Building Rome in a Day- The Final Stages of My Lounge Chair and Wig.

From the last post I had completed the base of the chair. Now my task was to add batting and foam and upholster it...after three painstakingly days of futtsing around with the lounge, I finally got it!

With two additional pillows--one with tassels from extra fabric. And after lathering some Old English on the Mahogany, the woods looks as good as new.

This image on left is what the lounge chair looked like pre-finishing on the front.

Got to love that Great Stuff...and foam insulation. I learned how many bottles of Great Stuff is required for such a task (nearly 5 bottles!) 

After some shaping the foam more on the band saw, I filled in holes with wood puddy to create a clean and smooth surface. After that I sanded the surface so it would be all ready for Paper Mache! 

I needed to paper mache the base for the wig because insulation foam can melt with the touch of hot glue. Here's a shot after I added paper mache. It actually helped me create more of a curve by the two top protruding parts. 

The image below is just a soft layer of spray paint. 

Meanwhile, molds and molds and molds. I created over 30 of these little guys. Only not using 6 shells on the wig in the end of the day! Just drilled a few holes and lightly placed them throughout the wig--you'll see how in a little bit :)

And the final result...spoilers. Here are a few shots of the final display. 

two birds in the hand

So after my tragic failure with my first bird cast...i went to find another bird...

i found two great sized birds at the dollar general! yay! now i just have to get moving on casting 60 of these little buggers.

As for the drawing, i have to iron out my other canvas, and work on the back of the head piece. This week is crunch week so i am planning on being in the studio quite a lot. 

Meat Your Maker

I tested my face mold with plaster. It turned out to be more detailed than I thought.

First I filled it with dog food. I mixed sliced beef and pureed beef. It looked a little too ambiguous, not enough like meat.

When the dog food dried out, it started to look more like a burnt hamburger. I like the texture but it lost the details.

Since Scot the meat man and I broke up, I've been dating others in the business. I found someone at Honey Baked Ham to donate two expired ham. 

This worked out really well and it had an interesting texture after a few days. I mixed ham, spam, and a little dog food. 

Thank goodness for the ham.

I also spray painted my chairs black to look more formal.

Permission to Fail Article

Permission to fail:

I believe that many people give themselves permission to fail over and over again. Most people that I come in contact will also say that they are going to do something and never quite follow through. I am one that does not like to do so. When I want something I will try over and over again. I feel as though I am like this because I am an art major and enjoy seeing my work progress and get things done. My friends on the other hand, put things aside. If they need to study for a math exam they will get distracted and end up just hanging out with each other. When they see me do my work they become very surprised. My friends never really thought being an art major was difficult. Time to time I will bring my friends to help me install projects and they become very shocked. Its like they never thought what I did was time consuming or “hard.” I enjoy their reactions because they see that I am a motivated individual but in a completely different way. I am one to stay in on a Friday and Saturday night to finish an assignment if I know that it will stress me out during the week and not many of my friends understand this matter because they would rather study for their entire exam in one day and not do too well than miss a party. In this situation they are setting themselves up for failure too easily.

            Coming from a motivated family, I do not like when people do give themselves permission to fail. I like to see everyone follow through and live above and beyond.

Update on Mold Project

Here are pictures of the progress of my mold piece.  I have been making my forms out of "great stuff" foam and the shapes seem to be coming out interesting.  The forms don't show as much of the texture as I would like so I'm thinking that I might cast some of them in plaster as well to get the more detailed shapes that I want.  I also think that I am going to glue some of the actual rock salt onto the outside of the shapes to add to the texture.