Franklin was on spring break this week so I had extra time to work on current projects in the studio. I have been working on a cross-stitch for an idea I have for an upcoming exhibition with some of my peers, that is apart of an assignment for our Professional Practice course. I am currently interning with a fiber artist who works with cross-stitching and have been learning the skill over the past few months. This past week I finished an installation that includes a foam fireplace and a wooden mantle, casted ceramic boots, and projection of country music videos and commercials from my childhood. The boots were part of our first assignment in Casting and Mixed Media, and were casted from a version of a glass my sister had as a child. The glass was a small, childlike cowboy boot, and I had always wanted one of my own. This idea of an important object from my life has given me an idea for what I want to do regarding my project at Franklin.
Ms. Strong and I spoke about doing a project involving clay, and over the past week I have been thinking of ideas for this. I would be creating a lesson for sixth grade, so I want this project to be both engaging and an introduction for students who have little to no experience with clay. I would like students to draw out an object that is important to them from their home and create that in clay. This will, I hope, help students to focus on their relationship with the object and why that is important. I am thinking that the object doesn’t need to be entirely represented (i.e. it can be abstract, or it can be inspired by their piece from home), because I don’t want students to become frustrated with likeness... but I will discuss this aspect when sharing my idea with Ms. Strong on Wednesday.