The exploration for 222 Grips for a Stone (or mineral) continues.
I have been giving a lot of thought to the definition of a stone and mineral and it is becoming increasingly broader scope - which is great because I am continuing to find more ways to develop my material exploration.
Glass consists of minerals and I am interested exploring the effects it has when bound by wire and then placed in the kiln.
I started my explorations working in the enamelling kilns, and my first lot of experiments did not heat up enough. The kiln sat around 1500 degrees farenheight and the only result was a softening of the edges of the broken glass. Which was interesting, but not the effects I was looking for.
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| #28 of 222 Grips for a Stone before melting |
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| #28 of 222 Grips for a Stone |
My next lot of experiments were undertaken in a different enamel kiln where the heat is stronger, and a little more unpredictable. The kiln heated to about 900 degrees centigrade and within minutes my glass was starting to melt.
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| #30 of 222 Grips for a Stone detail |
With the idea of griping the glass by wrapping it with wire, I was also interested in exploring the idea where the glass also starts to grip the wire, by melting the wire into the glass.
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| #31 of 222 Grips for a Stone |
Ideally I would like to capture drips like rain water. This is as close as I have gotten so far.
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| #33 of 222 Grips for a Stone |
In this last experiment the glass almost entirely melted away from the wire binding and slumped onto the copper metal below.
The experiments are taking my work in an exciting new direction and I am looking forward to upscaling so that they are about house brick size.
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