Our group project began with a brainstorm, arguably the best way to beginā¦ it gave us the opportunity to all pitch in ideas rapid-fire and not have to be too picky.
Generally, we all agreed that the idea of a machine that is naturally powered is fun. Natural curved towards physics more than anything else, with the work of Tim Knowles [1] and Judy Chicago[2] coming up a few times in conversation. The natural degree of these machines is really enticing. It is hands off, after an initial set-up, and the work is very open to do whatever it wishes.
We talked of domino- like effects, things like Rube Goldbergs machines. A constant flow of movement happening from something initiating i
We decided to try and have a motor that spun around a series of brushes, or pens / pencils, that would draw on a piece of paper. We like the idea that this would just keep going, around and around, and the machine would not stop, due to it being motorized. I thought a lot about Tim Knowles, and the way that once he leaves the machine, it is an āactive participantā[3]. Itās a cool thought, and the one that struck me the most about an art machine. You set this wonderful thing up, and then it does something in its OWN way.
I suggested that maybe we have a heat-sensitive piece of paper as the canvas for these pens (we were thinking about pens for quite a while) which could ALSO be undergoing their own machined transformation; water could be boiling below, so as that the steam would raise and hit the paper!
This went through a few varients -different vessels, forms of heating, placement and amount of paper- but in the end this was scrapped entirely due to AUT restricions
So we had this spinning, thing , that would draw on a piece of paper. That was kind of it. We decided to make it a bit more fun, and attach gloves to the end of balloon āarmsā. This gave us a super whimsical effect, which we really enjoyed
The drawing that this creature made werenāt so bad, either!
I thought it was very reminiscent of the naturally controlled (wind) drawings of Tim Knowlesā tree, which was interesting to me seen as this was in a totally different environment and had and entirely different āmechanismā
But still, our creation was rather boring! And the effect didnāt do much. SO, we thought we would switch up the mediumā¦ paint!
We lowered our five fingered friends further to the ground, and dropped pools of paint there, so that -in theory- when we ran the motor and let it do its thing, the hands would drag along and make wonderful finger-painting style art.
It worked pretty nicely. The more paint we added, and the more colours too, the more interesting it all became. What I noticed was a rather slow build up of patterns, that gave a very zen vibeā¦.. circular, you know?
This was nice, but again, MORE, MORE, MORE! We wanted it to be more exciting so we decided to fill some of the hands with paint! This made for some fun resultā¦ there was a lot more paint to be spread by the hands. The fingers would pick up what the one(s) before it had laid in its path and spread it.
Because of the way we constructed this all, and by having not only the arms and hands at different sorts of lengths, but the wheel which spun at an odd shape, it was all rather bouncy, which meant that it gave a big element of surprise.
Research
Margie Livingstonās work in her series of āextreme landscape paintingsā breathe life. They have an absolutely chaotic reveal of colours and scratches, that are at once violent, and peacefully natural. She creates them by dragging them behind her with a harness, going on walks that range from 5 minutes inside, to an overnight camping trip.
I really enjoy the way that they are presented, often with the backpack and harness still connected. It gives a sense of life ā before ā now. An idea of what might have happened, without needing so much more context
http://aeqai.com/main/2018/12/margie-livingston-at-greg-kucera-gallery/
https://www.gregkucera.com/livingston.htm
https://www.visualartsource.com/index.php?page=editorial&pcID=26&aID=5023
[1] Tree Drawing, Tim Knowles, 2014
[2] Desert Atmosphere, Judy Chicago, 1969
[3] Tim Knowles For The Baron, http://www.chrismurtha.com/knowles, Chris Murtha