Painting Smash The Patriarchy

Photographs 1-3 depict my first attempt at painting the feminist messages on the high striker. I used the same 3D paint I used for the clock face for the sculpture, Duration, but in different colours. Even though I had painted the clock face onto cartridge paper in Duration, the 3D paint is made for fabrics and has a plastic acrylic base that can be used on materials other than paper. From my experience with using the 3D paint before on Duration, I knew I could get the glossy melting effect I needed with this paint.

I stuck with the fairground style font, called Carnivalee, that I used for the Peace & Judy stall and which Anne also continued using for the fairground signs. Photographs 1 and 3 depict my first attempt at painting "POP THE PATRIARCHY". Originally, I thought bigger the font, the better. However, as seen in photographs 1 and 3, the font looks too big and makes the writing look as though it's inspired by halloween. Also, it covers the wooden drips and takes away too much focus from the melting wood. Therefore, I tried again with a more subtle approach by decreasing the font size and positioning the words to follow the flows of the drips (see photograph 2). "SWING IT LIKE A GIRL" and "DECOLONISE FEMINISM" worked much better, although "SHATTER THE GLASS CEILING" didn't work as well because it was more difficult to follow the drips and the 3D paint was too pale.

*Photographs 1-3 were taken on 9th April 2017.

Once I scraped off "POP THE PATRIARCHY" and "SHATTER THE GLASS CEILING" and re-sanded those areas, I tried again. This time round, I decreased the font for "POP THE PATRIARCHY" and changed the positioning and colour from pale pink to bright pink in "SHATTER THE GLASS CEILING".

Once all the messages were painted on, I placed the high striker up and took a step back to view it in its finished state. Unfortunately, my sister's dog ran into my studio at that moment and wagged his tail by the high striker smudging the bottom line! (Which definitely sounds like the beginnings of a comedy sketch). As the paint wasn't completely dry, I was able to wipe the bottom line off completely. Once the rest of the painted messages had dried, I re-sanded the bottom area and reapplied the 3D paint. Photographs 5 and 6 depict the finished state, (which I left to dry lying on the workbench above the ground!).

*Photographs 4-6 were taken on 10th April 2017.