Neuron Kimono Completed

I completed the Neuron Kimono yesterday and had it photographed professionally today. My photographer for my sculptures is George Young in Palo Alto. I am so lucky to be able to document my work with such a great photographer. I love how he lights my sculptures and having my work photographed professional always feels like the last step in completing a piece for me. Now I am ready to prepare it for shipping out to L'Attitude Gallery.

I will be creating the box to ship the piece in this week. I need to construct the boxes for shipping as well as create assembly instructions; the piece breaks apart in half and the large blue neuron elements are snapped on with clothing snaps. The final dimensions of the piece are 3'11" wide x 5'8" tall (including pole) x 3.5" deep. Media: magnet wire, silk, waste canvas, Japanese and Chinese food wrappers, Japanese manga comics, kozo paper, plastic sushi grass, plastic sushi garnish flowers, pearls, costume jewelery, and produce netting. I try to use as much recycled materials as possible.

I am much happier with the wire twisting on this piece than on my past works. In the past I have used manual electrician wire twisters to twist my long lengths of wire. For this piece, I used a drill to twist the wire and it looks so much more consistent. This was suggested to me by an art critique group I am in. I cannot emphasis enough how beneficial it is to be in a critique group. It really has helped me focus on pushing my art to a more refined construction.

Photo by George R. Young























Detail image:

Final Touches to Neuron Kimono

Yesterday and today I am working on final touches to the kimono for pediatric neurological center in Boston. I added the large yellow neurons which really help the composition, I think. They are covered in wrappers and then with yellow cotton fabric. They are attached to the sculpture with fishing line and wire.




















The piece is starting to look like the original sketch. I did make some modifications such as enlarging the blue neurons in the center sweep and I reduced the size of the orange right hand curved area.

















I attached the yellow fabric with YES glue. Below are the different glues and glazes I use.















Next, I am adding the "Bling" of bits of recycled jewelry donated to me by my son's school's principal, Vivian Franklin. Last year she gave me a plastic tub filled with her mothers jewelery. I love using objects that have had a past life.














Here is a detail of the jewelry added.




















I have added sushi grass to the green trim area along with scraps of beautiful sheer silk from Colleen Quen Couture. She graciously gave me some of her remnant fabrics.
















Emily is enjoying experimenting with the materials in my studio. She has also been helping me tear and cut up the wrappers and manga that I add to the sculpture.

Produce netting and completing Neuron elements

Today I completed most of the final neuron elements (I have three large yellow ones to create tonight). Here is Emily standing in front of the piece. The large blue neurons are still not attached. When the piece is installed it will hang from a bamboo pole and be in a large plexiglass box. I will also have to include assembly instructions as the piece splits in half and some of the big blue neurons will be attached after assembly.




















Below are images of the blue produce netting stitched on to add body and texture to the sleeve areas. I can't remember what the netting came from. I think it was a big durian bag. I had cut it up into small pieces for a workshop I did at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. I liked working with the smaller pieces for this sculpture as they created faint geometric shapes.

Building kimono

These past few days I have been trying to complete this piece. Kind of busy, though, with the Fourth of July weekend. Here are some pictures of the progress. I completed the green wrapper edging and some of the smaller neuron elements. To create the neuron elements I designed the outline in Illustrator and printed out templates in two different sizes. I used the smaller sized template for the sleeves and the larger template for the middle section.

Making neurons: I twisted the wire with a drill and then shaped it to the template. After the wire forms were completed, I gave each neuron a skin of Chan Pui Mui wrappers attaching with the PVA bookmaker glue. The larger neurons were also covered with kozo paper and manga. After they dried. I placed them on plastic bags outside and glazed them with a UV resistant coating (Golden Polymer Varnish with UVLS)
















Once the glaze dried I added some orange silk to the middle of each neuron (I used YES glue). This is the sort of nucleolus. My children have been curious about these funny forms and it has given me the opportunity to talk to them about cells. My almost four year old scurried off with one neuron to play with, but I got it back in good form.




















Sheer blue silk, courtesy of Colleen Quen couture, covers the large neurons. YES glue used here. Kind of nice to use glue after so much stitching with the waste canvas layer and then the orange raw silk layer.




















Here is the kimono as of this afternoon. This evening I completed papering the large neurons and decided to add blue produce netting to some areas of the sleeves to add more weigh to them. The floor was such a mess. Bits of fabric and food wrappers everywhere. I vacuumed the room a bit just so that bits of scraps don't attach to the elements I make tomorrow. I'll be making large yellow neurons, perhaps three. I hope to complete this by Tuesday and then comes the fun of making the box to ship it in.

Neuron Kimono Commission

This week was a break from the animation project as I have a commission from a gallery in Boston to create a five foot tall wire, fabric and food wrapper kimono for a pediatric neurological center. The first step is to draw the sketch on a piece of cardboard. I get the cardboard free from a bicycle shop near by. I then twist magnet wire with a drill and form the wire to the cardboard template.





















After the wire is formed to the pattern, I transfer the piece to a large stand that my dad made for me for such projects. I then start to sew waste canvas to the areas that will be covered in solid silk.




















Next, I add wrappers and manga to the swooping wave forms. I am using a new glue, PVA by Lineco (www.BooksByHand.com). After the glue dries I apply a polymer UV glaze.





















Today, I added the solid areas of silk by hand stitching it over the waste canvas. This evening I started the neuron elements and tomorrow I will press recycled paper to cover these elements.