Wei Wei, Wings, & Drag Queens
I’m always trying to find a better way of structuring my larger, more complicated pieces. Unfortunately, this has been happening while I’m putting them together and one part sags and threatens to split apart while I desperately try to stretch another into position. Once the piece is modeled in the computer, it’s quite a pain to go back and try to shoehorn additional structural members. In my last big piece HYENA, when the head kept drooping toward its chin, I ended up having to punt and place a post in the middle of the mouth cavity. Sooo not what I wanted.
You’d think as an architect, I’d figure this stuff out while I’m modeling, but no. I’ve struggled enough to get a form I liked and didn’t want to be held back by an obvious solution. Never liked plain o’ post-and-beam buildings, either. Gotta have curves. All the things tough to construct.
Lately, I’ve been looking further into how I can use the significant lines in the digital model to build an armature that will hold its shape while I attach the individual pieces of paper making up the skin. The armature needs to be precise, accommodate all the bends and twists I want, and not kill me trying to figure it out. I do tend toward the most roundabout procedures. What I really want is a technique that’s exact but easy.
Looking around at how other people build goofy shapes, I see that by starting with the skin, then adding structure, I’m going in the opposite direction of everybody else. Many hand-build a wireframe out of a flexible material like bamboo, reed, even foam and coaxial cable, and cover it with silk, rice paper, or papier mache. Such wonderful shapes they get; I still want something else.
What I’m looking at…
Ai Wei Wei/ Life Cycle at the Marciano Art Foundation, Los Angeles. Bamboo and silk.
https://www.designboom.com/art/ai-weiwei-life-cycle-10-05-18/
I think the multi-headed rooster-creature is my favorite. I also love seeing visible structure and “unfinished” forms.
But note the rounded limbs and torsos. Like balloon animals, they can’t help but be happy, like Mickey Mouse all made of circles. I want something twisted and bent, distorted. Nearly ugly. Angry.
Stan Winston School of Character Arts/ wireframe made of foam and tape for a monster suit.
This does amaze me. I will get this dvd and learn how to make one. I’ve experimented with enlarging my paper shapes and cutting them out of foam, but this looks like more fun. Still want to make my distorted un-fun shapes, though.
Parade the Circle, Cleveland/ fantastical shapes constructed from coaxial cable, chicken wire, and papier mache.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/clevelandart/sets/72157618828007008/show/
Coaxial cable is magic. It has a metal core that makes it easy to bend and retain its shape. The casing makes it easy to shoot a screw into to hold it together or to a wood member. Unfortunately, it’s getting harder to source as the technology has moved on. You kind of have to find a building where it’s been taken out of, I understand.
Of course, I want a cleaner, more considered interior. This ad hoc mess won’t do.
Thickened veins forming the structural framework for a leaf, pitcher plant, and butterfly wing.
This tight integration of skin and rib/vein/framework is what I am aiming for.
What I’ve tried in the past…
Earlier structural strategies: 1. twisted SKULL/ 2. ribs following curved joint lines/ 3. ribs following straight slices/ 4. original Head-&-Shoulders.
An even earlier piece, GOAT, had no internal structure at all and can’t hold itself up as it’s all skin and no bones. The ribs following the joint lines in twisted SKULL proved to be a pain to figure out and assemble, especially given the severe distortions I put this head through.
Slicing the form and adding ribs to create separate “pans” that I reassemble, in effect doubling the ribs each time the pans come together, created a different set of problems: the glue holding rib to rib and the pans together warps the watercolor paper. I also couldn’t spread the glue fast enough over a large surface before it dried. In later pieces such as LION-SNAKE and CHIMERA where I used a heavier polypropylene frame to attach the separate paper pans with plastic rivets, the problem was that the paper expands in high humidity while the polypropylene stays put, causing waves in the ribs and making the pans pull away from the frame. Worse, I couldn’t always get my hand deep into the heads to pop the rivets closed without crumpling the delicate 90-lb watercolor paper. You can see where that got me here:
https://johnlauerart.com/blog/all-about-process
Something has to happen if I want to go big. In paper. It makes more sense to switch to foam or reed-and-rice-paper, but no. I seem intent to figure out a possibly avoidable problem.
What I’m currently studying…
Warning: NERD ZONE
Head-&-Shoulders Redo: wireframe made of 3-sided paper trusses skinned and painted a light gray.
I took a headstand I made some time ago to support a series of helmets, elongated it, and found a way to make a stable framework that followed the significant lines of the form. This won’t mean anything to non-modelers, but the trick to making the curved members less onerous to figure out was to use the original T-splines model, not the converted-to-paper-shapes one. Found a number of other tricks that helped untangle some other issues I had previously, like bringing that circular collar piece inward so it holds the 4 vertical trusses in place but isn’t expressed on the exterior.
I quite like revealing the structure within. It certainly makes it easier to glue from the inside. You can see the problems below when I insist on closing the form.
1. Original Head-&-Shoulders in 90-lb watercolor paper/ 2. Top of 90-lb head/ 3. Top of 140-lb head/ 4. Head-&-Shoulders Redo in 140-lb oil paper.
One step forward, two steps back. The 90-lb watercolor paper cuts much cleaner and fits more tightly together than the 140-lb oil paper. I can also glue from the inside when I’m using the slice technique, so I avoid the crunchy stuff that happens when I have to glue from the outside and paint over it. However, the 90-lb is mighty delicate; I can only use a whisper of glue or it will warp, and I can’t easily paint it after putting a form together even if I’ve soaked and stretched the paper beforehand.
The 140-lb oil paper is hardier but more fibrous so that the cut edges stand up slightly, highlighting each joint. Gluing from the outside isn’t so bad in itself because the glue is transparent; it’s when I paint over it with something other than clear matte medium that it becomes visible and irritating.
A possible solution may be to stretch and paint the 140-lb before cutting so I’m not painting over glue and to keep areas of the form open so I can get my hand inside to glue. I much prefer open formwork and exposed structure anyway. Solid forms do not interest me. The work has to be hollow, and imaginatively enter-able. Have no idea what that says about me.
An assortment of queens from RuPaul’s Drag Race: 1. Peru Envy/ 2. Alyssa Edwards/ 3. Symone/ 4. Peru Envy, again.
Sometimes you look up and see that you’ve been outdone by …drag queens. These are fantastic sculptural shapes. Reminds me of looking up from the hats I was trying to make in the mid ‘80s and seeing I’d been outdone by the haircuts coming out of the East Village. One artist used the same clay she used in her ceramic work to mold her hair into the most fantastic shapes. Of course I can’t find the photos.