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| Nearly a year in the making, Katie and I as collaborators have our first solo Museum show on view at the Taft Museum of Art. Up next the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Fuller Craft Museum. Here is a sample with links to explore, and more to come (click here) |
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| A block of plaster, hammer, chisel, a potters trimming tool, and my bare hands. |
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| A little shot of our project for Model Citizens in concurrence with New York Design Week at the Chelsea Art Museum. You must check out our project at our Future Retrieval blog as well as Katie's blog to get the full scope of the project . |
Over the last several months I have been involved in the production of these porcelain busts. Lenin from Poland, the RUX cameo, Alphonso Taft for the show Katie and I are working on at the Taft Museum of Art, as well as the many animal heads, there seems to be a theme. I began a new collaboration today using busts, and the visiting artist came in also mentioning how he wanted to make a bust. You gotta get yourself some ceramic busts.
I am in the process of redesigning the branch like forms, carving them from plaster. The size and shapes are changing as well as the strategy for fastening, assemblage, and mounting.
My take on a project we are working on for a museum show in Massachusetts's. We have been attacking the new shape on multiple fronts, with more to come. I have been adding hand cut decal triangles to our nasty hunting dog head. Katie has been china painting to an insane degree.
The second exhibition on the symposium that I participated in last September in Poland opens Feb 3 and runs through March 4 in Wroclaw, Poland. I wish I could make the trip to see everyone there. Here is another glimpse at my work station at the Walbzrych Porcelain Factory.
The moles have been resurfacing in the studio over the last few weeks. Here are prototyped versions of the scan data, smooth, textured, and mini mole, plus a little model for a plush toy of the Slasher that I designed last summer (so secret that I may be forced to remove this post). Mole molds have been made and some new sculptures are on the way.
Poland was great, and I would like to thank all of the symposium participants who for a short month became my good friends and family. I did not know what to expect, but I managed (with help) pretty well with the factories resources.
Some shots of my work area in Walbrzych Porcelain plus looking out the window of the factory. As you can see my main subject matter here has become Lenin, the Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician. I found this mold here and knew that I had to have it.
I have had the pleasure of working with RUX a Manhattan based design firm over the last year on this secret project that was launched at the 2010 International Contemporary Furniture Fair.
Here is the master ( a mold of a mold ) with a detail and what it makes on the right. Check out the finished work on the RUX website.
Here is the squirrel chandelier in full effect. Titled PVR's Garden, we are acknowledging the source of the squirrel, who had been terrorizing a crop of tomatoes. The materials involved are digitally imaged porcelain from my own taxidermy practice, hand and die cut paper, cast iron, yarn, and neon.
Harlequin A conventional buffoon of the commedia dell'arte, traditionally presented in a mask and parti-colored tights.
A clown; a buffoon.
This years contribution to the clay studios small favors show, the squirrel. I dont have much to say about this.
The submission above is for Replanting the Garden, an exhibition curated by Richard Saja at Big Car gallery in Indianapolis. I decided to follow the Bosch painting of The Garden of Earthly Delights with a triptych of objects reinterpreting each of the three panels of the original. From the left, The Joining of Adam and Eve, The Garden, and Hell.
A bit of progress on the cane toad initiative, click the image for detail. These guys made their debut at Musicnow, an incredible three day festival of performances held at Memorial Hall in Cincinnati. We (Future Retrieval) devised and installed work specifically for that event which was presented by Country Club Projects. It is true Cane Toads can and will eat rodents. The labor that has prevented my posting will come to light within the next month and a half where there are a few shows/ products that have been underground.
I have been getting this 3-D printed squirrel ready for some mold making, infusing it with epoxy to harden the gypsum powder. On right is the original taxidermy squirrel, painted white, leap-frogging its enlarged replica. The tail is such a distinguishing characteristic of these varmints, and I have come up with a few off the wall takes on the form. Stay tuned for some really wild stuff.
This recent acquisition to my collection of invasive species is Bufo Marinus, the infamous Cane Toad. These giant toads multiply by the thousands and are probably the most widely introduced amphibian in the world. Growing to devour small rodents, there is also a milky toxic secretion coming from perotoid glands that will burn the eyes and inflame the skin . A dog or a cat that bites a Cane Toad will sicken and may die.
Squirrel. Tail coming soon. STL files describe the surface geometry of a three dimensional object.
Here is a image of the freeze dried mole we have had 3-D scanned, I hope to have this thing rapid prototyped to gremlin like proportions quite soon. Moles, amongst the most subterranean of mammals have enormously enlarged clawed forefeet enabling the critter to virtually swim through porous soil at about a foot per minute. The grainless fur allows for easy movement backward or forward in tight burrows. A narrow pelvis helps facilitate an easy change in direction while underground, often by somersaulting withing its tunnels. I am really digging the detail of those claws seen on the left.
here is a bit of the work Katie and I produced for Country Club in Cincinnati. This collection is being shown parallel to the paintings of Aaron Morse (background). In this image the porcelain centerpiece and the chandelier are nicely complemented by both Aaron's work and the bright Orange Saarinen table. Look here form more images of the project.
My collaborative work with Katie Parker has been pretty intense the last couple months so here is one of the projects and you can see more here.
So much for the coon skin cap, how about a royal rat hat to top off some western porcelain. This is another piece to complement one our upcoming gigs.
Leading the procession, a royal runt of rats, riding pillowback, complete with golden bells and crown.
For one of a couple top secret project's coming up this September. Remember this?
I decided to belly up to the old potters wheel recently. I had a dream where no one believed that I could throw, so I had to prove it to myself. These pieces, with a bit more work will be the beginning of Future Retrieval's slow service line of hand made, hand made, and hand made, porcelain ware.
Alright, were are getting ready for a very busy year! Visits from gallery directors, curators, local entrepreneurs"more than I should list", as well as project with a designer from New York. Katie Parker and I have more than enough creative work to shake a stick at. Above is a collection of my work of accumulated from the last nine months,which is a sample for whats to come.
