12 Feb 23 by Justatest
This is a line drawing but rather than using a pencil or a pen, I´m drawing the line with black drainage pipe.
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It´s a drawing that can be stepped into, and then examined in 3 dimensions.
camouflaged
Somehow the drawing was too plain and needed a bit of jazzing up, so I introduced some ´crosshatching´ with available twigs and small branches of hazel, oak, sycamore, alder, ash, willow and pine growing in the garden, then just shoved them into the drainage holes running up the side of the pipe, and secured together with wire.
As it progressed, I noticed that the natural browns of the curving branches was making the line disappear into the background as if camouflaged, with the danger being it would no longer be noticed from a distance (maybe a good thing?).
single colour jumble
Sealed the branches with waterproof glue then afterwards applyed an oil-based undercoat. Those planks of wood are temporarily placed to allow me reach the top with the ladder. At this point the grey undercoat layer is complete.
It´s turning out to be the largest work for many years, in terms both of dimensions and the act of finicky, dogged, slogging away process. And through cold and dreary winter months of little daylight to boot.
However the single colour approach doesn´t read so well. It appears increasingly as a tangled confusion whereas I´d prefer the quality of flow to be more evident.
Perhaps at this stage a 4-colour approach will ease the jumble of arcs with each of the four lines of branches a different colour traveling from the base to the top? If I go with that then it´s going to become even more involved (yet again), and the work will likely continue well into Summer.
It occurs to me that what I´m doing here is simply a scaled-up version of this earlier piece [LINK]. Which of the two has more value? One that takes half an hour to put together with qualities of freshness, immediacy and accessibility, or the imposing yet laborious one that looks like it´s going to take the best part of a year to complete?
pipe end
I feel it necessary to do something with the end of the pipe but not sure exactly what. I couldn't leave it blank so I cut a piece of it, wrapped it around the end, found a ball amongst the trees, stuffed it in the opening and painted it red. Not really convinced but I´ll leave it for the present to get on with the more important stuff, and return to it if anything better strikes me.
colour finally!
Blue, orange, pink and green. Not exactly the most harmonious colour scheme but then, as previously mentioned the intention is to express the flow of the lines through that jumble of arcs. I´m hoping it´ll be easier to follow the individual discordance of a colour whilst it twists and swirls from end to end as the line travels from the ground up into the trees.
okay done