Two weeks after i sent the email, i got a reply saying that i had got the commission for Kidderminster Arts Festival. I was looking forward to getting started on this project as i have missed working to a tight brief like this/ the one i made myself. This might be a thing which i have to do in the future, set myself out tight briefs.
I began with the composition of the field, as i was confident the most about this one as it was a basic composition. I tried out different methods of making soil and i decided on using plaster, then covering it with sharp sand and then letting this dry and then painting it with chalk paint. I decided on chalk paint as it left a dusty appearance to it. I then topped it off with bits of soil in some places. The rest of the piece came together well. I knew that i wanted barbed wire, and realistically the only way to get some to the correct scale was to make it myself. This was probably them most time consuming thing out of everything, nevertheless, what i gained from it was a very convincing piece of barbed wire!
I then put this piece aside and moved onto my second sculpture. For this one, i needed to create the shape of the trenches, and so followed what i did in my moor piece and used papermache. Once this was set i again added plaster and sand, but i wrapped what would be the wooden supports in the trench in cling film, so i could push them into the plaster in order to keep an indentation. Once this was all dry i painted this and started to 'dress' it. I researched what was typical to have in the trenches and it seemed there were three common things: wooden supports, hessian and sand bags. I draped the hessian over sections to make it seem as though it was keeping back/ up the mud and banks - to stop it all from caving in. After this i then overlaid this with the wooden supports. Next i need to make sand bags. Traditionally these were made from hessian, however, i went to make one out of this but the stitching pulled out of it due to its size. I then thought about what scaled down hessian would be and the next best thing which i could think of was muslin. It had the same loose weave but was tight enough for me to stitch it. I then dyed it with and started making sandbags. I made LOTS of these as i found that when i added them to the sculpture they transformed it, It began to really look real. One this was all done i added more soil and sprayed paint into sections to gain a mud dyed look.
As it was well known the trenches were a wet and muddy place. I had the mud, but not water. I then started experimenting with different things to try and create puddles within the soil. I tried glazes, glues and clear silicone but nothing seemed right. Some dried white and others were too lumpy. And with some the liquid was too runny and it just didn't look like a puddle unfortunately. This meant that i did not have anything to represent water in y piece which was annoying. However, i will keep trying to find something which looks like water!! ...I have heard that latex and soil mixture are good, so i might experiment with this.
Finally i wanted to add a tiny bit of blood to my work to represent the loss and to show that there was once someone there. Again, this proved difficult to find a substance similar to blood. I tried paint but i could get the right hue, then i got some dye but this was too watery. I didn't want to mix it with glue either as this might have changed the colour. I ended up resorting to Ketchup. This was the right colour and thickness. I add tiny bits of this too my work. I did not want the blood to be a main focal point, just a slight hint as i didn't want my work to turn into some gory piece of art.
Over all i am pleased with the result. However, i feel like i might need to start to find a new way to do/put grass on my work. I am now ready to gain some interesting and deceptive photographs from my sculptures.
I began with the composition of the field, as i was confident the most about this one as it was a basic composition. I tried out different methods of making soil and i decided on using plaster, then covering it with sharp sand and then letting this dry and then painting it with chalk paint. I decided on chalk paint as it left a dusty appearance to it. I then topped it off with bits of soil in some places. The rest of the piece came together well. I knew that i wanted barbed wire, and realistically the only way to get some to the correct scale was to make it myself. This was probably them most time consuming thing out of everything, nevertheless, what i gained from it was a very convincing piece of barbed wire!
I then put this piece aside and moved onto my second sculpture. For this one, i needed to create the shape of the trenches, and so followed what i did in my moor piece and used papermache. Once this was set i again added plaster and sand, but i wrapped what would be the wooden supports in the trench in cling film, so i could push them into the plaster in order to keep an indentation. Once this was all dry i painted this and started to 'dress' it. I researched what was typical to have in the trenches and it seemed there were three common things: wooden supports, hessian and sand bags. I draped the hessian over sections to make it seem as though it was keeping back/ up the mud and banks - to stop it all from caving in. After this i then overlaid this with the wooden supports. Next i need to make sand bags. Traditionally these were made from hessian, however, i went to make one out of this but the stitching pulled out of it due to its size. I then thought about what scaled down hessian would be and the next best thing which i could think of was muslin. It had the same loose weave but was tight enough for me to stitch it. I then dyed it with and started making sandbags. I made LOTS of these as i found that when i added them to the sculpture they transformed it, It began to really look real. One this was all done i added more soil and sprayed paint into sections to gain a mud dyed look.
As it was well known the trenches were a wet and muddy place. I had the mud, but not water. I then started experimenting with different things to try and create puddles within the soil. I tried glazes, glues and clear silicone but nothing seemed right. Some dried white and others were too lumpy. And with some the liquid was too runny and it just didn't look like a puddle unfortunately. This meant that i did not have anything to represent water in y piece which was annoying. However, i will keep trying to find something which looks like water!! ...I have heard that latex and soil mixture are good, so i might experiment with this.
Finally i wanted to add a tiny bit of blood to my work to represent the loss and to show that there was once someone there. Again, this proved difficult to find a substance similar to blood. I tried paint but i could get the right hue, then i got some dye but this was too watery. I didn't want to mix it with glue either as this might have changed the colour. I ended up resorting to Ketchup. This was the right colour and thickness. I add tiny bits of this too my work. I did not want the blood to be a main focal point, just a slight hint as i didn't want my work to turn into some gory piece of art.
Over all i am pleased with the result. However, i feel like i might need to start to find a new way to do/put grass on my work. I am now ready to gain some interesting and deceptive photographs from my sculptures.