After the first week of getting to grips with casting plaster it was time to see how we could take things on and experiment further, looking at textures, imprints and moulds in moulds.
I decided to initially try and create a block of different textures, using various items; my hands, my footprint, off-cuts of blue foam, found items, and then my beard around the edge...
I also made a small relief using some random plastic soldiers to see ho much detail would be retained. As much as this created interesting outcomes it was also, I didn't feel, with direction. I also wanted to try to use the sand to cast objects and see how that material worked and what you could do with it. By using a piece of bent acrylic, similar to the piece I used with the strimmer wire thread through it I worked into the sand to created shapes and folds. It took a lot of perseverance to make the sand do what I wanted to. I couldn't get it smooth enough, I couldn't make the shapes to link, the sand wasn't as flexible as I would have liked. It was only through pushing it and trying different methods that I got the shape I wanted. I then had the issue that I felt a solid piece of plaster at this size would not only be very heavy but also be a mass that I wasn't sure I wanted it to be. So I looked to create it as a 'slip shell' by building up layers of plaster until it looked strong enough to support itself once out of the mould.
Once I had taken the clay away and was left with the shape it retained a certain amount of the redness colour of the sand. On discussions in 3D rather than trying to lose this I would enhance it and add a ferrous coating, very fine bits of iron in water painted on, to give it a more rusty/metallic texture. This has dried back to a more reddy brown and lends itself to an earthy colour and the pieces has echoes of landscape but could also be interpreted as bodily with the folds and flowing curved areas.
When you look at the work of Henry Moore, the figure is still very clear, even when it is as abstracted as it is. It retains the feel and shape of a figure with very little detail, there is enough information for you to make out the position of the figure, lying, reclining, sitting or however.
When you look at his studio you can see all the drawings, studies and pieces in progress, fractured parts, moulds, works in progress and finished or discarded pieces.
Moore took a lot of his influence from nature, not just the large wild landscape of Yorkshire with its exposed rocks, geological formations and natural stone where he was born but also the smaller items he would collect.
"I have found the principles of form and rhythm from the study of natural objects…pebbles and rocks show nature’s way of working stone" (https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/henry-moore-om-ch-1659/henry-moores-sculptures).
The more I read the more I become interested in his work and maybe this will form a part of my 2,000 word essay for this unit. The Henry Moore Foundation in Hertfordshire would be well worth a visit. (https://www.henry-moore.org/).
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