Making and Doing

A photo from the earlier 'Fullmoon Solstice Saltway Ritualstic Walk' that evolved into a comfortable sitting-in-a-circle-around-a-fire 'event'.

(I love this archetypal image.)

To Do Lists

This episode is mostly about doing. I have been busy putting together the basics for my show to be held at the UCA Canterbury Campus, (week starting the 19^th of August.) So my lists are full of ‘do this’ and ‘do that’, with a timescale alongside which is either mostly ‘do-able’, or done! When I am in this mindset, I feel there is nothing better than being able to tick, physically or mentally, the job done once it is written on a list. I have been known to add recent, unplanned-for tasks to the lower part of an existing list, just so that I can tick them off!

An experimental plaster of paris model, shown sitting in the copper bowl which was used in the 'Fullmoon' event, just to show its scale.

I started off this week making an experimental plaster of paris model. This is part of my ‘to do’ list, to create 3 scaled models of my site-specific way-markers. I made a mould out of an empty Tetrapak carton, poured the mixture in and then as it started to dry, I imprinted a large circle on its surface using a plastic lid. I then used a small plastic ball to create the central depression, which depending on which model I am working on will represent two elements. The first will represent a clay vessel in which the seawater was gathered/harvested. The second will represent a copper bowl to symbolise a fire that would have been lit to create salt through the process of evaporation.

I worked on the outer edges of the circle imprinting grass heads and other organic matter to create a surface that could link with one of the actual sites in the landscape on the Saltway.

When the plaster was completely dry and I had stopped playing, I turned the mould over and out slipped the model. It reminded me of my Plastercast and Shakermaker childhood and felt very productive. But the crisp clean model that I wanted was not to be found, it looked like an early O-level preparation project, but what I did discover was that the underside of the model was perfect. Perfect as anything that could have been made out of a Tetrapak anyhow. The crease of the box was perceptible, it bore the traces of what it once was and I had an idea. The idea was to recognise that as my project looks at how we leave traces in the landscape, this is how I could create my model. I shall endeavour to create a scaled down negative of my model in the landscape and then take a mould from it. I don’t know quite how I shall do this but it feels like it is the right way to go about it.

The first paper stencil I used was for the colour blue. These stencils add up to create a chalk pavement way-marker.

Another element of the project that needed to be done before the show was to create a way-marker that can be put on the path itself to guide walkers through urban areas. My initial idea was for the marker to be sprayed on but this felt like a form of meaningless graffiti so I chose to use coloured chalks to give the path a transient ‘outing’. This approach means that if I choose to run any guided walks in the future, the start, middle and end parts within the urban environment could be temporarily way-marked.

These photos show the stencil for the colour green and the completed design. 

Working like this reminded me of another childhood favorite- Mary Poppins and the chalk drawings that Bert/Dick Van Dyke made. More information can be found here. 

Yesterday I created paper stencils for this. I quite enjoy breaking down an image into components; it is a method that is required when I have produced screenprints in the past.

The graphic I have designed for the Saltway incorporates three circles. These represent the three site-specific way-markers that I aim to create along the route. There will be two distinct versions of the ‘brand image’. The first one will be used for standard way-markers used along the route to literally point people in the right direction and this version will also be used for the surface chalked type.

The other version will be more of a ‘brand identity ‘stamp’. This one I will use on my business cards and the A5 booklet that I aim to produce which will be a psycho-geographical account of a specific section of the Saltway.

This photograph shows the comparison between my coloured paper design and the finished pavement graphic. Here it maybe easier to see the three circles as being representative of seawater collection, evaporation and saltcake production. 

So, lots to do and lots to make in a relatively short space of time. I haven’t mentioned the scaled section I want to make of the whole route, the film of the Storywalk taking place, the personalised map of the area and an accompanying aerial photograph…

In the meantime I will continue to look at my to do lists and my timescale and continue to add ‘done’ tasks to them so that I can happily tick them off!

The finished chalk design with shaky handwriting. This obviously needs to be improved upon, but I like the 'raw' feeling of it.

I have just found this link to a much more technological approach. I love this potentially subversive element of chalking on public surfaces.