Ahhh.....Books

Okay,

When I last left you I informed you about my meeting with Aaron.  So, I have been working like crazy to get enough book warped.  I was able to get them all warped within one week, and the past week I have been attempting to cut them by hand.  I know this sounds crazy, but they increased the security at the wood shop because someone cut their finger off...so cutting books on the machines is a no go.  Ricky and I have cut most of them by hand, but both of our hands are extremely blistered and ready for a break.  Enter the table saw...Ricky has a transportable table saw that we are going to try to use for the remainder of the books on Thursday.  Hopefully all will go well.  

I have one new update about life in general.  Ricky is in Houston right now for a second interview for not one but two positions.  He interviews for both tomorrow and will hopefully hear back soon.  I have been searching and applying for things in both Cincinnati and Houston to be prepared, but it will be nice to know one way or another so I can focus my job and gallery search in one area.  I also have an interview tomorrow in Cincinnati for a Gallery Internship at Manifest Creative and Research Gallery.  We will see how this and Ricky's interviews go tomorrow.  I will keep you all updated.

Here are some images of my studio after I warped all of the books.  There was not much room for me to walk, and there is even less room now.

It's insanity.  I will give you an update soon

Rachel

An Update

It has been a week or two since I have posted and I am returning for an update. Things have been crazy this week and I have a lot of news.  I'm going to start from the beginning.  I had my Passages Gallery Show right after I posted last.  It went really well and the gallery was a lot nicer than I thought it would be.  The only bad thing was that the walls had a large cork board type thing where the pieces went.  It probably would have looked nicer if the walls were all white.  However, it was a nice experience and there was a good turn out.  I actually forgot to get a better picture of my piece, but I managed to get this piece from far away.  My piece is the second from the right.  I'll get a better picture after the show.

Secondly, I had a critique recently where my professor was a little concerned that I wouldn't have enough room for my book wall, so she suggested that if I can't get enough room in DAAPworks that I show the catalog cards.  So, I have been working on those a lot lately.  This is how much I have gotten done so far.  I am in the 4th section out of 7.  I am pleased with the progress of the catalog cards, but I have to put them on hold.

I met with the man that runs the galleries at UC to see if I would be able to use the wall of books and where he thinks it would look best.  The meeting went really well.  There gallery consists of exterior walls that go from floor to ceiling roughly 12-13 feet tall.  There are also free standing walls that are 10 feet tall.  I had always felt that my piece would look nice on the free standing wall.  However, the gallery owner believed that it would look nice on the exterior walls, and that I should make my wall of books larger.  Aesthetically, he said that he could see the piece going from floor to ceiling.  And guess what???  That's what I'm going to do!!!!  

I have 5 weeks to add 4-5 ft. more of books.  I panicked at first, but I am much calmer now.  I figured out how many I needed to make and I decided to cut a lot of the books into thirds so that I didn't have too make so many.  On Wednesday and Thursday I warped 68 books in total.  I also cut 9 books into 22 pieces.  So, I think I will only need to warp another 50 books and i should have enough.  It's going to be a lot of work, but I think that my piece will look so much better.  I am really excited about it.  

I have also made a website!!!  It is still in progress, but I have it published so you can check it out.  I need to add more images still, which requires getting nice images of my work.  But feel free to check it out.  Here is a link to the home page.  

artbynieman.weebly.com

I will talk to you soon with updates on the books!!!!

Rachel

Typing Some More

Okay!!!  So i have been busy this past week typing up cards and continuing to recall memories.   I have realized that this is a lot more time consuming than I expected.  There are times where it is difficult to recall certain memories, and others where I it is emotionally difficult to recall them.  In terms of typing them I can get on a good roll sometimes, but other times I start to recall some of the emotions and it takes me longer to get through it.  But, I am pleased with how they are turning out.  I had a critique a couple days ago and I got really good feedback on them.  Also, my professor suggested wearing out the older and more accessed ones and leaving some of them clean with crisp edges.  I'm also going to go to a stamp store to have one made so i can stamp on the cards when they were accessed (month, day, year).  My prof also suggested stamping information about whether the memory was good or not.  

I was pleased with the feedback.  I think I was expecting to get a little more negative feedback.  Though, i think that is just because I haven't truly had any feedback on these cards yet, and I was at a point where I needed and wanted it to move forward.  I think this idea is what scares me a little bit about graduating; I'm not going to have scheduled times for feedback.  And sometimes I feel like I need that reassurance or guidance in moving forward.  But, I guess that is apart of being an artist; I have to figure it out on my own.  

Okay, here are some images of my cards from yesterday.  This is how big the stack of cards is so far.  I am almost done with the first section, which is "My Grandma's House".  There are 6 other sections, and I think majority of the memories are in the first section.  But, I still have over half to go.

Here are some of the new catalogs I have done

So, I am happy with the progress so far.  Some of my fellow peers said that I should show the catalog cards instead of my book wall.  So, we will see.  I think it all depends on how much space we are allowed at the final show.

Rachel

Typing

Bonjour my followers!!!  It is nice to be back at it discussing my progression in my artwork.  To begin with I finished organizing all of my memories yesterday.  It was a lot of work as I needed to remember the years and which memories came first.  I counted today, and thus far I have a total of 329 memories that are recorded.  I was not expecting such a large number, but I am happy with it.  I think the bigger the bulk the better.  It will demonstrate my concept better.  

Today I started typing them out so that I could figure out the set up I liked best.  Here is an image of the typewriter I used. 

Here is an image of the inside of the typewriter.  I love things like this.  There is so much history in it as well as a grittiness to it.  I knew if I was going to catalog my memories there needed to be a much more vintage and historical nature to the words, instead of the perfection of the computer. 

  

I was able to get 18 cards typed once I figured out the right set up.  Here is one of the cards

I'm hoping to stamp below the words the dates that I have accessed these memories.  It will be like I'm mixing a catalog card with a check out card.

Here is another example.  I messed up on part of this one, but I was able to go back over it with the "=" sign on the typewriter.  Despite its lack of perfection, I find that showing the imperfections is better.  It demonstrates my human struggle to remember what once was. 

Okay, so here is something different that I have been working on that is exploring this cataloging aspect of exploring memories; or preserving what once was.  I thought it would be interesting to apply my interest in image transfers to the idea of cataloging memories.  It would be archaeological, as though these images were discovered and are now being preserved.  Almost like a museum.  I hope I am making sense.  I did this by covering a piece of wood with caulking so that it looked like sediment.  Then, I took an ink jet image and transferred it to the caulking with water.  It is extremely faded, but it has a distant memory facade to it. 

  This is the original image after I transferred it

Here is another one

And another one

And the original image

And another piece

I am really intrigued by these, especially the process of transferring the images.  But, before I make anymore I am going to get some feedback in a critique.  The catalog cards however are going to take some time, so I am going to hop right in there and keep typing!!!

I'll talk to you soon

Rachel

Hello Again

Okay!!!  So I have obviously been gone for awhile from the blog, but I am ready to get back at it.  I wanted to let you know what I have been doing over the past several weeks.  Basically, I have been continuing my research into the card cataloging.  Thus far I am up to 210 memories and counting.  I often find myself remembering something new after I think I am done.  After I was able to write down many of my memories I realized I needed to start making my own Duey Decimal System...or a "Rachel Decimal System".  This way I can figure out how I'm going to organize my memories into a value system.  I decided that I would have 7 different categories ranging from My Grandma's House, My Mom's House, Family Events, to School.  Then within each category there are sub category's.  For example, My Grandma's House has the sub categories of Kitchen, Living Room, Bedroom, Outside, and so on.  And each of these also has sub categories.  It took awhile to come up with this system so that each of my memories had a place in it.  But, I was finally able to make it, including a cooresponding number to each category.  

So, this past week I have been trying to organize my memories into the correct category with the correct decimal number.  Here are some of the categories with my memories listed.  I apologize for the bad quality of the first image.  

I haven't gotten to numbering these next two categories.

In addition to the catalog cards I have been getting ready for a show in the "Passages Gallery" in North College Hill.  This show is a group show that my fellow classmates and I are going to be in from April 14th to mid May.  There is limited space in this gallery so I decided to explore something that I have been curious about trying: painting on the books.  About a year ago I wanted to paint overlaid portraits on a large wall of books.  But, I lost interest and decided not to do it.  I have still been interested in doing it occasionally and I think doing it on a smaller scale would be a good way for me to see how it would look.  Since the space is small the piece is only 2' x 2'.  Here is the project after I put a couple layers on it.

 And here it is after a few more layers.  I was not completely happy with it.  I felt like it didn't stand out enough.  I got really frustrated and I had to take a whole day to not look at it because I couldn't figure out what to do to make the piece better.

After sitting for a day I decide to apply paint a lot more thickly, with heavier and larger brush strokes.  After just one layer I started to feel so much better about it.  I think in total I added 7+ layers of portraits. Here are two different views of the portrait.  I did add a little extra paint after this picture, but I am a lot happier than I was before.

Okay, It was nice to talk to you once again.  I will return to update you on my progress.

Rachel

Oops

I realized I forgot to talk about what I have been doing this past week while the show was up...so I'll just make a new post out of it.   I loved the idea of labeling and identifying the specimen like pieces for the dry run show.  I wanted to take this idea and incorporate it with my books or even just the idea of memory.  I started researching different ways to label and organize information in a storage or museum type way.  There are obviously display cases, frames, and  labeling everything with a number.  But, then I researched different ways to catalog things and I came across catalog cards for a library.  I was immediately intrigued by the nature of them and how they can be piled and interconnected with one another.  Many libraries have various versions of these cards that all interconnect.  I felt very compelled to use this to catalog my memories.  

I have realized that I hold onto all of memories of my grandma so that I don't forget who she was.  So that I can recall who she was and a specific memory at any point in time.  I felt that cataloging the memories was the best way to achieve this.  In order to do this I needed to truly understand the cataloging process as well as the duey decimal system.  Eventually I will create my own system to organize my memories by number.  All in all, I would like to create several different systems of cards that are interconnected.  This may include the memories of others as well.  

Here is a picture of a card catalog system at yale university.  Although I wont do anything this big, I would like to fill a lot of drawers with catalog cards. 

        

Here is a picture of a catalog card so you can get an idea of what they might look like. 

  

So thus far I have been writing down my memories of my grandmother so that I can start to figure out how I will organize them and what information I will put on the card.  I have a little over 100 written down and I am continuing to write them.  It is not comparatively a lot to how many cards are in a library.  But, I am curious to see how many I can actually write down.  We will see.  I did want to combine the cards with my wall of books and the polyurethane squares somehow, but I do not want to just force it on to them.  So, I am going to start off with the writing down my memories and beginning to catalog them on cards and then I will see where it takes me.  I will write to you soon

Rachel

Dry Run Show

Hello again.  It has been awhile since I have posted anything...2 weeks I think.  So, I think I will give you a recap.  After I talked to you last I had to finish up the last polyurethane squares and drop off my work at the gallery.  It was a nerve recking weekend as I couldnt stop thinking about eventually having to hang my work.  I was incredibly nervous.  But Sunday cam without fail, and luckily I had my lovely boyfriend with me to help me out.  It was a lot more time consuming than I thought it would be.  Actually, after I got there the man that runs the gallery told me to hang my frames straight across the wall in a line instead of in a grid.  I was very happy that he told me to do that as it looked much much better.  The hanging process took about 3 hours.  But, we had to be very precise and each one of my frames had to stay in line with the next.  So, we started in the middle and worked our way out each way.  

At one point Ricky was about to leave...I had 4 frames left to hang, and when I started to do it myself I realized that I couldnt see above the frames to make sure everything was straight...im very short...so Ricky ended up staying.  We just moved a little faster since he had somewhere to be.    All in all I was very pleased with the result. 

Here's a full wall shot

Here's my name on the wall!!!!!!!!!!!!

Another full shot

I have a picture of all of the twelve frames.  Here's A

 B

 C

 D

 E

 F

 G

 H

 I

 J

 J

 K

 L

I was very proud of myself and I got a lot of compliments on them.  The show was up for all of last week and this week is the second half of the seniors.  Now on to other ventures.

Rachel