Second Skin/Second Life: Calve. |
Second Skin/Second Life.
Packaging, can itself be thought of as the outer ‘skin’ of a product which has to be shed, or peeled like the skin of an orange, in order to gain access to the contexts therein. This waste material, rather than being discarded, becomes the skeleton and musculature of my sculptures. The second skin here in question refers to the means by which I create these new sculptural manifestations by the encasement of this accumulated dross into coherent forms. Detritus is collected as usual in trash bags but it is then configured within, and with, the enclosing bag into a harmonious, sculptural embodiments, frozen into place by the binding of "stretch wrap film. Two new layers of skin, the first loosely gathers and then the second tightly coheres the materials. |
Alternative images and pre-sculpted raw material.
Second Skin/Second Life: Nodule |
Found objects/recycled materials.
The wrapping of objects has been a part of my installation process since my first venture into the genre (see Tension). But in 'Second Skin/Second Life' it has a new relevance. The 'found objects" in these pieces are strictly waste packaging, things which until recent changes in recycling policy, I would have sorted to be put out as recycled trash. This is therefore a form of sculpture with an environmental message built into it. To me anything and everything can become a resource in the creation of art. If I can use materials in new ways, why can't others? Why send valuable, reuseable materials, metal cans, plastic bottles, cardboard boxes, to landfill when they can be recycled into new versions of themselves? By giving, easily, recyclable materials a new life as art I hope ask for more reflection and reconsideration before and how materials are discarded. |
Alternate images and presculpted raw material.
Second Skin/Second Life: Relic. |
Plastics/plasticity.
Plasticity: the quality or state of being plastic. The quality of being soft enough to be changed into a new shape. The quality of being able to be made into different shapes. My second-skin forms are plastic. Often many of their component parts are made of plastics. But they are also plastic in the ways in which I work them. They have a malleability about them. As I bring objects together and wrap them, the sensation has a similar 'feel' as making objects out of clay. Whilst the materials are loose to move and flow in the trash bags I can both arrange their order, but I can also change their forms through the pressure of my hands. Only when the Second Skin of the stretch wraps finally coheres them together do the sculptures finally solidify. |
Alternative images and pre-sculpted raw materials
Second Skin/Second Life: Biped |
Choice/Control.
Sometimes there are components of my collected dross that are more rigid than others. They refuse the strength of my hands to crush or bend them into new forms. However, I can choose where and how they manifest within the body of my sculptures, giving them specific roles of my choice to play. By working in this way, I still retain creative control over the malleability of the whole sculpture. Objects and shapes aren't allowed to appear randomly. They are considered, controlled, manipulated and finally placed exactly where I want them to be. To fulfill the role that I require of them. I have used and controlled other items of rigid trash as found objects in sculptures previously, please see images of Still and Engine on the Mass index, details to follow. |
