SubscribeA bunch of people have been asking me what this series of cut-up text pieces, the Blast Series, is all about. The common questions are "How do you come up with these arrangements?" and "Why is there text on them?", both of which are great questions. Some knowledge of the process ought to make them more interesting beyond the initial formal level.
I came up with the ideas for this series in late 2008 or early 2009. I started dividing up squares geometrically, writing on the intact square, then recombining it into a more interesting abstract shape with text that was half-readable. I wanted some text-based art that was interesting to look at in terms of its formal qualities, but that wasn't as direct as the usual readable text art. The first study was done on a 48 x 48" piece of paper, but it didn't really hold up physically or as an idea--it didn't relate to anything I was doing. A few months later, after I had been working on the Black Holes and Collisions for a while, I came up with the idea of a series of Blasts, in which canvases or panels would be "shattered" and arranged on a wall in a geometric arrangement. It's only this year that I put those two ideas together to create this series.
I like the idea of using text directly in my work because almost all of my ideas begin linguistically as a word or a phrase. The Black Holes started from the words "Black Hole", and I sought (and still seek) to make exactly that--Black Holes.
Everything starts with the phrases. They either come from what I'm consciously thinking about, things that get stuck in my head out of nowhere, or are based on ideas I'm reading about or otherwise encounter randomly.
I do a bunch of thumbnail sketches of squares divided up.
Once I have those thumbnails, I pick ones that seem interesting and not too symmetrical and do a clean, larger version.
I'll spend some time associating particular phrases with those cleaned-up sketches and deciding on how the text might be arranged.
The next step in the process is actually making a 12 x 12" version of the piece. For the first few, I used stick-on vinyl letters in Helvetica font to mask out the text, leaving a negative image, but now I use a font of my own design.
After the 12 x 12" square on paper is done, I cut that up as planned and begin making some possible arrangements. After a few tries, I'll lock down the shape.
Once I decide to scale up the piece, I start by drawing out the shape on panel and cutting it out.
To make the support bars, I have to go back to the square design on paper to calculate all the angles, which isn't too tough considering there tend to be a few 45 and 90 degree angles to help define the remaining angles.
Once all the panels are built, I put arrange them upside down on a table to drill all the holes for the bolts.
After that comes priming and painting the solid color on the panels.
The stencils are placed on the intact square of the panels, painted, then left to dry.
After that, the bolts are put in place and tightened down, and the piece is finished.
