SCULPTURE / RELIEF WORK
RELIEF CANVAS SERIES
COMBINED MEDIA WORK
Be Bounded By EU Art Project
BURREN 2002
While in the Burren on the BBB project, Brighin Farren and I decided to work collaboratively. We were set the brief of working with materials from our surrounding environment we decided to explore the sounds which could be created from the rock formations. We created a bow using drift wood and horse hair from a local stable. Fish hooks and violins strings were used to string up one of the crevices of the coastal rocks. A shell was used as a bridge. We attached two smaller rocks at the end of the strings to adjust the notes played by pulling the strings tighter or leaving them loose.
While in the Burren, we decided to create a wind organ on the beach . We used a large drift wood log found along the beach. The pipes of the wind organ were made from large seaweed stalks weaved together. When these stalks dry out they become hollow in the center creating pipes. Due to bad weather conditions, the stalks never dried out. But a more intriguing sound ended up being created by the hundreds of holes erroded in the log. The sound of the piece continuously altered according to the speed and direction of the wind, as well as by the position of the listener.
ESTONIA 2003
Collaborative work by Aoife Murphy and Brighdin Farren
While being immersed within a multicultural group dynamic on the BBB project the issue of communication became of interest to us. We decided to create a collaborative work dealing with the issue of boundaries created within the process of communication through language.
Within the area of language and communication we decided to focus on a subject which was common to all participating countries, the subject of folk tales.
Our original plan was to create a new tale using elements taken from four folk tales, one from each of the countries participating. The tale was also to be written within all four different languages. We wished to do this in order to create a situation whereby information is muddled within the process of communication, in a circumstance which two individuals do not speak a common language proficiently. The multi-lingual structure of the tale would create a situation where an individual would attempt to piece together some version of the story through the parts which they could understand . This would mirror the way in which we piece together some kind of understanding communication with those who do not speak a common language.
Due to time limitations we decided to use the phrases roughly meaning "Once upon a time" which are traditionally found at the beginning of most folk tales.
English - Once upon a time
Irish - Fado Fado
Estonian - Olipa Kerran
Finish - Oli Kord
We first began to experiment with the use of clay and snow in order to create the piece, as we wanted to use a natural material which would mimic the way in which folk tales change in form and sometimes even completely disappear. The cliff face by the beach at Ontika Mois was chosen as the original canvas, as natural stone surfaces are recognised as the earliest known places which were used to documents stories.
Within the area of language and communication we decided to focus on a subject which was common to all participating countries, the subject of folk tales.
Our original plan was to create a new tale using elements taken from four folk tales, one from each of the countries participating. The tale was also to be written within all four different languages. We wished to do this in order to create a situation whereby information is muddled within the process of communication, in a circumstance which two individuals do not speak a common language proficiently. The multi-lingual structure of the tale would create a situation where an individual would attempt to piece together some version of the story through the parts which they could understand . This would mirror the way in which we piece together some kind of understanding communication with those who do not speak a common language.
Due to time limitations we decided to use the phrases roughly meaning "Once upon a time" which are traditionally found at the beginning of most folk tales.
English - Once upon a time
Irish - Fado Fado
Estonian - Olipa Kerran
Finish - Oli Kord
We first began to experiment with the use of clay and snow in order to create the piece, as we wanted to use a natural material which would mimic the way in which folk tales change in form and sometimes even completely disappear. The cliff face by the beach at Ontika Mois was chosen as the original canvas, as natural stone surfaces are recognised as the earliest known places which were used to documents stories.
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We decided however to use twigs from the surrounding area, as the association between trees and a history of constantly growing information felt more appropriate to the issues of the piece. The rings within the trees detail a story of their surrounding environment constantly growing and changing.
The work consisted of all four phrases broken down into single words and mixed into as many combinations with words of the other phrases without writing the original phrase.. This was done to create a circumstance in which audience members would have to read through the whole piece and attempt to piece together meaning.
We considered placing the piece within the woods so that the work would blend into the environment making it even more difficult to make meaning from the piece but instead decided to place it on a wood floor.
Exhibition of Be Bounded By work - Ontika Mois Art Gallery
We created a piece documenting the instrument created in the Burren using still images taken from a video piece of the instrument being played.
DIPLOMA WORK
At the begining of september 2001, a brief was set out by the sculpture department. The brief consisted of an assignment involving reading two set books and developing a project around an element drawn from either of the books.
The names of the books listed were " Things fall apart " by author Chinua Achebe and " Double time " by Mickey Donnelly. I decided to focus in on the novel " Things fall apart".
A particular passage of the book interested me. This passage details a woman making her way through a forest in the middle of the night with little or no light at all to guide her along her way. The passage encouraged my curiousity in two particular things, sense of touch and sense of sight.
After considering various different ideas dealing with sight and touch, the two lines of development came to a progressive meeting point, in which I decided to explore the idea of the creation of optical illusions through the use of Braille code.
The idea that one would be seeing something that wasn't actually there and not being able to see what actually was there i.e being able to read the Braille, interested me greatly. I began to explore the negative and positive space of the Braille code and looked at ways in which optical illusions can be created through them, looking at ways in which the braille pattern can be effectively transferred into well known optical illusions.
The names of the books listed were " Things fall apart " by author Chinua Achebe and " Double time " by Mickey Donnelly. I decided to focus in on the novel " Things fall apart".
A particular passage of the book interested me. This passage details a woman making her way through a forest in the middle of the night with little or no light at all to guide her along her way. The passage encouraged my curiousity in two particular things, sense of touch and sense of sight.
After considering various different ideas dealing with sight and touch, the two lines of development came to a progressive meeting point, in which I decided to explore the idea of the creation of optical illusions through the use of Braille code.
The idea that one would be seeing something that wasn't actually there and not being able to see what actually was there i.e being able to read the Braille, interested me greatly. I began to explore the negative and positive space of the Braille code and looked at ways in which optical illusions can be created through them, looking at ways in which the braille pattern can be effectively transferred into well known optical illusions.
This work is an example of one the first works, which I made while exploring the idea of creating a synergism between braille and optical illusions. In this work, I used an excerpt from the book " Things fall apart by author Chinua Achebe. The excerpt details a woman making her way through a woods in almost complete darkness. The braille was created through the use of various grades of sandpaper. As a viewer moves theirs hands across the piece from left to right the paper gets rougher and the size of the braille increases. This corresponds with the excerpt detailing the woman finding her way out of the woods.
The above work explores the synergism of braille and optical illusions. The illusion is created through the use of a chess board pattern. This pattern creats a dazzing optical experience. The braille is written in cast wax fingers, which are painted either black or white according to their position on the board. The finger braille is only clearly visible when viewed from a slight angle. The reason for using the chess pattern was to establish the way in which codes of language are structured. Focusing on how the fundamental components of a language create meaning through their structural rearrangement. The piece measures 1 metre by 1 metre.
For this piece of work, I cast my hand in black wax and painted the hand white. The hand is held in a position to indicate the gesture of touch. I made indentations in the wax to create a passage, through a form of physically negative braille. I choose indentations instead of raised dots to indicate the way in which reading braille takes in information through the skin. At the wrist of the cast hand, there is an inscription of the translated version of the braille. This is representitive of the way in which braille is picked up by our sensory nerves and travels up along the arm to be translated by the brain.
This work deals with the subject of the senses and sensory languages. It is a clay piece embedded with cloves used to write a passage in braille. It appeals to our sense of touch, sight and smell.
