A sense of perspextive

If you are a regular here, you'll know that my ethos is to recycle, reuse, upcycle etc materials whenever I can. So, when I had an offcut of perspex from an old bus-stop shelter, I had to find a use for it. I don't have the kit to melt it into interesting shapes, and that's not my thing anyhow, but I do have power tools. This and a love of nature inspired the following, entitled 'Hard Rain'...

'Hard Rain' raindrops and ripples captured in perspex form - land art of a sort...

Looking through the ripples. The scuff-marks are part of its previous life as a bus-shelter and shall remain, and I hope that wherever it finds a home, it'll be hung as a panel through which to view, well, whatever lies beyond...

A portrait of the artist as a young pond.

Being an entomologist in my other life, I can't help but feel that this could be an insect's-eye view of the world from the water of a pond in the rain. Or a frog's-eye if you're feeling amphibian. However you look at it, I hope you like it - next stop = framing.

I built this city from, er, stuff and paint

Over the last few weeks, I've been working on a new painting/mixed media piece entitled 'City'. It was one of the more technically challenging pieces I've attempted, encompassing painting, ink-drawing, collage and some unfamiliar techniques/materials so here's an insight into the stages it went through.

The initial collage layout - plastics, polystyrene, card and wood on laminated hardboard.

Everything was spray-painted white. It makes a good photo, but in reality looked like what it was - a blank-but-heavily-textured canvas.

Sections of text from a lecture on NGOs and environmental law, and graphs from scientific papers on ecology were photocopied onto acetate sheets, then cut and attached to the discs already present.

The background was painted in black oils.

The black background highlights key features such as the organic structures made by applying solvent-based (but non-toxic!) products to polystyrene.

'Stars' and 'galaxies' are added in white spray, oil and acrylic paints. It is now a city in space!

Details at this stage include a fox and an angel... to my eye, anyway - to yours?

The final stage - 'circuitry' details in black ink.

The finished piece - 'City' (80 x 60cm). Texture is a huge part of it, and a photo doesn't really convey this, but I hope you like it. Once framed it'll be up for sale...

Ritz of bits

As you may know, my jewellery and hair-wear is made from reused and recycled materials, but I try to follow this ethic as far as possible in my other artwork as well. So, when I found I has an old printer's drawer and all manner of other bits and pieces accumulated in my materials store, an idea started to form, and that idea was 'Hotel'...

'Hotel'

So, why hotel? Well, the most obvious reason is that it is made of rooms - as simple as that - but, it has a little more depth as it is, in part, highly personal, so although some of these rooms are primarily decorative,  many are actually 'memory rooms' containing little segments of autobiography. A boot from a childhood Action Man, a small volumetric flask from my PhD, the sketch that became a piece of silverwork, a Rainbow warrior badge, items from my travels, an empty pack of Citalopram. Of course, it's designed to be looked at closely, peered at, scrutinised and zoomed in on - so, let's go on a little tour...

The central third of Hotel - there's that flask (second room up, bottom right) and of course a magic fish held down by a spider (top left)

Zooming in a bit more, the moulted skin of a stick-insect (I am also an entomologist), chainsaw links and postage stamps under a celestial arch.

If you been here for example, you'll know about my liking for 'cyber' imagery using bits of electronic gubbins...

I like pubs, well good ones anyway - here's a tiiiiiny one complete with posters.

The only room I've ever wallpapered...

Words, I love them so... to the extent of wearing out a Scrabble set.

Luv 'im or hate 'im, a little homage to Damien Hirst

That's all for now - I hope you enjoyed the tour, and if current plans come to fruition, you may get the chance to see Hotel hung in a gallery at some point...

(Keep wearing) fascination

No, not an homage to the Human League (I make no apologies for punning) but an introduction to my recent foray into making hair-wear/fascinators. This may seem an odd addition to my jewellery range, but they are small pieces packed with detail, so more of a logical progression that they may initially appear. I'm also retaining (of course) the recycled/reused ethos, so apart from the bases and clips, they are constructed out of, well, all sorts of things and generally have an industrial/cyberpunk/steampunk feel - there won't be any sprays of dyed feathers... for more, have a look here - they are quite tricky and time-consuming to make but there are more in the pipeline...

Fascinators with mainsprings - wobbly!

'Cyberpump' fascinator - a wondrous device for your hair (and lighter than it looks).

The first one I sold - a tiny time machine - here being worn by its new owner at a Steampunky gig.

Synapse by stages

I've just finished 'Synapse', my latest science-inspired mixed-media piece - so, here's a brief insight into how it was created. Enjoy!

Stage 1: The baseboard is in the background - here some components from dead mobile phones...

Stage 2: Adding components to the baseboard - it could be a space-station, but it's not...

Stage 3: Adding more components.

Stage 4: Now the right way up - adding detail in gold ink - but the pen ran out and it's 10pm!

Stage 5: New gold pens bought, final details and white oil-paint highlights finish the piece, so here it is - 'Synapse' (40x50cm approx), £POA

Cortically speaking, I've just had an inkling

It's been a busy few weeks, hence the quiet in HubArtHub, but there has been much moving, and indeed shaking, in my developing artistic life. First up, I've embarked on the 'Creative Dave' plan which has been brewing for some time i.e. to link together my jewellery, painting/drawing (i.e. what's here on HubArtHub) and poetry. It's still a work in progress (look out for a dedicated website in 2014 if not before), but that's OK - it is progressing.Part of this has involved getting some pieces ready for sale - one of these is 'Cortex' - a mixed media piece on board which is inspired by the natural circuitry of the brain and works with my liking of intricacy and non-standard materials. It's for sale £POA so do let me know if you are interested...

'Cortex' in the middle of frame-choosing at Bridge Gallery.

'Cortex' - the finished piece (well worth the pro-framing IMO) - 30 x 40cm approx

'Cortex' (detail) showing the materials - tacks, gold paint and ink, electronic components - and many hours...

Getting in touch with my cyber-side

Halloween's coming (yup, it really is) - pumpkins, trick-or-treaters and of course masks. Being a wearer-of-glasses, masks can be a bit of a pain, but they do offer interesting opportunies for some not-flat artistic expression. Given that I like a bit of detailed pen-and-ink work, including some sci-fi cyber-style gold-on-black, you might not be too surprised at the route I went down to produce these. Better still, the add-ons are all recused bits and pieces (the red eye is from an old cycle lamp), and the blank masks can be acquired very cheaply from fancy-dress shops like this splendid independent one (my personal fave, hence the plug). Anyhow, here's what I came up with...

Cybermask I - an electronic pharaoh inspired by Stargate/Fifth Element.

Cybermask II - a head full of words and numbers...

Introducing the Quantum Triptych

OK, here goes - the first proper 'look what I did' post on HubArtHub. To start, there's a few themes and about-me things that you need to know. The main one that's relevant here is that I am an unashamed nerd - in my non-artistic life (though that's being rapidly absorbed by the artistic one), I am a professional academic/ecologist with a penchant for physicsy/mathsy/sci-fi stuff. This informs at least some of my art. I also like to use recycled/repurposed materials (as in my jewellery), and this sometimes drives what I make my art from. So, what's the Quantum Triptych?

Well, I wanted to explore the aesthetic of very-big-and-very-small physics - you know, the interesting stuff that Brian Cox talks about on TV - fundamental particles, quantum-weirdness, cosmology and so on. I also wanted to look at this like a story with a beginning, middle and end. Actually, not the end - I chose 'now' as the end point, but the idea stays the same. Anyhow, I could babble on, but won't - here's the triptych, all 'mixed media on board' - I hope you like it.

Triptych part 1: '1.616 x 10^-35m'- this is the Planck length, measurement used in quantum physics, and the smallest unit of distance that has any real-world meaning - it is the realm of 'quantum foam', particles popping in and out of existence and so on.

Triptych part 2: 'The first three minutes' - after the Big Bang, the period when the Universe rapidly expanded and created matter as we know it. A lot happened in this short period of time, which also approximates to the length of many a song. This is a time of major transition, hence the loss of structure seen in parts 1 & 3.

Triptych part 3: 'Virgo Supercluster' - our corner of the Universe as it is now - a cluster of clusters of galaxies, and a structure that's actually large enough to be significant in what is a very grand scheme of things.

As yet unframed, but here's the triptych as it is intended to be displayed.