 |  |  |
|---|---|---|
 |  |  |
ENTROPY - BEAUTY AND DECAY
This is my final piece for the unit of beauty and decay. What I want to reflect in this piece, is the idea of dead, decomposing and rusting things to be able to make something beautiful and tender, like a flower.
I chose to make the flower petals with modeling paste, because it proved difficult to make imprints without using the modeling paste. Although it was not intended, the salt dries out the modelling paste and makes the petals cracked which to me reflect the idea of aging and time, which reflects the unit topic of beauty and decay.
I chose to make rusting imprints because I wanted to reflect the idea that although rusty old nails and other rusting materials reflects images of dirt and age, you can use those vibrant colors to make something beautiful, which is why I decided to make flowers.
The two things; rust and flowers, compliment each other because they are complete opposites. Flowers are soft and tender, where rusty nails are hard and reflect images of sweat, and work.
I used tea and coffee to make the stems and the background, as well as to give the petals a wash to distribute color, and I think that this also reflects age and time. As we get older, people start to drink coffee for the energy lost to age. To me, whenever I smell or see the color of coffee, I think of aging and time, and i hope that my audience will also notice that.
This piece to me also reflects the idea of a cycle, where something dying or losing purpose is then used to make something which will continue the cycle until it is dying away and then maybe recycled to make another thing, and the cycle continues.
RUST AND FLOWERS
These are some pre-drawings/paintings that we did before that reflect the idea of beauty and decay, before we started working on our final piece.
pre-work
I chose rust and plants, and decided that that is what i wanted my final piece to incorporate. I was inclined to rust and decaying things and corrosion because I was really drawn to Martyn Dukes paintings and all the vibrant colors he used (a painting is displayed in the next section).
Our first step in this Beauty and Decay project was our Mind-Mapping, where me and a partner mind mapped some ideas that we had for our final piece, or to get a general idea of where we want our project to head. We decided to design it so that it would reflect the process of decaying flowers.
​
 |  |
|---|---|
 |
These are some work from two artists that inspired my project, named Horst Janssen and Martyn Dukes. Horst Janssen created these amazing drawings with color pencil that showed the evolution of flowers wilting. I wanted to include this progression of wilting in my piece of work, using flowers as well. I also really found Martyn Dukes 'Texture' paintings very interesting and wanted to include this in my final piece.
Along the way, i came across the production of methane gas in my science class, and i think the idea is very interesting. Methane gas, that is used for cars, is made from decaying objects in the ground, like plants and animals. This idea that something dying created some that we can all use everyday to do everyday things is something that is very interesting to me. I am big on recycling as well, which i think played a factor into why i am so intrigued in this idea. i wanted to reflect that in my final piece by rusting objects and making patterns out of that rust.
 |
|---|
 |
 |
 |
 |
These are some photos that i took for the observation aspect of my project, and also to get an idea of the nature of flowers and what they look like when they are alive and how they wilt. I also did some observational sketches/paintings of the flowers as i went through the process of doing my final piece.
I noticed that the effect of the process of decaying on the flowers was mainly seen by the fact that it looked like their dried and shriveled up, and that they would become less turgid, due to the water loss.
Although I was planning to show a process in my final piece, I think that that would change the focus of my message because I really only want to show the process of materials, and in my final piece my flowers are alive, and will decay with the paper together.
These are some photos capturing my experiment with rusting different materials. I first used a big old machine that was found outside the Art Studio, that seemed like it would transfer rust very well. I used a sheet of paper and put salt and water on the paper as well as the machine. This created a very nice textured and rusted piece of paper, which i used as the background of my final piece. I also rusted some nails and other metal objects onto a piece of paper, to experiment the ways that i could in the end make a flower or an impression of a flower in my final piece. I used a horse shoe found in my garden to make an outline of a flower, which ended up making a really interesting rust. I rusted these objects using salt and water and later used some vinegar when I tried rusting the copper tube.
I also used modeling paste, salt and nails which made a very rusty imprint that i will incorporate into my final piece because i think it really shows that I've tried new and interesting materials, including the rusting of objects on the paper.
Unfortunately, I realized that once i wanted to start my draft piece, it proved hard to display an image of a flower just using a rust impression, so i thought with the help of my teacher to instead cut out petal shapes from a shoe box, put some modeling paste and rust my objects individually on that, and then form a flower those petals on the final piece. This gave the flowers a very interesting textured on the paper that i am happy with.
Although this idea made a lot of beautiful petals, i still wanted to give each petal a brown wash, so i used some tea bags. This mixed with the rust and gave it more of a black was. Now i have more color on my paper, which is great.
When it came to doing my final piece, i had realized that somebody had taken my piece of paper that i was rusting for the background of my piece, was taken off the big rusty machine. This forced me to come up with a new way of creating a brown-ish rusty background color, so i instead used some tea bags.
While assembling my petals onto the final piece of paper, I noticed that there was too much empty spaces, so I decided to get some coffee to drip down and make stems for each flower. I really think that added a nice touch and made it look more realistic. If it wasn't clear that there were flowers on the paper, it is clear now.
​
The last photo is what my work area looked like during the process. You can see where i did my experimenting (left paper), and where i did my first draft (right paper). I also have a lot of materials that made this project happen, like the SAXA salt, and the vinegar at the back. This is a photo taken just as i started experimenting with the separate petals from the shoe box that i've explained above.
mind map
connections
observation
experimenting
This is my draft version, where I did a big part of my experimenting. However, I incorporated different techniques and materials in my final piece. I think this was due to the time, because I didn't realize how much time I had until it was too late. Last year each of our projects took very long, and I don't think i adjusted my brain to anticipate what was expected of me. Although, my lesson is learned.