benchbenchbenchbenchbenchwiththelovelypeople

a research day at Kings working on bench with the bench team! – it was a joy. I approached the day with a very loose idea of intention, way of working or a perceived outcome. I enjoy the idea of turning up in a space and making work with limited materials. The challenge is like a tradesman, a jobbing artist if you will. I had simplified the materials and activity from previous ideas. The very broad intention was to create a system or structure that would enable individuals to create a narrative. They would do this by choosing a rubber-stamp, printing it onto a piece of paper, attaching it to a wire and then continuing on the same wire, repeating the actions until they felt they had finished, creating a linear narrative. I have several revisions after watching participants operating the structure and discussing how they worked with the materials.

The work could be structurally less complex –

Instructions – there is a need to add these – they could take the form of a lab protocol.

Example - Pick 3 stamps, consider how together they could create a narrative that is of interest to you. Print onto the paper and attach them to the wire.

For clarity there could be different coloured wires, making it easier to follow the lines.

A way of attaching the prints needs to be considered. This could take the form of small clips to enable ease and flexibility. The prints could be attached anywhere on the wire.

Rethinking the work -

there could be a 2D scroll-like version made simultaneously with the 3D piece, almost creating a record of activity. 

The piece could be a large sheet of paper, a rubber-stamp is printed, a line drawn and another stamp is added until you have a complex set of interconnected lines and visual nodal points. Each participant could work on their own diagram, but it would interlink with each other’s stamps.

It would be possible to work directly onto a bench, drawing and stamping directly onto the surface or wrapping the bench in paper. The shelves would bring height and a range of levels.

controldocuments

SZC work continues, the ideas continue to flow alongside the conversations. It’s been an excellent week all round - We have got R&D money for the bench project at Kings with the possibility to extend it in so many ways, this is really exciting as I get to work with a wonderous group of people. I’ve been offered a show at imprints in Crest, France and I’ve been making more work around the theme of data, the show will be called control documents. Sarah B at Bristol has invited me to show work in an exhibition in Japan, the 3D printed work was chosen, and I think it will look good and hopefully go down well. I have been awarded research money to work on the project exploring Catenary. On Thursday I got to see some of the Norwich pattern books with Ruth Battersby-Tooke, the Senior Curator of Costume and Textiles at Norfolk Museums Service at the Bridewell in Norwich. It was, as ever a real pleasure to be in the presence of such extraordinary objects in the fantastically knowledgeable hands of Ruth. The books give a hint at what the past might have looked like in a similar way that the textile ‘swatches’ held by The Foundling Museum in London. Onto screens – almost finished White Lotus, the whole experience is just distasteful! Started Zero Day, unsure where its going to go yet. Life List was difficult to watch through the tears!

iminabook!

I’m in a book! Pattern and Chaos in Art, Science and Everyday Life (Book) Critical Intersections and Creative Practice. By Sarah Horton and Victoria Mitchell some work I made whilst in resident at Nanotech DTC in Cambridge. Working on some 3D structures using a present – PLA that gradually blends from one colour to another – the first one looks totally alien. Saw Little Shop of Horrors at the Wolsey in Ipswich – intriguing musical that kept me interested throughout all the show tunes in that it seems to comment on capitalism/slavery. Onto screens – Land of bad –the caring might of America demonstrated through drones and expensive technology! Code 8 part 11 – superhuman powers, robots, authoritarian state – what could go wrong. The Gentleman – wonderful, glorious nonsense. Just at the beginning of Masters of the Air – truly shocking visceral, footage that depicts the utter madness of flying in a metal box into a war zone.

imaginingthefabricofthepast.

Extraordinary day spent in Rotherhithe at the Thames Discovery Centre at a Women at Work event. Really great speakers using finds to reveal the lives of working women through mud larking. So many amazing stories - of the development of ale houses by explaining the relationship between women brewing beer in the home and witch burning - through the use of cauldrons, pointed hats and broom sticks. Then there was the history of women and their role in the manufacturing of pins. The language of pins, their names are absolutely fascinating. Then there was the churches relationship to sex. By decree of Henry II the church was given control of brothels - called stews - there were eighteen licensed brothels in Bankside employing about a thousand prostitutes at any one time. As a result of the church taking control, most of London’s churches built during this period were largely financed by prostitution. https://dirtysexyhistory.com/2017/01/26/a-cesspool-in-the-palace-prostitution-and-the-church-in-medieval-southwark/ After the event I went onto the Thames beach and found a piece of a torpedo bottle – researching what it actually was and finding out about its history was fascinating - this could be a new thing! Akram Khan’s latest piece, Creature was a brutalising visceral experience. The whole evening was totally extraordinary, from the pounding music, sparse set, and mesmerising dancers. onto screens - A Man Called Otto – a study of understated care – quite beautiful. Operation Fortune – gotta love Hugh Grant – he is having a ball.

sharingthelearning

An extraordinary day at Kings. The Knowing through Making conference was such a positive day. It was a great opportunity to share some of the experiences I have had from my engagement with the synthetic anatomy module and my general engagement with the world of science. Working in this world and creating and giving the talk was, as ever a joy. Constructing and presenting a talk is always a learning experience, an opportunity of reflection on the amazing journey I have had with my association and collaborative within the science world. I always feel welcome and what I bring from the world of 'art school' thinking is valued highly. Running the 3 workshops with Celia Pym was most excellent, I think we gave a flavor of the student experience to the conference delegates through presentations and especially the workshops. https://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/knowing-through-making-les-bicknellppt link is to the presentation, although the many gifs embedded within the talk don't animate on the platform. Images from one of the workshops show the need of the groups to work intimately in collaboration. 

thefirstmechanicalcut

After much learning with illustrator the lazer cutting tests for the Goldlay Square commission look good - really pleased with how the references have become heightened - the  images of books opening and cell structures 'pop' out of the design. Also when you have a physical thing rather than the digital you really get a sense of the scale. Other physical aspects of its materiality become obvious such as how the design creates excellent shadows.

growthgrowngrowingcontainer

Working on the background research for Goldlay Sq in Chelmsford. Continuing the idea of information and communication whilst making connections with the history of the site.  This has taken two more paths. In the process of the space becoming a place it was the site of an allotment. I have been thinking about the material contained within plant matter. Looking at cell structures and the process of growth. Words such as storage, connections, food and seed are spinning around my head. This is a fairly underlying concept and is at the root of the idea of existence and evolution - this has taken me into the world of Ernst Haeckel. Information and embedded knowledge has thrown up numbers, patterns and sacred geometry. On the other hand the library storage facility and the idea of book have resurfaced. I started to build and draw book structures whilst thinking about the question - What does information look like? The book as an image standing in for knowledge, a container of information, documented and disseminating. To disseminate is to "spread abroad as though sowing seed. The two ideas mesh and point to fundamentals - the building blocks of the material around us.

foldingandfinding

continuing to extend the idea of nets, crystals and systems. A visit to look at the potential of a plasma cutter at http://www.steelsculptures.co.uk/ has led to thoughts of combining the nets with tessellated patterns. The pieces would be a combination of both geometric art piece and seating - shadows have great potential - aesthetically pleasing and useful! Meanwhile collating distances to everywhere from Chelmsford. The signpost/distance idea is fairly straightforward but rather than buying actual signs they could be cut and galvanised to last forever. I love the idea that everyday the individual looking at the posts will consider their physical place in the world, connecting and joining them to others.

netgymnastics

the mental gymnastics that occurs in the mind when looking at a geometry net is intriguing and something that I've spent the day working on. https://www.mathsisfun.com/definitions/net.html  The galena crystal structure was the jumping off point for this work, also the idea of a plan and how it is interpreted - it would be interesting to have the drawings of nets and actual solid structures within the space - there could be a form of game play - working out what the net would make and then which it matches to.

convergentcrystalhistory

convergence - today the various strands of research have merged - from the book repository, thinking about the idea of communication of knowledge and how we communicate - The Marconi Wireless factory is/was just around the corner and I started to reflect on all the places messages were sent to and from and how far away places were/are - signposts - an image from my family album - far right is my Uncle Reg my great Aunt Floss who is sitting on his right, always with her handbag. He worked at GEC and I once made a cats whisker radio set with him - a proto transmitter - the crystal was galena, which has an isometric structure so the idea using symmetric crystal structures to exploring moulds and the positive and negative is in the air.  

Goldlaygardensbecomesasquare

I have a new job. It's a great project working with Commission Projects http://www.commissionprojects.co.uk/ on a new housing development for Essex County Council on the site of the former Essex County Council Libraries Headquarters and storage facility in Chelmsford.  The site has an intriguing history which I am just starting to uncover. My first foray into the archives has thrown up a link to a Mercury Press on the site around 1930-40 which has provided a strand of research. It was also a space of 'knowledge storage' for all you psycho geography people out there. Books ordered in, held there before being disseminated within Essex library service. This flow of stories is another strand, thinking about words and how we use them. Finally walking around the site, the work is beginning and seeing the buildings rising from the ground one connects to the making process. The plans have mirrored formats within the design and the process of building involves moulds so an inside and outside or negative and positive. I'm interested in how this relates to the idea of the puzzle and how good public art makes you think but you can also ignore it until one day you engage. The work begins here......