Culture meets Nature: Drawing

To continue on our theme of 'when culture meets nature' we each chose two words out of a hat, one was a natural thing, and one cultural. My two words were 'mountain' and 'shoes'. I started off by doing some observational sketches of shoes, both mine and other peoples.

I then sketched a mountain the best I could from memory (unfortunately I couldn't find a mountain in Wolverhampton) 

I then tried to combine the two, by making a 'mountain of shoes' starting with a pile of shoes, turning into a mountain further up

 Some close-ups of the drawing:

I then tried to combine them in a different way, by making the mountain into a shoe. I did this by putting laces up the side of the mountain, and trying to make it shoe shaped, while keeping the form of the mountain. I then cut away the excess paper to better show the shape.

Quick drawing.

 A quick drawing in fine liner and pencil crayon of the shield bug. It was difficult to draw because I had to scale it up while I was drawing, and it kept moving, but I think it has turned out okay.

Design visualisation: observational drawing and modelling.

I decided to use a glove as the base for my observational drawing, to link with my theme of trace elements. A glove is often something people lose without noticing, if it falls out of a pocket, and it is a trace of the person who has been there.

I started off by using a graphite stick and pencil to do some quick sketches of the glove, in various different sizes and positions. I then used ink and collage to work into my drawing, to highlight interesting patterns and shapes.

I also did some separate quick drawings, to try to capture some of the different tones and shadows in the glove. 

After this, I started picking out some of the interesting patterns and shapes to make in wire. I found it difficult to bend very tight angles in the wire so some parts were more curved than I hoped they would be.

I then started to use black thread with the wire to create different thicknesses of lines, and some sharper angles. Some of the wire bits didn't look at all like a glove, but I found this was a good way to generate ideas from everyday objects, that could be used for jewellery or a printed pattern.

  After this, I started using collage, string, masking tape, sewing, and photocopies of the glove to create small object, taking ideas from my first drawing.