Exploration of Fiber, Cloths, and Yarn

This week's exploration endeavor consisted of fabric and yarn. We used our sensories to examine them and see what properties it contained that could be deconstructed. From last week's paper making project, we saw that the drying process of the papers richly highlighted the final stages of its creation. So here are the materials used to demonstrate various properties that become transformed when combined together:



From the start of departure, I was able to analyze the various properties of yarn. The Tealish colored yarn was:
soft, fuzzy, stiff center, bendable, wrapped around my fingers, felt like a stringy carpet, broke apart at the ends, which made it look like hair, wavy like tides, felt like little cotton bals pasted together, felt different in my hands vs. on my lips (felt like burnt hair), tickled my nose, formed into balls, fragile, dropped like a feather, formed little cloudlike shapes, felt like fur when bunched tightly together.



The sea green yarn carried different properties:
it was braided tightly together, rougher, hayish quality, pliable, stringy, it was a byncg of strings wrapped around a tough string, hard to break apart, tangly and knotty

The purple with gold design fabric:
soft and silky, rough patches, gold design, string started to come out of the sides, it flapped, difficult to rip, sheer, stringy where it was cut but was held together with thicker threads along the edge.

Combined together, transformed into this:

Paper Making

What a fun fun day!
Here's Mary showing us the steps to making paper. I have forgotten the enjoyment these actives can bring to a classroom.
There were many steps to the process of paper making but once you get the hang of grinding paper, mixing ingredients together, and remembering to apply glue to the mixture, I know for sure people of all ages will fall in love with this project. I was thinking if I was to do this in my own art classroom, I would have to be as organized as possible. Because it can get chaotic, children will need as much detailed instructions as possible. But not only that, having students involved in the process would be great in that they are taking responsibility for the efforts in creating the art. I can have each child be responsible for a station, like the water station or dumping mixture into the buckets, so that it can be less chaotic and more organized. I would also have to put as much time into preparing everything in advance since there are a lot of supplies involved in the process of paper making.

Fibers and Embroidery

Throughout the week, I've been able to record various fibers, textures, embroideries and designs in order to further investigate the assignment. Fibers play an important role in engaging an artist's curiosity for exploration of a material. Even in the first image, as I continue to look at it from different angles and proximity, I can't help but to be infatuated by the shape it starts to formulate. It reminds me of a never ending maze.

The exploration of fibers are endless. Everywhere you look, when you look hard enough, you are bound to see beautiful art made of various textures, quality, paper, formation, etc.

First Class

Paper Project:
White paper- grainy, translucent, smooth, weave like pattern, white with subtle gray, soft, smooth, light weight, thin, flexibility, sharp edge, pointy corners
- it has the ability to make sound
- smells like a library, starch, bleachy
- tastes salty and melts

As an artist, you bring your own experience to the various mediums. Children are natural investigators with their own senses. We lodge the richness of the medium to a simple and single way.

Ways to change paper:
- fold, bend, refold, reshape. crumble, twist, shred, cut
- by tearing along the edges, we meander the edge, use body parts, tear and weave, and make shapes by folding and tearing, shred, poke holes, create various shapes on the paper...becomes endless
- but at the same time, must know our limits of the material.

Using 2 papers:
- we are engaging in conversation between the 2 papers.
- physionomic perception: seeing objects as a representation of something you're familiar with.
-- reading into something and responding to that situation.

Creation of 2 separate pieces of paper to form into one shape. Paper 1: I folded into different parts and intersected in a way that would be able to hold the other piece of paper. Paper 2: I shredded the ends because of the interesting form it started to created then twisted one side of the paper that was shredded. Outcome: It started to look like octupus tentacles. =)

Application:
1. Exploring opens up their conscious of what they are learning.
2. Combine limited amount of options with choices
3. Choose among possibilities where guidelines help to promote even more creativity.