!
 |
| The paint spattered floor tells a different story from the pristine walls! |
 |
| I LOVE my work bench! |
 |
| Starting to move in ...
Having the luxury of more than twice the space in which to work has been amazing so far. I've kept my regular studio (right next door), and am using that as a reading/research/drawing/'clean work' space, so that I can devote the AIR Studio to the 'messy work' of fabrication and work on large-scale pieces.
|
And what have I been up to work-wise? So far, 300+ photographs of nests, for starters! I'm really excited by these images, and their graphic quality. They lend themselves to adaptation and extrapolation in other media - printmaking and drawing for starters ... so I'm looking forward very much to working with them in various ways over the coming months.
I've also been drawing a fair bit, and loving that process as well. This, in particular, has become a way into working with nests as sculptural forms - of learning how they are built in a physical way, since the hand that makes the mark also builds the form and traces the limits of its structure in space. The drawings are also teaching me a great deal about scale, and its particular importance for this body of work. I'll come back to this idea again in future posts, I'm sure, but for now, I'll content myself with posting images of a few of the drawings I've done over the last couple of months ...
 |
Lots more to come ... and I think I have figured out a couple of construction questions that will make for some interesting results! I'll keep you posted!
