Back to the lab

I started making drawings with the idea that it would help me think about the sculptures I plan on making soon. However, it turns out that I am only effectively thinking about the drawings as things in and of themselves -- not the act making sculpture. And since I haven't been currently making sculpture, I'm not actively thinking about it in the way I had anticipated I would. It's extraordinarily difficult to do without actually making things, so here's the new plan:

Since I'm still interested in the drawings, I will continue with that, but since I (A) need to make sculpture and (B) haven't been thinking in sculptural terms, I have decided to make "thoughtless sculptures" -- sculpture without pre-meditation.

Of course, this is impossible -- the very act of making is thinking. But the idea is that I'm not really starting with an idea, or question, or thesis. I'm just going to use whatever I have on hand or stuff that I find and put things together so that it's form is negotiated in its making. Every thing that I make this way will exist on its own terms, whether those terms are conceptual, structural, etc.

This isn't intended to be a new body of work, but rather an exercise -- a homework assignment to myself. If it turns out to be worthwhile, I'll continue with it as background activity while working on whatever I happen to be working on. I plan on making these quickly or slowly, trying to let each piece decide for itself what is required. If I expect anything from this, it's probably just a pretty high rate of failure, but if anything good or useful does develop, I'll post the findings.

And with that, I'm off to the studio for the day.