ARC | pickersgill-2

Facade

This latest piece Telling a New Storey was long planned to be about the symbolically charged status of super-modern (usually corporate) urban architecture. Its specific form came about after my Canary Wharf residency and a subsequent collaborative installation which involved the use of a projector. This instrument seemed a suitable medium with which to address the subject - particularly in the boundary between exterior and interior, open (transparent) and restricted access. The projections are symbolic of the city as palimpsest as well as asking the viewer to consider what is 'real' and what is an illusion, a reflection. The images shown are made up of objects, projected images of objects and landscapes and then a photograph of these projections. The ‘still life’ tableaux include sculptural abstractions of the building type. The transparencies are printed in A4 format acknowledging the ubiquitous size of corporate 'documentation'.

'Images of real things are interlayered with images of images'.

On Photography. Susan Sontag

A key enquiry in the work is the nature of transparency. At construction sites I noticed the shell of the building, without walls, temporarily results in an edifice which is almost transparent. Once the glass is installed there is a conflict between transparency and reflectiveness. To photograph looking through glass one must get up very close. Pre-eminent is the material's capacity for surface reflections, which are often best experienced at a distance. Glass is the daily recipient and facilitator of millions of fluctuating images - of ourselves interacting with it, of the surrounding built environment, of climate conditions.

Historically one of the most expensive building components, our iconic buildings employing glass facades subject users to unprecedented security scrutiny. Its physical characteristics of open access are belied by these contractual procedures.

Like the fictional hero Whittington, we migrate to the city to fulfil our ambitions. We see ourselves literally reflected in fragmentary montages of images which confirm our place in these environments. If not employed to work in the ‘ivory tower’ we may experience it as a consumer, in a restaurant, mall, or hotel, (subject to status, of course). We ascend to a viewing gallery and marvel at our ant-like status in comparison, a fitting metaphor for the individual involved in the system of contemporary global economics.

The superlative construction fills us with awe, as pilgrims would feel on entering the medieval cathedral. Yet, ultimately, it is only possible to identify oneself with it in terms of the human acts performed within the interior. The ‘object’ of the encounter gives way to the 'contained' experience.

Components:

perforated and solid aluminium & steel sculptures, folded and rolled
flexible acetate sheet and paper, folded and made into cylinders
photos of sculptural objects printed out, made into paper sculptures & containers

Construction:

exterior and interior photographs of the super-modern urban environment; primarily Canary Wharf
using photographs as a projected image onto object
re-photographing the projection and objects
close cropping and printing onto positive film in A4 size

Key lessons learned:

improved photographic and projection skills
I have progress to make on photographic materials and presentation - the positive film used here (for the first time) cannot be fixed with adhesive
allow materials to speak for themselves, apart from cropping I have used almost no post production processes
remember the key ideas behind the project and attempt to make the presentation (as well as the content) reinforce those concepts: reflection, transparency, shadows

Below: some of the development work - projections onto cut paper work, hanging textured papers and post production work turning positives into negatives - the cold blues and greens become warm brown and gold.

Notes on a sustainable practice:

This course has been completely transformative for me, in terms of learning new skills and a more rigorous approach to my practice which previously comprised drawing and painting.

having become interested in making sculptural objects I have found a sculpture workshop with open access membership to continue this strand of my practice - I'm particularly interested in the potential for combining nylon filament or wire with the perforated aluminium I have been using.

I expect to continue my investigation of architecture and geometric forms through paper and card and will explore the potential for all forms of model making, folding and cutting.

the residency I attended last year taught me much about working with limited resources and collaborating, I intend to apply for further opportunities of this type.

additionally I now have the confidence to look for opportunities offering studio space and shared projects, I have enjoyed collaborating immensely and benefited from sharing skills.

The urban landscape - an overview

What view greets the visitor as they encounter London for the first time? Frequently, it is that of the aerial city, a model glimpsed from a plane window. Historically, Canterbury pilgrims would have encountered it as a city of spires, as they crested a hill.

The distant view emphasises the landmarks; St Pauls and the forest of church spires which symbolized the power of church and state. These are now dwarfed by new landmarks; Canary Wharf, The Shard which are signifiers of the power of commerce.

As we draw close our view changes from landscape to portrait. in the super-modern age, scale and materiality have been re-imagined: the higher the building the less physically substantial it appears. On the ground we look up like Lilliputians at Gulliver. Inside and from their top storeys we look down to a city reduced to a miniature model of itself.

Above gallery - the visual language of super-modernity - repetitive grid patterns, transparency, reflection and shadows.

Making models: cut paperwork exploring negative and positive shapes, voids, light and shadows.

Object, container, contained?

The (Obscure) Object of Desire

The city is where we go to remake, to remodel ourselves, free of old constraints. We can discard humble beginnings, forget a past failure, forge a successful future. The urban myth of Whittington still holds sway over us. The city is where the illusion becomes a new reality.

During image making I began to think of these assemblages as having a duality of meaning; existing on the edge of two artistic genres. Are they still life rather than a landscape? I see them as 'Objects in a landscape' as are so many of our iconic buildings. A property advert (below) which pushes home that exact point. The developer of these towers only seems to want to be associated with the iconic Opera House, not the city itself.

Iconic Spires

Today's iconic buildings are primarily made of glass; Burj al Arab, The Shard, Luis Vuitton Fondation, The Gherkin. Glass, first discovered in Egypt, has been in existence since around 1500 BC. Singularly, for most of these years it is the one material with the characteristic of transparency. Its use was limited to precious objects due to high costs and production time. It was not until the Middle Ages that it began to be used in buildings. This was revolutionary, it allowed light in whilst isolating the interior from the outside elements. Our Gothic cathedrals were some of the first examples of glass architecture, with their panelled windows growing in size as structural advances were made. In the 19th Century further developments allowed the Crystal Palace to be built. Since then its rise has been unstoppable. Glass is capable of being used for larger and larger surface areas from the whole façade of a modernist villa to the clamped together curtain walling of our tallest building in the UK.

Left : Icons 3 - a pivotal piece in this project

Developments:

making metal sculpture, bending and welding
cutting, drilling, drawing and painting on perspex
projecting light onto objects in a studio
using printed photographs of sculpture as material for further 3D explorations and object making

Metropolis work was primarily produced for Sensing Place exhibition January 2018. It followed Icons but prefaced the structural developments of Object. The venue for the show had similar strictures to the Canary Wharf residency; so I took an almost identical materials approach and made work capitalising on paper folding, tensioned threads and mixed media. The eponymous film by Fritz Lang seems to have a lot in common with Canary Wharf.

Metropolis

A slide show of contextual references below: German Expressionism, Panting, Heizer, Josef Albers, Gehry, Libeskind, and Antunes.

Shadow Drawing:

The investigation of light and in particular shadow has formed part of my recent research.

Above are two experiments projecting light at mixed media sculptural objects. In one of them I have drawn round the shadow then removed the light source. Does this make shadow a negative space or a or positive? I have worked in this way before:

Right: a pivotal piece from a year ago: Expanding City

Developments:

built a relief structure - of an abstracted building
used light to create the drawing - tracing the outline of the shadow every half an hour as the sun moved the position of the shadow.

More Canary Wharf research: it takes me almost a dozen emails to get a one day permit to take photos at Canary Wharf estate again; such is the control which the estate exerts over access to its POPS (privately owned public open space) .

During the day I go into the ground floor of the estate's HQ; One Canada Square.The lobby aesthetic is haunted by Mies Van der Rohe's Barcelona Pavilion (1929) photo right. It is furnished with identical leather and steel furniture which the architect designed for that building. Apart from the rosso levante marble (used exclusively here) the cold green verde imperial marble reflects the 'house style' for much of the estate. Externally steel and glass dominate, internally one is treated to the 'jewels' of semi precious crystals and minerals, luxurious leathers. These are the 'stained glass windows' inside the 'cathedrals of commerce'; a display of the finest crafts that money can buy.

Corners - creating the angle and the object, a collaboration - with Carlos Sebastia

This represents phase 2 of a collaborative project which Carlos and I conceived whilst at CWND residency : Encounters - the nature of materials - scroll down for more on this or click here Light.

In Phase 1 we made sculptural objects out of aluminium, steel and wood, projected light onto them, photographed the results and then made an installation out of all the components, including projecting the photograph back onto the installation. Thus 3D became 2D and was then returned to 3D.

Phase 2 is primarily a project involving photography, paper and light.

I had a desire to return to the physical materials from which we had made the images. Both being interested in corners and intersections (following on from our ground level photos at Canary Wharf) we started photographing some of the objects in a corner of the room. It was typical of our individual practices that we preferred these photos printed in monochrome.

The 2D photos were then cut, folded and pinned back on the wall as 3D sculptural objects to re-photograph them with voids and shadows as per the photos below. Our collaboration is in its final stages as we prepare a piece to show at the MFA graduation show...…

'That most sordid of all havens, the corner, deserves to be examined. Consciousness of being at peace in one's corner produces a sense of immobility, and this, in turn radiates immobility. An imaginary room rises up around our bodies, which think that they are well hidden when we take refuge in a corner'.

Gaston Bachelard.

Below - the install photos of Nature of Materials for our graduate show. The photos are installed alongside and using some of the source materials.

Encounters - the Nature of Materials - an installation project in collaboration with Carlos Sebastia. Whereby banal materials are ( as if by magic ) transformed by light.

This project was based on our mutual interest in working between 2D and 3D and in the manipulation of perceptions by these processes. Our physical materials were sheet steel, aluminium, wood, paper and rigid acrylic sheet. We played with lighting and overhead projections, adding screens to the projections by way of masking them with some of the materials; using the punched aluminium for this was very successful. Refracted colour was achieved by bouncing light off the acryli sheet.

Carlos's practice is more experiential than mine; based around photography and video installations. My practice is more materially based; usually starting with investigations into form. Aware of this I appropriated more of the work with the materials, whilst he concentrated on the photography - image manipulation.

Working with Carlos has been a rewarding opportunity for me, as I had little experience with projection and lighting and this project has greatly improved my confidence in this area. The benefits of collaboration have been that of exploring new areas personally whilst being aware that a partner can take over or act as a mentor where ( my ) skills are still developing. In return I shared with him my considerable experience and knowledge of textiles which, with my help, he is incorporating into his graduation piece.

Below - our interim work for the external examiner with preparatory photos. The install was photographed then the life size photo was hung and the objects re-arranged back onto it with a projection of the aluminium material as a screen through which the rest was viewed. Thus we returned to the source information, the ubiquitous material which had inspired both of us to make the piece.

Light

Why should the inspiration that comes from an artist's manipulation of the hairs of a brush be any different from that of the artist who bends at will the rays of light?

Pierre Dubreuil

From the introduction to Shape of Light. Tate Modern

Left: Atrium Assemblage - a pivotal moment in the development of my degree show work:

the use of projection
assembling constructed objects together with different lighting sources & using an overhead projector
photographing projected images

Making the landscape - from folded and rolled paper, perforated aluminium, aluminium sheet, softwood, spray paint and perspex sheets.

Column

A Greek tragedy (turned to stone and back again). Site specific work conceived for The Crypt Gallery group show.

In Straitened Times; my piece for One That Holds Everything in November 2017 was a pivotal piece for me in terms of approaches to my practice.

Key developments:

First time use of soft textiles in my sculptural work - which is architecturally focussed in its subject matter so this is not easily an option for me
It marked the point at which I recognized that I was making 'generations' of objects/images
Extensive research in Athens and London