Hand pulled glass filati, concrete, pigment.
Various dimensions.
2024.
Field of Vision – a broad-landscape view and what is within our sights.
Miniature, organic shaped, wall sculptures appear to cluster and disperse, suggestive of lichens and cellular worlds meticulously observed.
Informed by personal experiences of being immersed in, and studying, nature Kessel is interested in looking out, the nature of observation, and our personal response, how we experience, interpret and respond to what we see.
‘I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.’
John of the Mountains: The Unpublished Journals of John Muir.
The practical, and immersive, act of making is an important aspect of the work. Glass filati with wrapped cores are encased in pigmented concrete. Colours are selected and each thread is hand-pulled then cut to form miniature tesserae, placed with precision, one in response to the other.
The VAS Inches Carr Creative Development Award 2022 funded research into the materials, techniques and processes involved in creating traditional filato micro-mosaics and how these could be translated into a contemporary context. Micro-mosaics were popular souvenirs collected by travellers on the Grand Tour of Italy in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Around this time my gaze shifted from the urban to the natural environment we inhabit and the research led to the research exhibition Memento at mote, Edinburgh and Field of Vision Inches Carr Showcase in the VAS Centenary exhibition at the RSA galleries, Edinburgh.
