CrumpArt

I’ve had this week off uni for our mid-semester break, and thanks to being totally, absolutely and utterly broke, I haven’t been able to do much. I couldn’t really afford to travel on the days I didn’t have to work, so I didn’t end up going into the studio and working on my uni stuff like I’d planned to.

Instead, I stayed home and read books. And while my complete lack of money would normally send me into a huge stress, spring has well and truly begun in Melbourne. I can’t possibly be too upset when I can walk out into my backyard and see all this.

On Monday night, Mr C and I sat down to watch Talk To Her, a Pedro Almodóvar film that we’ve been waiting for from Quickflix for months. Whomever had it on loan finally decided to return it… we were starting to believe it would never arrive.

Both of us loved it, and it had many wonderful moments, but one of my favourites was a small one. A nurse answers a phone at one point with “Hola Lola!” (I won’t say what she said following that, but it was pretty funny…) We’ve both been walking around the house since then shouting, “Hola Lola!” repeatedly.

So imagine my delight when we received an email last night from Gizo with the news that we knew was coming, but the details that we didn’t. Yesterday, the second day of spring, Kymbo gave birth to a healthy baby girl… named Lola! Congratulations!

Hola Lola!

I’d better get cracking on your surprise.

Remember these?

Well, the green and white Pi circles have now been frogged and turned into these…

I dyed them using the d20 die set method. As you can see in the following picture, Mr C’s 8-sided die determined the colour, the 20-sided die indicated the length in centimetres of the colour and the 10-sided die determined the overlap of colour.

All of this is part of my latest art project, crocheting the Lorenz Manifold. This stems from my interest in space, the universe and Chaos Theory.

As the Oxford Amercian Dictionary on my laptop puts it, chaos theory is

the branch of mathematics that deals with complex systems whose behaviour is highly sensitive to slight changes in conditions, so that small alterations can give rise to strikingly great consequences.

My lecturer at uni did advise me to go all out with my geek this semester, and as such, I’m lovingly referring to this project in my head as Jaffa Cakes and Coat Pockets.

This was my Ravelympics project, but I didn’t have the yarn ready in time for the opening ceremony and ended up starting this a week ago instead. There is no way I’ll be getting Ravelympic gold here, but at 23 rounds of a total 47 in, I’m pretty damn proud of my progress anyway. Before this project, the only crochet I knew was the basic stuff needed for knitting, so I’ve learned how to crochet on the coolest (”cool” in geek terms…) project ever.

I’ll give more details as the project goes on, but my proposal this semester is looking at the links between fabric, stories, creation, science and the universe.

As such, this podcast, which I listened to on the tram coming home from work the other night, almost made me cry with its wonderfulness. Thanks to Alex for turning me onto Radiolab.

Happy National Science Week everyone!

This is up there as my favourite music video ever…

Architecture in Helsinki - Like It Or Not from helsinkids on Vimeo.

I should add, this was directed by Josh Logue from Mathematics in Sydney.

First up, the photos of the Mixtogether gift I received from Drewzel. It’s so cute! Drewzel was suffering from a case of crafter’s nerves on Saturday, which is just silly. I love it! The Monkey bag is adorable, and as an added bonus, it has a lining of owl fabric. Monkeys and owls. Awesome. I’ve also just discovered that one of the pens is a tiny fountain pen. I love fountain pens. Score! Every time I have to work in the stationary department at my store, I’m tempted to drop a load of cash on one of the beautiful fountain pens.

Also, currently very much in need of a Light Bulb Moment. My animation proposal is due in class tomorrow. I plan on sleeping it over tonight, getting up super early and writing it from the warmth and comfort of my bed.

Next up…

I finished knitting something! Actually, I plan on ripping the body back when the semester is over and re-knitting the ribbing from just below the bust to improve the fit. Despite that, I’ve barely taken it off since I finished it a fortnight ago. I love having a warm and simple jumper to wear. Rav details here.

I finished something else last week too… Mr Crumpet’s birthday gift! He turned 35 yesterday, so go and wish him well (and quickly, before the onslaught of our combined geekiness puts you in some sort of strange coma…)

First, the bookmaking geekiness.

It’s another clamshell box, this one made from an old (and free) RMIT library book that I gutted. But wait… check out the title…

Yes, it’s a box for his d20 Dungeons and Dragons dice. Now I just need to make some velvet bags for this set and the two others that he’s recently bought for himself.

Of course, he can’t actually use the dice this Friday night like he thought he could, because he’d forgotten that Friday the 15th of August is the annual RMIT Printmaking Auction. He’ll have to show off my +10000000000 awesomeness to his d&d group (guild? is guild the right term?) some other time.

Viewing for the auction is from 6pm, with Andy and Joel starting the very fun live auctioneering at 7pm. The purpose of the auction is to raise funds for our graduate show in November, and we’ll be auctioning around 70 or so artworks from a variety of emerging and established artists. m1k3y, this is your chance to get your hands on some of that “medieval furry art”*. You know you want it. Actually, I know I want it…

Anyway, the address is level 1, building 49, 67 Franklin Street Melbourne. From 6pm. There’ll be food and drinks and cupcakes and raffles and doorprizes and awesomeness. I’d love to see you there.

And if you come, you’re required to put in at least one bid for each of the following two lithographs… or else…

*His words, not mine.

Yesterday I had to get up at 5:30 to be at work by 8. Difficult, especially as I’d attended Kristina’s show opening for perceive.identify.archive at Off the Kerb gallery on Friday night. It was well worth it — the show is amazing. Kristina has started filling the room with her paper yarn (I taught her to spin!) from floor to ceiling and will continue to do so over the next two weeks.

Anyway, I had to be at work that early to do a stocktake. Always ridiculously fun. I got to leave earlier than everyone else though (although, as it turns out, not quite early enough to get to where I was going on time…) because yesterday was Mixtogether #2!

I spent some time this week making my favourite kind of handmade book for the gift swap — single folio blank journals sitting inside a cloth-covered clamshell box. Although I made it without all the fancy tools in that tutorial… just my trusty scalpel, a heavier knife, a steel ruler, a cutting mat and a bone folder.

Here it is open — some of you may recognise the spare Alice screenprints from first-year uni that I used for the covers of the books.

The outer is linen coloured book cloth (my favourite!) and the inner of the box is stunningly beautiful printed paper, both purchased from Melbourne Artist’s Supplies on Little Lonsdale St near RMIT in the city, for those interested.

My book, along with some relief printmaking supplies (ink, cutting tools and a couple of wood blocks for carving) went to the lovely Serena from Reeniesu. This is her on the right, and Nikki on the left. I promise to post a relief printing tutorial soon, Serena.

I haven’t had a chance to take photos of the adorable gift I received yet because I decided to surprise the Mister with dinner from one of our favourite old haunts, Global Vegetarian on North Road in Ormond, as I was in the area. As such, it took me quite a while to get home, what with the waiting for the meal and the waiting for the public transport, but the look on his face when he realised what I’d brought home was worth it. Then we sat down and watched the brilliantly wonderful Hedwig and the Angry Inch, which I’ve been wanting to see for a ridiculous number of years, but has been quite hard to find. We both adored it, and Mr C also has a new mancrush in John Cameron Mitchell.

Then it was to bed, with our awesome new underlay that I received as a prize through Mini Jumbuk from work. That’s $600 of free right there, for true. It’s so awesome that I haven’t actually made it out of bed yet. Yay for laptops! Have to get up now though to go to the country for my grandmother’s 96th birthday celebrations — happy birthday Grandma!

Been madly busy this week. I have blog posts that I want to make, but I haven’t been home to make them. Here’s a little something in the meantime — my first blossom for the season, blurring the lines between winter and spring.