Friday 17 March 2006

My Neck Ceramics

These are old photo's I'm delving into now so you can see my ceramics. My good stuff, which was for my degree show (1994) was all smashed 3 months before my show, before it was even fired! I couldn't believe it, and no-one ever confessed to it.

I had made thousands of little porcelain pieces, mostly long slim pod shapes, that were to hang in clusters as part of light sculptures and to be grouped with my metalwork pieces into jewellery and small sculptures. I never even took photos (who knew they would be powder the next day). All that work gone. And I knew I could never make it all again in time, I didn't have the heart. So instead I went BIG making huge copper shell pod sculptures from scrap copper (ever the recycler).



So no pics of my good work, but instead these pieces which I made in '92, blimey, time flies. They were designed as neckpieces and pins to hold essential oils so that when you wore them the heat of your body would warm them up and the smell of the oils would gently be released. Unfortunately I was a bit ahead of my time since only art students and people into alternative medicines were remotely interested in them.

The forms came from studying vertebra and other bones found on the beach. There is something intriguing to me about bleached bones, they are so perfect.

The piece on the left ties in with my fascination with women's bodies! Mine was in a state at the time and I had period cramps that could floor me for weeks (turned out I had endometriosis but it took them 8 years to work it out!). I got really interested in simplified female forms, mummies, russian dolls etc. I still work with these things in my more 'arty' work but I'm not posting any of that, it's too personal just now. Do other people get like that about their work? I can happily post pics of things I make for friends but my 'serious' stuff is harder to put out there.

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