Stephanie Jonsson

I managed to get through the first term of grad school. I’ve been working on these William Morris inspired pieces, incorporating ceramics into them. Here is a piece that I created last term and its install.

I’m into the third month of my Masters degree at Emily Carr University of Art and Design. I wanted to post a video of the wall piece that I am working on right now. It is an appropriated organic image that I took and made asymmetrical and irregular, and cut out on the CNC machine in pine plywood. I plan to incorporate some ceramic elements as well, and potentially some fabric elements if it feels right. The piece is referencing the curvilinear and floral inspired forms of Art Nouveau and the handmade wood cutouts made during the Arts and Crafts Movement. This is a mechanical reproduction of those natural forms.

Recently I recieved two awards. The first was Avenue Magazine’s Top 40 Under 40 and second was The Alberta Craft Council’s “Award of Acheivement”. CBC also came in and did a piece on the radio that was recorded at my studio.

I am also going to be in two group shows at the Craft Council in January.

I had an incredible time during my stay at the Banff Centre. I met other artists, I was able to work in my studio whenever I wanted (which meant I got a lot of work done!) and the usual making of meals and cleaning up of my living space was all taken care of. I must admit, the Banff Centre really makes it easy for artists to get work done, while allowing artists to network and make worldwide connections.

My final show was a successful and fun time. A lot of people were packing up and getting ready to go, but they still came out to check out the exhibition. Here are the photos:

The work ready to be installed in the gallery

The pods all disassembled and lined up

An installation view

Installation view of the other side of the gallery

One thing that was an unexpected happy accident was the shadows that were created on the floor when the work was lit from above. I found it to be an interesting perk to the work that I hadn’t noticed until it was brought to my attention at the opening reception. I’m happy with the way these works turned out, and I feel like I’ve resolved my need for complex patterns in the work itself. I kind of want to try these works out as an installation with painted walls and floor elements as well. It could be a challenging endeavor to make these sculptures hold their scale in a larger installation context.

This past Friday, the Visual Arts department at the Banff Centre had an open house. It was a great success. I received a lot of positive feedback on my work, and some important feedback about things I’d been waffling on that were happening (accidental glaze peeling, placing smaller fabric pods on the tops of the blue piece, etc). I also got the chance to see what all my colleagues here have been working on and their experiences here translated through their individual and collective practices.

I have been so busy with making my work and preparing for my exhibition that I haven’t posted any images in quite some time. However busy, I still managed to snap a few photos. I thought I would post some images showing my progress up to date – two entirely completed sculptures and three that are very close to being finished.

First the pieces have to be dried, then they go into the kiln for the first firing. The first firing is called the bisque firing, and it is done at a very low temperature. Here are my pieces in the kiln for the bisque firing (some of them are upside down so I could save space in the kiln):

The next step is applying the glaze. Below shows a photo of a glaze after it is mixed up and before it is applied:

Glazing involves weighing dry chemicals to a very precise weight (to a tenth of a gram), adding a specific volume of water, then combining them and putting them through a sieve. A glaze is basically a combination of chemicals that form a glass at a specific temperature. The glaze shown above is fired to Cone 6, which is about 2246°F (or 1230° C).

The white pieces waiting to be glazed in the glaze room.

Installation of my Harcourt residency show, Urban Organic Absurdity

I just had a critique with Amy Fung, a visual arts writer from Edmonton. I bumped into her and we had a discussion about my new work and issues I’m confronting.

I told her that I feel a certain affinity with the new wave of Do It Yourself artists, crafters and designers that recognize a marriage between historical techniques, punk and DIY ethos…. but are still influenced by traditional handiwork, modern aesthetics, politics, feminism and art.

She mentioned that the DIY crowd usually has two characteristics: a) a distinct lack of formal training and b) an avante garde aesthetic that usually states that it’s cool to be lazy. She didn’t really see the work as relating to the DIY movement.

I addressed my insecurities in my current practice and responses to my residency show – that it was unpolished, that the craft of the work wasn’t “perfect”, that there were sharpie lines and duct tape showing. To quote Sarah Hamilton, “As attractive as the installation is, it is also absurd, repulsive and post-apocalyptic in its overly complicated simulation of nature’s elegant design.” I don’t think this comment had a negative connotation, knowing Sarah, it was more of a matter of fact statement.

I still haven’t really resolved the issue of the craftsmanship in a real way – other than that I wanted the work to disrupt the illusion in some areas, and suspend it in others. I wanted it to be both alluring and disturbing, keeping true to the paradoxical nature of the installation.

Amy agreed that it was important for me to go to grad school to get formal training in ceramics, so that I could prove that I was capable of making “perfect” work, and then break all of the rules and go for wobbly bowl shapes and imperfect forms.

She also strongly emphasized the need for research in my work. Perhaps I should be looking into plant or underwater species – their kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species, etc… their environments, modus operandi, etc. If I can’t find the answers within the work, then maybe I can find it in the outside world. These creatures I’m making aren’t completely fantastical, they have references to organisms that exist in our world.

After talking with Amy, I realized how badly I want to go to graduate school and have professors grill me with technical questions and help to improve the conceptual aspects of my work. I really need it, and I need to find a way to get there, no matter what it takes.

Another installation shot

When I was in Canmore last weekend, I managed to get my sewing machine looked at by a very helpful man at The Sugar Pine Company. I learned that I was using the wrong needle for the type of fabric I was using, which explained why the thread was breaking close to the needle and not higher up or inside the machine.

I also received all of my glazes this week after tracking them down (they were at the shipping room on campus since September 30th, but somehow the message didn’t get to me that they were there). So I was very relieved that they hadn’t been lost in the depths of the postal abyss.

So with that said, I only have 12 days before the installation of my work in the Other Gallery. I have the clay parts on three sculptures done, the fabric elements completely done and assembled for one piece, and the fabric silkscreened and ready to be sewn for two pieces. The clay segments are the most important because they take the most time to dry and fire. I’m certain now I will get at least three sculptures done, but I would really like to have all five completed for the exhibition so I don’t have to finish them at my studio at home where I have so many other things to worry about (grad school applications, work, and life in general).

Nathan suggested that I start using an online project management tool that is mainly utilized by programmers for tracking and graphing progress on sprints and estimating how long they will take to finish. It’s called Acunote, and although a large part of the features are useless to me, it’s a cool way to organize goals and make lists and sublists. It helped me by breaking down my overwhelming large project into small, manageable tasks. I’m still a little concerned about finishing on time, but using Acunote has saved me time in that I know exactly what I’m supposed to be doing when I walk into the studio. Things are prioritized so that I know what I should be doing first and a deadline and quota for each day. Of course there is still room for artistic developments that are difficult to estimate times for.

I’ll be posting some new pictures soon of my new printed fabrics and clay pieces.

I’ve had a number of small setbacks recently. First of all, I’ve run out of glazes, and I’m still waiting for them to be shipped in. This isn’t really a big deal because I can still work on the fabric elements.

However, my sewing machine has decided to stop working. I’m not really sure what’s wrong with it – I’ve changed the tension, the thread, the bobbin. So I’m hoping to either rent a machine while I’m here, or get my machine repaired somewhere this weekend.

At this point I am just starting on my third sculpture (which will be purple), so I’ll post some pictures of what I’ve accomplished up to date.

slab in purple

This is my first slab of clay in purple. I really like the way the colours contrast, and I think they’ll turn out pretty cool.

purple piece

A studio shot of my first three sculptures

I also decided this week that I am going to have a small exhibition while I’m here. I managed to book the Other Gallery for October 30th. It’s just going to be up for a day, and then I’ll pack up and go home the day after. I will also have a small reception in the afternoon or evening. It’s a small and strange exhibition space, but I can definitely hold it with all five sculptures done. I’ve been told more than once by a few people that this project is “ambitious”, but I know myself and I’m sure I can finish it if I push myself hard enough.

I discovered an easier way to print my patterns onto clay, which was very exciting! Now that I’ve run out of glazes, I’m working on some of the fabric elements while I wait for my glazes to be shipped in.

Fabric for the black and white piece

Fabric for the blue piece

The first step to the fabric elements was printing the patterns on the solid fabric. I only have two pieces started so far, so I thought I would start with those. The first piece that I am almost finished the clay elements for is the white and black piece. I decided to print that fabric first, but I also want to print the reverse of this pattern (so the white areas appear black and the black areas appear white). The blue piece seemed like it was ready to move forward, so I started to sew the fabric tentacles, or as my mom calls them “appendages”.

Once I had sewn all the fabric pieces, I made sure my steel structure was ready for them to be attached by spray painting the entire thing blue. This way there is a cohesiveness to the sculpture, and if someone really wanted to look underneath it, the underside would fit with the rest of the visual identity of the piece.

Then I attached the fabric elements using foam insulation, which will later be painted blue so it matches the rest of the sculpture. I also sewed some silk legs, so the piece looks like it has wiry, unstable legs.

Each pod stand is labeled with a number that corresponds to a ceramic pod. This way it is easy for someone else to install my work when I’m not there, which happens occasionally in exhibition installations.

Second view of the nearly completed ceramic elements

Last night I finished almost all of the ceramic elements for my first sculpture. I would have been closer to finishing if one of the forms hadn’t cracked and broken from the pressure of the steel inside pushing against it.

I’m about a week behind my own self imposed schedule, but I put my first firing in the test kilns today – little test tiles of different glazes. I also learned how to use the kiln sitter today – knowledge I had conceptually but never actually put into practice. It was really easy and just like I imagined it to be.

I hope to finish all my internal steel structures this week and get a good chunk of the ceramic parts done and maybe – if I’m lucky – start silkscreening the fabric elements. So much to do! I feel like I’m running out of time – I have just under 40 days left here. But as long as I stay on track, I should get everything done by the time I have to leave. Here’s hoping!