After my recent launch of my Ukiyo collection design proposals I was approached with a few questions about decisions made behind the collection and about my practice in general. I'd like to share with you what I'll call a 'mini interview' to give you a little more insight into the Ukiyo collection and more!
Q: Have you got a favourite tool or process that you use in your work?
A: I love my Fretz hammers! I've built up a nice, little collection of them for raising, planishing, blocking and texturing. My favourite is hammer number 14; the texturing hammer. It gives a beautiful feel and aesthetic to my wire projects. Fretz hammers are beautifully made and really comfortable to work with. I highly recommend them!
Q: Do you have a preference between jewellery or vessels? If so, which and why?
A: I'm much more used to designing and creating jewellery pieces and definitely need more practice when it comes to vessels. However, I absolutely love both and it just depends where the inspiration takes me and leads the design. At the moment with the design pieces from my Ukiyo collection being put on hold, I've had time to comb through my inspiration and research for that project in more depth. This has led me to start investigating a very exciting vessels based project yet, I have found an abundance of inspiration in the same body of work to begin a jewellery line also! Exciting stuff ahead!
Q: What inspired the Ukiyo collection?
A: My profound love for Japan is the core of my inspiration. After a life-long love for the country I finally made my first trip in June 2018 where I travelled for a month with two friends over various cities; Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Sapporo and Fukuoka. Arriving back in the UK I had major withdrawal symptoms as it was just a taste of such a rich culture. I made my second trip Dec 2018/Jan19 experiencing the culture in further depth over two weeks and spent my time between Okinawa, Hiroshima and Tokyo. My third trip was over 5 weeks long from June 2019 and my first real solo trip. Here I covered some incredible locations, exploring Fukuoka, Kyoto, Osaka and Tokyo in much more depth, and included Naoshima Island and many cities outside of Tokyo in this non-stop adventure. My latest trip was January 2020 for 2 weeks where I stayed local to Tokyo and making a weekend trip to Nikko. I will be covering all my Japan explorations in a separate blog as I feel it's important for people to hear about my experiences and understand the culture to fully see the inspiration behind the project and how it will lead what's to come.
Q: What did you aim to achieve with the Ukiyo graduate collection?
A: The concept and inspiration behind my design proposals came from my travels to Japan and looking at Japanese culture and the mindfulness that takes place in every aspect of their lives; from performing a tea ceremony, to entering a shrine to even taking a bath.... I compared Japanese culture to British and found I wanted to take Japanese dining elements and bring a mindful and interactive space into the British home. I was aiming to create a sensory experience through tactility, vision and emotion, in the hope I would create a mindful space for the user/viewer, taking them away from their daily worries and distractions, bringing them into the moment and connecting with themselves, the objects and with others.
The Japanese word 'Ukiyo' refers to being 'detached from the bothers of life' or 'temporary escape' and that is what I'd aimed to do with this series of vessels.
Q: Why did you choose purple for the jesmonite in your graduate project?
A: Colour was such an important element for my collection (and is in most projects I do) as colour really inspires me and gets my creative juices flowing. I decided firstly I wanted to create marbled patterns with colour to create a flow, a feeling of movement within the colour. I chose purple hues because of its symbolism and how the colour can manipulate emotions. I researched in depth into colour theory and colour psychology and found that purple could act as a 'bridge' between warm colours (reds, yellows, oranges) and cool colours (greens, blues). This meant I could manipulate the purples to evoke many emotions; by adding blues I could stimulate feelings of calm and tranquility, however, by adding reds to the purple hues I could bring forward feelings of warmth and energy, bringing juxtaposed emotions into harmony.
Q: What is jesmonite?
A: It is what's called a gypsum-based material and acrylic resin. It is much more eco-friendly than a resin and is similar to plaster in consistency. It's a fantastically versatile material which can be pigmented different colours but metal powders can also be added which gives the work a real metal-like reactive surface. The consistency can be adjusted to fit the project accordingly. It's heat resistant, water proof, used in external and internal building projects, in jewellery, furniture, sculpture and so much more! It's pretty magical really.
Q: What part of the overall process do you enjoy the most?
A: This is a little bit of a tricky question to answer! Every part has an enjoyable moment and at times stressful or frustrating moments for varying reasons. I love digging into my research but I've often struggled to do so in an educational environment as I panic about lack of time to complete a project. This is because I know I can dig so deep into a subject I'm passionate about for hours, days, weeks or more, sometimes getting distracted about having to make something as I'm so engrossed in the information! I love this part of the process because I've learned over the years that my inspiration will mostly stem from emotions or attachments to a place and not so much from visuals like others might. (This may be because of my musical and poetry background as this is often created through feelings and experiences). So I love to sink my teeth into the research and really gain an understanding of the subject. Making is enjoyable too, because you learn so much in that process. Although at times frustrating when things go wrong, this can also end up creating happy accidents and new stems of inspiration. But then, completing the work is such an elating part of the process too, because there's a great sense of accomplishment here. You learn so much through the research, design and making process that when the work has finally reached the finish line it's such a wonderful, fulfilling feeling.
It was really enjoyable answering people's questions to help them better understand my practice and the motivation behind my graduation project. Until next time!
Stevie
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