nicolecon-divergentpractice

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

honestly, this piece means so much to me.

during the exhibition, i chose my outfit carefully to enhance my work and to drop hints that this piece is a recreation or representation of myself.

working from the bottom,

under my boots, i wore the black pair or frilly socks that came as a set with the white pair my sculpture was wearing, the pair that were once soaked in my blood.

next, i wore tights from the same pack as the red ones, purposely picking a contrasting colour to the deep red.

then, for most of the show i had the "blood" somewhere on my body, either on my hands or up my arms. I also had some dripped on my boots that i wore that night.

finally, i made sure the rest of outfit was black to contrast the white of the sculpture.

while the details were subtle and definitely not noticed by anyone, it felt like performance art to some extent.

i'm so proud of this piece and everything it represents for me, my past, and my future!

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

final touches

i decided to really lean into the dinner table kind of theme and invested in a few props.

first, i set the table with a table cloth then i set a place using an old plate from my kitchen and an old knife and fork. I then littered the plate with "scraps" including stuffing, teeth, and blood.

next i added some fake maggots around the vulva/stuffed in the underwear then added some more details to the sculpture itself.

I added a very specific pair of socks, in all honesty these socks are the socks i lost my virginity in and i know that because i remember not putting them in the wash because i wasn't sure how to explain why there was blood on them to my mum as an 18yr old.

the final detail was a blood soaked bow holding her legs in place, this leans more into the meat idea, emulating how turkeys are presented on a dinner table with the little bit of twine holding the bones together.

before the exhibition i chose to go back in with my bruise kit and add some reds and greens to the area surrounding the vagina and the underwear, bringing it all together.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

next i had to position the legs on a plinth.

my original idea was to have the legs crossed but as time went on i realised how much detail that would hide so i chose to lean heavier into the meat/consumption themes and position her like she was on a table being served and about to be consumed.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

time to move the piece to the exhibition space.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

learning from my previous lino print, i created a new carving making sure to flip the text this time and made some slight changes to the text.

while i wanted to keep the "legal age" call out in the piece i thought the date of my 18th birthday might not land as well as i wanted, i realised it would probably only be understood by family members/people who knew me and were willing to do the math so i changed the text to alter this.

i then, just as before, printed this on the tights just under the bum.

i then put her custom made "rotten" underwear on and just as i did with the tights, i cut the crotch of them strategically so the sculpted vagina could be seen.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

sculpting the vagina.

i chose to start the same way i had before, creating an oval then carving the slit from there.

i made the decision to sculpt the vagina on the red pair of tights and just strategically rip any other tights that might get layered over, i done this so i could blend the wax into the red tights using the colours in the bruise kit, giving it a more seamless look.

next, i added colour and teeth to the slit.

i was really happy with how the bruise kit was blending so seamlessly into the tights colour.

at this point i knew the vagina wasn't fully done but I wanted to wait to add the final touches once everything was together and finalised so i moved on.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

still experimenting with the first toothy vagina and layering with latex, experimenting with heat etc.

i wasn't really doing much of worth but i did realise that heating the wax with a hair dryer made it so much easier to work with but if too much heat was applied the wax would melt.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

back to the legs.

i decided to try just a wire frame and stuffing around that.

so far i thought it was looking okay but as i started stuffing the tights with newspaper i ran into similar problem, the wire was too awkward and ridged to work around and i found myself getting overly stressed or frustrated.

so for the time being i decided to scrap the wire and potentially just get to that later when/if needed.

i also decided to start with coloured tights as a base, i learned that multiple layers of tights worked best so i thought maybe a red pair of tights as the first layer would add some colour and dimension to the legs so i started with the red tights and started stuffing them with newspaper.

quite quickly, i began to run out of newspaper so i decided to forage around my room to see what i could find.

i stumbled across some folders full of work from high school and thought that would be perfect.

i thought stuffing the piece with little parts of me, my hand writing, and remanence of my last years of innocence was the perfect analogy for this idea.

i also found the paper i was using from course work and jotters was a lot thicker than the newspaper so when stuffing the tights with it, it was tough enough to create space rather than just compress which was great.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

while brainstorming how to solve my leggy problems i decided to make another menstrual pad work, this time making it more 3D and textured with scrap thread i had lying around.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

as the weeks pass it's time to start working on my final piece, time to get the final legs started.

assessing my first pair of legs, the problems i noticed were the lack of structure and how thin/flimsy they were so my solution to that was chicken wire.

i thought i could make a small frame based on my dimensions using wire (for structure and shaping) and chicken wire (for girth) so i collected my materials and measured my legs!

looking promising so far!

i then applied a pair of tights then began stuffing the space between the wire and the tights. for this, i used some stuffing i found for cheap at hobby craft, i thought it might add some interesting shape or texture.

quickly i found i was getting really frustrated with the legs. they were difficult to stuff, they were cutting up my hands, ripping the tights and they looked oddly lumpy.

i enjoyed the texture of the chicken wire against the tights but i felt they just looked too hollow and mannequin-like to achieve what i wanted.

they also where not bending or staying positioned like they needed too, they seemed too heavy so it was back to square one.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

heading back to lino prints, i decided to try printing on some more tights to see how that would look over skin, like the inspiration Sabrina Carpenter!

i just used the same backwards lino again to make use of it.

i stretched it over a towel and printed on to the fabric while it was stretched.

i actually really loved how this looked and was so tempted to photograph the print with just bare skin but thought that might not be the best to upload.

the airbrushed look the tights give paired with the black text was so interesting to me.

i'm also really happy with the placement i chose for the print. i used the lines in the tights as a guide as i wanted the text to sit just under my bum and got it right where i wanted.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

i've always found my biggest inspiration for most of my art is music. i'm someone who has always loved music and is always listening to something.

an artist i've become quite obsessed with this year is a woman named Sofia Isella, particularly her song titled "the doll people" which features lyrics such as;

"a woman who doesn't want it is much hotter than one that does"

"to be desired takes importance over desiring"

"you can never trust...the art these days"

"we are paintings with legs"

"we are art you can fuck"

"they fuck the art on that afternoon"

"art does not interpret itself"

"they don't know what happened...they looked under our skirts one morning...but all they saw were maggots"

i really love the visuals these lyrics create and how aggressive they are.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

for my "creative enquiry" class, I'm currently playing with a lot of visuals using teeth and the mouth and considering these two projects run alongside each other it only feels normal that they interact at some point.

the concept for the teeth/mouth imagery is this idea that the "forbidden fruit" and what happens when the consumer becomes consumed or the idea that "the fruit bites back" which seems so relevant to this project especially considering the body parts that have become the main focus.

I wanted to play around with the idea of the vagina as an opening and a hole...with teeth.

so i decided to use my sfx kit again and begin playing around with the desired visuals.

i made the vulva the same way i made the sfx cuts. i started with an oval shape of wax then created a slit in it, the only difference is this time i filled the slit with teeth instead of blood.

as soon as i stuck the first few teeth into the slit i knew this was the visuals i was looking for, the visuals created from the placement of the teeth were much more effective then any cuts i could create.

it became less about "look at my wounds" and more about "i'll create the same wounds on you" especially when considering the cannibalistic nature of the project.

this project has been about/started as "you're eating me alive" and has slowly become "i'm going to eat you alive"

the passive prey becomes endangered and is forced to become a defensive predator.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

embroidery by hand is quite hard especially when you're a novice so i'd have to take frequent breaks, giving me more time to develop the print based elements of this project.

i decided to take the failed lino cut from before and attempt to bring new life to it.

i felt myself drawn to printing on more fabric.

i began with the pink top i had previously printed on, i chose to print on the back of the top the same way i had done with the text on the green top so i printed in the same spot and took some more final-like photos.

i really enjoy the use of colour in this. I feel the red portrays the attempted "advertisement" while the black seems straight forward and almost like fact compared to the red.

the placement of the prints also feels interesting, even disregarding the fact i unintentionally repeated the placement of the first top of this project.

the back placement and lower position of the date makes it almost easy to look over or intentionally disregarded while the juicy red text calls attention to itself.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

continuing to work on the mould embroidery.

in this photo you can really see the impact of the makeshift embroidery hoop, the patch done using it (left) appears a lot more straight and lies against the fabric where as the other sinches the cloth together, there are visible gaps, and it looks less polished.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

in between my embroidery work i chose to continue developing the legs and mt sfx work.

i decided to begin carving some wounds into the tights, seeing how different it would be compared to working on skin.

i used all the same techniques as before and i think the outcome was quite similar regardless of the lack of body heat or soft surface.

I then chose to look to the other things that came in the original kit and thought it might be cool to try out painting with some liquid latex.

(photographed in the studio, latex applied and worked with elsewhere)

the latex was definitely interesting to work with. it dried quite orange and had a really appealing shine to it while the actual tights seemed to become a lot more "skin-like"

contrast of how the experiments compared.

[nicolecon-divergentpractice]

deciding to take the underwear idea further, i began thinking of ideas.

playing around with the idea of presenting these legs or this visualised woman as "rotten" as to expand more on the "use by" date idea and more specifically it having passed.

in all honesty, there is plenty of trauma ridden detail and thought put into this project down to the garments chose to work into.

while this pair of pants came as part of a multipack, the image of them is something I play a lot with. plenty of things happened while wearing these specific pants, lots i'd like to forget about.

there is trauma and experience sewn into the very fabric used here. while it's not important to spill all the details regarding exactly what happened, it's important to address that this choice was intentional and that this project means a lot to me in this sense.

i think sewing such rotten words and ideas into this piece just makes it that much more interesting.

i spent some time picking out thread and considering thickness and contrast.

once having sewn the word "rotten" into the back of these pants i chose to continue the development by embroidering what i hope looks like mould or moss, anything that signifies growth and rot at the same time.

i was just free handing the embroidery at this stage which was proving difficult when working with such stretchy fabric.

after speaking with my mum she suggested an embroidery hoop might make this project easier which i agreed with! i didn't want to just go out and buy embroidery hoops so i had a look around the house for something i could use instead or form into something similar.

it just so happens that my mum had not long finished a tube of pringles.

it was the perfect thing!