 Happy Sunday! Uhhh. Things got really hectic real fast! First part of my week was pretty good, all things considered. There were some speedbumps here and there like weather or things breaking down but we made some hedway in the yard. When it rained I'd pick up cataloguing and bringing my Art of Where up to speed. Uploading has gotten a lot faster on there since I know what I want each product to have. I also accepted the fact that sometimes consistency isn't possible because a design won't look good on certain things so I count my losses and keep going. Then I realized one of my deadlines was a day earlier than expected and bam!! Kicked me down the stairs into the studio after a long time. I started work on a new image, inspired by simply searching up the word “vessel”. In glassmaker's lingo, “vessel” refers to any glass object that is made to contain something, so we typically call cups, jars and bottles vessels. I had initially meant for this project to make it for a Call of Submission made by the Glass Art Association of Canada, but that deadline ended up being today and I faced some obstacles in time management. If I really tried to rush it I might have made it, but I feel very strongly about taking my time with this one. So yeah, the impulse to use “vessel” as a prompt was due to my craft side. The term also has a strong spiritual connotation with me, especially inspired by the media I consume. In this case the vessel is the body containing the soul or some other truly precious essence. A vessel preserves and protects the contents, possibly even imprisons it. I tend to lean toward the latter, because I always feel trapped within the physical, filling me with frustration. Attempts to express myself at a level of catharsis isn't always socially acceptable either, so the boundaries of a vessel can extend to normative expectations, a very ambiguous realm. So anyway, vessel is a very interesting term for me. So when I searched up the word I was immediately attracted to this structure in Manhattan, New York. Is it a hive? A ribcage? What a pleasantly geometric construction. I thus made a reproduction of it to explore urban ruin. I personally love this image, which is part of the reason why I don't want to rush it.  I have two call of submissions left to apply for, so I have about a week or so. As I mentioned some time ago, deadlines aggressively jumble my priority list so you'll never see any consistent work progress from me. It's a thing! I can't do much about it right now but I hope to improve. I have two plates on the go that I will try to gluechip, (it's gonna be a bit difficult during this humid spell we're experiencing here). Then they'll be dremeled and good to go! I have all of this paper I cut to size, originally for the Lonely Hydra, so at least I don't have to spend too much time on that end. Keep a close eye on my social media and you may see it realized step by step.  Oh, and another reason why I'm kicked back into gear is because there will be a print market day I'm attending, tentatively. I say that because I'm unsure if it'll be pushed further back to abide by COVID19 restrictions. In my mind it was already cancelled, but there hasn't been an official call for cancellation or further delay. Now I feel a bit unprepared, even though I do have lots of stock. There is still much I wish to do, both work- and setup-wise. I will announce it closer to the date of whether it's still on or not, so keep your eyes peeled!
One final piece of news, Art of Where have released face coverings as a product! Looks like I gotta backtrack yet again, but it shouldn't take long. Maybe I can get some in before the market. Yeah I'm gonna have to sit down and make a whole new list of priorities again. RIP. Stay connected, Gosia  Hello! The weather has been very good the past week so I spent most of it outside with my father. We installed some drainage pipes in our backyard because our soil tends to soak up all the water and make it extremely difficult to get anything done. So I tuned into some podcasts and dug holes and trenches. In addition to that we sorted through a lot of junk and waste materials, and right before the rainfall we managed to chart them off to a dump. We dismantled some of our fences, trimmed the dying tree we intend to take down later, and more or less reorganized our priorities. While my dad is away for his next trip, I'll just keep filling holes and even out the ground in our garage shed for when we lay down the asphalt. So with all that happenings, I didn't have much time to return to any of my projects, which is a bummer. In the downtime I did end up having, I was too exhausted or sore. To stay productive in those times I continued documenting my shops and uploaded the Lonely Hydra designs to Art of Where, since I was going to do that eventually. Other than a few bugs with the system here and there, it went by rather smoothly. In the midst of it I realized that I didn't have a white lineart of it in my Society6 or Redbubble shops, so I put that on my list to do. A white iteration of Plague Gaffer was also made, and both have been uploaded to Redbubble since writing this. It shouldn't take long for Society6 because there won't be that many products with them. I realize that all this is probably really boring, but life be like that sometimes. I am super excited of getting that backyard in order, after years and years of neglect. I'm excited for the garden, finishing the garage shed, organizing a proper home studio! As it stands, a lot of the boxes I've organized with my materials and tools have been piled and tucked, which makes it a hassle to get to. When I can have everyhing on-hand, in a space of work and not comfort, well, I feel that my productivity will be properly maintained.
If the emergency lockdown ends soon, I'll be able to return to the studio space Cheryl has for me in Aylmer. It'll be smaller than what I'll have when we're done here but it's a studio space nonetheless. Plus I get to see some amazing people (and cats) I've really missed. I'll take this long weekend to catch up on any documentation but to also rest a little bit. Starting Tuesday I have some print-related tasks lined up to meet with some deadlines. Expect to see some pictures this time, since this week has been a little dead on my social media. See ya, Gosia  Happy Mother's Day! Mm, this week sort of went by like a blur. Sometime last week, while I was preoccupied thinking about masks through Art of Where, I wasn't aware that Redbubble already released that option. I only really check on my shops when I have a new release, so I was fortunate to have someone mention it to me. So all the designs I've previously published now have a mask option! And many more! In addition to that I released and re-released two designs. Sundance was published some time ago but I was unsatisfied with it. I revisited it by taking a properly-lit photo and working with it, and I'm happier with this version. The new design, City of Gold, is a painting I made for my mother five years ago; it currently hangs in the hall outside our bedrooms. Both designs are good additions to my abstract series, Enthralled. You can view products with their print in both of my Society6 and Redbubble shops! While those were published, I spent time with my Art of Where account. The design lab is very intuitive there, but I wish there was a way to save the workspaces as files. I change my mind a lot about certain products (ex. Background colours, inclusions of watermarks, etc.) so I end up having to start from scratch anyway. I also have to try and keep some consistency, depending on the design. Plague Doctor is the biggest collection because while it's the same concept, there are eight iterations of it. It makes tracking them hard, especially if they all carry the same name. So this week I went back, tallied, and renamed everything, which in turn also alerted me of missing products i had to remake. I never got around to uploading the Lonely Hydra, which I don't look forward to doing, but hopefully I do everything right the first time. I don't want to have to return and reorganize each time! But that'll have to wait for a little bit because I do want to return to my pending projects. Wax skulls have been rendered to my liking, thanks to some bingeing of Community. They're currently anchored with their reservoirs in the basement so that I can inspect them one last time before rubbercasting them. I also refashioned the octopus with the reservoir in a new location, in hopes the new orientation will resolve air bubble issues. To carry on with the with bottle prototypes, I'll stick to the fabrication of the first line of cores incorporating the skulls I've made, as well as some flower moulds I nabbed from Michael's. The printing table has been left in the same state for a few weeks now; I've taken the shattering of the Lonely Hydra plate to heart and the motivation's null. But I'll just have to get it out of the way so that I can proceed with new plates, plates that won't take so long to do because I can't go get em blasted anyway. They will be sketchy, they will be rough, but I'm certain they will be interesting. Anything to keep going, and they'll make great entries for a virtual exhibition coming up!  Plague Gaffer had the pleasure of representing the Call of Entry for the Glass Art Association of Canada. Lest we forget the Uke Fresco. Sigh. I'll get to that soon.
I leave you today with a bit of a 180, because while things have been mainly positive on my end, I see you. I wish you the best of luck, whether you fear for yourself, your loved ones, your country, our wellbeing physically or mentally (or all of the above). Keep faith, fight the good fight, and remember your compassion. Take care, Gosia |
ObjectiveHere you'll get to know me a little more personally. Either self-organized or prompted by questions, I will write blogs about Archives
January 2021
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