Critique # 2

Going into this critique I was a little more nervous than the first. I was more confidant in my first structure than I was with my pillow. I was scared that everyone was going to have these really great projects and I was going to have this pillow made of marshmallows. The thing I didn't like about it was that it sounds so easy and simple, but the work that went into it was a lot more than you would think.

For this critique we were split in small groups and assigned three other projects to look at and critique first. I liked the projects that my group had and so it made me even more nervous to hear what others had to say about mine. We looked at the camera taken apart, the soap, and the clock globe. I really liked how the camera looked taken apart with each piece hanging like a mobile. The idea behind it was pretty cool too. The camera was put on display, instead of it displaying something else. The soap was really good as well. The detail of it was well done and the overall picture was really recognizable. I didn't quite understand how all the different religions were connected with washing your hands, but I still liked it. The clock globe was good too. I thought it was put together well, and gave a pretty clear understanding of the idea.

When we came together as a class and actually started the critique, the artist wasn't allowed to really talk about their piece until after the class talked about it. Usually the people who critiqued the piece would talk, then others would if they had something to say. I felt like it was a lot harder to say something about the projects that you didn't critique. It was harder, because without the artist talking about it first, and without reading the artist statement, you really didn't know what to say about it. Especially with this project, the transformations, it was hard to tell what some of the projects were supposed to be. I didn't like the format of this critique because of that. I also feel it's a little unfair that we're graded on how much we speak during the critique when it was formatted this way. I'm also unhappy with my grade from the last critique. I spoke about at least five other student's work and still got a lower grade. I don't see how we can comment on everyone's piece, or what we're expected to say. I would honestly have to make stuff up to say because there's not that much to say about everyone's work and I hate making up fake things to say. I feel like it's stupid to have to do that and defeats the purpose if you don't really mean it. I say something when I mean it, and if I don't have anything to say, I don't say anything, and so I feel like we shouldn't be graded so much on how much we say.

Okay now that I got that out i'll finish this. When my turn came around, not too many people had anything to say about it, which was okay. The group that critiqued it told me what they thought, but I didn't get much out of it. I don't know what I would do different, or change. I was just happy after it was over, but I don't think that my grade is going to be too good on this one.

Transformation Project

For this project I had to go with the only idea I had because the others wouldn't work out. I tried to melt marshmallows in the microwave and then form them into something, but that really didn't work. The marshmallows dried way to fast and were just too sticky to work with. I only had a limited amount of time to finish the project and so I had to get going on it. My only other idea was to make the pillow out of marshmallows. I had an idea of what it would look like, but the end product ending up being different than I imagined.

I did a little trial with mini marshmallows to see how I could connect them. I tried gluing them together with super glue and that didn't work. I was surprised that the glue wouldn't keep them together. I'm pretty sure it's because of the powder on the marshmallows. Then I tried getting them wet and rubbing them until they were bonded together. This worked with the mini marshmallows, so I figured it would work for the large ones too. I thought I could use toothpicks as a last resort if the water wouldn't work. I wanted the marshmallows to still be soft on Tuesday, the day the project was due, so I didn't want to start making it until a few days before that.

The first day I started on the pillow, I tried to connect the marshmallows just with water. Because I was using large ones for the pillow, it was much more difficult. They would not stay together with just the water. It would have taken forever if I wanted to do the whole pillow this way because I would have to sit and rub two marshmallows at a time, then let them dry (which took hours for the small ones) and then add one on at a time at that rate. There was no way I would be able to construct it this way, so I decided to just connect them with toothpicks.

I would dip a toothpick in water, then slide it in the middle of a marshmallow, then stick another on the other side. This process went by much faster than the water. I stuck together a row of marshmallows at the length I wanted first, then added another row next to it and so on until it was the width I wanted. Then I made the second layer on top of the first, connecting the two as I went with the toothpicks. I was amazed at how many marshmallows and toothpicks it took to finish the pillow. I ended up using five bags of marshmallows, and over 500 toothpicks.

The pillow didn't exactly turn out how I hoped. I didn't really like using the toothpicks to connect them because they showed through in some parts. I couldn't really avoid them showing because they would be deep down and connecting the marshmallows together, making it almost impossible to go in and redo it. I also didn't like how the marshmallows had spaces between them. Because they're round, they won't fit perfectly together, therefore leaving spaces between them. There wasn't really anything I could do about that either. I was surprised at how heavy the pillow ended up being as well. When I think of marshmallows I think of something light and fluffy, but this pillow was not that. With the amount of marshmallows I used, it made it much heavier.

I ended up liking the fact that the weight was something that you wouldn't expect from a pillow made of marshmallows. I also kind of liked that there were hundreds of toothpicks within the "fluffy" marshmallows. If I could have somehow made the craft better, I think it would have been more successful, but I don't see how I could. Over all i'm pretty happy with it, but there's just some things about it that turned out different than I pictured.