Title : Body Of Women
Exhibition
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Women's bodies have always been seen as sexual objects, to be hidden away for private use, but at the same time to always be seen for the male gaze. The way we use our bodies have always been in the hands of men, what we can wear, say and do, since the men have always been in power. But times are changing. Hopefully sometime in the near future, if a woman wants to show off the body she has, then she can do so without fear. Until then, this art piece will be for all the women who just wanted to be left alone, but weren't. This art is inspired by Statue of crouching Aphrodite, and metal-corset-01 by Timo Pentillä. |
Inspiration
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Corsets were once associated with the male gaze, but now they're seen as a means for women to flaunt their bodies on their own terms, to inspire other women to enjoy themselves, for men to be who they want to be and wear anything they want, and even for the one person who doesn't feel like a boy to see themselves the way they want/need to be. Because Aphrodite is the goddess of love and beauty, this art work was influenced by the Statue of crouching Aphrodite. The fact that the statue has body fat was one of the things that struck me about this piece. I admire how the artist didn't give her a barbie doll frame. Nude figures first appeared in ancient Greek art, where athletic performances at religious festivals honored the human body, notably the male body. The Greeks preferred to see Aphrodite dressed for several ages, but in the mid-fourth century B.C., the sculptor Praxiteles created a naked Aphrodite, known as the Knidian, which formed a new trend for female nudity. They express deep respect for the human body as a form, but they do not applaud human diversity; they may have sex appeal, but they are never fully prurient. Late Hellenistic poets depict the goddess as perplexed by the statue's resemblance to her. She is said to have demanded, half bemoaning the violation of her dignity and half confirming her nude beauty, “Just how did Praxiteles see me naked?” In brief, many people did not support or respect their goddess of love and beauty showing her naked body to the world, but it quickly became a new practice for many gods and goddesses. The goddess herself is the primary source of inspiration from the crouching Aphrodite. In my design, I wanted something that was based around beauty. I also took slight inspiration from metal-corset-01 by Timo Pentillä mainly for the skirt bottom, with the way it seems like a cage. He studied art at the university of Lapland in northern Finland. Timo is an art teacher not only is he a teacher in the arts, but he has been making art professionally for at least 25 years. Timo has been making metal art for some years and was interested in medieval armor making. |
Process
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I had to first sketch out what I was going to do. because this piece is all about the female body, hence the name, I wanted to make something that really accentuates the frame. I also wanted something that drew the eye inward, towards the body. I then thought about how in comics, when there is a huge action word, there is a sort of an explosion of color behind the word. so I decided I wanted something like that, sense I know when I flip to a page with that, I know that is the first thing I look at even if I'm not there in my reading yet. After I got my initial sketch, I released it was somewhat hard to see what I was doing, so I colored in what was going to be cardboard, and did a page of more in depth drawing and information about each major piece; the corset, skirt, and back piece. I figured out how i would do the corset by looking at multiple different corset layouts. Many of them show a basic 10 piece layout. To get the corset measurements, I cut pieces of tape and drew a red line one one side, then I placed the tape in each spot according to my sketches, making the line be where the edge would be, having the lines at the bottom of the tape for the pieces at the top, and having the lines on top for the tape at the bottom. I measured the distance between each tape, and wrote it down on my sketches. That was likely the hardest part of getting measurements. For the skirt, I started that same, drawing the pieces, then measuring. I measured my waist piece first. Then for the bottom of the skirt I had to do many steps. First I figured how long I wanted the skirt to go, then I measured the circumference of my legs together, and saw that it was 32 inches with an approximate radius of 5.1 inches. Then added 3 inches to the radius for how much wider I wanted the skirt to be, which gave me a new radius of 8.1 inches. Did the math for that and I got the new circumference for the bottom of the skirt of 51 inches. I looked back at my sketch and remembered that I wanted a piece of the skirt cut out, and figured about 11 inches of the front of the skirt would be enough, and subtract that from the 51 inches and got a total of 40 inches for my skirt. |
The chest, arm, and neck pieces were the easiest to figure out. I did my sketches like normal, then I wrote down my measurements for each piece. I gave myself some circular arrows at the bottom of the chest and arm sketches to make it easier for myself latter to remember that I need to fold those pieces in.
Process
~~~~~~~~~~~ I started with the chest piece because I knew that was going to take the longest. I first had to measure everything out and cut it. I tried a few different things to get the texture I wanted, I tried putting it in water so I could rip it easier, but it came clear that I was going to take too much time because it would need to dry before I could glue it. so I just went with ripping it to get the texture of wanted dry. I tried different types of glue to get it to hold together and I found that the strongest hold was just original Super Glue, hot glue was not working at all. I also had to adjust a lot of measurements because I don't think that I got the measurements correct when I tried that tape method. Then did what I thought was going to be the easiest part of the entire project, which was the neck and arm pieces. which I was correct, they were the easiest things I've ever done. although it was slightly inconvenient trying to make the neck piece have some sort of clasp so it would stay on. For the skirt, I started that same, drawing the pieces, then measuring. I measured my waist piece first. Then for the bottom of the skirt I had to do many steps. |
I figured how long I wanted the skirt to go, then I measured the circumference of my legs together, and saw that it was 32 inches with an approximate radius of 5.1 inches. Then added 3 inches to the radius for how much wider I wanted the skirt to be, which gave me a new radius of 8.1 inches. Did the math for that and I got the new circumference for the bottom of the skirt of 51 inches. I looked back at my sketch and remembered that I wanted a piece of the skirt cut out, and figured about 11 inches of the front of the skirt would be enough, and subtract that from the 51 inches and got a total of 40 inches for my skirt.
Because the chest piece was not completely finished yet I had to go back and finish that. One of the reasons why I didn't finish the chest piece right away was because I didn't know how I was going to make the string for the corset back. But one day when I was getting doordash for my coffee and breakfast, I realized that the bag they put my food in was a paper bag and had Twisted paper as their handles. so I decided to take those out of the bag and use those as the string for my corset back. Looking at the strings closely you can see that on the inside is Twisted cardboard, then paper twisted around that. I then moved on to my skirt.
Because the chest piece was not completely finished yet I had to go back and finish that. One of the reasons why I didn't finish the chest piece right away was because I didn't know how I was going to make the string for the corset back. But one day when I was getting doordash for my coffee and breakfast, I realized that the bag they put my food in was a paper bag and had Twisted paper as their handles. so I decided to take those out of the bag and use those as the string for my corset back. Looking at the strings closely you can see that on the inside is Twisted cardboard, then paper twisted around that. I then moved on to my skirt.
The skirt wasn't too difficult, I first had to make the part of the skirt that was going to go around my waist. I forgot to add a curve to the cardboard so it could go around my waist more easily, instead I had straight edges which was not a good idea. But I didn't realize my mistake until I had already made the peace, and added my string on to the front of the skirt. By then I was already too deep into it and I didn't want to have to do it again. I then moved on to the bottom of the skirt, the 40 in long piece of cardboard. I was going to do a curved to that cardboard as well as what I was supposed to do for the top, but because it was going to be such a long piece, and I already had two cut the piece into two and glue it together because there was nothing that I had that was 40 in long, I decided to not go with a curve, which I believe mistake in the long run. After I had that piece done I moved onto carving my 2 by 15 in pieces of cardboard for the skirt itself. First I had to measure them on cardboard and then obviously cut them out.
After using the super glue for a while, I realized it really wasn't working, like at all, it would take so much glue for it to hold, because it would not stick to the cardboard the first try, because it kept soaking into the cardboard. so I opted for Elmer's Glue, which took forever for everything to dry, but in the end was probably the better idea, especially since if I got any Elmer's Glue on my hand it was so much easier to get off. I asked a math teacher what the distance between each 2in thick cardboard piece was going to be needed for the top part of the skirt. This was hard for me to figure out because originally I thought it was going to be easy because the top part of the skirt is 30 in, but I had to take 2 in off each side of that cardboard for my clasp, so I ended up actually being 26 in. I tried to figure out the distance between 10 2 inch thick pieces of cardboard, which was just too much math for me, so I asked my math teacher and he told me that it was going to need 2/3 inch in between each piece. I measured it out, and the 10 pieces fit on their evenly. I figured it was going to be easy to glue the strips of cardboard onto the top and bottom skirt, because for the bottom of the skirt it was 40 inch, so having 10 pieces of cardboard 2 inches thick a piece, I knew I needed 2 inches between each cardboard piece. however the skirt was not turning out how I wanted it to, and it became wider in the back, and pretty close to my sides, when I initially wanted it wide all the way around me to make my waist look more accentuated. the skirt also ended up ripping in the back, so I had to glue it back together and it ended up giving it a dip in the back. While trying to put the costume on I ended up ripping the necklace piece, and given that it took almost 2 hours cheer trial and error trying to make that thing, and having it rip on me a few times already, I was not going to make another one, so I decided to not use that in my final piece. I also decided to not use the top chest piece, because there was already so much going on. |
Reflection
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Overall I enjoyed this project. I love all the symbolism put into the piece. the cage like skirt to represent how a lot of women feel trapped in society, the corset to show power taken back, and the cardboard on the back to bring attention, the usage of the alcohol cardboard, and much more. Something I wish I could do better, would be the back piece. I don't like how the individual pointed pieces are visible, if I were to redo this, I would glue the points on the back, making it not visible.
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Overall I enjoyed this project. I love all the symbolism put into the piece. the cage like skirt to represent how a lot of women feel trapped in society, the corset to show power taken back, and the cardboard on the back to bring attention, the usage of the alcohol cardboard, and much more. Something I wish I could do better, would be the back piece. I don't like how the individual pointed pieces are visible, if I were to redo this, I would glue the points on the back, making it not visible.
Similarities and Differences
Similarities-
- caged bottom - corset Differences- - Timo uses metal, while I used cardboard - difference style of sculpture |
Similarities and Differences
Similarities-
- concept of beauty - shows power Differences- - different type of sculpture |
ACT Questions
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Clearly explain how you are able to identify the cause and effect relationship between your inspiration and it's effect on your artwork.
I knew I wanted to incorporate a corset into my art, so when I looked up different sculptures that incorporated corsets in them, and saw Timo's sculpture, the cage like bottom struck my eye. I also knew I wasnted to have some sort of power to it, and that is when i remembered about Aphrodite.
What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
Timo wanted to make art based on the medieval times, so he did. as for Aphrodite, the artist in unknown.
What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
I didn't know that the Greeks didn't like the nude sculptures of their goddesses.
What is the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
My main inspiration for the theme of my art was the Aphrodite statue, just the fact that she is the goddess of love and beauty.
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Clearly explain how you are able to identify the cause and effect relationship between your inspiration and it's effect on your artwork.
I knew I wanted to incorporate a corset into my art, so when I looked up different sculptures that incorporated corsets in them, and saw Timo's sculpture, the cage like bottom struck my eye. I also knew I wasnted to have some sort of power to it, and that is when i remembered about Aphrodite.
What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
Timo wanted to make art based on the medieval times, so he did. as for Aphrodite, the artist in unknown.
What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
I didn't know that the Greeks didn't like the nude sculptures of their goddesses.
What is the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
My main inspiration for the theme of my art was the Aphrodite statue, just the fact that she is the goddess of love and beauty.