Fabricating Ideas

Last week I attended the NCECA conference in Philadelphia. It was my first time at NCECA and it was a great experience. There were tons of exhibitions to check out and lectures to attend. I think I will make a few posts about the conference over the next few days, so today I will focus on the panel I attended that was titled "Fabricating Ideas." The four members of the panel were artists whose work I really admire. Chad Curtis spoke and served as moderator, and the members of the panel were Del Harrow, Jeanne Quinn, and Steven Thurston. It started off introducing the goals of their collective and describing the equipment and software that they were using to achieve their results. The three members of the panel then described the different ways they have used technology to create work. They all had very different approaches, but they were all using technology is some way.

I feel that when this topic is discussed, many people assume that this will be purely about using machines to create the work. What I found interesting, was that Del Harrow was directly addressing the issues of fabrication versus the makers hand. He creates his forms in Rhino (a CAD program) and then outputs the polygons that create the 3-D model to create a template that he then uses to construct his work by hand. I often find myself getting caught up in the idea of creating on the computer, and then wanting to have it constructed by a piece of equipment. I had never really thought about using the computer to show you how you could construct an object.

Jeanne Quinn described her process of putting drawings into Adobe Illustrator and outputting them to a CNC vinyl cutter to create the components of her wall based installation. I don't remember if the installation involved any ceramic material, but again I find it interesting that technology could be used in other materials that may not need such expensive and technical equipment to operate.

Finally, Steven Thurston talked about his residency in Dresden and using the Mops porcelain dog. He talked about the technology that I am really interested in and that is rapid prototyping. He explained some of the processes such as using the 3-D scanner to capture the model of these old porcelains that could then be manipulated to account for shrinkage rates in clay or to completely change the piece. They then use a Zcorp printer to print the prototype using a plaster powder system, and pull the mold from that. Again, I don't necessarily view this as a "hands off" approach to making. You still have to make the mold and assemble the pieces. Then you have to glaze and fire, just like any other piece. These are tools to use in the process of creating work based on your ideas.

Unfortunately, I never made it to the exhibition they had in the Crane Arts building. They do have a blog that you can visit, although it doesn't seem to have been updated too frequently lately. Nevertheless, they have many great links if you are interested in exploring the use of technology in art, as well as links to the websites of all the artists who are a member of the collective. The url is http://www.fabricatingideas.com/