Urban fantasy series and new clay

As well as trying out a new clay, which I like (thank you Ede Horton), I'm starting a new series of cast glass sculptures based on the genre fiction of 'urban fantasy'. Urban fantasy is a sub genre of fantasy fiction, where instead of magical lands in far away places, the enchantment occurs in contemporary, real-world, suburbs and cities. Some of my favourite authors in this genre are Charles de Lint, Kim Wilkins and Helene Wecker. The 1990's TV series 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' is a good example, though a different format.

Today I have been shaping the 'location' aspect, fragments of urban landscapes. The front of the pieces will have different mythical beasties in silhouette sandblasted on the front.  These are for a group exhibition in Melbourne, called Silhouettes.

for this piece I imagine a Griffin

A jackalope for this one

and a pegasus for this one

Dryad mould ready for casting

The Dryad piece is ready for glass casting.

Dryads

Today I also worked on my 'Dryads' project for the 'Tree' exhibition at Canberra Glassworks in March. I started because I needed to distract myself from waiting for wax for the forest light (melting or cooling, it always takes too long.)

Similar to some of my other work, but this time I'm combining scale and sandblast imagery. I'm thinking about gold leafing the Dryads but i'm not sure, or trying another colour other than black. Only one way to find out!

Title

I have been thinking of calling my work "Into the woods" ??
It made me think of a book by Robert Holdstock, 'Mythago wood', the themes that run through it resonate somewhat. wiki says
"Mythago Wood is a type of fantasy literature, especially the fantasy subgenre of mythic fiction. It has received critical acclaim because of its prose, forest setting, and its exploration of the philosophical, spiritual, and psychological. Mythago Wood won the World Fantasy Award for Best Novel in 1985."

I do like the research for this one...I can watch and read fairy tales to my hearts content..and call it study!

Apples & Mythology

This is for Katie Ann..

Apples (Malus Domestica) a fruit that has been mixed up in many stories and in turn symbolises: Immortality, eternal youth, desire, knowledge, trickery, forbidden knowledge....

A blog by 'Apple harvester' with a section on mythology

wiki apple  actually quite good...apple was a general  term for any fruit that wasn't a berry..compares the root of the word..comes very close to evil (Malum)

the annotated Snow white from Surlalune "23. Apple: The apple was sacred to Aphrodite and represented knowledge, especially sexual knowledge, fertility and love. IR"
The isle of Avalon (think King Arthur) is linked with apples..another word link.

Idun a Norse goddess:custodian of the golden apples of youth here 

Idun, Arthur Rackam. 1910.

Utility - Untold

I've just realised I haven't explained why I'm casting crystal ravens..well:

Every year the 'object' studio's at uni (glass, ceramics and jewellery) run an exhibition called Utility, each year it has a theme and this year's is Untold. I entered a submission and got in...and now of course I have to make it.

So here is my submission that I entered in May:

200 word description of the proposed work, including its conceptual basis and its relevance to this year’s theme.

Two life size ravens stand in conversation; their body language portrays intelligence and friendship. One is quite life like, the details of feathers, beak and claw can be discerned in the cast black crystal. In contrast the other, cast in opaque clear only suggests such corvid features.

In Norse mythology, Odin the God of war and poetry gave the power of speech to a pair of ravens, and he called them Huginn (Thought) and Muninn (Memory). It is told that each morning Odin sends them to fly over the land and before the day is over the pair report back to Odin telling him all they have seen, making him wise in the news of his land. Odin’s ravens are strong identifiers of who Odin is in Norse poetry and imagery yet the ravens are only referred to once in the epic poems. Considering the Raven’s daily task there seems to be a wealth of untold tales waiting to be heard.

I have depicted the ravens, “Thought” and “Memory” as though they were considering an event, something they had seen, something as yet untold.

“Thought” is shown in a more realistic manner (black in colour with finer detail), linking the act of thinking to be a conscious process while “Memory’s” more abstract features are portrayed in a misty colourless crystal evoking the ephemeral subconscious qualities of remembrance.

and I included some sketches and models