Wednesday 6 February 2013

Unmade/Remade I


Work in progress- A stretcher 1m x 1m has been built and stretched with canvas, the canvas has been pulled from the stretcher and is in the process of being unpicked. The threads going one way have been put in one pile, the threads running the other way in another pile. 


The vague idea at the moment (as implied by the working-title) is to unpick all the canvas and unchip the stretcher before putting the stretcher back together, and holding it together by wrapping the canvas threads (possibly soaked in medium first) around the broken wood. I have no idea weather or not it will be possible but that's the interesting bit.  


If you look at the canvas in the top image you will see one side is not being unpicked. This is because the canvas is from the end of a roll - so the threads running longways run, say from right to left, weaving over and under all the threads running up and down. BUT then they loop over and run back left to right (if that doesn't make sense, nevermind, I'll show you sometime). Unpicking these threads is pretty fiddly once you get to the looping back end, and the threads are over 2m long. The work is at a really exciting stage, ideas are sparking as I am unpicking and I am looking forward to trying to unchip the wood.