I visited the Philadelphia Art Alliance this past Spring and saw "The Tool at Hand," a traveling exhibition in which sixteen artists were asked to make a piece using only one tool.
It was an interesting idea for a show. Some of the pieces were really strong. One of my favorites was by London silversmith David Clarke, who displayed partially melted silver spoons. His tool was an oven. Another artist, Helen Carnac, used a rolling mill on several different household items- safety pins, papers, etc., and displayed them like artifacts in a huge glass case.
Pieces I liked less included a painting made with only one paintbrush (kind of a bland take on the challenge, in my opinion).
In my last post, I posted images of poems. Poetry has been a major source of inspiration for my work; a sort of abstract tool I use to get to work. In remembering this exhibition in Philly, I started to think about all of the physical tools I use to make things.
In the past month, I have used all of these items.
