Final evaluation

Final Major Project Evaluation

 According to my Project Proposal my work started from idea of organic materials such as bones, hairs, horns, skin. My research has taken me in the direction of a very wide field of ideas, resources and interconnections. My investigation included visiting museums – Tate Britain, Natural History Museum and British Museum. Another source of inspiration were local markets and retro shops, where I have got some materials (for example real fur and animal claws and teeth) for experimentation and support of my idea. I also used the library as kind of relevant exploration of contemporary artists work as well as source of useful information generating new ideas and ways of movement.

 My research grew and expanded and probably namely this latitude became the first problem of my project. But finally I found the solution for this and located all my resources in the form of constellation which was relevant to my whole idea of permanent cyclic movement human-animal-star.

 I also had some problems in experiments because not all of my materials really worked. My list of materials except for initial organic ones, included some metals - pewter, aluminum, silver plated wire, foil and silver leaf. And also some laminate surfaces - torn card, thin wood. The aim was to create a material with circular pattern imitating sea shell or horn layers. Unfortunately, when heated the aluminum did not change colour and the pewter just melted, the silver leaf did not oxidize with vinegar. Only wire and foil altered the colour from white to golden and grey. Also unsuccessful became my attempts to create three-dimensional form of hair structure from modelling material and then from some kind of dental plaster. I think I did not have enough skills for most of practical manipulations so I decided in favor of soft materials - wire and pewter.

 In addition I understood how hard and important it is to stop thinking and start making. In the future projects I will try not to forget about it and spent time on experiments as much as possible.

 The positive meaning to my work is the intensive attention to the small things such as hairs, feathers. The deep exploration of their physical structure was really useful and led me to the basic types of connection between the body and the adornment. Especially a big zoom of hair's structure gave very good result and just became the engine of all my work.

 Investigation of ancient myths, based on the poem of Ovid "Metamorphoses" allowed me to understand and realize possible types of fusions between the human and the animal, mutations in forms, shapes and essence. Ancient sculpture led me to use neck, face, back, hands, wrist and fingers as main places for my jewelry pieces. 

 I want also to add that despite sometimes I worked slow and probably lost the right direction the time management and especially  the action plan were really useful and returned me to the correct position of work.

 Finally I want to tell that as whole my project based on the idea of permanent cyclic movements in the life, when person can become an animal, a stone, a tree and even a star, only movement through challenges and overcoming them can lead us to the good results.

This project is about human. Sometimes we are people, sometimes wild animals, sometimes stones. And sometimes - stars.

For me the hardest process is transition. From one stage of project to the next. Step from the new idea to the research, from the research to experiments and than to the final work. It was really hard to get from my first thought of organic to the field of right investigation. Than to choose from hundreds possibilities (horns, hoofs, skin, bones, nails, hair, teeth, tusks, etc) only ones that will work and experiment with them. From all my variants only one - big zoom of hair' structure gave good result and others became just dead ends.

 And finally - create a real piece of jewelry, not from paper, real one.

It is about the problem of uncertainty. You never know what will be further, it is like journey from one dark room to another. But fortunately it is always light in the end. Even if you do not expect it at all.

just a dream

today i had a dream that i'm ISABELLA BLOW in her adolescence))how everything started

from a chaos and surplus born creation

through the death became immortal

troubles

It is very sad, but I have some troubles with experiments. Firstly, it is very hard to stop thinking and start making. Probably it is the biggest challenge, and I spent too much time on THINKING about my project (now it means so much for me^^). Secondly, when I had finally started experimenting I found out that not all of my materials worked. My first list of stuff included organics such as fur, egg shell, sea shell, snake skin etc. Than I added some metals - pewter, aluminum, silver plated wire, foil, silver leaf. And also some laminate surfaces - torn card, thin wood. The aim was creating material with circular pattern imitating sea shell or horn layers. Unfortunately, when heated pewter melted and aluminum did not change colour, silver leaf did not oxidize with vinegar. Only wire and foil altered the colour from white to golden and grey.

Also unsuccessful became my attempts to create three-dimensional form of hair structure from modelling material and than from some kind of dental plaster. It was jelly first hour, but as drying it became fragile.
So experiments were not really helpful and now I will try to work with wire, pewter and probably initial organic.