Thesis Pieces - PART FIVE

The forecast.

Thesis Pieces - PART FOUR

ANTICIPATION & FANTASY

Traveling is often more for the benefit of the rose-colored daydreams we create before the trip than for what the actual place can offer.  We often find what we seek in an adventure in its anticipation while the true landscape of our destination is as humble as home.

...But maybe with a few bells and whistles attached.

The postcard became an intriguing structure of romance and simplicity.

The 4 x 6 two-dimensional box that halfheartedly attempts to encapsulate a fluid locale.  

What's included and excluded on that flat glossy plane dictates opinion and perception as far as the postage will send.

Thesis Pieces - PART THREE

 Using my new set of symbols, I began sketching scenes of restraint and release. The perceived constriction of home, work, community, etc. are often the catalysts of travel. Without the contrast of home freedom doesn't taste as sweet. And the transformation is less profound.

I also began to study the shift of perception that occurs in daily and vacation life. Depending on how you look at things, you might be covered in flowers or buried in thorns.

If pattern represents a culture as a whole, is there a way to show the individual within?

At times, I had to stop thinking and just mash symbols together.  Here, phenomenology might determine the image's meaning rather than tradition.

Thesis Pieces - PART TWO

I started researching symbols- personal, global, historical - as a way to try to understand culture. 

I looked for common icons as well as abstract ones, 

working to build a visual language.

These icons of the human network can describe the exotic, the hearth of comfort and kin, and a panorama of emotional states.  

As pictographs, ranging from the stop sign to constellations, they communicate on a level more basic and instinctual than words, towing along the history of its origins and appropriations.

Seeking or fleeing from culture is one of the great motivations of every adventurer.

Thesis Pieces - PART ONE

I have been hard at work on my thesis project.  

The theme is travel.  

Mainly why we travel and what sensations occur along the way.  

When you go, are you running away, finding home or trying on a new version of yourself?

101 OZ

Amber bet me 5 dollars that she could drink 101 ounces of pure mountain spring water in the two hours remaining of our Pagosa Springs road trip.  

She won, painfully, and payment was long overdue.

For The Silver Screen

I was recently commissioned to make a prop for the movie The Brass Teapot.  It involved some old techniques and learning a few new ones. I'm quite pleased with the result and hope to try my hand at propmaking again.

  Thanks to Ellen for throwing this my way.