Personal Response to "On Longing"

"The Body is the primary mode of perceiving scale"

The small dark twisted shape at the upper left corner is a person, far in the background

"Capacity of Objects to serve as traces of authentic experiences"

Illustration I completed for a client's book on her travels

"To have a souvenir if the exotic is to possess both a specimen and a trophy"

Shrunken Head at the Lightner Museum, which served as a
trophy of war in its native context and as a
specimen in its Western context

Memento

Progress and Final Product of the Memento project

The "hockey puck" of Super Glaze epoxy molded in a
peanut butter lid, prior to sanding its rim to get rid of the grooves

A tentative digital model of the piece's basic form

An early version of the paper portion of the sculpture,
displaying a montage of the artwork that I associate with my memory

The paper cutout of a human figure (representing myself)
 laying on the center of the resin "hockey puck"

The base, figure cutout, and paper element of the "complete" sculpture, seen from below

The paper element, being a crumpled printout of the collage with a coffin-shaped hole

Artist's Statement: This piece serves as a representation of my memory, and of my feelings in the wake of it.  While working on a project for my drawing course, I was listening to a playlist of songs, which included "Skulls" by Bastille. Despite all of my musings on and exposure to death beforehand, it was this song which finally brought on my existential crisis about my mortality, and the subsequent feelings of hollowness, simultaneous claustrophobia and perception of overwhelming vastness, dread, and futility.  To represent these sensation, I depicted a tiny figure being forced to see and acknowledge the coffin-shaped hole hovering oppressively above. The paper surrounding the hole depicts a montage of the project that I was doing at the time, and its color and form communicate the overwhelming infinity of everything which is not the self, The clear base serves to give the viewer the perspective of the tiny figure. Fitting with the title of the project, this piece acts as a Memento Mori. 

Map Relief Sculpture

Progress and Final Product of the Map Relief Sculpture project

Digital model, which served as a guideline

Egg-crate in the assembly process.
The cutouts are based on the digital model

Paper towels being applied to the finished egg-crate
using water and a large paintbrush

Additional layers of paper towel are applied using
watered-down Gesso and a paintbrush, which
was then drizzled with wood glue for texture,
and painted over with more Gesso

Finished product, with ink representing submerged earth, and three

of the four faces given solid sides of

 paper (the side facing up is still "naked"). 

The relief sculpture is laying on its side, 

with the top-part facing the camera.

Viewed from the left side, top-side-up

Top-side-up and viewed from the front, displaying the "naked" side

Artist's Statement: Indulging my predisposition for literal interpretation, I created a model of a geologically plausible seaside cliff, covering certain sections of the white form in ink to represent areas covered by water.  The egg-crate method posed some disadvantages, such as the visibility of the egg-crate itself despite the layers of paper towel, and given the opportunity I might have used a different method

Soap Carving

Progress and Final Product of the Soap Carving project

Platypus #1: Pumpkin Scented Soap

Early stage, carving based on the flat
 underside of the plastic platypus

Viewed from above, at a somewhat later stage

Nearly finished carving, compared to the soapbox and excess soap

Platypus #2: Apple Berry Scented Soap

One remaining progress picture, depicts nearly-finished
body and unfinished head, prior to the damage done to it

Both

Depicts mostly-intact Pumpkin Scented sculpture,
the plastic platypus, and the damaged and incomplete
Apple Berry Scented sculpture, viewed from above

Switched around for some reason, and viewed from a more oblique angle

Artist's Statement: As with the Masking Tape Shoes, the objective of this piece was accuracy and detail.  I was unable to replicate my initial success in fulfilling this objective, as demonstrated by the forlorn-looking Apple Berry Scented platypus in comparison to its Pumpkin scented predecessor

Balsa Wood Small Sculptures

Progress and Final Product of the Small Balsa Wood Sculptures project

Sculpture #1:Pattern

This shape formed one half of an element of the
sculpture, which would be reproduced
in four successively smaller elements

laying on one side of the largest and second
largest elements, the sculpture includes four
elements inverted and assembled in a recursive
pattern

Finished product, composed of wood, pins, and wood glue.

Another angle, somewhat closer.
Displays two glue-coated faces

Seen from a more aerial angle

Sculpture #2: Texture

One of two in-progress pictures;
displays the wooden elements which
helps hold the paper elements together

The other in-progress picture;
shows the sculpure in its undecorated stage

Final Product;
displays the paper-and-woodchips face

Displays the sawdust-and=woodstrips face

Partially-aerial view

Sculpture #3: Shape

This is one photo of the final product, showing the more solid side
In my haste, I neglected to record my progress

A view of the interior

Another angle

Artist's Statement: Through these three small sculptures, three different elements or principles of design would be demonstrated; respectively, those elements and principles were pattern, through recursion of a three-dimensional object, texture, through the application of small elements, and shape, through the assembly of roughly equilateral triangles.

Masking Tape Shoes (Final Post)

Progress and Final Product of the Masking Tape Shoes project

Progress on the left shoe, forming the toe out of the short-walled base.

Body of the right shoe, before details, siding, tongue, lace-holes, or sole

Side and back detail to be attached to both shoes in the final stages

Finished product of left shoe, from the left profile view

Again, from the front-left corner view

Laying on its right side, displaying its top face

Artist's Statement: In creating these masking tape sculptures, my primary goal was the faithful

and accurate replication of my pair of shoes, which would be detailed and coherent.  Though I fell short of this goal in some respects, such as the unfinished soles, lack of laces, and slight dissimilarity of the two shoes, the finished product is still decent in its own right.

3D to 2D

3D to 2D using the Map Relief sculpture

For this project, I used SumoPaint to create an extended map of the terrain represented by my Map Relief sculpture, but contrasted the original and extended portions through a frame and the inverted emphasis on the water versus the land; in the original, the sea is solid green and the land is multi-valued, while in the extended, the land is solid black and the terrain of the seabed is multi-colored.