The Kick-About #54 ‘Whirligig’

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Our last Kick-About together invited us into the spectacle of Toulouse-Lautrec’s circus paintings, and so to spin around for a bit in the company of clowns and acrobats. Thanks to Kick-Abouter, Gary Thorne, we appear to be turning in circles again this week, and departing on other flights of fancy…

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Gary Thorne

“Having swam my way through sciatica, it seemed appropriate to channel that commitment into a Whirligig self-portrait. It is not quite pivoting smoothly on turning into the wind – so more engineering fun ahead yet, it was massive fun to make. Apology for the amateur film making!”

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linkedin.com/in/gary-thorne

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James Randall

“I found myself with a bit of time for a 50 second whirligig video, made of junk I had, but not having touched Premiere or After Effects for years – and playing in Garage Band too… It was fun. Thank you very much! “

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Kerfe Roig

“I had no illusions I could construct an actual whirligig.  But I figured I could do something that moved, with birds. As usual, not much like my original vague idea.  And I had a very hard time finding a place to hang it where there wouldn’t be too much stuff in the background for a photo.  As a result, the photos aren’t great, but they do give an idea of how it looks in motion.  And now that it’s fan weather, it’s in motion much of the time.“

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kblog.blog / methodtwomadness.wordpress.com

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Colin Bean

“Rowland Emett was a cartoonist and sculptor of automata. He created things that are whimsical, English and eccentric and which serve the purpose to raise a smile and be enjoyed (Far Tottering and Oyster Creek Branch Railway Festival of Britain 1951). To me, his work is like a cross between early steampunk and Festival of Britain surrealism. I  also wanted a theme to work around, and an illustration of the cross section of the (art nouveau/steampunk) Nautilus in a  1950’s  Disney children’s book provided the theme. The first idea was to imagine a whirligig  (generally a wind driven automata) for Captain Nemo’s garden. Unfortunately, he never made land and I am no mechanical engineer, but I did put one together and rough-tested it with white card model. However, a lot of time was spent in the processing and considering its movement, and I felt the fantasy and whimsical Emmet elements were getting a little lost, so in the late and last hour, to refresh, I returned to doodling and to the train idea. Times up and I have a beginning and some initial responses. It’s been another great Kick-About and provided a lot of material to mine….. plenty more left in this Kick-About to chase.“

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Phil Gomm

“Developing some ideas first inspired by a previous bird-based Kick-About, I set about thinking about how I might release a bird into the rooms of my home and photograph it. Actually, I set about constructing a cardboard, bird-shaped whirligig that I could suspend along a length of white elastic, which I then sent twanging around the low-ceilings of our tiny seaside home and photographing on longish-exposures. From humble ad-hoc origins (I spray-painted the cardboard bird-thing with cans of old car paint from the shed, using our landfill wheelie bin as an impromptu spray booth…), I was able to produce some surprisingly transformative photographs. Some of them even left me thinking, ‘It’s an actual bloody bird!’. I did four different shoots over four different days – an hour-a-piece – and tried a few different things each time, with the resulting photographs moving quickly towards more impressionistic effects.”

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philgomm.com

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With thanks to regular Kick-Abouter (and cocoon-botherer), Graeme Daly, a new prompt and another complete shift. Looking forward to seeing you getting into your neo-expressionist stride! Enjoy.

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