Today is the final day to finish all the work and set up for the show, so there is a lot to be done. Mine was in a slight state of disarray, but I covered the plinth in the white carpet, trimmed it and placed the work on it in a way I am happy with now. The next thing I had to do was to hang up the gun. I used a nylon fishing wire so it is barely visible and after decided the angle that it was to be hung, we used drawing pins at the top of the wall to fix it in to place. I decided that the gas mask would be better leading to the floor rather than having the boots on the floor on their own. This linked in the whole piece in the space rather than it being things on a plinth, then things on the floor and wall which i think will improve the whole look of the work.
The rest of the day was spent cleaning, and helping other people put their work up or organize things. I was a bit disappointed that I didn't get a chance to sort out lighting and my text panel before the end of the day, but that is getting sorted tomorrow before the show, so all should go well in the end.
I was given the photography studio as a space to set up alongside other people. This is an odd shaped room because of the infinity curve and it having an upstairs, which gave us an interesting space to work in. The first thing that we thought we should do is explain a little about our work, so we could judge where things fitted in the space or if they fitted at all.
What was decided over some deliberation and adjustments is that my space was opposite the door leading in to the studio next to the stairs. I like this spot, the stairs, to me, make it seem more like a homely atmosphere and it also acts as an alternative viewing angle which is probably more ideal for 3D work than photography or projected images.
My work next to the stairs
Once spaces were decided we needed to retouch all the surfaces and clean the floors etc. This was done by we used Polyfiller and white paint on the walls and obtained plinths which were also painted white.
The Plinth I'm using, painted white
Polyfiller in the holes
At this point I was considering still keeping my work on the floor but having a carpet underneath as I thought that my work would look more authentic as a whole on carpet rather than a grey lino. However, after looking at the placement with the stairs, I decided that it would be better placed on a large, low plinth. This will hopefully stop the work from looking a bit lost in the stairs and give it a little more presence against the wall behind it.
On a Red carpet (I thought it made the work look smaller)
White Carpet (I preferred this colour)
I also decided, with input from others, that the rifle would look interesting if it was suspended, and we though fishing wire would work well for this. Unfortunately after making these decisions I had to leave without getting a chance to put it up, so that’s going to have to be done Monday. I would really have liked to get it done to a point on Friday though, and give more input in to helping other people put up there work and agreeing what would look best.
I thought of presenting my work and the fact that a lot of my work is on this blog made me think of how i am going to show this. One thing thats becoming really popular in advertising is the QR code, which is scanned by phones etc. and directs you to a link. I thought that it would be good if I could use a link like this to direct people to this blog. Another way I thought of using this is as a type of take away gift that links to a wallpaper or some kind of download for people to have.
I made the QR code for this blog using http://www.qrstuff.com/
I I have and app on my iPhone which uses the camera to read the code and this takes me straight to this blog, so it works nicely. I plan to take some good photos of my work as presented and hopefully use that as a wallpaper.
I wanted to explain my piece in the text panel to help people understand my work. However, I realised that the point of the panel was to introduce and point people in the right direction rather tell people exactly what my piece is and how it came to be.
So, after a bit of brainstorming, this is the text panel thats going to be displayed with my work:
This piece is a celebration of harmonious opposites, set in a time of conflict. I am inspired by stories told by the people from World War Two. These stories told of changing expectations and making do with the materials that were available. My interpretation of this is manifested in to altering the products from the war to see ways I could change the relationship of what they are perceived to be, and what they can be.
Now that all my individual objects are finished, I have to work out how I’m going to present the piece as a whole. I had rough idea during the creation of them and obviously I can see constraints because of size when making them.
One thing I knew I wanted to do from the offset was to present the case open with some objects inside, my inspiration here was the idea of soldier returning home an dumping all of there stuff on the floor to greet heir families. I liked this idea because it felt really human and showed of a story and emotions that is involved in the war and could potentially make the piece more emotive.
This story of the returning soldier meant that I though the boots would be better placed about side the case, and made to look thrown off casually. I also wanted to show the sole of the boots but not too obviously as there is interesting detail here. The gun would have to be placed outside the case as well because its too big to fit inside. I think that because I want it to be a type of vase it would be better stood up to keep the flowers inside.
Other than these objects there is a bit of free reign of the placement of the objects in the case, but these need to be done in a way to show the objects clearly but not look over cluttered.
My current favorite way to present this work is the third way as everything is clear to see but not too cluttered and i really like the gas mask lit up at the front because it grabs your attention.
I decided that I wanted to use the boots as a kind of speaker to play wartime songs. This is because I think it would add much more of a wartime atmosphere when presented. I also want to include more of a product side to the project and I think that by having the boots as speakers they are more of a sellable product. This was also another opportunity to alter the purpose of the original object, which were basic boots, simply used to get the job done, but adding the speaker element makes it in to something almost opposite to this.
Turning the boots in to the speaker was actually quite simple, but I did have to change my initial plan for it. I had intended to get a pair of small speakers and plant those in to the boots, and playing the songs from an iPod. However the speakers I bought for this were much larger than I thought they would be and didn’t fit in the boots, so I bought a smaller single speaker, but this meant only having one boot play music. Although I would have liked both boots to play the music this would have been much more expensive and had more wires, which I was trying to avoid anyway.
The new speaker fitted in to the boot easily and I found a tiny iPod shuffle, which the music was loaded on to so everything fitted inside the boot without distorting the shape. One thing I though at this stage was that the appearance of the modern looking, black, plastic speakers didn’t really fit in, so I used a crochet sample to cover the top. I was worried that this may affect the sound but it didn’t so that was ideal.
I think that doing this has helped the piece feel more authentic because of the music. It also satisfies me in the sense that I want to make products and this is a little closer to doing that and making a more interesting, interactive show. I am aware that if I had planned to do this from the offset of making the boots, I would have been able to incorporate the speakers more thoroughly than what they are now, but I think this design works well. One thing with this is that during the show I will have to make sure there is enough battery in the iPod and the speakers, but the battery life should be enough to last to the end of each day.
The boots were more challenging than what I first thought they would be, the basic shape was easy to make but fabricating the boots was difficult.
Basic Boots Shape
I started by finding dimensions for the boots and finding a good reference image to work from. I used chicken wire to make the basic shape and covered that in bubble wrap and parcel tape to make it more secure and easy to shape. Obviously I had to make two, one thing I found quite difficult was getting the boots to look the same and this took a while to do and there are still small differences in the shapes, but they are not really noticeable.
To fabricate the boots I used a mixture of materials to highlight certain areas and add details. Again I used traditionally feminine materials and methods, which were also popular in the Wartime era this was mainly knitting, crochet and floral fabric. I also wanted to incorporate the make do and mend idea by using the different floral fabrics sewn together in a patchwork style. To work put what fabric I wanted to use where, I used the image as a reference to follow the seams and drew those on to the boots and decided that I wanted the floral fabric as the main body of the boot but changing the pattern at the seams. The knitting was used as the material to highlight detail, so I used that at the heel of the boot and as the lining. I initially intended it to be used over the toes of the boots but after covering it with a test piece it made it look too thick so I used the floral fabric for it. I emphasised the seams using a thin white lace and I think that this detail made the boot look more true to the original design as the seams were more exaggerated which makes the shape look more realistic.
The tongue and the lace area of boots make boot most recognisable as boots so this is where I wanted to put extra detail to draw attention to it. What I did to do this was to consider the most feminine materials I could use to really emphasis this section. I used a lilac coloured ribbon as the laces for the boots, I chose this as ribbon is mostly used on women’s clothing and the colour is also commonly associated with femininity. As the eyelets I used a crochet pattern that had holes in along it, this gave me somewhere to thread the ribbon through but looked more feminine than just having eyelets. As well as this the crochet also utilised a skill that was used in the war by women. The last main area of detail in this section was the tongue of the boots, the main body of which I made from the same wool as the lining of the boot for continuity but on the front I used white lace that contrasted against the lilac ribbon. I thought that this added a new type of texture in to the boot and helps focus your immediate attention to this area.
The next section I worked on was the soles of the boots, which I wanted to create from resin with flowers placed inside. This was to partially give a solid base to the boot but the flower were what I found interesting to add. One thing I really thought about when I was designing this section was the fact that the sole of the boot was what the soldiers walked on and what they went through during the war. I wanted to use the flowers as a way to blend the femininity of the flowers with the masculine nature of what they had to do in regards to using the resin type substance on the aircrafts.
To make the soles I firstly created a wooden version using a template I made from the boots. This was then vacuum formed and the first layer of resin was poured in to it. Once the first layer had partially dried I used a mixture of foam roses and real flowers and added the rest of the resin, which was left to dry. What I noticed with the real flowers was that the colour was changed quite a lot, the original colour was purple, but in the resin they are white. This isn’t an issue for me in this project as the colour of the flowers is not important, however doing this has made me aware that this does happen and to be cautious of colour loss/change if it is important to the finish of the project.
Basic Template
Wooden Version
Vacuum Formed
Resin Cast with flowers
When the soles were removed from the mould I realised that the template may have been to large for the boots, this led to me having to cut down the excess using saws and files to get the larger parts off. This gave the edges a rough finish so I used varying harshness of wet and dry sandpaper to smooth them out and I am happy with the way they ended up, even if it was more longwinded than just making sure the template was right in the first place. So in future I need to be much more accurate with making template for resin as when I was cutting in to the soles I was very aware of how brittle the material is and that if it cracked it could completely shatter.
Area that needed to be trimmed
So all I needed to do after that was fix it all together, the soles are heavy so need to be fixed on securely. My solution was to use a hot glue gun on the larger areas. The other thing I did was to add a crochet lining around the sole where it met the boot, not only did this re-enforce the fix but also added a nice finishing detail. To do this section I glued the crochet on to the resin sole and then sewed that on to the fabric of the boot.
Glued on the sole
I am pleased with the outcome of the boots, I particularly like the soles because they add a mixture of texture and material in to the object and I think the symbolism of the flowers in the soles is subtle but effective. One thing I am not too happy with is the attachment of the wool at the heel of the boots where some glue can be seen, but I have tried to trim this out for a better finish. What I would like to do if I started this again is think of how I can this so it is a new functional product than a warped interpretation of an old one. One thing I considered doing was turning them in to speakers for the show, so I could play wartime songs and radio broadcasts through them just to add more ambience around my piece. I don’t think I will do this as I can’t get wireless speakers and I don’t want wires hanging out from the boots if they are supposed to be from the wartime as I think that would look out of place though if I get time and find a way around this I may do it as I have seen a book about making knitted headphone wire covers which would be ideal.
I chose to make a mills bomb replica for the grenade as it is one of the most used and recognisable grenade that were used by the British in WW2. I also chose it because I liked the shape and details.
Mills Bomb Replica
I started making this by using a resin replica of the bomb to cast. I did consider making the grenade from scratch but I had no real idea of dimension and detail even after the visit to the war museum so I could never really have made it as realistic as I would have like to in this way. To make the rubber mould I made a wooden box which was sealed with clay the stop hot rubber leaking out and also used clay to stick the grenade to the bottom and to seal the holes left by the pin in the replica. I heated up the vinamould and poured it, unfortunately the box was too large and the rubber didn’t cover the grenade fully which was frustrating but I melted more and poured that over, but by this time the first batch had already cooled. Once the second lot of rubber was completely cooled I removed the box which revealed the mould to be in near enough two parts, whilst more convenient for pouring I was worried about the affect this would have on the finish of the grenade if there were big obvious seams and cracks.
Only partially covered
Concerned over the quality of the mould
As with the boots I wanted to add flowers inside the grenade to contradict its initial purpose as much as possible so the flowers were where gunpowder and explosive would have been. It help that this also made it look much more feminine. The initial plan colour wise was for the resin to be clear but after looking at the gas mask goggles with the sepia looking colour but with a bit of transparency I though that would be a more interesting effect that would pay more of a homage to the era than a more polished but modern looking clear resin. I also used a purple resin to highlight the detail at the top of the grenade.
Purple Resin in the top
I poured the resin in added a few of the foam roses and real flowers and left to dry and repeated that until I reached the top of the mould. One idea that I really wanted to pursue for this object was to make it in to a light. I just liked the idea of have an explosive device which as a weapon would have caused fires, therefore light, doing the some but as a small homely product, it felt contradictory but made sense still because of this. I have some small lights which replicate the light of a candle so the light flickers like a flame and had a plastic fake flame at the top. This was perfect to use as the source of the lighting for the grenade but the white plastic bottom was not fitting so I made a crochet cover for it to disguise it but still make the battery accessible. To attach this to the grenade to make it in to a lamp I put the plastic flame part in to the hole in which I poured the resin (which was the bottom) and it dried in to the resin making it a whole product.
Light inside the mould when drying
This is how the grenade looked just from the mould
When I removed the grenade form the mould after the resin was dried I was pleasantly surprised with the results as I thought the two sections may have warped the shape too much or the plastic in the flame may melt, but this didn’t happen. However it defiantly didn’t some out finished as some small bits around the seams of the rubber were in need of sanding and filing to get a good finish. I used a combination of rotary tool fittings to sand down intricate areas quickly and then wet and dry sand paper to get a smooth finish.
Finished Grenade
With Light on
One thing I think about this product it that the light isn’t quite as strong as I would have liked, but this may be because of the resin not being a proper transparent colour and the flowers my cover the light a bit. This process has taught me a bit more about the process of rubber mould and making sure the box is an appropriate size because the one I used was just too big which has affected the outcome. I would like another go at doing this with a smaller box to get a better mould but I cant because time constraints. I am pleased with the outcome despite this though and the light work nicely, it’s just frustrating that I know I can do this better, but as I said the grenade as it is looks good.
The gas mask was one of the more complex objects I made because it is made up of a few different parts, like the respirator, goggles and the canister. I started by using chicken wire to get the basic shape of the facemask and covering it in bubble wrap then made a respirator to fit it from cardboard. These were both then covered in parcel tape to hold them together and make them easier to shape, as the chicken wire cut my hands quite a bit (I learnt that you definitely need to wear gloves with chicken wire) .
The First Part made from chicken wire
Covered in Bubble wrap and parcel tape
The next stage was to fabricate the face section. To do this I cut out a section of fabric from the same skirt I used on the gun and pinned it to the mask, I then trimmed around the edges and did the same but with a different material on the other side of the mask. Sewing them together whilst trying to keep them tight to the shape was quite tricky as it is a complex shape and the skirt material was fragile so could tear easily. To give it a better finish, I did a seam around the edges of the fabrics so that no frayed edges show on the finished piece.
Fabricated Mask
Next I worked on the respirator by starting with covering it in a floral fabric using a glue gun. I then added a knitted edge around it to make it fit more snugly in to the facemask, this was sewn on to the fabric. For the actual respirator front section, I noticed when I visited the war museum that the holes and patterns looked like a type of crochet so I thought I would use that idea. Once this was made it was then sewn on to the respirator piece, which was attached to the mask.
With Respirator fitted
The next thing I did was create the canister for the gas mask, this was quite a simple shape to make and I simply used chicken wire, bubble wrap and parcel tape. I fabricated it with a large section of knitting but found that when it stretched to cover the shape the parcel tape showed which I didn’t like the look of. So I used a plain white cotton type fabric underneath the knitting, which gave it a much more finished look. I then attached the floral skirt fabric to the top and the bottom of the canister.
Canister for the Gas Mask
The last main section to make was the tube that connected the mask to the canister. From the pictures I could see it had an odd, spring like shape to it. One idea I had to create it was to place rounded metal wires in to the tube. However, I wanted to keep it softer so I decided the best way would be to stuff the tube and then tie things around it to give the effect. I began by making the basic tube firstly by cutting the white fabric to the right size as the inside and attaching a knitted section to the outside, which were sewn together. This was then attached to the canister by sewing but making sure the end was well sealed. To stuff it I used small polystyrene balls like in beanbags. I then sewed up the top and fixed that to the mask. To finish this off I used a mixture of purple and white ribbon and ties bows tightly around the tube to give the spring like effect but in a really feminine way.
Tube From Canister to Mask
Next I had to make the goggles, I started with some crochet around the eyeholes, which were shaped so they can hold the goggles in place without having to fix them in by glue etc. I made a template then a wooden version, which was then vacuum formed. I used general-purpose resin in the mould, which gave an amber colour to the goggles but was still slightly transparent. I used this rather than transparent resin because the colour reminded me of the sepia photographs from the WW2 era. This connection interested me because I see photos as capturing a moment in time and looking through the goggles as a physical interpretation of the photos that take you back in time.
Goggles
After I finished this however, I was a genius and dropped one of the resin goggles, so for an even pair I made some more, but I am now going to glue them in to place, because I don’t really want this happening again.
Second goggles (without Flowers)
One thing I thought would be good was to make the gas mask in to a kind of light, which goes back to the original aim of the project of making a lamp. This is because I thought that when light is shone through the goggle the lighting effect will change and be warped which was interesting. Also, I thought it further warped the idea of the original wartime product by turning it in to a homely light fixture, making it more feminine as well. To turn the gas mask in to a light I used the crochet part where the straps all tie around at the back to conceal a small led, battery powered light. I covered this with another crochet part and sewed it together but added a button so the battery could be access if needed. This means that now the gas mask can be laid down or suspended and acts as a light.
Laying down with Light (with old goggles)
Suspended with light
I am very pleased with the gas mask, its one of my favourite objects of this piece because of the extra details to make it more feminine and warped. For example the lighting point of this gives it a product element as well which is important to me in a way as I want to do product design and this questions what a product can be, which I find interesting. I would like to make the stitching on the actual mask a bit cleaner as in some places it does look very shabby, but this works in this context so it’s not so bad. Also, I found that securing resin is always a good idea, because making more can be annoying on a tight deadline.
My Plan, using maths and ratio to work out dimensions
To start with I had to work out the actual size of the rifle and break that down in to part, as I wanted this to be accurate in dimension so the impact that the change of material and use would be more prominent. This wasn’t easy as I only had the full length and the barrel length of the gun, not width, magazine size and all the other bits. So to get around this I found a good quality image of the gun in full and measured the image and using some maths worked out the scale ratio of the image and measured to other sections to get the dimensions to work from. This may not have been hugely accurate but it gave a good indication of the size sections needed to be.
Basic Shape of the rifle
So I then began making it using plastic pipes for the barrel and chicken wire, bubblewrap and parcel tape for the rest of it. This work well as the materials were easy to manipulate in to shape and held their form to give a solid structure.
Once I had the shape I began to fabricate the gun using a floral skirt from a charity shop (re-using it in the spirit of make do and mend), I used a hot glue gun and hand sewing to hold this in place whilst I added the rest of the materials, using the same methods. I used knitting to define the wooden areas of the original gun and the floral material was used in the area’s with more metal. Then using small pieces of crochet I created the trigger and define the rest of the knitted sections. I used ribbon around the top of the barrel to highlight that area.
This skirt was from a charity shop
Knitting and Crochet
Crochet detail on the side
Corset-Like detail at the bottom
What I noticed after creating this was that the section where the pipe and the chicken wire met was slightly flimsy because they were not held tighter by anything more than pressure. To have made this stronger I could have glued them together, however, the nature of the project (conflicting materials and products) actually means that in a way it makes more sense for it to be softer and less rigid. In reality a floppy gun is useless, but then again it would be useless to be made from knitting and a skirt. The point is that its warped beyond the point of it’s intended purpose (which typically a masculine one) so you question what it really is and can appreciate it more as a piece of design, rather that a war tool. I personally found inspiration form the hippies of the 60’s at this point with sticking flowers in the end of a gun, making me think that this could be used as a type of vase or flower pot (a much more feminine use).
