“… more serious-looking tools of Future Fossil Tablets #1 to #6, a series of archaeological-looking tablets Taylor moulded of clay, but glazed to look like stone. Softening the dark heaviness, the background design is a weaving pattern made with a kitchen fork, the tines pressed into the clay in the same way a baker would crease the top of a cookie or a weaver would weave. It’s a warm, domestic touch.
Of course weaving, and its traditional place as “women’s” work, can be read as a subtle nod to the feminist concerns that Taylor has long addressed in her work. (In fact, Taylor likens her art practice to weaving, picking up old threads of theme and technique, and weaving in new ones, too, with each new body of work).” – Kate Wallace from Future Fossils
TOOL PAINTINGS: acrylic on paper
I needed to feel these objects that I had lived with for the past 40 years, looked at, touched and in some cases, used…would be strong enough in clay to represent and convey the importance of human tools.
I thought of going to a hardware store and buying some with clean hard edges that would create a sharp imprint in clay…but when I looked at a new hammer, new shiny pliers…they just were not right, not what I wanted. So, I decided to draw my old tools first and make a decision.. As soon as I finished one I knew that I wanted them to be part of Future Fossils.
I talked once with Imago in Moncton’s Aberdeen Center about using their studio to make very large prints of the same tools…as you see they have been connected to my art thinking process for a long time…their presence on the wall beside the wood stove has been part of my working/thinking environment since I started using the Warman wood working shop as a studio.