FIFTY ONE DEGREES Collection

(Images of the whole collection, twelve pieces, after the jump)

Inspired by road signs and the local supply of the materials, the bus route lent some rather unexpected links. Since a previous exhibition installation in 96, I have come to be very wary of hanging metal artworks. The aluminium was to be filed down on the corners both to protect the handling and to mirror (literally) the window edges as seen on public transport.

The sheets were supplied cut down to 30inch by 15inch units and cut down and smoothed. The hanging mechanism also come by way of the aluminium supplier (who was called Al). Strips of metal were drilled and then positioned into a position to offer the sheets onto a wall, with only 4mm of clearance. After the sheets were painted and worked into, the rivets were hardly noticeable. They then went through a series of priming, sanding and priming in differing proportions, making the paint adhere more readily in some areas of the work.

Each of the selected 12 positions were poignant memorable locations for my trips down the a34 on the 51 bus route. Most of the work was photographed during the last year, both on and off the bus. The names of the pieces reflect which road crosses the route, or the name of the area before there were many routes at all (‘Gorse’, the title of piece number 6 of 12, is a reference to Gorse Farm which stands on the land of the M6/A34 junction 7).

Each scene is deliberately painted with an impressionistic feel, simple strokes of aerosol colour on the different metal surfaces combines with stickers I had placed and roughened up. The viewpoints in each piece draw your attention to a specific area, by way of detailing certain areas in ink. Fixing the viewpoint is the narrative for the whole show, displaying different views from particular stand-points, especially the cube experiment. More on that in another post.

All the pieces are now available at the Jibbering Art website.