Announcing..

I’m super-proud to tell you that on Friday my work 1.1.2017 was announced the winner of 2017 Elizabeth R. Raphael Founder’s Prize at the Transformations 10 exhibition in Pittsburgh. I have a total of ten works on view at Contemporary Craft including the prizewinning piece (pictured below) and earlier last week we shot a couple of hours of footage for an upcoming 5-minute documentary which will soon air in the space. So if you do want to see what now feels like a mini-retrospective of my time in the USA, and hear my thoughts on my practice and the making of this work, Contemporary Craft is the only place to go. It runs until March 23, 2019.

1.1.2017

55 places. 62 incidents. 66 guns. 73 people dead

1.1.2017 is a large scale jewellery work that contains portrait of each of the 66 guns used in fatal incidents on January 1st, 2017. These gun outlines are made in metal, plastic, fabric and paper, from containers crowdsourced from the 55 places in which these acts of violence occurred. The work was created for the Transformations 10 exhibition  at Contemporary Craft in Pittsburgh, where it won the 2017 Elizabeth R. Raphael Founder’s Prize competition for artists working in found materials.

And once again I acknowledge the help of the donors who gave me containers for the work, as well as the models and my director, stylist and assistants who helped me photograph the wearable sections.

Electrical Sale

Closing down US studio sale – all electrical equipment must go!

The USA voltage is 110, and Australia’s is 230. This means I’m getting rid of a lot of cherished equipment. We’ll start with the big one, and work our way down:

PUK 4.1 Micro-welder SOLD

This machine is a workhorse, and had been recently serviced by the PUK US distributor in Chicago, so he is being kind enough to offer a 6 month warranty on my 2nd hand machine. What a guy!

$3250

Comes with a new set of 0.5mm electrodes and in its original packaging with 2 alligator clips and a set of pliers and an extra electrode grinding wheel and of course the regulator. Bought new for over 5k, it is the version for which you can also purchase the tack foot pedal, and is the full version, rather than the new US only abbreviated model, the C440. And if you’re in the Seattle area I’ll throw in a 1/4 tank of argon. You’ll be ready to weld in moments!

If you’re not in Seattle I’ll make up the disappointment of not getting the argon tank by throwing in free insured shipping to anywhere in the contiguous states. Please contact me at blog@melissacameron.net. I’ll see to the emails in time-stamp order.

OK, and now in order of the gallery (the only other piece I will ship is the Proxxon mini drill press):

Proxxon mini drill press – $100 so many bids!

Foredom SR flex shaft with brand new hand piece – $120

Mini crock pot – FREE (pickup only)

2 Space Heaters –

– Silver – FREE! (pickup only)

– Black – $15 – it’s 7 months old and great desk size for drying liquid enamel, fast

Aluminum clamp lamp – 6 months old – FREE! (pickup only)

Ultrasonic cleaner – $15 (pickup only)

Oxygen bottle – FREE! (pickup only)

Orbital Sander – FREE! (pickup only)

Hot knife – 5 months old – FREE! (pickup only)

Jigsaw – 6 moths old (courtesy of TurboNerd) – $5, or free with any other item

Air Compressor – you move it – $150 ono. Wired in, needs to be detached from power. Located in garage with easy access.

Pair of daylight CFL photography lamps from Glazers Camera. One switch sticks, one head clamp has failed.  $80.

Shop Vac – 1 year old, comes with a pack and a half of bags – $2o

Bench lathe – great little polisher from Otto Frei, removable spindles – $60 – so many offers!

contact me at blog@melissacameron.net and we’ll do a deal.

1.1.2017

Images from the photo shoot and from Contemporary Craft in Pittsburgh, with details about the Transformations 10 exhibition

The folks at Contemporary Craft shared these images this week:

I got these and my heart swelled – I’m so proud of Tegan and her son Calder, and of everyone for coming out on the 7th of July to make these images with me. There are so many of them, which I’ve shared with all the participants, but here’s the big group one:

1.1.2017

and one of the pairings images I sent to Contemporary Craft

1.1.2017

Contemporary Craft sent out their invitations this week for the free and public opening of the Transformations 10 exhibition on Friday the 14th of September, (at that link you can see the Tegan + Calder pairing too) as well as for the public artist talks that happen the next afternoon with some of the exhibiting artists. I told Pittsburgh folks at SNAG months ago that I would be going to this event, and I am making good on that promise. I will see this work installed before I leave the USA, and I hope that if you’re in the Pittsburgh area that you’ll come along and share the experience with me.

Next week I will send out all of the barter jewels to my container donors for this project, so stay tuned to see what they look like – and if you sent me something, your trade jewel will be in the mail next week!

 

(And if you want to know what I’m on about, there’s the post about donations, the post about the photo shoot and all of the Monday-Gun Day posts to learn more about this project.)

Global Enamel News

Seeking enamel stories. Does not need to be an exhibition notice, but definitely can be!

Brace yourselves Team Enamel.

It’s Global Enamel News time once again. My deadline for copy is next Wednesday and I’m running a little late on the round-up, so if you have an enamel story to tell, I’ll take it right up to midday of that date.

Is Wondernamel happening at RMIT? I can find nothing on the web this far out, but someone must know? Will your end-of-year student shows have enamel in them, Australia? In fact, do you have a Christmas/holiday exhibition in the works, Canada? If so, please drop me a line – blog@melissacameron.net

This won’t publish until October, and as I’ve complained before, finding venue and date info of practically anything more than 2 months out is tough (except maybe airline, or Hamilton, tickets,) so I’ll take conjecture.

At this stage I have a document that has the second set of dates added to the With Other Eyes exhibition, so I’m faced with the possibility that this will become a creative writing exercise about the chipped enamelled butter dish that well-known feminist enamel person Marissa Saneholtz sent me last month. There’s a lot to say there, sure, in fact it could be quite a story, but maybe the Enamelist Society Newsletter is not the best audience for that.

You know what to do.

Monday – Gun day

Even I thought we were done with gun-days…

1.1.2017

The last post was all about the impending photo shoot of the above-titled work, which took place without a hitch just over two weeks ago. A huge ovation and a raucous Hip-Hip-Hooray! for my 56 intrepid volunteers, who modeled the 73 pieces that I had made in the previous month like absolute professionals. We worked basically by city, so we managed to get the works arrayed across our models.

I then took all the wearable works back into the studio to photograph them with the 73 containers from which they had come. After that I packed up the whole of 1.1.2017 and sent it to Contemporary Craft in Pittsburgh, and emailed a batch of the finished photos of the piece by the deadline, as per our contract. Then I reclaimed my weekends!

Contemporary Craft are now assembling the works of the 26 artists juried into Transformation 10: Contemporary Works in Found Materials in preparation for opening the exhibition and  awarding the Elizabeth R. Raphael Founder’s Prize on the 14th of September.

Now I’m working towards other deadlines. Have I mentioned that I’ll be in an exhibition With Other Eyes starting at the Ruthin Craft Centre in Wales on the 29th of September? I’m currently waiting on my first ever order of enamel decals (don’t worry, you’ll hear about it) while slowly slicing some 2mm shipping container steel.

So that’s why I regretfully don’t have any images to share of the work, or the shoot, just yet. But if you seek them out on Facebook, a few of my volunteers posted their images and thoughts. And yes, I’m still doing the editing on the pictures that I didn’t send (we shot about 680 images on the Saturday in Fremont, and I took about that many again in the studio), so I will be able to share images of everyone involved, and the whole work, very soon.

In the mean time, there was some positive gun news on The Guardian recently-there’s been more sales slumps for one of my favourite brands << you’ll be sure to shovel on the sarcasm for those last 2 words, won’t you? >>

Photo Shoot this Saturday!

I suspect it’s too late to apologise for sounding like a broken record…

Thank you to the big flock of people who have signed up already, and sorry to everyone for still harping on about this, but we’re really, really close to making our volunteer target for Saturday’s photo shoot. If you have been thinking about signing up but just haven’t got around to it yet, I’d really appreciate you (and your mates!) getting on board today.

Sign up here

This will be the only opportunity to see these neckpieces in Seattle, as the whole work (both the pendants and containers from which they were cut – 146 pieces all told) will go on display in the exhibition Transformations 10 at Contemporary Craft in Pittsburgh in September. And as most of y’all know, not long after that I move back to Australia so I won’t be in the USA to organize a Seattle venue.

And to keep us all sane despite the idea behind the pieces we’re photographing, we are working hard behind the scenes to make this an enjoyable experience for everyone!

For the last time – photo shoot details at-a-glance:

– 7/7/18, 8am – 12pm
– Meet at the parking lot under the Fremont Bridge (not next to the Troll – the one that opens)
– 8am-9am sign in
– 9am-12pm all 73 people in 73 different gun-shaped pendants stand together for the shoot (if we finish early we all go home early)
– You wear something comfortable with dark top-half and no logos, I loan you a pendant to wear for the morning
– Drinks and snacks provided
– Kids, families welcome – but no pets please.

Monday – Gun Day

Jewellery is meant to be worn. Please come wear these pieces for a few hours

1.1.2017

55 places. 62 incidents. 66 guns. 73 people

It’s take one month of drawing, drilling, sawing and slicing to make a portrait of each of the 66 guns used in fatal incidents on January 1st, 2017. These gun outlines are made in metal, plastic, fabric and paper, from containers sourced from the 55 places in which these acts of violence occurred.

Now we are seeking 73 people to wear the outlines, small and large, while we take an image to help tell the story.

Please come and stand in for the people we lost to these guns on that day.

Register here

More info here

VOLUNTEERS NEEDED!

Seattle – come help me out on 7/7/18 for a few hours. It will be fun, promise 😉

Sign up here


A huge thanks to everyone who has already signed up for the photo shoot on the 7/7/18. I’m back to tell those of you who haven’t that I need a lot more volunteers to help create a truly arresting image. I’ve made a poster (above, link) with all the details that I’d love for you to print and display in your shared studio, office or other place where cool people hang out! (FYI – I’ve already papered Equinox and Pratt Studios, and a big thanks to the others who have obliged me by posting it in their shared studios.)

AND in exciting news – I’ve managed to secure the services of local film-director Miri Stone, who thankfully has a lot more experience at this than me! She’s going to keep us all on task and motivated, and help us make the best image possible.

As far as volunteers go, I have just over a quarter of the sign-ups that I’m seeking. If you’ve been meaning to sign up please do so here, I’d really appreciate it, and if you’re going to be out of town you can do me a huge favor by forwarding on this email to someone who has yet to receive it.

And to those of you curious about progress on the artwork – my deadline for receiving containers was last week, and I’m currently at 49 pieces totally completed for the shoot, with 4 more awaiting cleanup on bench this morning. The last of the containers are still coming in too, so I’m on schedule to finish by the end of this week. Phew 😉

Photo shoot details at-a-glance:
– 7/7/18
– Meet at the parking lot under the Fremont Bridge (not near the Troll – the one that opens 😉 )
– 8am-9am sign in
– 9am-12pm all 73 people in 73 different gun-shaped pendants stand together for the shoot (if we finish early we all go home early!)
– You wear something comfortable with dark top-half and no logos, I loan you a pendant to wear for the morning
– Drinks and snacks provided

This is going to be a fun and once in a lifetime experience, so please come join us!

Some more about the project here and especially the shoot here

Poster for print: VOLUNTEERS NEEDED