leftover text project
Officially the end of the Text Project. A recent studio clear-out confirmed that I don't want to pursue the 'Text Project' no longer. Let's chuck the leftover letters I have and make both the headspace and physical space for the new projects. Done! This is the last of it, lovely leftovers, cut out from the O's. Bye bye!
Art, Poppies, Studio, Text Project
Creating a wall using hung drawings I'm working on (although they do flap about too much)
Frames ready to be cleaned/painted
Text project artwork, taken out of crappy frames and ready to go into re-restored frames. (Restored with love this time, not a deadline. )
Spraying the frames - smooth, matt finish.
Here's a few, complete. I like hanging them and seeing them collectively, rather than wrapping them in cling-film straight away, ready for selling at Bristol Harbourside Market (more about that later, but for now, here's the Facebook and the Twitter)
Sweet peas from the garden - one of the last batches. Lovely to have them in the studio
Art, Drawing, Process, Text Project, Thoughts
An idea, researching now, experimenting too.The idea of being part of one of the Bristol arts trails next year, North, South or West, either. Showing and selling a series of repetitive works, the kind I love, the 'serious stuff', full of compulsion, happy accidents, flow, doing the same thing over and over and really boring myself, like a factory worker. I love the task ahead of creating a large body of work. To frame and exhibit and sell. Then I imagined the space and all this seriousness. There's lots of beige and white.I realise there is a bit of a schizophrenic within my artist self. One half the above and one half fun, fancy-dress, silly things to make you smirk, color and vibrancy. It would be good to see the two sides represented in an exhibition, but perhaps under another name. The things I want to make as this second half are usable, aimed at adults, for adults to play. And at the same time being things for the cool kids to have. Pop-up signs, elaborate wigs, old man masks, vegetable and weather fancy dress, fake poo's in different colours. All of that and more.So I'm starting with lettering, making words on sticks for people to spell out different words. I like the idea of them being 3D, but this is proving impossible to find on the internet. All I found was this one guy's attempt: (see his blog here)
but as he says, the curved letters are near impossible, and it's all very fiddly. More searching found me this...
A wonderful person made a font! Free and downloadable from here: at DaFont He's got around the issue of the curves by making everything not curvy.(This font is a set of cut-out layouts with which you can build 3D pixel style letters. They should all work. Just cut along the solid lines, fold along the dotted lines, put some glue on the shaded flaps, stick them together and there you go... If you want to use this for commercial projects, please contact me: tobias (dot) sommer (at) gmx (dot) ch )No printer here, but I'm going to copy down the net onto cardboard and have a try myself, get that trusty old scalpel out.Here's what I'm trying to make, but in 2D version. I couldn't find any thing stick-like in my studio, (and I just had the idea that using an actual stick, painted...Would be really nice) So I've used a dental mirror. I came across these at a strange market stall selling mostly nuts and bolts. They are extendable and have a tiny rounded mirror on them.
By taking quirky and inspiring mottos and sayings, mixing them with my own process of entering a dazed state of making through repetitive actions, this is my Text Project. I often have a market stall the Tobacco Factory Sunday markets, and various school fetes throughout Bristol.
Each piece is completely unique, with the lines drawn free-hand and each letter is hand cut. I use vivid-colored card for each design and a good quality mount. A simple yet elegant design for the home, and all made lovingly in Bristol
I have lots of popular pieces in stock. As well as this, I offer a bespoke service, so feel free to commission me.
I charge £6 for each 4” tall letter, and the mounting is at cost-price, i.e. an A3 sized piece would cost around £8 to mount. I arrange framing through
Niche Frames, Bristol who can offer a large and varied range of framing options.
If you live out of Bristol, the cost of postage and packaging will be around £10 depending on the size of piece you select, although i prefer to hand-deliver as the work is easily damaged in the post. I will deliver for free if you live in the Bristol area!
Hurrah! My work is up in Planet Pizza Bishopston, Bristol.
The artwork is being displayed as a Valentines Exhibition, all pieces are for sale, at good prices -small sizes (about 5" tall) are £15. The larger frames are £20 and there are two big pieces in wooden frames are £35
All the other frames have been saved from being chucked, restored, polished and repainted.
Blimey, commissions are flying in for my text project! I created a very special half-size piece for a friend. (not something I am going to offer up to customers - it was so fiddly!) And i kept the waste intact, to create a kind of stencil. I like using everything all up - making use of wastage, so let's see what I can make with this.
And dear blog readers, it is Christmas soon! What would make a better present than something handmade, and if you haven't got time, I can make something on your behalf! Any word/saying/quote. £6 per letter + the cost price of mounting + wrapping. And if you are in the Bristol area, I hand-deliver for free.I have recently completed a few 'love' pieces, and some nice girly named artworks. it's nice when people commission me, otherwise I always use the same colors and feel like it gets a bit tired.
A nice chap who bought an 'OK' text project piece at the exhibition last week asked me for a favor - the word 'Nurture' in my font/text quickly sketched out on photoshop. Done.
Oh hello Tobacco Factory Market! My first one, what a lovely place, great atmosphere, lovely customers and fellow stall-holders, I'm going to book up some more Sunday spaces. Lots of interest in my Text Project, but I realise it's time to think up some new words/sayings.
My text project is going well... after having a stall at the Redland Girls School Fete, I received three commissions, one for someone who wanted a present for a christening - 'Zoe Grace', and two commissions for a gift: 'Love' and 'Peace'I have discovered that selling at markets is more successful whent he customer feels like they are part of the making process - if they are supplying me with the word, and I go away and make it for them, it's a whole lot more personal and meaningful. It's bespoke.I'm going to continue with this 'commissioning stall' as opposed to a stall where I have all my stock for sale. And in all future stalls, I will be sat creating the work infront of all market-goers. It's important that people see I have drawn the lines on myself, it's not just pretty paper !Holly, Adrian and I had a stall at the 'Queen Elizabeth Country Park' Show, which is in Petersfield, and which was a complete disaster. It was raining so heavily, it was misty, there was a really poor turnout, no one was particullarly interested in our stall, which kept nearly falling down. Holly sold one piece, the money recieved was paid back to the train guard when she got charged on the train... and I had a rainy two and a half hour car journey back to Bristol with a car full of damp artwork.We're seeing this as 'research', we know now to not leave Bristol, there's so many different opportunities for us here.
Yesterday, my friend Holly and I set up a stall at the Walcot Street Market in Bath. It was a beautiful day, and our first time selling on a stall together. It worked really well, we think our illustration and artwork is not too similar to drown each other, and not too different either. The work contrasts and compliments each other.
We aquired stand-things from a lovely lady called Rachel. She had 2 great tables, tablecloths, card stands, boxes to lean prints on and a trestle to hold more prints. As this was my first market stall, it was great to be lent everything we'd need, otherwise the cost of all that would have outweighed the profit. I may have to look into getting some of this equipment if I choose to persue selling at stalls. We also put up some beautiful bunting which my nan made for me, and pegged some greeting-cards to the front of the table.
The location was pretty good, not excellent though. the hussle and bussle of Bath was at the end of the road, and all the passers by were just doing that - passing by. Our stall did catch some peoples eye, but we were not pitched in the main market area, which could have made it more successful, but who knows. We're planning on trying out another market in Bath soon, we're trying to find the one which suits our work best, has the right people attending it, and is the most successful
.Holly's website is HERE and she keeps a lovely blog on blogspot HERE. The 'Walcot Street market' is also called the 'Bath flea market' and HERE is a link to more info about it for sellers
Art, color, Exhibitions, Process, Studio
I have been prolific today. I was in the studio till 8pm, inspired, I kept finding more things to do and I'm only home now because I'm hungry for fish and chips mmm. A Friday night treat from Bishopston Fish Bar!Today, I have: caught up on last night's Big Brother with my neighbour Mia, taken home all the crockery from my studio and put it all in my dishwasher, recycled, taken rubbish to the dump (I'm the 'head housekeeper' of the studio you see), done a layer of papier mache on the balloons ready for the Big Lebowski festival tonight at The Lanes, Bristol, put up a wall in the studio, painted that wall, watched 4 episodes of the L word whilst doing most of the above, made a friend a birthday present collage, bound my birthday blind-drawing papers, wrote this blog, started my glue molds,So these 'glue molds', they are for my my exhibition: 'Surface/Space/Time' at The Crypt Gallery, London (26th Aug - 9th Sept) which is curated by and also showing the work of Sam Clift who is a nice chap that I went to uni with.I have been meaning to get on with starting the glue molds for months. I created some whilst at uni, and made this small quilt with them:The idea I have for the exhibition is very similar, but with edited colors and on a much larger scale. The patchwork is made by filling big spoons with a mix of PVA, water and ink. They take AGES to dry, and the final stage sewing the patches together (but i'm thinking about spray-mount??)Today I started working out the quantities of glue to water I need to make the perfect mixture for the molds. I have five plastic cups, 1-5, 1 has 30 parts water to 70 parts glue, 2= 40:60, 3= 50:50, 4= 60:40, 5= 70:30 I need the mold to be the perfectly supple, and not brittle. I have poured the liquids into 5 different ladels, and I'll wait (about a week?) to see which mixture makes the perfect consistency of mold. Process! It's been a long time since I focussed on process. It's where my heart lies with my art, and it felt really good to get into this again today.
Art, Process, Studio, Text Project, Thoughts
I have been working pretty hard on my 'Text Project' and needed some escape from that. I've chosen it to be mundane and repetitive, and I love that, but sometimes I do need to release some more creativity within some other format. And yesterday, this came through mono printing. I used my little roller, and a piece of acetate to ink up, it's so easy and mess-free. I used some sequins too, and got involved with drawing a lot of small squares, again - very repetitive, I can't get away from it! The little pictures are not hanging on a washing-line type of structure in my studio - I have always wanted a studio with things hanging from washing lines, and now I have it. I'm so lucky.
Some pictures of my studio... Here are some gorgeous frames, the ornate one is a frame that my step-dad donated to me (thank you!) and the solid wood frame I found in a skip outside the Architecture Center, by Arnolfini, here in Bristol. Complete with map! (Which I hope to sell on Ebay)Here is where I do my sitting down. I treated my studio to a big tidy-up this week, It feels fresh and spring-cleaned. Must keep it like this so I don't waste time tidying. You can see more frames here, under the school desk, got to fill them up.Some text pieces, I have had a development in that area, as fantastic online shop Hunkydory Home want to sell my text project! I'm selling 'You're My Cup of Tea', 'Love', 'Hello', and 'This is it' with them, and want to get lots ready and in-stock as I'm being optimistic about them selling like hotcakes (that would make another nice text piece! I'm going to start talking in idioms only now)Some Receipt Mountains on the wall, and my monsters are hanging around too.
I am working on the things I'm going to sell at Carboot Circus. So much to make, and it's limitless - I can make as much or as little as I like. Feeling like this is not the thing i want to be making, but knowing that it's not far off.The aesthetic is simple, but i am keeping to the three important elements of the things I make;
Accumulation obsession
Color importance
Labour intensity
So that's good! Thinking about studiospaces - There are possibilities of finding a free one here in Bristol, run down buildings and disused basements. If i had the space, i would make the big, messy and scary things.
I am feeling like i really need to make some collages. This was the first in years. Nice scary faced man.I've started a new cut-out-text piece, quite fittingly it says 'This Is It' but i'm trying to this of other good things to spell out. Nothing too cheesy, something life-affirming maybe, but short. Or nice words, or meaningful words. What do you think?
