DISPLAY OF FINAL PIECE

This is how I chose to display my final piece. The order I chose was the 'normal' bone first, then the osteoporosis, then Paget's Disease of the Bone, then Brittle Bone Disease and lastly bone cancer. The box was made out of a cork material, whilst the wedges are made of wood. There are six wedges per rod; I think they add a nice detailing to the box which gives it an oriental feel. It connects to the title of my work, 'Architecture of the Human Body', as bones can be seen as pillars of the body. The diseases which weaken the bones mean the body struggles to keep itself upright. Like that of a building, if the pillars weaken or crumble, the building struggles to stay up and eventually falls without any added support.

Influences for Tag

Influences for Tag

Tags

Tags

  The normal bone is labelled 'Os' which means bone in latin, this plaster tube is plain to represent a normal, clean bone.

  I chose to place the osteoporosis bone next to the plain as a result of the contrast between the smooth, minimal nature of the first tube with the excessive porous nature of the latter bone. The osteoporosis bone is labelled 'Osteoporosis' as this is already its latin name.

  The third bone shows Paget's Disease of Bone, which is labelled 'Paget s osse vitiate'. The labels are all handwritten as I was influenced by the old museum labels, as if these 'bones' had come from a cabinet draw. The handwritten nature of these labels compliments the handcrafted nature of all the bones. Originally, I planned to have the labels engraved into metal but I feel this may have come across as a trophy case, which is not what I desired. Having the labels adds ambiguity to the piece, but hints at what they actually are without being entirely obvious. I drilled a hole just in front of the rods to place the string from the label.

  The fourth bone represents the fracture of brittle bone disease, labelled 'Osteogenesis imperfecta'. I had to put this bone together whilst making the piece, by drilling in the holes for the metal bars.

 The last bone disease, cancer (Osteosarcoma), was placed at the end as most of the plaster is untouched expect the end. It insinuates that a bone could seem healthy and normal, but in actual fact have a concealed disease. Many suffers of bone cancer do not realise they have the disease until after many years, as the only symptom is bone pain. This pain can often be mistaken for pains that come with a great deal of exercise.

Final Piece in Place

Adding rods to the box

Final Set up

Labels in box

 Overall, I am pleased with the final outcome. If I had more money or more time, I would have liked a wooden box or painted the box, but this was not possible. Despite these changes, I am happy with the set up of my piece. When considering the space, my piece works well with the surrounding pieces and there is a definite flow to the room. Although not fully a spacial experience like of Richard Serra's work (which is something I drifted away from during the process), there is still a connection between the space, piece and the viewer.

Making Process 6: Latex Tumour

Osteosarcoma is a malignant bone tumour that is caused by cancer. The tumour either grows completely inside the bone, seeps out a little, is inside the bone but at a high grade or spread from the bone to surrounding tissues. The latex is supposed to represent the bone tumour, and its alienated spreading nature. The latex is the negative space of the holes made in the rods, which is something I have previously experimented with. I have experimented with different textures for the 'tumours' and colours, to take away from the yellowy latex colour. To make the latex growths, you mix thickener with the liquid latex and paint over the plaster mould. This is left to dry for twenty minutes and then reapplied; this is repeated until thick.

Original Latex

 Firstly, I experimented with the latex on small samples: I looked at colours, textures, materials and so on. Below are all the samples created and their mix of materials.

All Small Samples

SAMPLE

SMALL SAMPLES

Normal Latec

Red acrylic paint and brown dye

Brown dye

Orange powder

Blue powder

All mixed together

 I found the brown dye and paint worked the best, with the powders not filling every nook and crevice of the mould.

 After making small samples, I decided to make samples at the actual size they would be on the plaster. I made many different plaster moulds and created three different samples: a blue dye, red food colouring/red paint and brown mixed with red.

LARGE SAMPLES

Plaster mould

 I found recreating the same colours was mix more difficult than I anticipated. The blue dye came out extremely false as it was all one colour; this did not seem realistic at all. The red food colour was almost rusty rather than red whilst the brown dye and red was the closest thing I could come to, to a natural bloody colour. The colour mixed up in the bowl dried a much darker colour so was difficult to predict.

Rusty Brown/red latex

Blue latex

 I originally wanted to have the latex in the middle of the tube, however, it just came out so false. Rather than growing out of the bone its looked as if it had been placed which is not what I wanted. I found this the most challenging aspect of all the bones because it just couldn't seem to look right. Everywhere I tried to incorporate seemed wrong. I chose to redesign my idea. I then chose to put the latex at the end of the tube, by chiselling out the end and placing it there as if it was emerging out. This was successful as it was subtler than before. As a result of the colour against all the white tubes, if there was a mistake it would have been extremely obvious. Having it placed at the end was a great way of resolving this issue. I covered it with PVA to make the latex shiner, and more alienated.

Drawing Ideas

Testing at the end 

Final positioning

Making Process 6: Fixing a Fracture

My original idea was to create a bone with a crack in to replicate the disease Osteogenesis Imperfecta, (Brittle Bone Disease), which causes extremely brittle bones and suffers are prone to fractures. When I was moving one of the rods accidentally snapped in two, however, the crack was rather perfectly positioned and rather beautiful.
 To fix this back together, I have created the nails that fix real bones back together out of bolts and three steel rods. One steel rod is positioned between the two pieces of 'bone', and drilled in. The other two are used outside the bone. They have holes drilled in which the screws and bolts fit into, that attach to the plaster. I have to put this together when I display the piece.

Example of the fixing of a fracture

Potential Bolts

Potential Bolt

Actual Bolts used

Crack repositioned

Fixings

Middle fixture 

Connectors

Making Process 5: S'more Drillin'

For the second 'bone', I was focusing on Paget's disease, which has a similar affect as osteoporosis in weakening the bone by excessive breakdown. However, the different between them in that Paget's disease localises to only certain bones rather than all of the bones like Osteoporosis. For this reason I decided to focus the holes to only one area of the tube, to represent this proportion. 

Bone representing Paget's Disease

 Like the osteoporosis bone, I used a drill to create the holes but instead of using different sized drill bits, I just used the one larger end. It was a localised, extremely fragile area of the rod.

Blow Drying away dust

 Like the previous rod, the holes built up with dust. However, after learning from my previous mistake of letting it build up before I got rid of the dust, I blew dry it away as soon as I had drilled the hole. This meant almost all the plaster particles were gone from the holes the entire time.

Brushing away excess

This piece was successful, so far this one has not broken or cracked, but its extremely weak due to the  concentration of holes. I must be careful with this when moving the rod to its final place.

Making Process 4: Drillin'

To make the rod that represented the disease of osteoporosis, I had to drill into the plaster to create this eroded texture. I used different drill bits to create the varying sized craters and network of holes.

Beginning of Drilling

Holes in Plaster 

Drilling the plaster 

 The drilling of the plaster was extremely time consuming as a result of the 2m length of plaster and the continuous changing of the drill bit. Moreover, if you did not continuously take out the plaster dust from the pores they would clog up, making it harder to remove overall. i found the best technique to blow-dry whilst using a brush to take out the dust. If that failed, hoovering it also worked.

1/3 Drilled

Breakage

As a result of the delicacy and brittle nature of the holes in the plaster, the plaster rod snapped in half. I may attempt to fix it but I actually quite like the crack. The almost happy accident accentuates the frail nature of bones affected by osteoporosis, and how the less dense bone marrow causes the bone to be so much more susceptible to fracture. I am very happy with the outcome of this plaster tube as it has an extremely effective aesthetics; I tried to fade the holes out near the end of the pole to show how osteoporosis eventually effects all of the bone.

Making Process 3: The Never Ending Peeling of Cardboard

I made the mistake of forgetting to lubricate any of the tubes before I poured in the plaster, which made it a million times harder to take the cardboard off. I spent hours peeling off the outer layers until only a thin layer was left on the plaster. 

Peeling Cardboard Off

 I found different techniques worked best for taking of the cardboard as quickly and smoothly as possible. Rubbing with the hand was one of the best methods but did end up hurting my skin, and using a dampened rag also worked well. I found the best method fro getting rid of small bits of cardboard and actually left an interesting surface to the plaster was a chisel. I used it to almost grate of the cardboard, and it left a roughed edged, bone like effect.

Wetting before peeling

Some bits of the cardboard came off extremely easily, I'm not sure if this was because it was water than the rest of the plaster or drier. I didn't time how long after the plaster dried I started to remove the cardboard.

Smooth plaster

I still haven't completely finished this process with two unfinished plaster rods to completely smooth out. Its an annoyingly lengthy process but I am happy with the end results.

Making Process 2: Stopping the Spillage

After having the tubes cut on Friday, I began to set up the process to begin pouring the plaster. I had to put clay at the base of the tube to try and stop any of the plaster leaking as well as secure it with cable to ties to stop it falling over. After testing one to see how much plaster a tube would use, I made all the other plaster rods. It did not run as smoothly as the first tube; the clay was not completely air tight and the plaster leaked everywhere on one of the other tubes. Also, it was quite challenging making the plaster the same consistency with each bucket. Some were thicker than others and I had to make around two buckets for each tube. Eventually. after solving the many crises that occurred and cleaning up all the mess I had six plaster tubes.

To prevent spillage

Cable ties to keep tube sturdy 

Final set up before pouring 

Making up plaster

Pouring Plaster