I've been looking for another art project, and bypassed this one several times. Couldn't think of a significant personal event. However, if one depicts the process of the acquisition of ethics as a diorama system, then one would have *the* defining condition of my life. As such, one begins as a child without ethics, training in all manner of things that most people don't get the chance to. One becomes a safety instructor at the age of twelve - and still doesn't comprehend ethics.

At 14, my trainers and some of my extended family looked at what I was training in, realized I not only didn't have ethics, but didn't have caring either, and sat me down to talk about it. The process of gaining ethics was thus under something of a threat - though I neither saw nor cared about the threat at the time - and I began the lifelong task of acquiring ethics that fit my system of belief in the world.

Since we're rebuilding a 1905 Victorian, I figured I'd give the house the chance to share in this - or, from an artistic perspective, I love wall nook artwork, and since the electricians drove a hole into the wall to check for wiring path to the second floor riser panel, I figured: Where better than there to place a diorama?

The rest of this picture is told in the captions of the photos and descriptions. Lots of that.



So, as with dioramas, taking a look at the general shape of your ethics is probably a pretty good idea. This diorama, I want it to fit in a hole in the wall. It measures correctly. I want it to hold some stuff. That measures correctly too, and with the oak panel scraps, I now have the space I need as well as a much niftier look.

Behind the plaster is lath - there's lots of lath and plaster in all the walls here. This gives you an idea of what I'm going to be placing the diorama in behind.



Except that this is going in behind a place where it was decided not to rip out the lath and plaster - as you can see, that's the hole the electricians left when they were test-drilling for access to place the riser panel. To the right is the old fused knob and tube panel.



As you can see, I've measured and taken some notes. The bottom notes actually apply to the hole, which is six inches wide by three high. This is the space into which I can insert the diorama, which, if I bend it just right, can actually be seven inches wide.

Ethics is like measuring. Measure twice, cut, refine, cut some more - but don't start out completely wrong, or what you're building won't work.

When I was 14, the people who trained me weren't sure if I was broken or not, and the options they had were limited. I wanted to make sure the diorama didn't have to be taken apart and rebuilt, so measured for depth, width, and so on.

I'm also a tech writer - and writing things down helps with both ethics building and diorama making. Or, you know, with making anything at all.



While I was deciding on material, I used some scrap lumber to pre-build the shape of the box I wanted to be working with. Measuring tape, a scrap of pine, etc. This gave me a view of how much space the interior would contain.



Clearly, this doesn't leave a lot of space, so I'm going to want some thinner wood on the vertical. What do I have?

When you're working on ethics, make sure what you're working with does what you think it's going to. When you find something isn't going to fit the model, change it!



Ah, oak panel flooring is three inches wide + tongue. That'll do nicely.

When you find something you think fits with your ethics, pick it up! Test it. If it does fit, use it.



When modeling your ethics, it helps to build the model piecemeal and look at it. If it's what you're expecting, good. If not, redo. If you think you can make it work once it's polished: Be ready to polish.



Then, while you're working and you go to pick up a tool, you'll find it's damaged. In this case, to drill the placer holes for the screws (scavenged screws and a some new ones too, since I couldn't remember where I left the scavenged ones) I needed a drillbit. I've got my lovely screw-gun/drill, but the bit in the size I wanted turned out to be bent. Well, no throwing away a tool without trying to fix it first.

Popped it into the vice, and very carefully bent it back into shape by hand. This is, actually, rather a stupid thing to do, even if you're used to it. Drill edges are sharp, and I've carved myself up a few times in the past by this method when I didn't have a vice - but even though the vice makes things better, it's not perfect.

Ethics: When you're taking a risk, know the degree of risk you're taking. Be prepared to suffer the consequences of taking that risk.

In this case, a touch of pain, no cuts, and a fixed drill-bit in under three minutes, using two re-vicings and spin testing by hand and eye. Spin testing a drill by eye isn't the perfect option, but you can generally get the feel for the balance of the thing. Testing ethics by gut can work too, especially once you're used to the process.



Once the placer holes are set and the screws screwed in, a box to contain the diorama. This box got run through the table-saw a couple more times using the rail guide to square up the shape, carefully missing the screws. Running a screwed fabrication through a table saw must be done carefully - if you tag a screw with the saw blade, you'll kick the fabrication like a mule, and potentially shatter the blade. I was *very* careful in this process.

Ethics building takes risks, but it takes caution too - that's your own system of rules you're messing with there, and if you do it wrong - act on something you weren't sure of, or bugger up a piece - sometimes they kick pretty hard. This means that before you run something through, think hard and be ready to pay the price if you must.



After this, the center panel was cut from oak flooring to friction fit vertically in the box, separating left from right. On the left hand side:

"This is where it comes from."

On the right:

"And here's the structure."

This fits beautifully with what we're doing with the house, as well, and I really like the resonance between the two. Both houses and ethics, if you start from good bones, can come out beautifully.

In this, I wanted to make use of copper wire for the complexity - copper allows for some lovely twists and turns - and represent transition as well, since nearly all my systems are transitional.

I figured I'd strip the wire, toss the trash from it on the left hand side, "From chaos and trash and destruction..."

But as you'll see, that changed pretty rapidly when I saw how it went together.



For starters, I found a Russian stamp. In Russia, my ethics were most severely tested - I'd only just stabilized them, and then ended up in a country where people poisoned me, tried to kill me, and *lots* of other bad stuff happened. A reference to that seemed initially a good idea.



So I placed the stamp and then started the long process of stripping the electrical insulation off the copper wire from the bar across the road that I'd scavenged. Sore fingers coming up...



Ah, but I have X-acto knives, however they're spelled. Great for stripping insulation from wires, if somewhat more dangerous. Ethics which trade speed for danger: Know the risks. Tools, sharp ones especially, are to be respected. If the trade of speed doesn't take added risk into account, bad things can happen fast.



So, stripping insulation, putting the insulation in place to represent chaos/rulelessness, and so forth. It feels a touch off, so I know I'm going to have to come back to it. Constrain the insulation somehow so it doesn't drop down the inside of the wall. It offends the eye some as well, all that green stuff. Maybe I really don't like it.

When you're working on ethics, and you notice a problem you don't have a fix for, be prepared to come back to it.



The transition of chaos to ethics is a delicate thing. One looks at one's surroundings, decides the system of rule and predictability one would like to apply to it, and builds the tools to handle that.

In the diorama, it seemed to me (in ever so ponceish a manner) That the traditional view of a transformer was about the idea I was after. Intellectual art annoys at times, but likewise when working on crafting one's self and one's art, one's stuck thinking the process through. Full of myself much? Sometimes.

But thinking it through: What does this mean?

Barrier twixt ethics and chaos, three twists of the wire around a pencil for each of the five pieces of thick copper, because repetition and system to repetition that stick in the mind work well for both ethics and art.

Drilled holes in the panel between are where the copper runs through: Transform this on the left to this on the right in an organized manner.

By this time, the insulation is really bothering me as a representation of chaos, and it's occurred to me that a natural system isn't precisely chaotic - there are patterns in patterns in patterns. I've also found that one strand of the copper in the set is in fact many thinner strands - why this is, I don't know - but the thinner strands I don't need brute force to manipulate, and I can make far more delicate items, which appeals to me greatly.



With thin wire, I can apply chaos in a non-trashy manner (I go downstairs and throw out the insulation which makes me ever so happy) and I can incorporate nature's patterns to demonstrate patterns from patterns, which is far more clear and less error-filled than patterns from not-patterns.

It's also more true and to the core of the idea.

So, to each thin strand, a figure eight knot (looped infinity) to demonstrate pattern in pattern repetition's endlessness. Then, braiding the tails of the loops to make a three leafed infinity tree with leaves, trunk, and roots. I have enough thin wire for five of these.

At this point my housemate and I discus the idea of Russia as related to ethics as related to demonstration of intent - and there's a definite feel that the stamp is out of place.

When you find something out of place in the ethics, in the art, in the life: Cut it out.

Since the stamp's glue was pretty strong, I ended up manually carving it out of the diorama with an X-acto knife. What a pain in the butt - yet ethics and art are both work, and the job is the job is the job.

If you're going to have ethics? Do the work.

If you're going to have art? Do the work.



The five trees, I wrapped their trunks together into a five/fifteen arm basket. Something must go in that basket.



At this point I got down to the two-fold pain of placing the divider and cutting out the Russian stamp. To do this, I cut toothpicks to hold the thicker copper wire take-offs in place, and manually reamed the divider into place.

Sometimes ethics require brute force to make 'em stick.

The stamp, as stated, was cut out. To do this, I had to cut away part of the wood of the box itself.

Sometimes cutting out a failed portion of ethics is an ugly thing. Hiding from the job just makes the final task that much harder. When you know it needs doing? Do it.

But: Don't move until you see it. Some things cannot be undone, in art and ethics both.



The final three... oh, four!... pieces of figure eight looped thin copper wire, I formed into an insect. I'd considered initially that it would be a butterfly (that famed butterfly effect) but what I ended up with was so obviously a bug in the system that I did what any sane wetdryvac does when they find a bug: I cut it out of the system, examined it, determined that it could still be of use, tied its legs together, and placed it into the infinitree basket on the left side of the transformational takeoffs.

Bug can still do work, but it can't get out, and it can't actually move as it initially intended.

Mental bugs in ethical structures are much the same - find the bug, kill it or put it to work in a new job, and keep going.

This particular bug I was quite pleased with, since I've not done this kind of wire work before.



So, into place, and it initially seemed a good idea to pin the basket to the left with an x-acto blade. Housemate pointed out that having a live blade in the wall was dumb. Housemate completely correct. Blade back out.

Ethics: If someone points out a flaw? Fix the flaw. If it's *not* a flaw, address what it actually is.



On the right hand side of the ethical divide: Structure. I considered a copper loop ring, and a number of other things, but an origami box ended up being both representational of ethical structure and representational of the structure we're aiming to come up with on the house...

...but I have no clue about origami, and so had to go researching...

Ethics: If you don't know what you're doing, look it up.

And found what I needed here: http://www.origami-instructions.com/easy-origami-cube.html

And show your sources if you're using some...

And thus started building my box out of paper scavenged from the printing shop up the road that went out of business. There's not a lot to be said about origami boxes if you've made 'em before, but I used paper that was much too thick, measured for a space that required some really tight folds on paper too think to fold easily, and generally had issues going in.



The key in ethics and origami is persistence. The box got made, a shape or two was off by a bit, but functional - and functionality in ethics and origami matters a lot.

I thought as well that I might put something *in* the box, but decided that the structure of the origami and the structure of ethics were similarly stand-alone items, so the box is to the right, standing alone.



Thus: Ordered patterns in patterns and bug control transformed into comfortable yet rigid structures of operation.

You can also see the mounting screws for the inside of the wall joist attachment. One major concern in box placement was that it would just drop down inside the wall and be impossible to get out. I figured that I could hold on and screw the thing in place, but wanted the screws pre-set before hand.



So, that's the final placement of the diorama in the wall. I'll be doing the finish work on the wall itself soon, I hope - depends on timing of other projects in hand - and when I do, I'll be either plastering over the box entirely, or leaving it open to view with some beautification around the edges so there's no gapping.

Working on a 1905 Victorian is like building ethics, and the later life event/process never ceases - every day is that same event, ongoing. The work on the house, watching one thing after another come together, with all the projects lining up, being changed, and sliding into place - there's a sense of comfortableness to doing the work, living the life, and making the art.