Personal Projects

Christmas Sale at The Kiln Rooms

ceramics, Exhibitions, FAT Project, Personal Projects, The Kiln Rooms/Ceramic works

I took part in the annual The Kiln Rooms Christmas sale, where I had a selection of my ceramic pieces for sale and for display. The chocolate bar sculptures where displayed with labels stating that I am available for commission for similar pieces, as I made the chocolate bars as part of a larger project and didn’t wish to sell them. For sale I had a selection of earrings that I made with the intention to sell at the previous Christmas sale which were not finished in time to be included, a newer selection of Christmas tree ornaments made for the sale (the gingerbread men, Christmas tree, and snowflake ornaments pictured) and more of my Anti-love heart and rude star pins, which I made to sell at the Pure Class exhibition and this sale.

The pins sold very well, and the chocolate bars got a lot of interest, so I am pleased that I took part! Unfortunately I didn’t sell any of the earrings- I think they could do well at a general arts and crafts market, or at a Valentines themed event, but they just didn’t stand up well next to the artsier ceramic jewellery made by members and my peers in the show, which were also packaged better and more expensive. My Christmas ornaments also didn’t sell well, again due to being surrounded by other, higher quality pieces by more experienced makers. I also had to settle with twine that wasn’t visually very appealing for them, which I had since replaced with a more festive and better looking thread, so hopefully if I try to sell them again next year they will do better. I also think displaying them in a more aesthetically pleasing way will help them to sell better next time. I think this was definitely a learning curve for me, and has inspired me to up my game and keep practicing and exploring new ideas. I am still fairly new to this medium and hopeful that with practice I can get better over time!

Self Portrait 2: The Making of

ceramics, FAT Project, Personal Projects, The Kiln Rooms/Ceramic works
The sculpture right at the start, built up out of shapes
my desk set up at home

A photo of the self portrait 2 sculpture in the early stages- you can see how the body has been built up of shapes stuck together
another early stage photo- you can see how parts have started to be smoothed out
the back of the sculpture in the early stages- you can see that the back and bum area are still quite flat and need more work
the finished greenware sculpture- you can see details like pubic hair, nipples and stretchmarks have been sculpted in
the sculpture after bisque firing- it is now completely white and ready to be glazed
a photo of the bisque sculpture being sprayed with glaze in a booth set up
the glazed sculpture before firing
the finished sculpture after the glaze firing, photographed in the grass at a local park
another photo of the sculpture in the grass, from a different angle

This was my second self portrait sculpture made over a few months in 2021- this one of my torso and upper thighs standing up, but still missing the arms and legs. I definitely became more confident with sculpting during this process, as you can tell by the detailed pubic hair, stretch marks, and nipples visible in the photos before glazing. The shapes are definitely more refined and less rough than the first self portrait sculpture I made, and I was really happy with the overall shape and sculpt. Unfortunately because I went for a thicker, opaque glaze that is made for dipping a lot of this detail was lost in the glaze firing, as the glaze obscured and covered up a lot of those details. I hoped that spraying the glaze (rather than dipping) would prevent this, but as you can see that didn’t work. The glaze also came out patchy on the shoulder area and inner thigh area, although you can’t really tell from the photos here.

I think if I wanted to attempt something so detailed in the future some solutions could be using a thinner, transparent brush on glaze, or just sculpting it on a much larger scale, which is something I would like to try once I get a bit more confident. Despite all the hiccups I can see how much I’ve improved already since my first self portrait, and I’m excited to keep practicing and trying new things!

Feedback from WCCD Crit

FAT Project, Personal Projects, WWCD

I presented a sketchbook for a project I am working on called “Brown Bread Tastes Like Punishment” at the monthly Working Class Creatives Database online Zoom crit, and below is the feedback and the references I was given by other members of the WCCD on the call.

  • “Like the text and drawings- text is very punchy”
  • “Beautiful drawings”
  • Could I use the designs elsewhere- i.e. prints or zines?
  • Drawings capture a moment and record a memory- Ross said that the drawings triggers his own memories of his mum doing all kinds of diets, so viewers might have their own memories brought up when viewing the work, bringing their own things to it
  • drawings might be good with textures- paper mache, or ceramics like I showed on the Zoom call
  • try lots of things- film/prints/zines/sculptures/animation
  • catharsis through the physical act of making, versus the act of showing the work to others and opening yourself up to the feedback/criticism of others

REFERENCES TO CHECK OUT:

  • Lucy Sparrow
  • Jo Spence
  • Heather Philipson
  • Lindsey Mendick
  • Mystical Femmes
  • Mr Bingo
  • Sharona Franklin
  • Victoria Sin- drag artist, Glitch Feminism
  • “Virus” by Linda Stupart, gender, body, fatness

Some really helpful feedback that definitely made me feel more confident about this project as a whole- I entered the crit feeling like I didn’t have much to show and was unsure where to go with the project and ended up leaving it feeling much more confident in the ideas behind it, and possible avenues to take with it.

Covid Collages

Personal Projects

I made this series of postcards over the first lockdown using a mixture of illustration, hand writing and collage and have finally gotten round to scanning and cleaning them up on Photoshop to upload here and to my Instagram. These collages were made fairly quickly; acting as a way to get my worries, fears, and frustrations about lockdown and other things happening politically during this period of time out of my system and down on paper. I initially planned to send them to friends and family in the post, but ended up keeping them all. I find collage a useful way to make sense of my thoughts through found media (usually newspapers) and by limiting myself with the size of the postcard it enabled each one to represent a specific thought I had at the time.

in order, the collages above are titled:
1. “EVICTION IS JUST A PAYDAY AWAY”
2. “PANIC BUY TO STAVE OFF THE EXISTENTIAL DREAD”
3. “DING DONG THE WITCH IS DEAD”
4. “I’M FILLED WITH DREAD AT THE THOUGHT OF BEING A HOUSEWIFE”
5. “Quarantine 2020”
6. “GRABBING LIKE AN OCTOPUS”
7. “MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS”
8. ” TIME TO STRIKE, NO END IN SIGHT”

The collages above are titled:
1. ” BLOOD ON BORIS’ HANDS”
2. “JUSTICE FOR BELLY”
3. “WE WILL SURVIVE”

Antidepressant Monoprints

Personal Projects, Work in Progress

I made these monoprints back at the beginning of lockdown, to open up a discussion about the side effects of antidepressant medications, based on my own personal experiences with Fluoxetine, Citalopram, and Venlafaxine. I finally got round to scanning them and doing minor Photoshop edits (a little bit of resizing).

These are not all the possible side effects of these medications and aren’t necessarily the worst, but they are some of the ones that I have struggled with the most- and some of which I didn’t actually realise were side effects of my medication until I did further research. I would potentially like to expand this into a zine for people who are considering antidepressants- often medication is forced onto patients instead of therapy or delving into the reasons why people are feeling the way they are, and in a short 10-20 minute doctors appointment we are assessed (sometimes wrongly) as having depression and are given a prescription with very little explanation as to why they are being prescribed and the affects they can have on your body and mind. I personally have found medication helpful, but I think people need to know the full facts before deciding whether or not to take something. I am also considering redoing the monoprints over the top of the paper inserts that come with the medication detailing the side effects as a development, as I see these very much as a starting point.

BPD & ME

Personal Projects
bpd-zineDownload

I finally dug up the file for the BPD Zine I made last year and saved it as a digital version. If you have recently been diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) also known as Emotionally Unstable Personality Disorder (EUPD), know someone who has been, or would just like to learn more about the disorder please feel free to read and share this with anyone else who might need it. Bear in mind that no one’s experiences with BPD will be identical and this is based on my own personal experiences.

Car Window, or Being Seen as a Fat Woman

FAT Project, Personal Projects

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Screenshots of a piece of writing I originally posted to my Instagram, about being perceived as a fat woman after an incident that happened during lockdown.

Transcript:

” Car Window (or Being Perceived as a Fat Woman)
You lean out of the car window and jeer at me
You say your mate wants my number
I hear you all laugh
As your car pulls away
This is the reality of being percieved
As a fat woman.
It started just like that
Back in school
A popular boy runs up to me
And says
“My mate thinks you’re well fit”
I see your group burst into laughter
I spit and curse at you
Before I hide in the toilet and cry.
It’s almost Valentines Day
And you, a popular boy, overhear me
Telling a friend I had never received a Valentines card
You come in on the 14th
Hand me a card and bar of chocolate
The card has a monkey in drag on the front
It says “Happy Valentines Gorgeous”
I laugh it off, like I’m in on the joke
And eat the chocolate alone in my room in the dark that night.
I have “boyfriends” in school
One of them is fat like me
But is still ashamed to be seen with me
One of them dates every less desirable girl in school
To hide the fact that he’s gay.
Dating whilst fat is a minefield
On dating apps I loudly declare my fatness
Lest I be accused of lying,
Called a catfish
Men send me messages that say things like
“You’re not fat, you’re beautiful”
As if the two are mutually exclusive
Or they say something sexual, no small talk needed.
I wonder
If their friends know they like fat women?
With every boyfriend I’ve ever had
I wonder
Do they only like me because I’m fat, a fetish?
Or do they like me in spite of my fat, is it something they put up with?
For a long time I couldn’t let my partners see me naked
I would keep my baggy tshirts on during sex
Or cover myself in lacy lingerie
Terrified that if they saw my stomach,
Saw how fat I really was,
That they would leave me
Disgusted.
It always felt like men saw me as fuckable,
Or not fuckable.
To be put into either category feels uncomfortable.
Realising that I am not, in fact, a woman
Realising that I am attracted to women
Has been liberating
Suddenly I don’t hate being naked
(at least not all the time)
Suddenly I am able to fulfil my own sexual desires and needs
Without shame
But that all crumbles away, when a man leans out of a car window
Jeering at me, a fat woman, out on the street.
I am back where I started.
Uncomfortable, lost, my confidence evaporated
Being seen as a fat woman, and nothing else. “

I envision this as becoming a spoken word piece at some point in the future, as I feel it would work well in that context- I get very emotional reading it out and that could work in favour of this writing.

Antidepressants Monoprints and Crit with Babeworld3000

Personal Projects

IMG_20200311_141832IMG_20200311_141837

I’ve made myself a little DIY monoprint set up for my room consisting of a sheet of perspex and a roller and ink from a home linocut kit. The above photos show the set up and the process for the series I made about 2 months ago (I was going to wait until I had scans to upload but I decided to just upload the photos from my phone as I want to document what I’m doing regardless). I knew I wanted to write, but with monoprinting your prints come out reversed and I am rubbish at writing backwards, so I wrote out each thing on tracing paper first which I then flipped and placed on top of the sheet of paper I was printing onto, so that I could trace the backwards writing- meaning the prints were the right way.

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The series consists of 13 prints- 3 are the names of the 3 antidepressants I have taken (one of which I am currently taking), and then 10 of the side effects I have experienced from these medications.

I made this as I have just recently switched antidepressants and am now on the third kind I have tried since I first started taking them aged 17, and I wanted to bring attention to some of the side effects that particularly effect me. Some of these side effects I didn’t even realise I was experiencing because of my medication- for instance the increased sensitivity to sunlight one- I used to tan really well and it took a lot of exposure to the sun for me to burn, but over the years this has changed and I now burn very easily and become easily fatigued if I spend too long in the sun. I also get dehydrated faster when it’s hot and it was only last summer that I read somewhere that it is a common side effect of long term antidepressant use. I think it’s really important to discuss relying on medication to be able to function; there is a lot of stigma still particularly towards those who take medication for mental health issues, a lot of misinformation, and a lot of jargon.

I was stuck on what to do next with this series of prints, so I put them aside for over a month to figure out where I wanted to go with it, and then saw a few days ago that Babeworld3000 are doing bi monthly zoom call crits and a reading group, so I figured joining the crit would be a good way to get feedback on this work. They gave me some really good stuff to work with and I enjoyed being able to feedback to others- it was something I really missed from uni!

I’m going to add the notes that the peeps who run Babeworld3000 made during the call once they email them out, but here are the things I jotted down just after my turn:

  • Make it into a zine- educational (one of the people who runs Babeworld3000 also took part in the exhibition I was in with WANK Collective last year and really liked the zines I displayed- she suggested making these into a zine and others agreed)
  • liked that it’s in my own language, more accessible, feels more real, honest
  • Printing onto the side effects leaflets?
  • Side effects bingo- everyone who has also taken these kinds of meds really connected with it and we joked about creating a “side effects bingo” which could be something fun on it’s own or as part of a zine
  • liked the medium
  • side effects bunting

To Do:

  • add notes from Babeworld3000 once they are emailed out
  • consider how to turn the prints into a zine- do I want to monoprint the whole zine, is this feasible? Or do I want to scan them in and create the zine digitally?
  • decide what else could go in the zine/what I want on the front and back covers, what size, is it going to be stapled, hand stitched, or just folded?
  • Take better photos or scan the prints in for portfolio

EDIT: CRIT NOTES FROM BABEWORLD3000:

Kat

  • Monoprint series for feedback
  • How to show? Maybe zines
  • Your past zines could be shared with a zine made from these new prints in sort of a library. 
  • All these perspectives on your own experience shows how multifaceted you are
  • The prints are extremely relatable with the whole group raising hands or saying “same” 
  • The bingo sheet at the back of the zine is an extension of this – like Instagram bingos where we can share parts of ourselves in a humorous and relatable way
  • The zine format is accessible and flips the whole doctors pamphlet thing on its head 
  • print on the list of side effects but using an accessible code of language – colloquial and loaded language.

Further GIF Experiments

Personal Projects, Work in Progress

3d_gif_attempt-Recovered.gif

3d_gif_attempt-Recovered1katoutten_gif1katgif

Making a gif banner seems a bit hit and miss- the lowest down one is the best one I’ve managed to make so far, but I’m still not 100% happy with it so I’m going to keep experimenting until I get it right. Also it turns out RedBubble only accept PNG or JPEG for their site banners so I’ll have to do something else for it.  I do want to get to grips with this process though and I would like a new gif banner for this blog, so I will keep tinkering!