This evening I went to hear the illustrious illustrator Alan Lee speak at the Falmouth Poly about his creative practice and his newly illustrated book; "The Fall of Numenor". To say I am a fan of Tolkien's Middle Earth would be quite accurate. The Hobbit was my first foray into literary high fantasy at the age of 11 and my love for Middle Earth has stayed with me ever since.

I have always loved Alan Lee's work with regards Middle Earth, I was surprised to learn that most, if not all, of his works start out as simple pencil drawings before being transferred digitally. He mentioned that he didn't have any issues transferring his skills and techniques from the page to digital drawing media, which I found particularly interesting as I have previously tried using Wacom tablets to draw on a computer and found them a struggle. In times to come I will definitely redouble my efforts to try this medium and technique again.

Plant Drawing session. I found this particularly useful to see what I create when sat in front of something along side other students on the course. I can sometimes feel self conscious about my work, given that any creative outlet can be a reflection on the self. But it was good to see that I was, alongside everyone else, confident in what we produced to contribute to the rotatory image below;

Last night's preview of the EoY show was a resounding success! The quality of of everyone's work really shone through and couldn't have been more well received. Head's of department for our future BA progressions were there and were thoroughly interested in what we had produced. The staff at the Poly have been amazing in helping us to build and manage our exhibition - all that remains to be said is please go along to our little exhibition if you are in Falmouth today and tomorrow, the Poly is open between 10am and 5pm.

Well - the exhibition setup is finally here. The culmination of our 10wk projects and everything we've been working toward.

Once I had come round to setting up my exhibit after helping out where I could, I setup the flats to add the corner that I requested and placed the black linen over the plinth then put everything in place as I had designed. Unfortunately I hadn't foreseen how "drowned" my sculptures were by the sheer amount of white background. Thinking on my feet I was able to source some more linen to hang from the flat panelling. Having hung this in place, I used safety pins to curve in the fabric at the base, to focus the lines toward the sculptures. With the help of Ed from the Poly, I was also able to focus a spotlight on my work and he also loaned me the use of a couple of battery powered tealights, for extra effect in making a shrine.

So the final wood burnings took a little while, but I am beyond satisfied with the results. There were a couple of mishaps with the woo burner overheating and placing marks that I didn't intend, but I was able to incorporate them into the final designs so that they are unnoticeable.

From these small blue marks, the ideas of aging I wanted have become brutally apparent! Jon agreed that they now look great and said the effects should just continue to grow over time, along with the drying out of the trunk. After having scanned in my sketchbook and rounded off a few other things ready for this final module submission, I went into town to the Poly to visit the 2nd year Photography exhibition: Melange.

I was immediately drawn to this first selection, due its obvious religious iconography. I was really taken by the way the photographer took the holy and made it controversial by changing the fashion of the model but not the colour, and the colour being what draws the viewer into a religious mindset. Obviously I was of the mind of how it was presented, given that our own exhibition is less than a week away in the same space, but having had this particular exhibit "lay the ground" as it were to have the viewer explore the idea of what their gods and faith might be.

This piece called "Molusca", appealed to my own fascination with macro-photography. I could clearly tell the subject was based in the kelp that washes ashore so frequently on Cornwall's beaches. I knew from previous research that there can exist a microcosm of life in amongst the plant-life that springs from the oceans. It's not often I see such a wonderful piece that speaks to the unseen world all around us. It's large size and presentation were also to be commended as I am sure that it would offer up something new to see with each viewing.

Given the current cost of living crisis, this diptych was particularly poignant. Having the every-man presented in such bold images struck home that every worker, on land, sea and in the air has a story to tell, is living a life that is just trying to get by, exactly as we are. The juxtaposition of vibrant colour next to B&W spoke that nothing is always clear cut, even amongst the most colourful of characters we meet, they are facing the same struggles as those whose lives are obviously living in darkness. A very evocative presentation.

I used the tools above to finish all the fine details I could put in. I tried using solid beeswax to make highlights to certain areas to draw attention, but after applying a small amount on an off-cut, it didn't create the effect I desired. When I asked Jon for advice on what to do, he said it would provide an effect similar to furniture polish and make it look too modern if I wanted to keep the worn rustic effect I have made, so I abandoned that idea.

After taking a moment to appreciate how far I had come with my sculpture, I sketched out some rough ideas of where I wanted to put the coins I intended to hammer into the beard. Before I could do that however, I had to fashion a sharp tool to make the holes the coins could be hammered into. Jon and Andy the wood-shop technicians fashioned me a sharp tool using staff only tools to penetrate the oak so I could hammer in with ease. Again, always using an off-cut to experiment on first so as to not damage the sculpture. The shot above right shows - the experiment was a success.. on to the hammering...

The above photo shows the positions of the coins I had hammered according to my design, and my reaction was that it looked far too sparsely coined. So...

On the hoof, I hammered in many more to give off the impression of a beard filled with coinage. I was pleased with result and took another emotional moment to inspect my finished project. When Jon came over to ask if I was happy with what I made, I said that I was and was happy with the aged look I had created, I then joked that it was a shame I couldn't rust the coins to add to this in time for the exhibition. With that, Jon took me to talk to another student working around the corner and showed me her work. She had created a copper plate and appeared to have written in aged copper on the back of it - when Jon asked how she achieved this, she said "Miracle-Gro".

She had plenty left over and offered me the use of it - and within minutes we were experimenting to paint two coats of Miracle-Gro to see if it would work on my first off-cut hammered 2p. She informed me that she left hers overnight to have an effect. Given that this was last thing on the Friday before the Bank Holiday weekend, I am still waiting to see if it worked. If it did, I will paint the 2ps embedded in my sculpture and leave them to work their magic. When I came home I still had a meagre amount of energy left in me to experiment with how I want the drapery on my plinth to look when it comes to exhibit.