Liminal Expressions

As I struggle through with a decisive and set thesis for senior thesis beyond just the generic human figure, I continue to make work about it.  I am currently in a show for advanced sculpture at DAAP for our midterm titled "Liminal Expressions."  My piece was a plaster sculpture of various body parts arranged at different heights on steel stands.

Lay In My Body
Plaster and steel
2013

To make this piece, I wrapped various parts of my body in plastic packing tape sticky side up and then covered another layer of the sticky side down.  After I cut myself out, I patched up the tape mold with more tape.  I then mixed plaster at a thicker consistency and poured it into my tape molds, spread it out, let it dry and cut open the tape mold.  Some pieces I was able to get very thin, which is rare for plaster because it is very fragile.

An example of how thin some of the pieces are.

Lay In My Body is made up of eight different pieces that make up the torso, shoulder and neck, legs and arms; there is no head or feet and hands.  This is the most abstract piece I have ever made.  I need to work on how I photograph and light the piece.  It was rather difficult because the piece is white and galleries are usually white, the piece gets lost in the space against the walls.  Someone suggested that I paint the stands black and photograph the piece against a black background to make the body parts stand out more.  If I could display this piece in my ultimate setting, it would be alone in a medium sized room that was painted a deep blue (floor and ceiling too) and each part of the piece would have its own light from directly above.  

Here are a couple more views of my piece from when it was in the 840 Gallery at DAAP.

Lay In My Body
Plaster and steel
2013

Lay In My Body
Plaster and steel
2013