DNA Fingerprinting

I am increasingly becoming interested with the scope of DNA Fingerprinting. I have tried to work with barcode but I find them too formulaeic and the potential of doing a truly personal art piece with lino is gripping me. I think this idea/concept became important when I made the shoebox construct mid last year and now I am extending the ethos.

manchester artist's bonfire

The Manchester Artist's Bonfire 2012 happens on Friday at Islington Mill, Salford. I was part of this event last year where I burnt my fresh from the printers book about Road-Side Markings. I burnt this book as a thinly disguised attempt at publicity, I didn't sell any more books but I met a couple of nice art people from Manchester. This event is now becoming the inaugural art event of the MCR Art calender.

This year I will be burning my maquette for a proposed public construct that was supposed to have been built in the Summer of 2011. This particular project couldn't be finalised though due to logistics and lack of finance and it kind of bugged me for some time. I think it was a little ambitious to have been built because I would've needed a lot of help and the whole project needed more planning.

I can't be there this year physically though due to have a device surgically placed to monitor my heart beat. I have a rare heart condition and this device will send the relevant data to my consultant via wifi..I'm a little apprehensive but hey-ho. The organiser is kindly going to say my piece and burn my work and I'll have a jar of ashes from the fire at a later date.

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This is my pledge:

Pledge #4
Sonny J Barker.

Practice:
Installation

Blog:
http://organicrobotix.blogspot.com/

Title of art work:
Maquette for possible public structure

Description of art work:
Piece of Painted MDF with Plywood Squares. This was the maquette for a piece of public art that was scheduled for July 2011. It was abandoned due to timing and logistical issues.This piece spells out the word [TOUCH] in squared braille and at life sized would have been a three-tiered cement block structure.
Pledge:

Through destruction we have further construction..I am aiming to sacrifice previous thoughts in order to supplant a more phoenix-like process of working.
I needed to get back to why I love art and by doing this I have started a more personal and defined project…

This is my speech


Speech for MCR Artist’s Bonfire 2012

I’m sorry that I can’t be here in person, I have had some kind of recording device surgically attached to my heart and I need to convalesce. I have a condition called Dilated Cardio-Myopathy that is now being monitored.

This piece of work that I am burning is called Touch and was brought into being by my interest into public spaces and how these specific places are then used by humans and by animals.

I constructed this maquette/model after research into Braille and how this kind of semiotic text could be used to subvert the general public. I often take oblique text and use them within my artwork.

The plan was to construct this structure within a public space in the summer of 2011 but failings in logistics and because I am wholly dependant on my own funds, it couldn’t be built.

By burning this maquette, I am saying farewell to an old friend and an albatross that has lain across my studio floor. Through the destruction of this piece I may achieve a state of catharsis and begin new constructs that will be built within public space.

Sonny J. Barker

new text

This is a backward glance to the other letterpress work that I did last year. The type doesn't fit right here but work will be carried out soon to rectify it. I am researching into E Rushca and Barbara Kruger at the moment and also Brian Eno's Oblique Stratagies.

New Painting

This paintings is finished yet and is a little rough around the edges somewhat. I am experimenting with colour and spatial concepts here and this may become a relief sculpture sometime in the future... My inspiration behind these paintings are the constructs and paintings by British artist and constructivist, Gillian Wise.

Press Release | Tea-Room, Manchester School of Art

MANCHESTER SCHOOL OF ART

Grosvenor Building
Cavendish Street
Manchester
M15 6BR

Holdentearoom.tumblr.com

Holdentearoom@gmail.com

Twitter @holdentearoom

PRESS RELEASE: 13th January 2012


TEA ROOM
Sponsor: Lancashire Tea and Barnes Bakery, Blackburn.
From 30th January – 10th February 2012
Open to the public from 11:30 – 16:30 (Monday- Friday)
Preview: Salon Hang, 2nd February 2012, 17:00- 19:00


Manchester School of Art, Holden Gallery Cafe is pleased to present Tea Room, a truly unique cafe experience. On the 30th January, the Holden Gallery Café will be transformed into a fully functioning tearoom. What is ‘quintessentially’ a British experience will become a pop up space, existing for two weeks in an art school environment. Successfully merging café culture with contemporary art, performance and installation, Holden Gallery Café will accommodate a tearoom with a wait on service, specialising in ‘afternoon tea’. A bespoke aviary of birds will be a focal point, with a salon hang style exhibition, bringing together a host of craftsmanship and art, reminiscent of tearooms of yesteryear.

In 1908 the Holden Gallery held an exhibition of William Morris.
The simple beauty and classic natural aesthetics are reflected in the Tea Room’s construction, which pays the upmost respect to Morris’ time and the history of the gallery’s architecture. Every aspect of Tea Room, from the complete running of the services, to every piece of art in the salon hang will be created in a mass collaboration of Manchester’s finest up and coming young artists.

Good food and wonderful home made cake, and the best tea Manchester has to offer. We cordially invite you to join us for a spot of afternoon tea or lunch.

Ends

Tea Room @ Manchester School of Art

From 30th January through to 10th February we are going to intergrate a tea room within the Holden Gallery at the Manchester School of Art. We will be selling Afternoon and Cream Teas, cakes, sandwiches and also be offering light enterainment and a bird aviary. I'll be hosting Gramophone Hours on selected days where I will be playing selections from my collection of twenties and thirties 78 rpm records.

We are going for the 'Betty's' aesthetic and have a somewhat classical thirties appeal. This is going to be a fully fledged business and all the proceeds are going towards the end of year/degree show catalogue that we will be needing and hopefully we'll make in excess of £1000.

This is an ambitious project and is going to involve each member of [42] third year Interactive Arts students and hopefully we'll have some help from other years. We are being sponsored by Lancashire Tea Company and a small bakery called Barnes Bakery of which each have donated produce for our tea room. This is going to be an exciting and perilous endeavour and I think, will cause a buzz within the school.

We have a wall concentrating on what is called a Salon Hang and it will contain various artworks that would be contained within a golden gilt frame and which will be sold at a silent auction. The works will be of 2D quality and be in accordance with the sensibilities of a salon hang/tea toom environment.

I have included a construction/hard-edged collage and a painting to the salon hang and both are contained within a gilt frame. I am also donating three gilt framed Polaroids that I have been holding onto, for such an occaision. I don't really care if they are not sold because I love the Polaroids and I am quite fond of the other two pieces. I won't mind if they are sold though, nothing like a stroked ego..m' eh.

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Flyer created by Philip Simpson

Sculpture - Rietveld

The Red Blue chair


Model of Rietveld Joint.

On of the art movements that is close to my heart is the De Stijl movement. I love the architecture, furniture and especially the painterly aspect of the movement. I find it pure and simple but extremely stylish. In particular, the furniture by Gerrit Rietveld was shocking and thoroughly modern at the time of inception and his designs are still thought to be contemporary even by todays standards.

Rietveld made his demonstration of the joint he used in the construction of the Red Blue chair and some of his other early experimental furniture in the fifties. For me this jointing system is purely sculptural and will be the basis of my next off-the-cuff construction. I am going to construct a one foot high rendition of the above joint to show how the utilitarian aspects of furniture can be made into sculpture.

Your Silent Face

As I am interested with the Brian Eno concept of Oblique Stratergies..I have chosen to veer of course and generate one of the tracks of my favourite albums of all time, New Order's Power, Corruption and Lies. My favourite track is Your Silent Face and here is the barcode in Code 128..

Manchester Artist's Bonfire 2012

It's that time again for the inaugural Manchester Artist's Bonfire 2012. One year on and now is a staple in the Mancunian Artist's Calender. I did this event last year under a paper thin pretense of getting free publicity for my then just released book, what I got from it was a hellava lot more. I met fellow artists and people from Manchester and had as great time.

This year is more personal and I will be burning a brand new maquette of some public structure that I tried to construct last July but because of logistics, it was put on hold. I had a fairly strange attack of loss of faith with my work and decided to throw away quite a few pieces of work that I was concentrating on, I haeld this piece back so I could ceremoniously burn it at this event.

Pledge #4

Sonny J Barker.

Practice:
Installation

Blog:
http://organicrobotix.blogspot.com/

Title of art work:
Maquette for possible public structure

Description of art work:
Piece of Painted MDF with Plywood Squares. This was the maquette for a piece of public art that was scheduled for July 2011. It was abandoned due to timing and logistical issues.This piece spells out the word [TOUCH] in squared braille and at life sized would have been a three-tiered cement block structure.

Pledge:
Through destruction we have further construction..I am aiming to sacrifice previous thoughts in order to supplant a more phoenix-like process of working.

I needed to get back to why I love art and by doing this I have started a more personal and defined project…

Market hall..designed by BDP

as Blackburn Council are demolishing the Market Hall that was designed by the the Arctitecture Team BDP in the Mid 1060's for a replacement Bus Boulavard, I decided to force my way in through a gap and take several photographs..

photo opportunity

Sunday, 15th January 2012..Trek into the Forest

With Beethovens Symphony No6..The Pastoral Suite oozing from my iPod and another glorious Winter's Sunday, I decided to explore Longridge and Beacon Fell. I trekked through the forest with my Polaroid 600 and my Lumix and started to take photographs of the wooded areas. Unfortunately, the Polaroids took a turn for the worst and because of the severe coldness , never had the chance to develop. I am really cheesed of with the temperamentalness of the Impossible Project products but that IS another story.

The local landowner has this part of the forest of Bowland under a state of flux at the moment, at some sites there are Scot's Pine and in others just sheer wasteland. The wastelanded areas though are conducive for the linocut project but they have just decimated a large area of natural habitat for fungi and adders.

The photographs above are ones that I have letterboxed in wait for analysis and eventual carving into the lino. The previous linocut was from imagination and now I am ready to intergrate real life vistas into the project.

Response to tutorial feedback

I was given my feedback from the tutor about my recent work a few days ago, it over ruled the previous one from December. She wants me to concentrate on found materials such as wood and metal and this is the response to her words of .. encouragment.

It is only the start of the project and is subject to change..I'll nail it at the uni on Monday.