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reflection 8-

 image1- I first made an image inspired by a section of work I saw at the Paper exhibition by Fred Tomaselli. I really liked using the newspaper as a background to break up the piece. I thought about trying to melt the colours together more - similar to as I had done before. This is definitely something I want to explore in my work in the future.

 image2- Here I looked at the shapes and forms of the pressed flowers to create the shapes which I would fill with colour in my own work. I really liked the natural shapes which came out of this however I felt that the colours I used werent that appealing to the eye and I still wanted to look at how to make them appear more melting/flowing.

image3- a photograph of the flowers I used for references throughout.

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Reflection 7- 

 image1- After looking at Ted Wallaces piece ‘Fine Feathers’ I wanted to create a piece which mimicked the way that his colours appeared to melt into one another. I began by using the reference of the flowers which I had been using throughout my experimentation so far. I really liked using my fingers for this rather than a brush and I think it created an interesting effect, allowing the colours to appear as if they were melting and looking a lot more free and natural.

image2- In this piece I used the same technique however I created this piece in the style of the transformational and visionary artists. I also experimented with scale here. I found that working so loosely on a larger scale could appear more unfinished or empty looking which was not something I wanted to have in my own work.

image 3- I wanted to look at creating another ‘melting’/flowing piece similar however I wanted to try and see how I could create shape or form within it. I used natural colours as that was what I had mainly focused on so far and I really like how it turned out, however I would of preferred a bigger range of colours.  I found that by not covering the entire surface with paint, the marks I do make are more prominent and it creates depth.

image4- Here I experimented with using more unnatural colours and I really liked the results. The bright colours all melting and merging in the same directions was really interesting to make and I am really pleased with the outcome.

image5- This piece was the same as the previous however I wanted to look at incorporating shape and form somehow. I really like the mixtures of colours while allowing some of the background to show through, it recreates the depth I found it gave in earlier experimentation.

 image6-  I was not as pleased with the outcome of this piece due to the lack of variety in colours. I wanted to try to create a concentrated area of ‘melting’ style painting while creating a form and shape and this achieved my aim well however I think that it appeared a little dull and flat on the background, perhaps because of the colours all merging together too much.

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Reflection 6- 

 image1- This was an extension on the work I had done in my sketchbook, only on a larger scale. I really wanted to experiment with using bold line and washes of colour to create a piece. Although I really liked these pieces as experiments I didnt think that they would progress, rather they were a source of inspiration and I want to use elements of these pieces, like strong lines and loose shapes based on foliage and plants, in my future work.

 image2- This piece was looking at Richters scraping technique and exploring texture within the transformational/visionary method of working. I really like how this piece turned out, mainly because of how much I realised I enjoy working in the transformational/visionary style while making this piece. This piece really freed my mind and allowed me to just experiment with what felt right for the piece. I like that this is one of the only pieces with texture and I would be interested to look more at creating 3D pieces, or relief pieces.

image3- Here I wanted to encorporate the patterns I saw in Ted Wallace and Mario Martinez’s work with the scraping effect of Richters work. I relaly liked how sections of this piece turned out however I found it difficult to achieve this successfully over any scale other than a5 or a6. It was an interesting piece to experiment with but I am unsure on whether I will use this technique again.

image4- Finally I look at combining Richters scraping technique with the scratching/drawing into the paint itself to create lines. I really like how the scraped paint when scratched into shows all of the layers of paint within the lines. I used colours which were based from a reference photo of a landscape and I am pleased with how it turned out however I am interested in using unnatural colours due to my research in psychedelic art.

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Reflective 5- 

 Image 1- Here I looked at recreating a the abstracted images of flowers I had been doing with watercolour using a different medium. I used acrylic paints and tried to recreate the scraped/blurred effect that I saw in Richters work in my research. After scraping the paint I felt that I wanted to try to encorporate the line that I had been using in the watercolour and biro pieces, I did this by scraping into the paint and I really like the effect that this created as it blended more into the image; rather than the biro which stood out more, this was more subtle and added to the distortion. 

 Image 2- In this piece I aimed to experiment with using a different medium and a different scale from the image I had created prior to this in my sketchbook. I used acrylic paint as a background, then using biro and very diluted oil paints. I love the texture that this created due to using plywood to paint onto, however I did not like this piece overall. I think that it looks too simple and lacked any bold lines, shapes or colours - things which I had really liked in my other pieces.

 Image 3- After finding that I wanted to look back to using strong lines, I thought about one of my earlier experiments in which I used line to create dimension and depth. I worked from a reference image and selected elements of the scene which stood out most to me, and presented them in a way which to me summarised the scene almost. I really like how leaving the background clear makes it appear as if the colours are coming out from the backdrop, almost 3D feeling. The use of the red lines added further distortion while also adding a feeling of depth and dimension in the image. I used imitation gold leaf to recreate areas of light that I saw. I tried to make the gold leaf appear cracked/worn to add texture, which I felt added more distortion of the reality while also representing it further.

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Reflection 4 -

Page 1- Here I first began with the intention of creating a simple abstracted/distorted image of a selection of dried flowers I had.I wanted to work with natural shapes as they were often recognisable. I used watercolour and biro as I liked how it had worked in my previous image of an area of my house. The watercolours allow me to easily created a distorted/blurred base for me to then work on top of. I created loose impressions of the shapes I saw in the flowers. Later, after looking at Martinez’s work I thought about encorporating faces or recognisable features into my work. I had previously focused on the eyes as they proved to be the most identifiable to the viewer, and so I began finding shapes in the lines I had originally drawn that looked similar to eyes. These eventually turned into little faces and I really love the ethereal mood of this image. 

Page 2- With the second image I worked in a similar way to the previous page, but this time i kept the colours more bold and controlled - similar to Wallace. I really enjoyed finding recognisable shapes within drawings which were not originally intended to be used to create faces, or eyes. It created a kind of merge reality feeling which was something I wanted to explore further.

Page 3- Here I first created a continual line drawing, with the intention to keep it as minimal as possible. I used a reference image of my own and focused on the shapes I saw only, rather than seeing them for what they really were (trees,vines,bushes). I then focused on the colours I saw and filled in around the lines with watercolour.I really like appearance of the lines with the more hazey washes of colour as it makes them appear unreal and almost dream like, which fits well with what I was trying to explore. The abstracting of scenes and things is something I want to further explore in my work.

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REFLECTION 3 -

Page 1- Here I wanted to create a distorted/abstracted version of an area in my house (from reality). I wanted to create this piece quite freely, as I had seen that in my research that was the work that inspired me most. After looking at Hitchens and Picasso I wanted to create something that was based on the real world but abstracted and distorted. I really like how there is a contrast from the watery colours, against the harder, bolder lines of colour. I added the biro on top to create a sense of depth and I feel this use of line to create dimension worked well as it didnt take away from the abstracted/distorted appearance.

Page 2- Here I was inspired by the mentality of the transformational/visionary artists I had research and wanted to see how I could apply this style to my own work. I wasnt necessarily pleased with the outcome but I really enjoyed experimenting with allowing myself to paint what comes to me, and be more free in my work.

Page 3- This piece was heavily influenced by Ted Wallace’s work. I really like the bold strong colours and shapes and I was a lot happier with the outcome of this piece than the last. I applied the same philosophy of working to this piece but the inspiration from a specific artist really benefitted me here. I think that the strong colours against a plan background works well and is something I want to look at more in my work. I also want to look further into Ted Wallaces works as I find his styles to be ever changing and inspiring for me personally.

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FMP, Reflection

I am finding it difficult to ground my project within something and am realising that I perhaps picked a topic too broad. I decided to try to base my project/apply the themes within a more niche area, I did this by beginning to do research for what area might inspire and excite me the most. 

My research has a massive role in the development of my work and I have begun looking at more abstracted art and distorting images/landscapes based in reality around me.

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REFLECTION 2 -

Sketchbook page 1 - I began working in my sketchbook looking at adding to an image to distort it in different ways. I added acryllic paints over a picture of a face but I wanted to maintain some parts of the face to distinguish what it was. I found that by keeping the eyes clear allowed me to add the appearance of a veil of perception over the face while still allowing the viewer to recognise it as a face underneath. This creates an interesting way to show the issue of the veil of perception within epistemology and illustrates it clearly, creating the feeling that the viewer cannot ever reach the ‘truth’ of the image. I want to explore whether replicating this on an image of a landscape rather than a face works in the same way or if it works best when using easily distinguishable features, in this case the eyes.

Sketchbook page 2- I tried to recreate the same effect on an image of a landscape/scene but I was not as pleased with the results. I felt that it simply removed parts of the image rather than creating another layer between the image and the viewer - perhaps because of the lack of an instantly recognisable feature. I began to think about how I could create layers within the piece and so tried experimenting with creating ‘cracks’ within the piece. I found that simpler lines appear best but I wasnt that keen on them aesthetically and I decided that using a face worked the best to create the effect of a veil of perception, adding rather than removing.

Sketchbook page 3&4- Here I continued to experiment with adding to the image. I had previously only used acryllics paints so I decided to use pencil as I thought this might make a more delicate and subtle effect when creating the ‘veil’ appearance I was interested in. I didnt like the effect the pencil gave as it appeared too subtle and sheer, it didnt keep the viewer seperated from the original image like the layer effect the acrylic paints did. I went back to looking at the acrylic paint and I tried to maintain the form of the face using the different colours but only used straight brushstrokes to distort the face somewhat. I looked at isolating different parts of the face, such as the mouth, but I found that the eyes were the most salient. I wanted to look at creating a more broken veil, like a haze or frosted glass effect over the picture to create the ‘veil’ effect more effectively.

Sketchbook page 5- As I said I wanted to create a less obtrusive veil, allowing the viewer to still see through parts of the image rather than let the paint become the new image, I wanted them to appear as seperate layers. I used a dry brush with white acryllic, and then chalk once the paint dried, to create a foggy haze over the image, keeping the eyes still clear from paint. This was my favourite effect out of the three. This was because the use of only one contrasting colour was less distracting than using multiple colours as I had done before. It created the veil at a perfect middle between overpowering and too subtle, which I had found previously.

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FMP, research

Before beginning my project I wanted to do a lot of research into epistemology and art/artists that deal with themes around knowledge of reality/issues with knowledge of reality, for example the surrealist movement.

I began by looking at a series of images which bent reality, a lot of which heavily featured religious imagery. Although the religious imagery had a strong link to the themes I wanted to explore I felt they distracted somewhat from me wanting to focus solely on reality, illusion etc.

I read an article about artistic hallucination on the Tate website linked here. 

Looking at the pieces in the article made me feel further confusion as I was realising how broad the subject I had chosen was. I wanted to continue to research artists which explore themes I am interested in to try to find a more niche area within the subject I am looking at.

These pieces by Richard Wilson looked more at splitting up reality into different parts. This idea interested me but I wanted to explore more abstract pieces.

These two pieces by Ivon Hitchens and Picasso both explore things based in the real world but distort them somehow, I liked the free and fun nature of them both and wanted to explore using gestural movements and marks and also maybe exploring with collage or mixed media.

This piece by Tim Head was a good example of illusion however I felt it was obvious and it was more of a final product than a prompt for inspiration.

http://www.n55.dk/manuals/discussions/n55_texts/art_reality.html

I began reading the above text which helped me to focus my project on something rather than keeping it too broad as this was hindering my progress within my project. The questions at the beginning, “Could one imagine art which had nothing to do with persons?

Could one imagine art which had nothing to do with other persons?

Could one imagine art which had nothing to do with concrete situations? Could one imagine the existence of concrete situations without the existence of things? Could one imagine concrete situations with persons in which the behaviour of persons had no significance?”, inspired me to look into using real life images and distorting them in some way.

I first began looking at Richters self portrait as it uses a photograph which Richter then paints over the top of to distort it, similar to what I thought I was interested in.

I loved the way which Richter makes the viewer feel that they were seeing something distorted or changed from its original, “real” state. They inspired me to explore distorting images, changing them or disrupting them to change or cover some part of them. I thought about using water to distort an image or scraping similar to Richter. I am going to looking at drawing and painting on top of images and see what kind of effect this gives.

Richter’s work also made me think about using the colours of an image to create a more impressionist style image of a landscape/person/object, as this would still be distorting the reality of the image - by using my impression/senses to give a new reality to it. Similar to...

...These pieces focus more around shape and colour, and a general feeling of a place/scene. This more impressionist style is definitely something I am excited to look at in my own work and explore, by looking at shape and colour more loosely and freely in my own work. Using acryllic or watercolour with pen would be interesting ways to explore these as they both give good colour while allowing a lot of freedom in mark making. These heavily influenced me in creating pieces using acryllic and oil paint on wood.

I began researching psychedelic artists and art from the 70′s as I felt that when looking at distorting reality/hallucination/illusion that psychedelic art would fit really well as psychedelics cause hallucination. I began reading about psychedelic art and different artists and found out about ‘Transformational art”, a style of art in which you allow yourself to not think too much about what you are doing, and just to create a piece. I felt like this worked well with my intention of creating free, gestural impressions of scenes or objects. I found a series of artists which inspired me within the psychedelic art style.

http://www.widewalls.ch/psychedelic-artists-top-list/

Dennis Konstantin - http://www.denniskonstantin.com/. Dennis Konstantin writes about “visionary art” which focuses more on feeling than seeing, saying,

“The perceiving artist takes from reality, mixes the impression with his own thoughts and artistry and spills it back out on the canvas. The seeing artist takes his inspiration from a different source which can’t be seen, just felt….he is able to bring forth something from the unknown and enrich our world with something which can’t be expressed yet. It’s the fire of infinty which burns right through the artist and expresses it’s own image through the hands of the artist. The artist becomes a tool for a greater spirit which works “through” him. For me a “visionary” piece can’t be planned…it just comes to you.” http://www.denniskonstantin.com/thoughts-on-visionary-art/

This sounded similar to what I understand of transformational art, however it focuses more on a spiritual connection. Although I did not want to focus my art around a spiritual connection I allowed myself to create a piece of art purely from my imagination rather than from a scene or reference. It was very freeing and I enjoyed using my imagination as a reference rather than a ‘real life’ thing.

I also read this article which explored using art as knowledge http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195396577/obo-9780195396577-0198.xml. This made me think about creating pieces from my imagination further, rather than using references or working onto other images as I had been doing previously.

I also drew inspiration from Ted Wallaces work, using its strong, dense colours to create strong shapes and lines in my work. 

Ted Wallace - Migrations 1. This piece was painted on plywood which made me want to experiment with painting on wood in my own work also.

Ted Wallace, Dancers

(Both by Dennis Konstantin). 

I noticed within Dennis Konstantins work there were a lot of shapes that appeared to mimic eyes and faces. I wanted to see if I could incorporate this into my own work which had been looking at nature/landscapes.

I really love the way this piece, Fine Feathers, by Ted Wallace recreates very natural forms, this fitted well with my work since I had been focusing on plants and landscapes of forests/mountains. The colours appear to swim amongst eachother and melt into eachother. This melting appearance was something I wanted to explore more. I tried to use ‘melting’ paints and colours into one another in my own work.

I went to see the exhibition ‘Paper’ by Fred Tomaselli at The White Cube Masons Yard. His work looked at more political themes however I saw some similarities in style in parts of his work to what I had been looking at. His work was all done on top of newspaper articles relevant to his theme however I found that it created a really aesthetically pleasing background, and I preferred it to a single colour background. I wanted to use this in my own work and see how it worked. I used the newspaper backdrop to then creating my own impressions of flowers over the top which I then filled in with colours, similar to Wallace and Tomaselli.

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Research - Art & Environment 4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_Y3utIeTPg&t=59s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqjdRAERWLc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyH2D4-tzfM

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Reflection - Art &

I took photographs and/or worked from memory in creating entirely altered impressions of spaces in my everyday environment. This was heavily inspired from looking at the surrealist movement.

I found these really enjoyable to make as they were very free and it was interesting to look at somewhere which I see regularly and change it into a colourful, fantasy land. I found that using watercolour and charcoal allowed me to create a flowing colour scape while also allowing me to incorporate strong lines to show form. I would have liked to also explore using collage or photo manipulation as I think these would have been a good way to show what I was trying to achieve with my work.

I could develop my work from here by focusing more at a certain school of thought within epistemology, aswell as looking at different surrealist artists and finding which way I wish to show the nature of what is real and what we can know.

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Reflection - Art &

I decided to focus on Art & Environment. 

I first began looking at the project as an oppurtunity to focus on the meat and dairy industry however I quickly lost inspiration for this idea and decided to look at the “environment” in a broader sense.

I feel that I really enjoyed this project as I was looking at something which I really enjoy - philosophy. I spent a lot of time reading and researching for this project which I felt benefitted my work a lot.

I first decided to look at environments I had been in and create impressions of them rather than seeing them too literally, to create an image which encapsulated how the place sounded and felt. I used oil pastels for this as I felt they were the best medium to describe the feeling I wanted to portray for my images. I really liked how the oil pastel allowed me to create texture and movement within the piece. The image appeared as a scene but still showed the feeling that it brought to me and I felt inspired to look further away from the literal/what appears to be as it is.

I was inspired by looking at Richter’s untitled pieces where it appears that he has painted a scene using oil paint and then scraped the paint in one movement, to distort the image. Since I was focusing on reality his work seemed to work really well with my own ideas. I wanted to try and recreate this idea of creating a scene and then distorting it so I decided to use felt tips and water.

I drew scenes from photographs of my local area and then brushed water over them to distort them. I was really happy with the outcome and found that this medium worked well. However, if I was to do this again I may make a stop motion or a film of the process of the distortion, as once I applied the water the image went through several different ‘stages’ of increasingly warped image.

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Reflection - Re Flux 2

I wanted to look more into the side of Fluxus movement which appeared to be mocking high art. 

In keeping with my looking at food as accessible, I began using simply arranged food packaging. I really liked my idea behind this and the simplicity of the piece because it fulfilled the role of being a piece of art which may appear to have some deep complex meaning however was simply just crisp packets stuck to a page, this really fit with the philosophy of Fluxus. 

Doing this was helpful as it moved my focus more towards the anti high art aspect of Fluxus. I wanted to look at bi products of “high art”, and the waste that is produced by them. I began collecting used pallettes and tissue paper which people had used to wipe their brushes off. I really liked these as they appeared aesthetically really beautiful while also being what is ordinarily discarded.

Looking back I would have explored the potential of the anti-art movement further, perhaps by looking at other kinds of waste produced in creating art itself (for example, photographing dirty paintbrushes, empty paint bottles etc). 

This project has taught me to look for inspiration in things which I have become desensitised to, and to find beauty in the everyday.

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Reflection - Re Flux

I spent a lot of time researching the philosophy of Fluxus as there is so much information on it. 

Since Fluxus looks at making art accessible to the everyday person, I wanted to look at using materials which were easily found/in most households already. I decided that it would be interesting to use food to do so.

I wanted to create something which was still clearly seen as the figure I was observing, but to also allow the viewer to see that it was created using an unusual medium. I started out by using herbs and spices mixed with water to create different textures and colours. I expected the spices to mix with the water and turned into a coloured liquid, however they were a lot more water resistant that I had anticipated. This made it hard for them to be used with a brush and difficult to get an even distribution, it was a lot more difficult to manipulate than actual paint or ink. Looking back at this, I could try to use glue to stick the herbs and/or spices down to create areas that are more densely packed with the colours, and giving me more control over where the herbs and spices lay on the page.

After seeing that the spices had not worked as well as I first thought I began looking at using tea and coffee to paint with. I found this a lot easier than the spices as these are much more easy to use with a brush since they are not forming a paste. I really liked how these turned out as they allowed me to create clear forms and lines however I think in the future I would work back into the image with graphite or biro - although this may contradict the idea of making it accessible.

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Research - Text

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/andre-rotor-reflector-review-t02137

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/martin-chance-and-order-group-vii-drawing-6-t01847

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/martin-drawing-for-a-screw-mobile-t01700

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/beuys-untitled-ar00671

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Research - Expanded collage 3

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/magritte-the-future-of-statues-t03258

Discussing the works, the artist’s friend the Surrealist poet Paul Nougé suggested an association between death, dreams and the depth of the sky. He commented: ‘a patch of sky traversed by clouds and dreams [can] transfigure the very face of death in a totally unexpected way’.

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Research - Expanded collage 2

Untitled is a collage combining three separate images. The principal image is a colour photograph of a film actress taken in the 1940s or 1950s. Her face has been excised by the silhouetted figure of another woman cut out of the paper on which the portrait was printed. The space of the silhouette is filled with a photographic reproduction of a moth on a branch. As is usual in a portrait, the photographed actress looks at the viewer but as a result of the artist’s intervention only her cheek, a few eyelashes and a sliver of eyebrow are visible on her right side and her jaw and ear on her left. Her right shoulder and part of her forearm are raised – she appears to be leaning on something. Stezaker’s collage obscures all the parts of her normally needed to read a portrait and in this sense the silhouetted figure operates like a mask – a concept central to Stezaker’s work

Stezaker’s use of a silhouetted (male) figure to open a window into another space or world recalls several paintings by Belgian Surrealist René Magritte from the 1960s, in particular The Upholder of the Law, 1964 (private collection), High Society, 1965-6 (Bounameaux, Brussels) and The Happy Donor, 1966 (Musée d’Ixelles, Brussels). These paintings feature a bowler-hatted silhouette man whose head is filled with sky; the cloudy sky in the head of the silhouette man in Third Person recalls the blue cloud-dotted sky in the head of the silhouetted figure in High Society. However, Stezaker differentiates his work from the surrealist aim of providing a window into the unconscious, saying that feels that he is doing the reverse: ‘I wanted to make conscious, to save the viewer from unconsciousness rather than release the viewer to it.’