Carousel at Showground

Here are some of the Jamie's photos, just love the light reflected on people's faces. Thanks so much to all of you for such a huge effort xxx

Installed at the MECC

Well done crew, looked very professional!

Photo by Tomoko

assembling art by night

Great job all you multi-skilled cabinet makers/trapeze artists/window fitters/carpenters and patient encouragers!

Photos by Tomoko

art takes over dining room table again

amended panels layout

Hi everyone,

Here are a few changes to the order of the panels, in order to avoid having two in a row etc. Magdy your sizes are all the same, Wanda and I have swapped one. Hopefully this will be right to go now!!

a night in the crib room

Had a really productive night in the crib room, no cane being cut due to rain, a whole night to fill in, and voila!

a seed of an idea

Finally something is forming for me. . . have attached some diagrams.

I'm thinking of the country show, the displays of fruit and veges, great mosiacs of grains, sorghum heads, corn cobs, sunflowers etc that farmers would display with pride (out west where I grew up), all the home-grown produce on show, presenting your best pikelets or floral arrangements in a saucer (to win a certificate), young men with their beloved prize bulls, gaudy poultry in all its fluffy spendour . . .

And the sideshows, sticky, loud, tacky, expensive, thrilling, and gone, a mysterious nomadic subculture as you put so well Wanda.

I might go out the the Finch Hatton Show next Sunday and collect some rubbish to use for collage . . I don't finish work till its over but that could be just fine, sifting through the remains of the show.

I am thinking of putting a perspex disc into each panel that can be spun around by a knob on the front, and radiating images branching out from its centre. Still very much draft form but its a start, what do you think? I could leave some unfinished around the outer edges if anyone else would like to contribute to them.

Trace

carousel images

So many beautiful carousels, such works of craftsmanship. I think it is the gentle rhythm of them that makes them so appealing too, a gentle horse ride, all the delights without the dangers, going somewhere but not really, coming back to the same place again, waving as you go past again and again!

http://www.google.com.au/search?q=carousel&hl=en&rlz=1C1AVSX_enAU412AU412&prmd=ivns&source=lnms&tbm=isch&ei=HSr0TbKjGI30vQOIobjFBg&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&cd=2&ved=0CBMQ_AUoAQ&biw=1366&bih=667

panels - random or layered?

Hi artmakers,

Our current model has our individual panels scattered randomly in each panel. Another option is to layer them, like sedimentary rock, for example, Madgy's are all along the bottom, Wanda's in the middle and mine along the top (or any other combination), then it would give more continuity of our styles, like a narrative, but still a bit higgeldy piggeldy, as the tops and bottoms won't quite align, like merry-go-round horses going up and down. What do you think? Or do you prefer them random?

Adventures in New Media Art Course Two

Last night at the workshop we learnt how to use a program called pd. This I found a bit easier to get my head around than arduino...I used it to create a video mixer) no sound unfortunately)...

today we learn how to interface pd with arduino...

I am recording everything again, so you guys can still attend virtually down the track...

brain too wired to sleep post workshop....

All lights are out so am using the thermal imaging on the computer...

groovy timber

and the timber grooves for the perspex have been beautifully cut by cabinetmaker Alan Hughes.

Do you want to keep the timber natural or paint it? I've got Tues/Wed/Thurs off next week if anyone is interested in coming over to help put the panels together - the perspex will be here by then and all the

screws etc are here and ready to go. Thursday night next week (9th June) is looking like our gathering date . .?

rotating light box

The rotating light box has landed in my lounge room - I love it!

Through my eyes...and yours...

Hi All

I have an idea...I would like to supply you all with printed images of my retinas...and invite you to include my "view" into your work...

Once I give you the images you are welcome to incorporate them any way you wish...they do not need to be identifiable within the work...you can cut, paste, stitch, rip, paint, resin, felt, fold, copy, replicate, damage, destroy, or enhance the images in any way that takes your fancy....

What do you think?

PS - Magdy, I hope our neck is starting to recover...

Cheers

Fiona xo

this is with the indented side:

draft design

Hi friends,

How does this look? The dimensions are 880mm for the wider sides (including frames) and 680mm for the narrower sides. The heights are 2m, 1.8m and 1.6m.

short & fat or tall and thin?

hello everyone,

Mathematical gymnastics are not my forte . . ! We have a couple of decisions to make. If we are going to fit the panels in my car (and I think my old Audi can fit more into it than our other cars?) the panels need to be either 680mm wide by 2m high (with the passenger seat forward) or 880 wide by 1.8m high (width according to whether the perspex sheets are cut lengthwise in two or across in three, and includes 35mm each side for the frame.)

We still have the option of 5 sides instead of 6. The rotating light will fit easily inside either option, it is 1.5m high x 350mm wide x 150mm thick (I've taken the liberty of ordering one - $175, hope that's OK).

So, panels taller and thinner, or shorter and wider? Either way we will need 3 sheets of clear and 3 sheets of opal ($540 total) or may be able to do 3 clear and 2 opal and use some clear offcuts for our own backing using paper, or single layer of perspex or whatever. My brain has stopped here - Madgy??? or someone else who would like a puzzle to solve?

What would you prefer?

more on materials

Hello fellow travelers, I hope and pray that Fiona and Magdy you get better soon and are getting plenty of rest.

I checked out Perspex and its about $90 for a sheet of 1.22m x 2.44m, so will try to work out how to get the most pieces out of that. We do buy the whole sheet so if we can adjust our panel size to accommodate that as you suggested Magdy, that would be good and not too hard to do, I can have a go at working it out if you like. 3mm looked like a good thickness to me. . .what do you think? It will take a week for it to get here. Maybe we could get equal quantities of opal and clear? Or more of the clear than the opal? I think the opal would give better translucency than sticking our own paper on the back, but maybe we can make our own choices on that for our own panels, as we might want to play with translucency effects using paper or other materials, what do you think?

I also checked out timber framing and there is another pine baton a bit wider but not as thick (50mm x 25mm) for the same price as the 42 x 35 mm, but it doesn’t have rounded edges and is slightly heavier in weight. There is also a wider framing, 70 x 35mm, it is twice the cost ($3.28 / linear metre) but still quite light in weight, and structurally would be more stable, would add more weight to the whole structure, but would give the panels more three dimensionality. I guess it depends how thick we want the panels to be, ie how big the gap between the Perspex, ie is a 2cm gap enough or do we want it wider than that, say 5cm?

Also in terms of tranporting the panels, my car could hold panels 700mm wide by 2m long, if that's of any relevance.

Dave not sure if you are getting all these emails too? It's probably all a bit techy at the moment, how are you anyway?

possibilities for rotation of work...

Hi All

Jesse Stevens got back to me about a question I asked him about the possible constructs of a turn table...below is what he had to say...relevance to the turn table starts paragraph four...

He's keen to help if we want it...so let me know what you all think...

Heya

Just realised I hadn't replied to you so sorry! It's been a crazy few weeks - almost everything is kind of culminating on the same deadlines. Very boring..

That's great - I'll pass that info on - just had a quick meet with them about it to get some bits and pieces organised so good timing!

The resonating speakers I've been sourcing from Jaycar - apparently a little hard to get at the moment which is a shame but they come in waves - it'll seem as if they've been discontinued and then suddenly they have huge amounts of stock again. They call them "Micro Resonator Speaker" with the "Digitech" brand (which is actually Jaycar's Chinese brand).

As for the turning mechanisms I'd definitely be happy to help and be involved if you'll have me - this is something I worked on for another project that never got off the ground. How big will the turning tables be?

For the work I did on that project I figured out the best way was to use a bearing built for a lazy susan (you can get these all over the place including ebay) and then attach the size perfectly round disk you need for turning (can even be smaller with another table on top of it. You then use a continuous rotation servo motor with a round flange head on it with a rubber ring. Using a hinged section and a spring to apply tension, this wheel then presses against the outer rim of the circular disk which is attached to the lazy susan bearing. You then have the ability using an Arduino (wink wink!) to change the speed to whatever you want, or you can also just add a potentiometer to read from to manually change the speed yourself when it's in place. I'll attach a diagram so it makes more sense for you if you want?

Let me know if the diagram is still confusing and I'll have another go.

Jesse Stevens
Cake Industries
+61 3 8060 5248
www.cake.net.au

In /dev/null, no one can hear you scream

- Show quoted text -

Variablespeedturntable.jpg 79K View Download

gathering?

Would be great get together again soon, I'm free from Sunday onwards next week any time after 5pm . .would be happy to come to your place Fiona if that's best, how about your availability Magdy and Wanda?

Trace

thoughts on the carousel

HI all,
sorry for being a slack blogger, I've been busy getting old!.
All is looking and sounding great, Fi the pics of the trigger button and speakers look great and should be easy to incorporate into our designs , can't wait to start!

I loved your thoughts on what carnival means to you and yes our new structural design also reminds me of the old curiosity boxes and cabinets. They also remind me of carnival changing room doors, through which bizarre, mysterious, strange and shocking things might appear!.

I too have been having many thoughts about carousels and carnivals during my many long drives in and out of town, I thought I'd share them with you -

I have always had a fascination with traditional fairs, carnivals and circuses. My earliest ambition as a small child was to be a clown in the circus, and there have been many times in my later life that I have likened life to that of a tight rope act - heading out into the unknown, balancing precariously on a very thin and risky line, and hoping that if you slip and fall the net of family and friends may catch you, failing that you just hope that if you fall you may pull off a spectacular triple flip and land up right on your feet, or crash in a big heap!, Either way the thrill of taking up the challenge for me always out ways the risk.

When I think of carnival, it is the old school traditional traveling carny that comes to mind. A world in which misfits belong, where oddities are celebrated and nothing is ever quite as it seems, normality is questioned and the imagination stretched. The nomadic nature of the carnival for me adds to its rich , dark and glittery appeal. Appearing in towns overnight, erecting magical tents, and bringing to life vacant fields and car parks. Creating a world of chaos and wonder then moving on to the next town before the mystery behind the magic is uncovered.
Never quite belonging to any one place or time, a culture and life style that exists along side the main stream, steeped in tradition and governed by its own laws and code of ethics.

I feel the contemporary essence of carnival also exists in modern day festival circuits and in the resurgence of modern burlesque clubs, and collectives like circus solae (?) nitro circus, and mutoid waste - We delight in watching people explore the boundaries between acceptable and riske, those performances that push the limits of the human body in a way that excites and amazes and shocks.

In a nut shell, for me I think its the bazaar contraction of carnival that i find really intriguing - the dark and the light.. the sparkle and the dirt, the laughter and tears, the risk and the accomplishment ... all rolled into one grand show with quite often just a flimsy ( thou very sparkly) curtain to separate ..

So here are some images of the space we will be in for the light extravaganza...

This first one is of the alternate door (In the background) that leads out to the Fijian space (Foreground)...

The next ones are the various views of the space around the building, its entryway, the foyer entry and entry into the room, and of course the main room...

I did not get any photos of the space on the other side of the entry to the room where the glass display cabinets were...