Making Teaspoons of Darkness/Teaspoons of Light

 I had the idea to develop the teaspoons of darkness work by actually casting the bowls of teaspoons in the black emulsion paints. I like the thought of creating quite simple looking objects, where it is not immediately obvious what they are or how they have been made. In my mind there would be a large amount of these small black teardrop shapes, and they would be displayed in rows or lines as if artifacts in a museum. I am always drawn to multiples, especially wen they similar but very slightly different. Carrying out this idea began with sourcing some teaspoons, and therefore scouting the charity shops of Falmouth and Bristol (as if I needed more excuses). In the past year, collecting the objects for my projects has become a significant part of the work, and I quite like how the spoons will be objects that have belonged to people from across the South.

The first experiments I have done have not been a great success. I discovered that, as emulsion is water-based, the paint halves in volume as it dries and therefore does not keep the shape of the spoon. The resulting objects were thin, crisp-like shapes of matte black paint, entirely lacking in interest or poetic potential. Its quite interesting to note how, evident in this example, although a work can be conceptually driven, its aesthetic is still very important in conveying the idea or sparking the imagination. If it is not working it is very obvious but, as I discovered, it is equally easy to know when something is interesting...

I have been thinking of ways to bulk out the paint to maintain the shape of the spoons.. I want to try latex as it will hopefully preserve the colour (which is central to the work) but I will have to wait until I am back in Falmouth after the holidays. I tried mixing with PVA and (some dodgy looking) paint thickening agent, but they still reduced in volume far too much or diluted the colour to such an extent that it would invalidate the concept. In order to just get an impression of what the spoon shapes might look like, I decided to try casting the bowls in wax and then painting them (a tester - I don't think this is conceptually strong enough to do for a final work because it would not be measurements of darkness). To do this I lit a candle and dripped the wax gradually into the spoons, put them in the fridge and removed the cool wax - it reminded me of making the medal and I really enjoyed how malleable and tactile wax is.

I was immediately very interested by the results - where the wax drips in tiny circles onto the metal, there are layers evident in the set article which look like a kind of mottled glass - they remind me of the surface and visual qualities of the contact lenses.  As the wax had blackened in places, burnt by the flame, each spoon came out a slightly different colour; the murkiness also hinted at the darkness and mystery I m after. I realised that, as it was the flame of the candle that made the wax fill the spoons, they are actually measurement s of light instead of darkness. 

I'm really looking forward to developing these. My aim is to collect more spoons to make a more impressive and coherent series, and to perhaps experiment with different colours.

Teaspoons of darkness (painted wax) and teaspoons of light.