Shifting Landscapes of Material and Language: Symbolic expression through metalsmithing and creative writing

Abstract

My research has sought to explore the possibilities of developing a fictional narrative through an existing visual art practice of principally working with metal. The focus of this practice-led project has therefore been to investigate this relationship between the processes of art-making and creative writing. The story, which was completed during the candidature, was provided as supplementary material in the format of a hardcover book. The subjects of the artworks and the written narrative include themes such as metaphor, symbolic expression, and landscape. It is through these concepts that the two creative processes first became intertwined. As my research progressed the relationship between writing and making evolved unpredictably. I came to understand the two processes of making and writing as ways of handling the two different substances of material and language. The relationship under investigation in this case, then, was not limited to a practice of conducting the two processes in tandem. More complex correlations arose through the ways in which these substances were manipulated and transformed.