Showing posts with label collections. Show all posts
Showing posts with label collections. Show all posts

Sunday, 8 July 2012

finished amulets

  Continuing from The Small Blessings http://pittrivers-amulets.blogspot.co.uk/project at The Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford, I went on to finish off some of the amulets which I started during the project. I have also made a few new ones.
To give the finished amulets a feeling of belonging to the permanent collections, they were all hand labeled and numbered.

plaster, gold and silver leaf

plaster, metal matchbox holder

aluminium, crystal bead, leather

embroidered wool purse, leather, donkey hair, found objects

aluminium, stone, leather

beeswax, plaster, thread, paper

copper, found objects, knitted purse

plaster, gold and silver leaf

Beeswax, plaster and pins

The labels were edged with aluminium and copper, to give a similar feel to the labels in the museum. All the specimens from the project have gone through conservation to check for any infestation and put through the deep freeze. This will protect objects in the museum from potential contamination.

Working on this unique project has inspired my work a great deal. It has led me to try out new techniques, such as mould making and casting and also to consider ways of presenting my work.
Hopefully I will continue to develop some of these ideas in my future work.

Tuesday, 29 May 2012

Small things arranged neatly

I recently came across an artist in America (Lisa Congon), who Created a blog based on photographing a collection a day. http://collectionaday2010.blogspot.co.uk/search?updated-max=2010-12-03T07:03:00-08:00&max-results=30
It was interesting listening to what her thought son collecting were on what the appeal of neatly arranging things was all about. Her thoughts on why things arranged and organised had visual appeal was due to the fact that our every day lives can often be quite chaotic. Looking at something which has been organised can give calming qualities, even if these are not our own things.

I have been meaning to record and photograph my many collections for a long time, and seeing Congon's work plus other artists who do similar things ( Austin Radcliffe - http://thingsorganizedneatly.tumblr.com/ ) has inspired me to think about this again.

I have many things which I have collected over the years (mainly from car boot sales), which I am going to start to document. They will appear on this blog as often as I can find the time to do this.

A few things which I have multiples of include:
  • butterflies
  • cigarette cards
  • vintage toys and games
  • vintage sewing ephemera
  • stamps
  • postcards
  • old letters
  • vintage scrapbooks
  • Vintage maps
  • old photographs
  • fishing tackle
  • dolls
  • vintage suitcases
  • old buttons
  • keys
  • old books
  • brass animal ornaments
  • tea
  • vintage press studs

Another artist/comedian who is quite interesting is Ursus Wehrli. His concept is about 'tidying up art' You can watch one of his performances here

Some of my lace making bobbins, awaiting organising