Rustnstuff: 02/18

Sunday, February 11, 2018

An artists' book about war and peace.

Futility 2 is the second artists' book in a series about the futility of war.

The inner pages have excerpts from three poems stamped into the metal.

The poems and poets are: Anthem for Doomed Youth by Wilfred Owen; The Farmer Remembers the Somme by Vance Palmer; and In Flanders Fields by John McCrae.

The deaths of so many in war is a futile way of achieving peace.

Friday, February 9, 2018

Scroll book container finished

I have finished the body of the sacred scroll artists' book. It has been ground, polished, riveted etc - I have deliberately left much of the age patina on the scroll case.

A gorgeous little latch I made - it is locked in place by using a crystal and post from a dismantled earring. I put a rivet post into the body and drilled a 1mm hole through it to take the earring post.

I did a test of the scroll to see what width I required and if the winder worked. The answers were: the scroll needs to be 12.5cm wide; and yes the winder works.

The only task now is to print the peace related wording on the scroll.

Wednesday, February 7, 2018

Reflections, soft light and other matters

The walk this morning was cool and soft. We seem to be on our way to autumn.

Before heading out I was attracted to the reflections of the soft morning light on the still surface of the water in the the old rusty fire pit - now really a huge (1m in diameter) avian font.

This little visual feast was followed up by the blue of the hydrangeas and the pumpkin flowers - the vines are starting to spread over everything as is their way each year.

Most of the flowers on the verges on my walk along Treehaven Way were reflecting the soft cool morning light.

Uplifted by nature.

Sunday, February 4, 2018

Progressing the sacred scroll slowly

©2018 Barry Smith - The stand that will hold the sacred scroll is given a test run before the brass bits are ground and polished and the Camphor Laurel timbers is sanded and oiled - the photo gives a pretty good idea how the winder sits within the brass body of the scroll holder.

Much of the weekend was spent on a heap of paper work that Fiona and I needed to do. So the container that will hold the sacred peace scroll was progressed but not completed. It is a fiddly job so it all needs to be done mindfully and slowly.

I share a few photos of progress and mock-ups of the progress.

©2018 Barry Smith - The winding rod is threaded and I have added a threaded and drilled out brass fitting that slips over the newly created support rod; and it will also provide an edge for the scroll.

The container is now up to the stage where I need to spend a couple of hours on the grinder-polisher before starting to assemble the lot. I don't want to lose the patina on the extinguisher body and handle so I hope to get the finish I want using a brass wire polishing wheel.

I did locate our stash of pianola rolls; and I chose one.

The paper is fine but tough. I like the aged colour of roll. I will be cutting a strip about 1-1.5 m long and 14cm wide off the left edge of the roll that has the least perforations. And then I will print this with Fiona's help.

Friday, February 2, 2018

A new artists' book

Not a lot of time in the studio/garage today; but I did make a start on a new artist book. It will take the form of a ancient scroll in a brass scroll holder - in this case a vintage hand held and hand pumped fire extinguisher I have had in my stash for about 5 years with this very artists' book in mind.

The worked started with an idea in my head; but I thought I'd sketch it out for the sake of recording where I started and where I was going with the book.

I cut up the extinguished with a side grinder. This included cutting out the corroded pump section inside the extinguisher - a bit tricky given I didn't want mark or cut into the opening I had created. You can see the result of the cutting below. And then the filing of sharp edges and creating of the other elements was started. You can see the corrosion of the inside of extinguisher

I think this piece will make a statement on a couple of levels - form and content. I plan to make the scroll itself out of an old piano roll and print the words on it using one of our galley presses.