Exploring the gravitational waves

When 100 years ago Einstein predicted the gravitational waves, he was in a debate with himself. How would you prove something that is not only invisible, but so difficult to detect? Earlier this year (2016) scientists of LIGO (The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) finally announced to the world one of the major discoveries of the century: the existence of the gravitational waves, which opened a new door into the space exploration. In the meanwhile scientists of ESA (The European Space Agency) for many years (first proposed in 1998) has been already working on a mission called LISA Pathfinder, which is designed to explore the gravitational waves. The 1st spacecraft was launched in Dec. 2015, before LIGO's official announcement. This extraordinary mission inspired me to create a ceramic sculpture. 

I was carrying this idea in my head for a while, trying to figure out the way to pursue the task. I knew that I want to have two gold cubes to be the focus of the sculpture (the essence of the LISA Pathfinder projects is two perfect gold/platinum cubes that are placed in space to free-fall through the fabric of space, without touching the spacecraft). At first I thought I would like to make cubes appear falling (floating in a zero gravity), but the task was not easy to achieve.

The cubes are ready for bisque firing. This set is close to the LISA Pathfinder's cube sizes.

I picked ceramics as my medium, because I could hand-build the cubes and any other parts of the sculpture. I decided to make a structure to represent the gravitational waves, on which I planed to rest the cubes, to make it look like they are floating on the gravitational waves. 

Gold luster appers bright red before it turns gold in a kiln

There are a few stages of the process: make the "perfect" cubes (easier said than done), and the waves. Fire once; glaze; fire 2nd time; apply gold luster on the cubes; fire them again. 
In reality, I made 8 cubes and 2 wave structures, there were many more then 3 firings too. The gold for the cubes would just not appearing perfect enough, so I had to make 3 gold coats for some of them! Between the multiple firings and using so much of the gold luster it became more pricier then I originally planned. But you can not stop in the middle of the project, you need to go all the way, even if the world doubts the outcome of it (have LISA Pathfinder as an example, a mission ahead of our time, that was very futuristic and yet is becoming a big success!). I was lucky to have Cesar Garcia Marirrodriga - LISA Pathfinder Project Manager - to visit me in art studio, who encouraged my work on the sculpture and explained a lot of details about the mission. 

I am still continuing on working on this sculpture, but it is already scheduled to participate at the 1st show! Stay tuned, more to come.

Greenware (raw clay, before firing). 

The waves were hardly fitting in the largest kiln! Greenware is extremely fragile and I had to shorten it on 2 inches - it is a very hard job, which took me 2 hours to do.

Applying glaze for the 2nd firing.

67P: creating ceramic sculptures

When you go to a museum or a gallery, you usually only see the final end product. You judge it by the way it looks at that moment in it's final appearance. To me, the actual process of creation is the most exciting part of any artwork which may influence my opinion on an artwork. I always try to investigate how it was done. 
In this post I would like to take you behind the scene and introduce you to the stages of creation of my new ceramic sculptures. In between the many stages, starting from generating the idea, shaping the sculptures in my mind and sketching on paper, then forming them out of clay, firing, glazing and assembling, all of it is a part of each piece, which makes it a complete artwork, with an experience.

These ceramic pieces are inspired by the comet 67P, a project on which I have been working on for for over a year (see paintings). The rock part of my sculptures represent the comet itself and the white cones – water, found on the comet in the shape of ice. This water evaporates when the comet passes close to our Sun. 

I just recently started working with ceramics and this whole experience is intensified since I am studying about the media as I go. After working with porcelain and stoneware individually, I realized that I could combine the two in one sculpture. The complication was that porcelain and stoneware shrink with a different rate when fired, so when the objects are made out of raw clay and designed to be match-fit, after firing they may not match when combined. This was an interesting puzzle to solve. Below is an image of how my table would look like at my ceramic studio in 92nd Street Y, New York.

Glazing pieces was a whole independent subject of itself. I wanted to mimic the textures of the comet. I decided to leave the white cones as pure porcelain without a glaze. But for the rock part I looked at actual meteorites (image below). 

Here is a documentation image of my glazing record. Each glazing layer (could be 2-5 glazings) was recorded for the future record. When ceramic is fired, it is very hard to predict the outcome and I enjoy the non-predictive nature of ceramics. Assembling the sculptures is also fun. For this particular work some porcelain parts were made to fit exact areas of the rock, the rest where matched later on. I used the epoxy glue to unite the pieces.

Photographing works. Each piece of my work is photographed for the record. But who says it could not be art on itself? Photograph is a way to turn a 3D object into 2D. With a photograph you can create a special mood, which is hard to recreate during the exhibition time, due to the environments offered by the the gallery. A photograph can tell a richer story, while you enjoy the three-dimensionality of a sculptural piece when observing it in person. For this set of works I choose to give it a cosmic look. The lights would be extreme, surrounded by darkness, as if my comet would be flying through space in a cold lonely environment.

There is a story that goes along with the actual European Space Agency's project when they landed a robotic probe on the comet 67P. When the probe ran out of the charge, it fell asleep for a few month since it could not re-charge being positioned on the dark side of the comet where sun does not shine. Scientists were waiting for the comet to turn and eventually in the summer 2015 we started to receive more fascinating data from the probe.

67P in 3D

I am starting to develop a new idea. Comet 97P is the main subject still, but this time I would like to work with a three dimensional format. This is a very early stage of the process and it is hard to say what will come out of it at the end. But as it develops further I am getting a more clear picture. 
For now I am putting my ideas on paper, making collages and 3D models. I picture my final artwork to be made of porcelain (perfect white) and stoneware (rough dark). I am taking pottery classes at the moment to study the precess and my possibilities.

White cone shaped objects, piercing through the rock represent the vaporizing water from the comet as it moves through the space. The contrast with natural shapes of the rocks and perfect sharp shapes of the white cones are very attractive to my eye. It is a parallel between the solid and liquid (rock and water) as well as the union of two different conditions of the material: solid and liquid. Water represented on the comet is remaining in the solid condition of ice and only when the comet is passing next to the Sun, it's starting to melt and instantly turning into vapor (gas), stretching for many miles as a comet's tail.

3D model: 8"x5"x4", rock and paper

Collage is another good way to play with the project and quickly decide on the forms, orientation and the relation with the main objects. For building the parts out of clay I will need to have an idea of the shapes and then allow myself to follow my intuition while forming 3D rock objects. 

Paper scraps