Hello! It was a good week and I was able to give my father his gift so, as promised, the rest of my project from last week. I made a wire and fabric Scottish Terrier. The coil that I had left myself ended up being a perfect amount of wire to finish off the inner form of the dog. It looked very silly at first but I was confident I left myself the room I needed to create the shape I had in mind.
I tied the small bits of fabric to the wire figure and was pleasantly surprised when the fabric did not weigh the body down.
There’s a moment where you begin to feel like a project is working out. Once I knew that I wasn’t going to have any structural, I was able to enjoy the quiet of knotting the fabric and getting the shape just right. This is modeled after my late childhood dog, a sassy lady with a greying beard and excellent eyebrows!
When I was happy with the head, I worked the rest of the figure from the bottom up. Marley (sort of named for a family friend from Scotland- Marleen with a Scottish accent reads as Marley to the US English ear, but she took the mishap in translation in stride) the dog had little bow legs with little bear feet and sat to one side often.
I took my time filling in the rest of the body and trimming up some edges that were too raw. As I took photos I found little places still left to trim. (This is a photo or two away from finished but no use including my nitpicking.)
Finally, though difficult to photograph, I had a little dog sculpture. The end result was so much lighter than I predicted and I am happy with how flexible it can be. I think I was able to capture the personality of the pup I was aiming to memorialize so overall I count this as a win (and I think Dad liked it too!)
What’s Playing – So here’s my confession, I’ve been listening to the same songs over and over. As much as I believe in the power of music in the creative process, I am in a musical rut. It has been helpful recently to take a bit of a break from the noise and listen to my own ideas for my art. It’s been grounding and I feel like I am able to consider new ideas for projects. I think it would also be fun to explore new music as a focus of some new art- food-for-thought and a good jumping-off point for later!
