30 Final Chapter of Coursework!

As I may have mentioned in the previous posts, I'm done with my coursework! :) Here are some photos of the end process, end results and my prep boards.

the last lantern, lying out on the table in the mac lab as i put final touches to it (ie feathers and gold foil).

one regret i have is not ironing the last two lanterns. i wasn't quite sure how to do it at home (and my mum kept asking me skeptically, 'IRONING a LANTERN?') and if it really made any difference but after i attached the rims i realized it was probably one of the key reasons my red lantern was the only one that didn't slump slightly. it stands better; now in the gallery my blue one's already a bit deflated.

note to future art enthusiasts: gold foil is VERY messy. i used tweezers at first, but it stuck to the tweezers too and now there's this huge clump of dried foil all around the tweezers. can be washed off fingers, though!

the following photos are how to attach the lantern rim (finishing steps!)

the original rims are attached to the lantern via glue. i bought extra lanterns. each lantern comes with only one rim whereas i adapted mine to have 2, so i cut rims out from the extra lanterns.

the original lantern has a square base at the top but i made mine thoroughly cylindrical, so i cut off the square excess.

attach the rim to the ends with bits of transparent tape. it's just a casual step before the actual glue so you can make sure everything stays in place.

attach super glue to the rim and then fold the paper in. press hard and hold to make sure the paper sticks right.

attach tape over the glued parts again just to be doubly/triply sure. (kiasu mah!)

i had to crawl inside the lantern for this one... reach your hands inside and paste little strips of tape down the middle of the lantern. it's helpful if you have someone at the other end holding it together. then go down it one more time with one long strip of tape.

attach a second rim to the other side.

taa-daa!

prep board 1/8
(top L-R, clockwise) my 'visual mindmap' of fairy tales and old stories; artist statement and inspirational lyric from In Dreams by Enya; pictures of lanterns from Thailand and China; Lola's Magic Ballet Shoes by Tracy Paul; Serenade (Darcey Bussell) by Gordon King; and a more wordy mindmap of ideas/themes associated with 'childhood dreams'.

*i forgot to take pictures of prep board 2/8! many apologies! in it i explored the idea of fairy tales and more ballet with Degas' ballerinas as inspiration... as well as watery paint that got too watery.

prep board 3/8
(top L-R, clockwise): dreamcatcher; Clemence Poesy with a butterfly; mash-up of Clemence and May Angels Lead You In (a Lookbook entry); a painting of a dancer with a dreamcatcher ribbon; references; a man held aloft/carried by birds.

prep board 4/8
(top L-R, clockwise): explanation of thought process; 'Day and Night' compositions using bird, star and castle motifts; song lyric compositions using girl and castle motifs, 'You Make My Dreams'- Hall & Oates and 'Moon River'- Audrey Hepburn; reference pictures of castles; 'What makes a set?' mindmap*; mash-up of ballet and fairy tales.

*since i chose to do a set of 3 lanterns, i had to have some common points or motifs throughout to identify them as a set, as part of a common project. i had different ideas, like same colour schemes... same materials (i chose coloured tissue paper in the end)... and same motifs, like birds/castles/girls/stars (i chose the first 3 in the end). i decided that an interesting way to do it, would be to have the same motifs but in rotation so each lantern would have a diff motif as its chief focus.

prep board 5/8
(top-bottom): a pastel rendering of a screenshot of Tangled; a line-art/pastel work with the girl motif, featuring stars and birds (inspired in part by MC Escher's Day and Night).

prep board 6/8
(top L-R, clockwise): line art on coloured tissue paper on tracing paper; coloured pencils exploring the idea of wings representing hidden potential; artist inspiration from Josephine Wall and MC Escher; a dreamcatcher cut out with feathers; line art paisley prints (inspired by the henna we did last year).

prep board 7/8
top-bottom: line art over blocks of coloured tissue paper, i later decided more exact tissue paper shapes would be better; my colour schemes and draft compositions. the first composition is underneath the flap, which is an experiment i did using coloured tissue paper on transparency (the kind we used to use for our projectors back in primary school... good old days) and watercolour paint on tracing paper for the background.

prep board 8/8
the final compositions, with lantern 101 (how to make a lantern; see pictures above), and a before-and-after shot of the lantern! the blank at the middle right is for a picture of the final works hanging in the gallery, which i haven't taken yet.

my 'babies', as i affectionately call them, hanging in the gallery on the first floor. lights have been installed in them already but i'm hoping to get yellow lights instead of white lights for a warmer glow. it's also more realistic since you normally have fuel cells/candles in the original lanterns!