Research Questionnaire for amputees

Name
Gender
Age
Have you ever suffered from a mental health condition related to amputation such as
body dysmorphia or depression?
Y	N
If so could you please give details on how this has affected you?
What care, if any, did you receive for this/these condition(s)? Was this care offered or
did you have to seek it out yourself?
Do you think your psychological state influenced your physical recovery? If so in what way?
Do you feel that the aesthetic of your limb is important? If so in what way?
Y	N

Do you think involvement in the design of a new limb could help to give a better sense
of control?
Y	N
Do you think it is important for a prosthetic to match your aesthetic needs?
Y	N
Would you wear an aesthetically designed prosthetic or prosthetic cover? Please give
your reasons.
Y	N

 This information is for use in a paper on the psychological aspects of amputation and how aesthetics could play a part in recovery, you will remain anonymous. Please contact me if you have anything further to add or if you would be willing to have a more thorough conversation, or even if you’re just interested in what I’m doing.

 Thank you for completing this questionnaire.

Ross Reynolds,

Ross.C.Reynolds@hotmail.com

Italian Adventure: Day 6

 This is a bit post-humorous, as the exhibition was a week ago now, but once again I've found myself inundated with tasks and this is the first opportunity I've had to sit down and collect my thoughts about Trento.

 The exhibition was quite a daunting experience having never exhibited outside of an educational institution, which always feels very safe. There are people there, it doesn't feel as though they're there to see (or indeed) judge your work, they've just come to support a loved one. I'm not sure if that's naive or cynical, or an odd mix of the two. Anyway, exhibiting work outside of that realm, promoting it as a 'proper' exhibition was fairly strange. Another thing I was apprehensive about was the language barrier and my inability to absorb any words other than 'caffe latte per favore?' 

 In spite of my worries, the exhibition proved a great success, with a fair few people wandering in from the street. One of the highlights of the show for me was Annabeth Robinson's process video, which captured everyone's working methods and showed how the work on show was created, giving a visual background on the principals behind everyone's pieces. I also made a process video, unfortunately my laptop seams to take issue with the file type, hopefully I'll be able to upload it soon.

 I'm actually quite proud of the work I exhibited, creating a series of prints in three days that are show worthy is no mean feat. I originally intended them to be black and gold, but felt the addition of the grey helped to produce a more complex image whilst maintaining the overall tone of the work. I used a map of the area to produce linoprint maps coupled with prints made from tracings I took from the cracks and textures in those areas. The idea was to show how the microscape can be more descriptive of a certain place than a map, and how the small microscape and city scape are irrevocably linked. Basically how these textures can be seen as the cells from which the town is composed. The texture prints also hold a sense of time, in that they are produced by temporal processes such as weathering.

And for the last time #TicTacTrento

Italian Adventure: Day 5

 So my plan to do a Trento diary kind of failed, simply because I’ve been too busy collecting images and making prints to exhibit. The town itself is quite strange when using Leeds as a reference. On the Saturday as few of us set out to get supplies from a local art shop set in an industrial estate, the buildings and tone of the area where strictly at odds with the surroundings, these imposing mountains that can be seen throughout the town. The centre, which I am counting as Piazza Duomo as it’s where I spent most time, has that quality that only age can impart. I found the entire place to be a system of textures, cracks and weathering. I found myself taking a photo of an interestingly textured door way only to find I was stood outside a H&M.

 As I began to see the town more on this scale as opposed to the grand mountains and frescoed buildings, my work began to focus on these cracks, the areas of temporal process. As I continued I started to relate these fractures to the framework of a map, linking the micro-scape to the cityscape and the macro, the textures I picked up becoming maps in there own right, connecting these small areas and the natural, timefull processes to the urban, manmade cityscape which because of it’s age seams timeless.

  The above is a preview of my starting point, the first prints that I produced whilst here. The final pieces are changed in a few ways but I feel I’ve kept the elements and the spirit I was trying to embody. The exhibition is tonight, we’ve handed out flyers, put up posters, all we can hope now is that people will come. Wish us luck!

#TicTacTrento

Italian adventure: Day 0

Credit to Kara Zichittella for the flyer design

So I'm all packed and ready, got my inks and lino, got my camera, everything I need to create work in the smallest time frame ever. On Tuesday the 1st of March some of the MA cohort and myself will be putting on an exhibition of work we've produced in Trento. I can't wait to see what everyone comes out with. 

#TicTacTrento

Also some new prints on my Etsy, so have a gander!

Anatomise Art - Shop

Resin impregnated tissue paper.

 So, from the mould I created from this plater leg I decided to create a hollow structure from resin. There are a few ways to do this, with the most common being producing a inner mould and pouring the resin into the space in-between. Another approach is to use something as a matrix, to hold the resin to the sides of the mould without the need for an inner cast. 

 I decided to have a play with impregnating tissue paper which resin, to find out whether it could produce a stable structure (the mould I used for this experiment was an older one laying around the workshop, if I find out who to credit I will). It worked well, creating a semi-opaque cloudy material filled with small air bubbles and inflections making it feel a lot more organic than pure resin. 

I then lined my leg mould, made from silicone, with the impregnated tissue. Building up layers of laminated tissue with the same intent of rebar in concrete. 

The foot had to be cast in the normal way, as I only made a single part mould. If I was going to recreate this I would probably make a two part mould so I could use the lining technique throughout to produce a more cohesive limb. There is a bit of yellowing of the pour-cast resin, and I didn't quite get the undercuts of the cast. Hopefully I can resolve both of these with the polishing process removing some of the yellowing from the foot, and a recast of the toes to get the full form. 

I may use this limb to experiment with light, I think the inflections and air bubbles would become more pronounced adding to the more organic qualities. I'd want the limb to look as if it itself was emitting light as opposed to just looking as off I'de dropped a bulb in there. We'll see what happens as I continue to experiment. 

The next step after the initial finishing and tidying up will be to create the interface, the portion of the prosthetic where the residual limb would connect. As this is just an experiment, not a limb for use, I can make a more generalised mould as opposed to one designed to fit a specific person.