Mixed Media Piece
Industrial Serenity
Medium: Industrial Found Object Pieces
March 2016 My piece, industrial serenity was made with the intentions to focus on re purposing found object materials and conveying a different type of atmosphere, than the original intentions of the material. Inspiration was taken from Marcel Duchamp piece's, his "Bottle Rack" and "Fountain" works. The major components that my piece consisted of were solely found object, chains once used for a chandelier, a wooden plank made for a patio, wrenches intended for automotive repair, and eye hooks meant for paintings and indoor wall decorations. InspirationWhen introduced to this project I was given multiple examples of artists and types of pieces that I could make, for example assemblages, junk sculptures, and photography. The one stood out to me was the found object because it was essentially finding another purpose for something, an object that was originally created with something else in mind. During the introduction to the project, Marcel Duchamp was the artist that had created work that had captured my attention better than any other artists shown, especially his Bottle Rack and very well known Fountain piece. In those works he had not altered the objects he had found to create them, he simply positioned them differently and gave them unique titles, in addition to very small touches. That was what I had done similarly to Duchamp's work, I had given the major components different purposes than originally intended by adding small touches to those pieces themselves, retaining the sheer simplicity the Duchamp also had within his work.
Process |
|
In all my art pieces so far, I always start with planning sketches and for the most part, they prove to be beneficial. In this project the first planning sketches I created did not illustrate what I had in mind, because not often do I immediately know what I plan on doing for the piece from the very beginning. In the case of this project, I decided on a found object based piece of work very shortly after being introduced, with the work of Marcel Duchamp in mind. And because I had access to a lot of materials, it also seemed like a time efficient plan to choose to go with a found object piece as well. Since I knew the piece would essentially take the form of a wind chime, I used low grade automotive wrenches from my fathers garage of different sizes as the core subject of the items that were going to be re purposed. At first I also planned on using a much thicker chain, until I then realized the immense difficulty of opening chain links of that size. Instead I had an old chandelier in my basement with an excessively long chain that appeared to have aesthetic value and structural integrity to hold the weight of the wrenches. Despite this, opening the chain links from this chandelier was still the most strenuous part of the process. After covering the top part of the plank with sand paper to improve its visual state due to rot, I then began to twist in the eye hooks into the opposite side, one for each wrench and chain. During the entire process I had to close and reopen chain links in link the pieces together, which proved very time consuming. After linking the chains to wrenches and hooks, I then added another eye hook to the side with sand paper, and chained together links that act as something that could hold up the piece. Then after noticing what I felt were minimalist sides of plank, I added screws and washers for consistency with the industrial use of materials, using simple patterns that would not sever my connection with Marcel Duchamp, my intended inspiration. Lastly came taking photos, choosing and outdoor setting for natural lighting and use of wind.
Reflection
In conclusion, I'm immensely satisfied with the outcome of this project because I achieved what I set out to do, without exerting and valuable resources. My goal was to re purpose materials, and in my project I had created what was essentially a wind chime. Something known to add peace and serenity to an atmosphere, despite that I had used supplies that are meant for loud and harsh environments. While also taking inspiration from the work of Duchamp, in terms of his simplistic style and methods when re purposing found objects. Things I might change for the future, may have been using slightly stronger and more effective tools because the work done was very tedious.
|
|