Initial Idea and
Concept for FMP & Essay
Portraiture is the main subject
that I aim to research and link to my creative practice.
In my opinion there is scope for
thorough academic research and hopefully to produce a series of portraiture
based outcomes. I aim to create personal and emotive works that are individual
for my purpose. Emotion and personal life will influence and play a pivotal
role in my work. I intend researching contemporary portraiture to develop
essential understanding of this key art form. Portraiture offers me the
creative opportunity to reflect on aspects of personal life and loss. It allows
a thematic direction that can be fully explored and exploited, transforming the
generic narrative or motif into thought provoking outcomes. I feel that these
elements within art are a relevant and necessary part of my creative direction
at this time.
Portraiture (Faded Memory) - Practical and
Contextual Proposal
For my FMP I would like to create a series
of different images that represent the heartbreak and loss of a loved one. Creating
images to symbolize the affect it can have on oneself. This chosen theme for
the final project of the Level 5, Year 2, HND Fine Art course has importance as
a personal theme. Art can be used to represent emotional elements for an
artist. It may also help me grieve, as I want to communicate to the viewer’s
just how much the loss of my Granddad has affected me and others. The outcomes may
cause distress for myself and the audience, potentially bring to the fore
feelings of anger, confusion, hurt and loss. I feel art has the power to have an effect on
the maker and viewer; it can enable them to relate to this overwhelming
situation. Death is a part of life and art, an everyday occurrence; it is a formidable
part of life that cannot be halted. Through my creative practice I aim to show
that the memories are always there in our minds, even though they may fade with
time, photographs and images keep memories alive, but they can also be
forgotten or lost. “The past is never dead, it is not even past.”- William
Faulkner
Researching and gaining influence from particular
artists work will help inspire, through imagery, media, techniques, compositional
elements and contextual ethos. Chuck Close an
artist that has previously affected my work, by taking ideas from the grid
methodology into consideration when creating my initial response. I want to
work with the grid in as many different ways as possible, to analyse what affects
it can have on imagery, and how it can be used to recreate and dissect likenesses.
The interesting aspect of how he breaks down the image through the use of the
grid is what stimulates my creative thought at this point. It is not the fact
that he uses it to create an easier method to reproduce Photo-realistic
imagery.
William Kentridge
works are reflective in narrative content, through his story telling approach.
They seem to be memories of living through Apartheid in Africa, and his
concerns and recollections of this time. Kentridge’s influence has relevance to
what I want to achieve in my outcomes. His use of words, phrases and narrative
which often link to feelings, emotions and memories, the use of symbolic
reference to content, gesture, marks, drawing, objects play pivotal roles in
his pieces. Gallery visits through more local North West venues in Liverpool and
Manchester will allow me to develop further sources of research, utilising
gallery websites will allow me to analyse past and present exhibitions,
relevant works of art, discussion topics and reviews. Further research methodologies will be
research through.
Through association with Kentridge, the
traditional method of printing will be explored through type and possibly
image, use of old note paper and typewriter. I plan to explore making homemade
paper which has a unique quality. I aim to play with the notion of the
scrapbook. Scrapbooking is another
aspect of keeping and collating images and memories. This has a point of
interest from my Grandparents use of photo-album scrapbooks. It will allow me
to fully explore imagery, words, media, layering and may work as part of my
final outcome. I find the traditional method of the scrapbook, although
seemingly old fashioned, a way to keep memories creative in a fragile and
handmade state. The use of technology now enables the instant saving and
storing of memories/pictures onto computers, phones safely. It is this tenuous
link that draws me to the use of technology in my work, and further possible
research into artists who use non-traditional methods. Further possibly lines
of enquiry and research analysing; photography, Symbolism, death portraits and
the non-traditional video use of Bill Viola’s, Damien Hirst and Andy Warhol
artworks. Viola, often deals with aspects of birth, life and death within his
work. Hirst poses questions of immortality, life and death similar to Viola.
Lastly the reproductive system of screen-printing of Warhol’s Marilyn Munroe
and the electric chair series of works. Further sources will be through
internet e.g. Tate online, Saatchi online, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram and
Facebook. The VLE links will be suitable and relevant for me to inform
research, and influence the works I will be creating, it will allow me to
underpin and build knowledge and understanding.
Exploring a variety of techniques, media
and materials during progress of this project will include; digitally drawing
on Photoshop, drawing physically, painting, layering, photography and image
transfer will make up aspects my final outcomes. The reason for using these
techniques is they have all worked well for me in past projects, and most
importantly to build on my understanding of these techniques and links to my
own visual language. I aim to further explore and experiment by making use of
the grid and shapes, to break down the picture plane. My workbook will be an
ongoing tool to jot down my quick visual and written ideas. The best way to
start off a project is to create a spider graph, this will consist of initial
ideas and interests and there will be some element of plan to give me guidance,
this initial plan will be developed more thoroughly throughout the project. I
plan to further, experiment with ideas, techniques, media and materials almost
all the way through the project to source the most suitable way to work. Also,
to make sure I can create my work that is as successful as possible. I will
need to manage my time in the studio as well as at home to make sure that I
meet deadlines. To explore I will have to print out my words that I type on the
computer onto ranges of paper to find the most suitable, linking to my theme, I also need to analyse
different type faces I may want to use. Colour and tone will be a major concern
in my work, the need to practice colour mixing as well as improving my drawing
skills, to make certain that it is as appropriate. There is a projector that I
can make use of if I want to experiment with scale.
The ongoing research into themes of life
and death through the critical study of artist’s works will enable me to expand
of visual narrative in my work. It also will develop my contextual knowledge
through this subject.
To help me with time management and
organization, using a daily action plan and ongoing reflection through my Blog
will be crucial. Completing these elements every day, to plan tasks, and analyse
at the end of the day. The brief will help me to make sure that I am working on
each unit in depth, in order for me to achieve a high grade. My blog will be
used to show my progress and I will be analysing ongoing creative and
theoretical practice through research, work, media, materials and techniques
that I experiment with and explore. This will help me with further expand ideas
and I can realise what needs improvement. I will always use the imagery of my
influences for inspiration as well as using my past work to look at what
techniques have worked out for me previously and which can be used again in
this project.
Critiques with my peers will assist me through
support and creative direction; we share ideas and give guidance to what needs accomplishing
and improving. I will analyse and write down the thoughts and ideas that come through
the critiques so I can critically examine these at a later date or stage.
My work may change throughout the
development stages of the project because usually, I get one idea from work I
have already done which then leads on to more ideas and possibilities. Regular
tutorial feedback will enable me to keep on track and share on going concerns
and development.
Hopefully a successful exhibition curated
by myself and my peers will reflect on how hard we have worked, the improvement
through our artwork, as well as our professional planning Capabilities. We will
need to look for a space to exhibit, ask for support from other artists, to
gain mentoring advice. This will hopefully guide me on aspects needed to work
as a team, an individual practitioner, and to present a professional exhibition.
The working aspects through the group exhibition should be arranged through
regular meetings to discuss roles, funding, planning and progress. This will
also be reflected through the PDP element of my Blog.
Books I will be using as sources to gather
information which may further my understanding of the theme are ‘Ways of seeing
John Berger’ this has useful information that is relevant to my professional
practice as well as my contextual research. Other books that will be
significant are ‘This is modern art’ by Matthew Collings and ‘Art Now’ by
Taschen.
After a group critique it helped me decide that it would be useful to start off this project by getting down my thoughts when I was feeling upset, this helped me with ideas of what to start researching and developing.
As I have recently lost my granddad to a sudden death, all of these thoughts are always in my mind and I feel that if I can create artwork successfully and professionally based around this theme, then I would feel a great sense of relief and achievement. This may help me grieve and get out the anger and sadness that I have been holding inside of me.
I wrote down everything I feel which helped me with an idea of using these words in my work, development and possibly final outcomes.
From doing this, I created this quick drawing of an idea I had. I have over painted the face to represent that my grandad is unable to be seen anymore which is also why I used the word gone as it is blunt and obvious to me. I still feel that I would like to go further with the technique of letting the ink or paint bleed using water as I feel that it can be appropriate to the title of my project.
I know that I need to work on my drawing skills so that my work can be as professional as possible. I also want to improve my drawing because I would feel upset and very disappointed if I created a drawing or painting of my grandad that wasn't very successful and if it didn't look like him I would feel that I have failed and disappointed him and my family. This is why I want to put my all into this final project and I want to feel proud.
I liked this photograph of him because it was not only simple but I knew that in a drawing I could make him look sad, especially as he was looking down slightly. I want my images to have a sad emotion linked to them so that I can get the full effect I want from my work so that the audience feel my pain but I also want it to be heartfelt. I do not want people to feel as though I am being disrespectful because it is a touchy subject to bring up, but I know that I want to make people proud.In the original photograph he is looking down at a food menu and this was taken on my 18th birthday which is an important memory that I also want to emphasise. The fact that my nan, which was my grandads wife since they were my age, is also in the picture makes it important and at some point in my process I would like to add her in my work. In this picture she looks very happy and I honestly do not think she has been the same since my grandad passed away. I may also want to show how much I feel that she has changed. how?
She looks older, she seems older physically and she isn't happy.
I have been researching to see what kind of influence I can get from artists, I have looked on pinterest which I feel has lots of useful and influential images, and I have found quite a few that have given me ideas, and I was unable to find out who they were made by which is a shame. Each of the images are by a different person, I just found these images interesting.
These images have links to my project such as; portraiture, layering, scrapbooking, fading image and emotion which is why they all caught my eye. I will take influence from these without making my work look the same as I have my own techniques and ways of working as well.
I feel that this piece in particular can relate to my project as the left side of the face on this image is missing and faded out which is what I am looking at, faded memory. This can represent somebody not being here or maybe as a ghost. The colours of this also make me think this also because there isn't a lot of detail in it.
She seems to have a cigarette in her mouth in each of the paintings which has given me an idea to use objects in my portraiture work to represent someone's personality and feelings, they can also be a way oftellin a story about someone and their life which is a possible idea for me to consider during this next project. Although in my work I want to try using more colour than she does as I feel that colour is a strong point for me as well as it being a good way to symbolise emotion.
I watched the begining part of this youtube video called 'In the studio with Maggi Hambling' where she mentions the Michael Jackson piece, I understood and liked what she said about the position of him in the painting, the way he was stood on the left hand side. He looks alone and vunerable which shows the emotion in him and on the right hand side of the painting there is an image of his feet, in a dancing position. This part shows what he was famous for and represents the celebrity part of him. I feel this this is a powerful piece as there is always different sides to a person and even the rich and famous may have problems and are probably not as happy as you think.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Wpf5MbBkqQ
I have been looking at Francis Bacon's portrait work and I find it interesting because they seem morphed and maybe this is another technique I could try out to see if I can create a portrait similar to his as well as adding my own way of working. To do this I intend on using photography and having a person or myself move slightly so that the photograph is blurred and maybe try and work from that as a starting point. There is a mention of his self portraits to be portraits of anxiety and alienation. I can see this link in his work and I feel that I can relate to the anxiety side of this which may help when creating studies for a final piece.
Here is two pictures of his portrait work.
I have also been looking at William Kentridge for his techniques and use of media, they way he draws is something that will influence me as well. His type of work link in with the scrapbook theme I am trying to achieve. The way he uses words and phrases in his work is effective and this is also something I will be using in my own work. I will be using words or phrases that I have written down when I have been feeling emotional, and hopefully the way I feel will show through my practical work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRfe1skdQfA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_e-p5M0vhZI
I am also quite interested in the artist Andrew Salgado who creates colourful portraits of people who are usually not smiling and the posture of them seems to be important to show the emotive story behind his work. I may try this kind of technique within my own ways of working through my development to see if I can create a successful painting.
Some examples of his work are here.
I don't know if I will make use of all the research I have found as it was the first impressions of the images that caught my eye and my ideas will most likely change along the way along with my influences.
I have been collecting images that I can use to layer physically as well as on photoshop. I can also over paint the pictures to create different effects. here are some images of work that I saw on the Saatchi website that have influenced me and given me ideas on how to paint over imagery.
This is by an artist called Jesus Leguizamo
and the piece is called Physicalism
And here are the images I have used and my finished photosop images, I may use some of these as finished pieces or I will use them to layer more and over paint, I want to play around with this to see how it turns out and which colours/ techniues/ brush sizes work best.
These two images are what I have created using photoshop and I have used 3 or 4 different pictures to layer and blend together and added effects. I feel that these look successful as they are without me adding anything to them such as paint, but I still may try it but I have a feeling that it will look too overcrowded. I like the placement of the pictures that I have put together because the image of my granddad is looking over the image of me, we are both facing the same way and it looks as if he is 'looking over me' and that is what I wanted to represent. I will also add type onto these at some point weather it is underneath the images or over the top of them, I feel that it would finish the pieces off so that they can be added to my collection for my final piece/pieces.
I wanted to play around with this image as it has importance to me, it is a very clear and more recent memory of my granddad. He bought me my first legal alcoholic drink on my 18th birthday, I remember where he was stood at the bar, where he was sat around the table in the pub where we ate with the rest of my family and what he had to eat. I always saw this image of being the best day ever because I had turned 18, I was always looking at the glass. It was only when he had passed away when I saw him in the background of the photograph, I felt sad and ungrateful that all that time I was so interested in the glass rather than appreciating that I had all of my close loved ones with me to celebrate my birthday with. I don't feel that these pieces of work are successful as final pieces but I may use them just to show the memory or in another piece of work where I can layer pictures and add a small paragraph to.
This is a very simple image and way of representing my theme of 'Faded memories' as it is blurred and almost seems old and manipulated. I may use this image in the future to over lay as part of different pieces then manipulate it more using photoshop and maybe by hand. The interesting thing about images and photoshop is that it can be used over and over again adding different effects and layers,then over painted and over layered by hand using different media and materials. There are endless opportunities to transform different images to create new pieces of art by taking away and adding to them.
The image below is an example of this.
I have cropped an image of my granddad then flipped it around. I had previously drawn over a printed image on a piece of plastic. I picked out the shapes from the head to make up the image. Then I scanned it in onto photoshop to make the lines darker and more balanced. An option to take this further more is to take out the coloured background and keep the colours inside the shapes to see how successful it will look.
I have created these through Photoshop as well. I have taken maps of the main places that make me think of my granddad and where he always loved to go and blended an image of him on top to represent that even though he is gone he will always be remembered in these places.
I have used the maps from Google maps as it is a simple way to search the location and capture a photograph through the internet, although if I was to create a physical piece of work to do with this idea, I would probably use a real map. The places I chose to use are, Atherton where he lived, his favourite pub which is also where we had the wake after his funeral, places abroad where him and his wife (my nana) loved to go on holiday and where they went usually every year which was Cyprus and Benidorm where he once took me on holiday for a week when I was younger. I tried out different techniques and effects to see which fit best to each image, I also used the grid to represent that the memory of him is always going to be locked there even if he isn't physically.
Here are three different examples of effects and filters on Photoshop, each once has the two same images in them with a grid to add the trapped effect I was looking for. I feel that by having the image of my granddad behind and above the image of myself, it does represent the thought of him looking over me all the time. In both the images, we are facing the same way and seem to have similar face expressions, this shows the connection that I felt that we had an still have through artwork as he enjoyed and created artwork as well. I will use these pieces in more of my development work as I feel that they have potential to look more effective and professional with more work added to them.
I have tried out a couple of different ways to try and play around with pixilation's, I then added the colour. I wanted to create the images so that the person in the piece couldn't be seen clearly or straight away so that I could create the faded image/memory effect. This worked well in both pieces and I may use these for future exploration but it may not work as they are colourful and I don't feel that this would work well with the theme. I am aiming to create much darker and neutral pieces.
This image is just and example of my exploration with merging and layering imagery in Photoshop. I have gotten the hang of doing this to make I look more professional and thoughtful. I don't think that I will use this to take further in my development as I am wanting to put my focus on photographs of my granddad so that it doesn't get too complicated.
I have created these by layering images and card and adding oil to the faces on the pictures so that they are partly transparent. The image underneath can be seen as well as the one on top and once a light in shone through it, it makes it more visible and a bit ghostly, which is an effect I am happy with considering the theme and circumstances.
I then scanned the image in and blended a photograph of my granddad into it. The image underneath isn't too obvious, only when you look closely and concentrate, the features can be seen although the eyes seem to be more visible. I think that the effect of the oil is interesting because the ghostly effect adds to the end result. I may use these in my final outcomes whether it be a photograph of it or the real thing, or I could make use of both to show the difference, because the ripped paper and layered images look interesting as a piece but it doesn't look as interesting as a flat photograph.
This piece turned out to be successful and was a quick technique to use, this looks like an image created on photoshop but it isn't. Again I have created this by layering images and card. I put oil onto the faces in the images and layered them on top of each other, put it onto a light box and then added card to make the space around the images dark so that it was easier to see the shining through, I think that it also adds a scrapbook effect that links in with what I want to do as a final outcome. This is a photograph of the image, I feel that it looks more effective with the layers instead of it being flat so I would like to try and do this again, next time gluing it together so that it can be added to my collection for my final outcomes. I feel that it is more effective to have texture and layered images to look at instead of just a picture of it, although I will be using some photography so that I have a variety of techniques in my final pieces.
I then scanned it in to use in photoshop, I added the grid from the previous project on top of the image which in my opinion added interest to it. I feel that this piece can represent my feelings of being trapped, lost and lonely, the grid that is over the top of the image makes it look lost in the background but the grid isn't too overpowering and it looks successful as a final piece, but I will print a copy of it out so that I can over paint and work into it.
I find this piece interesting as a final image because it shows that I have been looking for a way to represent a faded image and to do this I used oil to make the paper transparent. I have used this image in photoshop and I added an image of my granddad in the bottom right hand corner, in this piece it seems that I am the one that is no longer here because I have been faded and my face is no longer visible but really the point I was trying to get across is how broken and down I feel after my granddad passed away, the fact that my face isn't visible and is faded is my way of representing my hazed mind. I feel confused and unsure which I feel that this piece represents quite well.
Scrolling down on twitter I found a couple of pieces of work by an artist called Daniel Trindade, he seems to layer images and words/phrases using mixed media and it has the sort of effect I would like to achieve in my own work as well as it being relevant to my theme and final ideas.
These are the two images which have given me influence, I wanted to create similar works to this as part of my scrapbook pages for my final pieces, and I have been looking for influences and work that may give me ideas on what media and techniques to use to create this type of effect. I feel that they will help me with the use of colour and the amount of layers to use so that I don't make my work too overcrowded.
I have created these by taking the Photoshopped images as the main part of the piece, I have then taken other images and glued them underneath the main picture, I did this only using a glue stick. I then sanded the picture to reveal different parts of the images underneath, I used two types of sand paper, one that was more rough than the other, I could get different scratched effects and it almost looks as if its been burned through in parts. The media I used to create these were oil and paint. I may add writing to these, either a memory, my feelings or just one word.
I feel that the two shown on the right hand side has come out more successful because there was more colour in the original image, I feel that the piece shown on the left seems to be more flat and the colours are too neutral, it doesn't stand out and isn't as interesting. I plan to create lots more using the coloured pieces with added coloured paint instead of just white.
I have been playing around with the lighting from the projector to create different effects. I have used a photograph of myself and a piece of plastic with the shapes of my granddads face on it as well as a photograph of him too. This mixed together well and it is hard to tell that there are two different faces in the image which is a point I would like to get across. Although he is gone in person I always hope he is still with me some how and I think that this a creative way to represent this.
These images are what I have previously created but I experimented with them further by playing with the idea of faded imagery. This is one way I have figured out that can represent this theme. Because the positive and negative dots have white space in them with part of the image missing makes it harder to see what is in them and will make people look harder and for longer which will draw them in and make them more interested.
I have taken the image that I created by taking the shapes from a photograph of my granddads head, and I have layered different backgrounds such as a map of places that would have had meaning to him. I also simply just used a photograph, which seemed to work better than the maps as it looks more successful and professional. This is also another way of representing the theme of faded memory, just like the positive and negative dots. I have come to realise that it's the positive or negative space in the work that makes it successful and I am going to try and push this further by trying to find out other techniques that create this effect.
I also wanted to try out different techniques to create the effect of image manipulation because I feel that it is another way of representing a faded memory. The image is destroyed an hard to make out in parts,this is what happens over time. I also felt the need to add a modern look to my work so that more of my personality and art language is shown through, I also create this by working with digital media.
I wanted to try out a different technique of creating various ways of representing positive and negative space through imagery. With this I took the black and white version of the image as well as the colour and layered them both on top of each other using the circle grid template that I previously made in a different project. I feel that the circles link with the square grid but it is representing the gird in a different way. I have been exploring ways to create the grid method as I have looked at Chuck Close as an inspiring Artist. This will help me to become more in depth and professional. This method also shows that the image is harder to be seen which is the effect I am trying to create all the way through this project.
These images are examples of the explanation above. I have been trying to play around with various ways of representing faded imagery/memories through the grid method. I have used just one image in each piece but layered it using different techniques which I feel has worked out for some but not as much for others. In some I did add the grid template that I created in a previous project to see how it would look. I feel that these are the ones that have worked out the best and already look successful as final pieces. The ones that have become most successful I will probably take forward into my final development stage and see what else can be added to create more of a professional quality to them. To do this I may try adding words because this is something that I am aiming to do in my final work.
I feel that this piece is strong and has a ghostly quality. This wasn't done on purpose, it just seemed to happen when I was playing around with the composition and filters. Although it looks ghostly which seems to link to my theme, it also gives off a depressing vibe which may make you feel dark and saddened. This may be because there is a face in the image that looks sad, although it isn't obvious to see. I also think that the circle grid makes the image of the face in this piece look trapped, this is the exact effect that I want my pieces of work to have to represent my feelings to losing a loved one.
As I realised that the circle grid template works with my images and adds a trapped effect, I started to create more pieces to create a similar vibe. I wanted to experiment as much as I could with this so that I could make sure that my work could become effective and professional. I feel that using the tones and colours that are in this particular piece adds more of a link to my emotion and feelings which are not positive. Using colour doesn't seem to work well with this theme and it may take away from the meaning and detail in the actual work.
Linking with what I wrote previously , because I felt that colour wouldn't work as well with my theme and pieces of work, I decided to explore colour more throughout my development stage. This was to experiment with every possibility I had so that I could rule out the techniques that didn't work as well as others and the only way to do this was to keep playing around as much as possible with different imagery , colours, techniques and filters.
I did feel that the colourful pieces were too much for the images and took away from the detail and effect I want to have in my work. Colourful work may give off the impression that I feel happy and that is not what my work is about. Although I could still add colour to represent the happiness and memory I have of the person that I have lost. From thinking this I decided to create a couple of pieces experimenting with a little colour as well as neutral colour. he bright yellow and orange colours represents the light that helps the images shine through and lets them be seen more clearly and this links with my thought of heaven .
The piece that has the paper in the background is most successful out of the two because it adds more of a scrapbook effect which is what I am looking for, this links with storing memories and images in an old fashioned and creative way.
Again with this piece I wanted to add a little bit of colour. I used the grid template to cut out an image on Photoshop, the grid has copied the parts that it has template and I then pasted it onto a neutral background. I feel that by doing this it is another way of representing faded memory. The image in this piece of work is quite hard to make out, this draws you in and makes you look at it for a while and this is the type of effect I want my work to have on people as it gives them more time to appreciate and understand the work and the meaning.
I used the same technique with an image of my face and pasted it onto another piece that I previously created in Photoshop. This adds a layered effect as it already has two different images layered on top of each other in the original piece. Then adding the grid image of me which is already layered as well as another template of the grid on top. I feel that it isn't to much for the piece of work but still adds a complicated look, this represents all the different feelings that I have and had when my granddad passed.
I found this imagery on Google and I am unsure of the artist who created these. I find them interesting and quite relevant to my work, I do feel that it has a link to the way I want to display and layout my work. I will take influence from these pieces of work by looking at the media and materials used such as the paper, ink, paint and techniques. I think that the writing and the fading imagery adds interest which is something similar to what I want to achieve.
Me and the other pupils have recently been getting in touch with other Fine Art students at Bolton
University 'canverse collectives'
We are planning to be working together and finally putting up a joint exhibition, we have joined with their website . This will be a good experience to see what pupils at other institutions have been up to and how different our work is to each other, it is also nice to see fresh ideas and influences from these people as we are only usually around the pupils from our own college. I feel that this will help with my professional practice as an artist as I will be trying to raise money to pay for a space to have our exhibition, I will need to find a sponsor for the same reasons and lots of teamwork will be involved to help make this exhibition as successful as possible.
I now have a page on their website www.canversecollective.com
I feel thankful that they have been so helpful with adding us to their website and giving us information that we need to know and I hope that everything goes well and that out final exhibition of the year goes smoothly.
Here is some evidence of my application process to university.
I have signed up to the UCAS website again and sent my application through this to Bolton university to do my 3rd year in BA (hons) Fine Art.
I then got an email to verify that Bolton University have received my application and that it was being considered.
Then I received another email from Bolton University to say that I had to choose a date and time for my interview to take place. I now need to build up and change around my portfolio and add more recent work into it so that it shows my progress.
My Artwork is this weeks cover photo on the Canverse Collective page on Facebook. I am happy that my work is being shown on social media within a group because it is a good way of getting my name and artwork known, it may lead to other opportunities as well.
I have recently attended my interview at Bolton University to join the third year on the Fine Art course. I created a portfolio of work to show the interviewer my progress through the past two years and the skills that I have gained. He seemed impressed with my work as I explained the themes and meanings of my Art. I also told him the Artists that I look at for inspiration which he was familiar with. He showed me around the building and I found that the facilities are outstanding, he then explained a little about what will be happening during the next academic year and I was excited that there seems to be many great opportunities to get publicity for myself as an Artist and to work on different projects with other artists.
Group Meeting with Bolton University Fine Art second year students
Me and my peers arranged to meet up with the Bolton students and to sit in one of the lectures. This was interesting and I learned more on how to be professional when advertising and trying to get my work out there. The tutor talked about ways to present yourself to people who my be interested in you work and how to make the most of a great opportunity.
We do have constant communication with the Bolton students through a Facebook group chat page, this helps us to exchange thoughts and ask questions that need to be answered quickly. This page is a useful and quick way of communicating with other students, but we wanted to finally speak in person so that we could discuss options for the exhibition space.
We talked about the possibility of having our exhibition at the Downtex Mill, although we had already looked into the venue a Leigh Turnpike.
As the Bolton grading criteria was different to ours, their exhibition would have had to be in the first two weeks of May, us four at Wigan had already planned on putting our work up at the Leigh Turnpike in the middle of May. We discussed that we would submit work from a previous project into their exhibition that they decided would be in Bolton Marketplace and they would submit previous works for our exhibition, this was the easiest and most suitable plan for both art groups.
Although trying to pull off two exhibitions at around the same time would be hard for us, I knew that it would be possible with our great teamwork and communication skills that we have previously used in other exhibitions.
I have been offered a place at Bolton University to join the third year and study Fine Art. If I was to finish off the course by joining the third year I will receive a degree in Fine Art, but if I was to finish at the end of this academic year, I would receive a HND level 5. I am still unsure of my decision but, glad that I attended the interview and now have the option to finish my degree. I will decide what I am going to do closer to the closing date to accept the offer.
I have been to meet two people at Leigh Turnpike to talk about having an exhibition there to finish off the last year of our HND course. We have planned to put our work up on the 16th May and then have our opening for the exhibition on the 17th between 1pm and 3pm. I wasn't expected to book a date already but I feel relieved and happy that this is now planned for us. I do feel that we may have to make more time to put up the work as it usually takes a couple of days depending on how much work we have and the amount of space we have to fill and in this case there is quite a lot of room for us to have our Artwork. Me and my peers are very happy with the space as it is very big so there is plenty of room for us to put up a variety of work. We also feel greatful that there is lots of room for us to store our work as well, which is a big help because we can start to take artwork there and store it safely before the 16th which will give us more time to organise the work and put it up on the day.
The date that we have to take it down is the 30th May.
Here are the images of he space that we have to fill.
Here are two images of the forms they gave us that we need to fill in and read for information.
We have the chance to sign up on the creative Leigh website to become a member and a volunteer, by doing this it will give us 40% off prices such as the amount we need to pay for an opening night.
If we was to sell our work at the Leigh Turnpike we would need to give the company 20% of what we get for the piece of work.
I will start to look into how to price up my work correctly by pricing up how much I spend on materials and I will also put into consideration how much time I have put into each piece of work. To help with this I will go onto the Saatchi Online website which has tips on how to price up Artwork correctly.
As a group of 4 we have each assigned ourselves different job roles.
Resources Manager
I have chosen to organise the transport of getting work to the exhibition spaces and when. I will do this a little closer to the time as we don't know an exact date of when our work will definitely be finished for. I will organise the costs and health and safety for the events. I will be working out what will be needed for the events such as food, budgeting, costs of renting the exhibition spaces and when it needs to be done for.
Chloe Reynolds - Co-ordinator
Responsible for organizing and executing events such as our end of year show and being the 'go to person' about our relations to contracts and building the relationships. I will also be the manager of meetings and minutes, having arranged to have once a week with the group to meeting to review process and possible tasks. I will continue to remind people of tasks and will be working mainly alongside myself.
Calum Rennox- Spokesperson
He will be responsible for the marketing side of things such as the logos, posters and other advertising. Along side Calum, Charlotte will be working closely with similar responsibilities.
Charlotte Stockley- Networker
Charlotte will be advertising using social media websites and she will be in charge of the group emails. She will also be the main organiser of the sponsorships we need to have although we each need to do this task as well.
We still need to work together to help each other with these jobs so that we all know what is going on and when. This will also help us get things done faster and more efficiently.
I have been influenced by an exhibition that I attended a while ago at Yorkshire sculpture park. There was a dark room with old looking fragile books. The pages seemed very simple with just imagery on some and writing on others. This gave me the idea to make my own paper similar to the pages in these books. I feel that the effects of this work is relevant and similar to the kind of mood and effects I am looking to achieve for my final outcomes. Amar Kamwar's work had an effect on me and I became sad and angry, this influenced me to want to create work that has this sort of effect on people, it also raises awareness for a point that you may want to get across as art can have the power to do this.
The work was done by Amar Kamwar who raised awareness of people being killed unfairly because they are protesting against their homes and town being destroyed because of businesses being built ect.
I found that it was quite disturbing and it made me feel sad that peoples homes are destroyed because of this and they were being shot, put into prison and some even killed for standing up for their town.
This is a piece the artist created before he got killed.
The simple sentences that flowed together with other sentences, words and imagery create an overall interesting piece of Artwork although it may seem simple. The attention to detail is essential such as making sure the composition is correct, what will be in the background, the media/materials, the lighting and the quality of drawing. This will be my main focus's while I am creating my work.
As I have been making handmade paper I needed to research how to do this although there are different ways, it is a quite straight forward process but it just takes time for the paper to dry.
To help me with the basic process of making my own paper I used several tutorials on YouTube and here are the links.
I started to make the paper by using newspaper, cartridge paper, this worked well and created a pale grey colour. I used a slightly different process to what they used in the tutorials as I didn't have the same equipment. I used a machine that squeezes out a lot of the water so that it takes less time to dry.
I used a bin to mix up my paper so that it could soak before putting it into the blender. I then took a big scoop of this mixed with the water and started to blend it, then put it into the mould and tipped it out so that I could put it into the press, lots of water came out of the paper which made the drying process a lot quicker.
The colour of the paper dried a lot paler than when it was wet. I feel that it turned out to be a successful piece as a first try although it seemed to be a lot more fragile than I expected. The paper can not bend otherwise it will brake. This now means it will be harder for me to put together as a book, I am thinking of having the pages of the paper separate and it needs to be in a position where nobody can touch it as it would probably fall apart. I still want to try to make the book with the homemade paper, so I am going to add PVA glue to the wet mixture of paper before it dries and I will also coat the dried paper with PVA glue to see if it holds it together better.
I then added red fibre an paper towels to the mixture, using a machine that blends the paper up made the process quicker as well. The reason for adding the fibre was to see if the paper holds together better and it added more colour as well.
I created small pieces so that I have different scales to work with, I feel that this was quick once I got the hang of doing it. The ragged edges are ideal for my work and it is the kind of old effect I want.
I made a big piece which I then cut into four parts so that they are close to A3 size. To make the drying process faster I tried using an iron which didn't make much difference. So I decided to use a heat press machine that is used for transferring images off paper onto fabric. I didn't clamp it down as it is set at 201 degrees Celsius and I needed to be careful that there wasn't too much pressure to cause it to blow up. After a few times of the paper being put under the heat press it started to dry up quickly and it changed colour to a pale pink.
Here is two pieces of the paper, the two sides are different, the paler side is underneath and the darker pink is where the heat was most closer to which adds a more burnt interesting effect. I will make use of both sides to see which is most successful with imagery and type on .
Here I have added blue and white fibre and white sand to the wet mixture to see how different it turns out. When I put it into the heat press the paper seemed to split up into different parts which I was disappointed with. I am unsure if it was because of the heat or because of what I added to it. Next time I will add the fibres and the sand but be more careful with the heat and how long I put it into the heat press for. I do like the effect of it as the colours mix well together.
As a group we sent a brief to the graphics foundation pupils asking them to design a logo for us as we came up with a group name 'FoursightArt' we came up with this as there is four of us in the group and we all see and work differently. We decided that it links with the word 'foresight' which has the meaning of seeing into the future, the reason this is relevant because we all have ambition and know what we want in the future. We have collected the images of each logo and discussed which one would fit best to us.
The Graphics foundation level 4 group came up with different ideas and here they are.
I am happy that we could come together with other courses and I appreciate that they took the time to do this for us. I feel that they have all created successful logos but the one that we have chosen is this one designed by James Sanders. If you would like to see more of his work visit his Tumblr. http://www.james-sanders.tumblr.com
We now need to choose colours to have on the logo as well. The reason we have chosen this logo was because its simple but effective, it has four different marks which represents us as individuals, we can always work together as a team but our work is varied. This logo looks successful without colour which is ideal in case we need to print out a copy of it without colour ink.
The group and I have decided to organise regular weekly meetings every Thursday so that we can talk about what we are up to with our practical work and we will discuss what tasks need doing. This will help us stay connected with each other and it will move the process along much faster as we need to work quick and effectively.
I am looking to start using more of my drawings in my Photoshop work so that I can merge them with my photography and found photographs. This is me exploring further with the techniques and giving me more options to take my work further through the development stage.
This is how I have started to merge my drawings and photographs with my recent photography e.g a rose I photographed from my granddads memorial garden where his ashes are buried. This rose has importance to the theme and to me as it was placed on his plot, the day that we had a service to bury his ashes and I took images of it every so often until I had to remove it because it had died. The rose is another symbol of life and death because that also fades away over time if it is left there. The wind would have blown parts of it away whilst the rest of it rotted. It is a way of representing that nature is unstoppable.
As you my be able to see, my imagery, as it's building together is becoming more and more efficient in a way that they look organised. It's easier to recognise the skills that I have learned throughout this project, although I do feel that I need more time and experience in digital media to master the technique. My pieces have the exact effect that I have been looking to create with the layers, images and colours. The next step is to look at adding type which I feel will finish the pieces off in a professional way and create a sad atmosphere for when people are coming to view the work.
I have taken previous pieces that I created through Photoshop and added a scan on my drawings onto them. I drew a rose that I saw in a bunch of flowers that was put onto my granddads memorial garden, I thought it had significance to my project. I also drew the chair that my granddad used to sit in which is an important object which I felt needed to be included in the project as it is something that people in my family that knew him, would notice and respond to. It may also be something that other people that didn't know him can relate to the work in a different way, as I have found that it wasn't only my granddad that had his own chair at home. I went to visit the Bolton university students and I saw that one of the third years was basing their project on the loss of a loved one just like me. He was doing an installation of his granddads chair, I didn't expect anybody so local to me would be working on a similar theme as me and I felt more confident to put myself out there as an artist that puts emotion into my work.
Here are pieces of work that I firstly created in Photoshop and then printed out to manipulate by hand. Once I had finished doing that I then scanned them back into Photoshop to manipulate them more digitally and add more layers. I feel that this is the best technique for me to use to create more successful pieces of work as it allows me to explore with digital and physical ways of working and my images become more layered and meaningful which then may lead them to become successful final pieces.
I have tried out different way to manipulate my work by hand and to do this I used different media and techniques such as over painting, adding oil and plaster to my work, as well as sanding it ripping it. I also physically drew on top of the pieces as well as adding an image of my drawing to the work in Photoshop. I have done this with the below images as well.
I then added two different effects, one that set the image to the back and the other that I set to the front. The one where I set the image to the back which is the first image you my see, I feel that this is the most successful as it represents the theme of faded imagery and gives off the older scrapbook quality.
I have been looking into taking my portraiture techniques further by adding typography. I have seen an interesting tutorial on this which I have tried to follow although I found that it wasn't successful. I need to keep practicing this to get everything correct to make sure that the image turns into words.
Here is the invite/poster for out final exhibition as Wigan and Leigh College students. It is very close to the date and there are still things to organise such as, who we need to send invited to which will lead to how many we will need get printed, and this leads to looking at the cost. We have discussed that we will be inviting people that we he collaborated with in the past such as , the guided bus way team, Royal Albert Wigan Hospital, Students and staff of Bolton University and all of the Artists from Cross Street studios. We will also send invites to students and staff of Wigan and Leigh College including the head of HE, Governors, MP and of course our families and friends.
We have found that printing around 100 invites is going to cost between £15 and £20.
We also have the option to create our own business cards which costs £20 to get 100 o them printed. This may be an option for me personally an independent practitioner because it can help advertise me and my work to help with publicity. I would have my contact details on there but I would also add on a link to my blog so that people can see the variety of all of my on going Artwork.
We also discussed where we will be placing the posters to help advertise ourselves. The main place that needs most planning is the Leigh Journal. We will need to find out how much it will cost for us to have our advertisement put into the newspaper and get in touch with them.
Other places that our poster will need to be put up is around the town of both Wigan and Leigh, around college, maybe at the Cross Street studios, at the Royal Albert Wigan Hospital who will need to give us permission first, both Wigan and Leigh libraries and bus stations, which again, we will need permission for.
Group Meeting
As the exhibition was getting closer, as a group we decided to create a letter to send out to different people to help us with sponsorships.
After creating a draft of this letter we knew that it would need to be adjusted each time we sent it out to someone new so that it becomes more personal.
Here is our letter that we will be sending out to try and receive some sponsors. We will send it to different companies and people that we have worked with in the past and to people that we think will be helpful, such as the college and the libraries.
Hello,
We are a small group of four HND Fine Art students a part of
Foursight Art, Wigan & Leigh College. As up and coming local artists, we
are excited to be curating and exhibiting at Leigh Turnpike gallery this May during
the Arts Festival. This will be our first exhibition as Foursight Art, so we
aim to create a proficient and enthusing show. This is a fantastic opportunity
for us to promote and encourage art within the Northwest and bring the local
community together by creating an exciting, promising show displaying fantastic
artwork created by talented artists. Working in
partnership with CreativeLEIGH this is an unmissable prospect to gain essential
experience, future contacts and media coverage.
To aid us in the development and successful completion of
the exhibition, I would like to request assistance and support from local
organisations to help make this possible. We would like to raise £400 or more
to contribute to the expenses of creating the exhibition. This includes:
equipment, materials, transportation, advertising, food and beverage. If you would like to get involved and support
local up and coming talent donations would be greatly appreciated. For more
information please do not hesitate to contact us on;
Twitter & Facebook: @FourSightArt
Yours Sincerely
Foursight Art Artists,
Calum Rennox
Chloe
Reynolds
Georgia
Smallsahw
Charlotte
Stockley
HND in Fine Art Year
2 Level 5
FoursightArts Group, Wigan &
Leigh College
Georgia Smallshaw
Chloe Reynolds
Charlotte Stockley
FoursightArt@hotmail.com
Dear Governors,
We are four students currently reaching the end of our HND
Fine Art Yr2 level 5 programme of study at Wigan & Leigh College. As part
of our end of year show, and essential units, we have formed a new group called
FoursightArts. As an important element of our course will be exhibiting work
both in Leigh and Bolton in the near future. These exhibitions will be group
shows and will include forming student partnerships, from Wigan, Leigh and
Bolton campuses. The four of us are
progressing to Bolton University after this year, and are building professional
partnerships and curatorial understanding.
The exhibition in Leigh is scheduled for the Turnpike
Gallery from 17th May until 29th May as a part of the
Creative Leigh arts initiative. As part of this exhibition the A Level Art
students based at Leigh 6th Form Campus may have be invited to
participate, and discussions with Pre-Degree and year 2 Level 3 Art &
Design students are in progress. This we feel is helping to support and develop
the Arts on a local basis within the borough, throughout the College, and in a
time of financial constraints
The reason for writing to you is to publicise arts within
the Wigan and Bolton Boroughs, and to approach you to discuss relief through
financial support, this would assist the group towards the costs incurred in
putting on a show in these locations
The costs would include materials for hanging / mounting
work, production of publicity materials, insurance for the duration of the
exhibition, transport, private preview evening refreshments associated with
curating and presenting a professional.
Any amount of monies and/or support you could provide would be welcomed,
no matter how small.
We could meet with you as a group to discuss the on going
project, and provide you with a more in-depth proposal when required.
We look forward to hearing from you.
Regards
FourSightArt Group
Calum Rennox, Georgia Smallshaw, Chloe Reynolds, Charlotte
Stockley
.jpg)
Again I have been working with the grid to create positive and negative versions of my images. In my opinion, they have worked as pieces but are not a strong and successful as my previous pieces of work, so I don't think I will be taking these further in my final outcome. I am glad that I could experiment with different techniques as it had led me to other ideas and ruled out the non successful techniques, this will help me with future works.
I have been trying our different way to create backgrounds for my work which I am wanting to add words and notes to which I will also display as part of my final pieces.
I feel that the last image is too complicated and doesn't work as well as the first three images. Although, the first three images would have to be kept as they are because if I was to add words on them it would make them too complicated and they wouldn't be as successful as I am hoping my work to be.
I also found another tutorial on YouTube to create this as I was looking to find other interesting ways to manipulate images on Photoshop. The cracked effect adds interest and is a good way of representing me feeling broken.
I then added different effects and filters through Photoshop as well as over laying another image on top. The colours of these turned out to be more successful than I expected which is an amazing part of creating work digitally. With a couple of these I also added the gird template to see which worked best, with or without it, I also explored further by moving the grid around, I cropped the grid so that it only filled the middle part of the image as well as using it to fill the whole of the composition. I feel that the least successful is the piece with the grid that has filled the whole image because it looks over complicate and takes away from the detail of the image in the middle.
I tried out adding words to a few of the different compositions. To create these words I used a small Dymo machine that prints out words that I type. It turned out to look successful when I took a photograph of each word and cropped them in Photoshop. The words worked best when they were bold although some of them were less successful because of the light reflecting on them whilst I photographed them. Here are some examples of the words.
These are the words that worked the best and I have started to add these to my images that I feel are successful enough to be final pieces.
I chose these words as they are what I have been feeling since my granddad passed away. I also wrote down my feeling and memories as I was thinking about them. This helped me feel a little better and I could then use them to add words to my work.
Here is what I wrote in a word document.
I have lots of
small, happy memories of my granddad that I am grateful for, but why do I get
so sad when I think of them.
The smallest
things in life mean the most. He decorated a spare room in his house and made
it into a bedroom for me, he tried his hardest to get hold of a Nintendo DS
game for me which seemed to be sold out everywhere but still managed to buy it
as a Christmas present for me, he bought me lots of art supplies, my first
legal alcoholic drink, took me to the
cinema, the circus, the pantomime, shopping in Manchester and on holiday to
Benidorm.
But most of
all I feel appreciative of everything he ever did for me , such as pick me up
from school every single day and take me home, he picked me up if I was unwell
and looked after me. I knew that we had drifted apart as I grew up and became
older and he wanted to give me my space as a teenage girl but still loved me
just the same as he always did. Even the things he did for everybody else also
made me very thankful. I looked up to him for that. I saw him as a very strong
man of pride who loved his family and friends very much. He was a hero and a
true role model and I even appreciate one of his main career choices, he was a
prison officer.
Every time he took me home from school he waited
in the house for my mum to come home from work to make sure I was ok, even
though I always went out with my friends, out of all of those times, I could
and should have stayed in some of the days or gone to his house to just be
there and talk to him about anything, because I would do anything to be able to
do that now. I feel that I was selfish and he may have thought I was being rude
or unappreciative.
My Nan still
lives in the same house that he did and it hurts me so much to look at his
chair that he would usually be sat in. He isn’t sat there anymore. He’s gone.
Why? I don’t know but it’s not fair. This is what I think each and every time I
stare sadly at his chair that almost seems lonely and abandoned just like I
feel. The chair is still there, like all the rest of his belongings, and us. We
are still here. Life still goes on, only now it goes on without him here too
and that’s just the way it has to be. It’s scary to think that this will happen
over and over again to different people in my life.
I have learned
that money does and can buy happiness in some situations but only for a short
amount of time and does not last long, whereas love is and truly does bring
happiness, safety and comfort to our lives, especially mine.
I do not
understand that somebody can be alive, walking and talking one minute and be
gone forever the next minute; it is so bizarre and confusing to think about.
Before the loss of my granddad I never understood the pain that is felt and the
damage that is created after the death of a loved one and now I can’t imagine
how I could have been so unsympathetic towards everyone else when they had lost
somebody in their lives. And I now wonder if people feel the same way that me
and my family feel or if they handle it a lot better and find it easier than I
do? People say it gets easier but I
don’t believe them, somehow I feel worse than I did when he passed away. I look
at life so much differently than I used to, why is it so cruel when we are
supposed to live happily. The day that he died was the day me and my life
changed forever.
Doing this helped me realise what I was feeling as well as getting my feelings out of my system, this way I could really put myself out there and use words that have come from me. That then could lead me to create meaningful and emotive pieces of work.
This is an example of one of the words that wasn't very bold, this could work because it adds to the faded memory effect. I feel that these less bold words will work well on top of my final imagery but the bolder words will work best if they are displayed as single pieces as they will be more effective, by using the bold words and displaying them on their own, it will get the point across of how people feel with depression.
I then started to add these words to my final imagery which seemed to finish them off in a professional way. I am not sure how these pieces will be exhibited yet but I feel that these may look nice in frames. But I also feel that the frame may be too much so there is also the option to use frameless ones or mount them on mount board or foam board.
Here is our exhibition overview.
H.N.D Fine Art Level 5 Year 2
Personal Responses FMP
Personal Responses FMP
Exhibition
Overview
This is an overview
of what the group have been working on since the start of the HND course in
September 2014; this has been a journey through the exploration of transformation
and individual concepts.
The HND year 2 course
consists of 4 students which makes this visual journey quite personal. We are
all aiming to curate and present our own final exhibition; by showing our
individual understanding through the unique mark making, and creative output. The
range of work consists of 2-D & 3-D pieces of art, non –traditional media
and large works. At the end of our first
week this academic year, as a group we had in depth discussion regarding
individual pathways of art, concepts and the philosophy of artwork. We all
started by showing our initial thoughts through a transformative process,
producing theoretical ideas and compositional development, from this we noticed
that we started to question the way we view, create and represent art in a
given space. We began experimenting on different scales and with different
media; this enhanced our individual understanding art and our personal creative
language. Each personal response is unique, as we are all looking into a range
of concepts, philosophies and motifs. It has been an interesting experience to
see how a group of artists have produced their different ideas, but have
similar ideals and work together as a creative group, FoursightArt. Reflecting
upon our work we think we have been able to pull through different
representational and symbolic elements based on our creative journey. It is
this originality that will give our pieces their own unique styles which should
cater to different audience interests. We all worked towards gaining a variety of
responses so that we can then progress further onto a level 6 top-up year,
carrying on this process and journey. At this final stage within the course, we
have built a more professional understanding; it has helped us to work together
as a team. Also the journey has encouraged us to discover ourselves as Artists
and the new territories which we have been able to explore.
Having artistic
differences has presented creative challenges and learning points to develop
further in the future. Each personal response is viewed and created in a range
of ways where some might not be able to understand, but it is these challenges
that we are setting ourselves up for. Now that we are Higher Education students
it is important to independently push ourselves to an advanced level of
exploration, but also providing evidence for what we have discovered visually,
and how we have progressed from the beginning of the course, consistently
analysing and engaging responses.
We hope that opening the show during this busy
event for the college will gain publicity, showcasing the standard of our work.
This will also help some of us become established creatives in our community, developing
further understanding of the Art industry. We are optimistic that you will enjoy
our journey through art and making just as much as we did, and hopefully you
can see the links and differences based on our personal thought patterns and
processes.
We had to have somebody do a Health and Safety review on our exhibition space which is the Leigh Turnpike. This is the email to show evidence that this has been done.
Here is an example of our financial assistance form that we sent to try and help us fund our exhibition, from materials and transport to paying for the space and refreshments on the opening night. Doing this helped me break down how much I had to spend so that I could price everything up professionally.
I will use something similar to this for future exhibitions and projects as I feel that it may help keep everything organised.
Member
of staff submitting request and contact details.
Name/
tel no/and e-mail:
|
Lee
Paton HND in Fine Art Course Leader
Student
Representative
|
Student
Group
|
HND
in Fine Art Level 5 Year 2 Students
|
Date
of Trip
|
Exhibition
Curation 14/18/19/05/2015
Preview
Evening 20/05/2015
|
Destination
|
Turnpike
Art Gallery Leigh
|
Total
cost for the student group
|
Overall
Cost £910:00 – Minus £300:00 Media materials
Minus
£300:00 Venue
Minus
£50:00 Marketing - Group
Total
£610:00
|
Total
cost per student
(including
any contribution from the Foundation or other sources)
|
Overall
£227:50
Minus
Sponshorship - £140:00 per student
|
Number
of students requesting assistance
|
4
|
Additional
expenses for travel and admission etc. to be paid by each student
|
Material
and Media costs per student £75:00 subtracted from the overall cost
Probable
Costs for hanging materials/frames etc
Some
incurred travel expenses, negligible.
|
How
much in total is being requested from the Foundation?
|
£150
- £200
|
Is
funding being sought (or been granted) from other sources? If so, how much?
|
Sponsorship
Creative
Leigh: Venue Hire secured for free - £50 per day total for the week £300
Marketing
– J.Fletchers - £50
|
Description
of visit/event
|
HND
year 2 in Fine Art Final Major Exhibition – Group curation, promotion and
exhibition during Leigh Creative Festival event month
|
Why
do you feel the Foundation should support this activity?
|
An
exciting opportunity to work in partnership with the wider creative community
– Wigan & Leigh College promotion through local media, and social media –
students personal blogs and group website
|
Can
you confirm that the appropriate risk assessments will be undertaken?
|
Yes
– Linked with Sue Counsel, Venue Management, Appropriate College Risk
Assessments
|
Who
will be providing feedback for the Trustees?
|
Lee
Paton and Student Representative
|
Please note that it is a
condition of funding that the person requesting the funds confirms that all
appropriate risk assessments and other requirements will be carried out in
accordance with College policies.
Furthermore, that they will provide written or documented feedback to
the Trustees upon the completion of the activity.
For
administrative use only:
Application
Received on:-
|
|
Agreed
financial assistance
per
student
|
|
Total
agreed financial assistance agreed
|
|
Agreed
on behalf of the Trustees by (initials) (Date)
|
Total Costing:
Group Marketing –
Invites/posters/visitor book/key information – £50:00
Group are also saving on
marketing through emailing invites
And use of personal
Blogs/social media links/College website
Personal Marketing - £20:00
per student – Group Total £80:00
Material Cost – Per student
£75:00 – Total £300
Venue Hire - £350:00 - £50:00
per day
Preview evening security -
£60:00
Catering/refreshments -
£70:00
Here is my own breakdown of the costs, this helps me to feel organised and gives me an indication as to how much I would put my work up for if I was to sell them.
A breakdown of my costs.
·
Printing of my final pieces - £15
·
Foam board £12
·
Double sided tape- £2
·
Emulsion paint - £4
·
Printing for invites - £4
·
venue -
£10
·
Transportation- £15
Breakdown of costs for the group
·
Venue - £40
·
Marketing (invites)- £16
·
Emulsion paint- £20
·
Tools(screws, mirror brackets,) -£15
·
Transportation- £45
Sponsorship
·
£50 from J.Fletchers
·
Donation of Wine for the evening (Red, White and
Rose) from Wigan and Leigh College
We have organised for our exhibition to be advertised throughout college and on the website. This may help us gain feedback on our works as more people are likely to attend on the opening night if they know what the exhibition is all about. It is also good publication for us as an art group as we have only recently decided on a name and made ourselves as FourSightArtists.
Here is the statement that went in the college news.
What on eARTh?
Final preparations for a prestigious art exhibition at
The Turnpike Gallery of Leigh are underway. The inspired exhibition theme “What
on eARTh?” is the brainchild of four talented HND Fine Art students from Wigan
& Leigh College.
The creative students: Georgia Smallshaw, Calum Rennox,
Chloe Reynolds and Charlotte Stockley will all be showcasing their work at the
event which they have arranged and organised themselves. The exhibition is the focus of a final year project
that the students were tasked with as part of the HND course.
They all have innovatively interpreted the “What on
eARTh?” theme using very different influences, resulting in a very stimulating
display. The students have used a variety
of materials and methods in their work including; print, digital media,
painting, sand and plaster.
The exhibition is the gallery’s first exhibition as
partnership Foursight Art. The students also secured sponsorship for the event from
J Fletcher Engineers Ltd, based in Eccles.
This is a great opportunity for the local community to
view and support local talent and the students would love to see as many people
there as possible. The exhibition opens on Wednesday 20th – 29th
May with a Public Reception at 7.00pm – 9.00pm.
The opening event will be attended by College Principal,
Michael Sheehan who would like to with the students good luck and congratulate
them on all their hard work.
I have used my small samples of handmade paper to practice experimenting by printing on to them using the laser cutter. This pieces above has been cut out with the laser cutter but as the paper is quite thick and the laser cutter was set on a lower heat than normal it seems to have just burned into the paper which I feel looks successful on its own. I am planning on layering different materials and media on top of these and maybe add words to finish them off as an exhibition piece.
Another setting on the laser cutter is that it draws onto the paper by burning it in the different toned areas which I feel is another nice quality to be added to my work. Some of the parts to the image on the paper is missing as it must have been the lightest tone, this is a significant link to my theme of fading imagery.
Here are another two examples of the laser cutter etching onto my handmade paper. I decided to try out using two drawings that I had done in my workbook as ideas. Whereas with the other examples I used the Photoshop imagery that I had created.
I used a piece of bubble wrap to print onto of one of those examples to see if I could recreate the look of the circle grid that I have been using in my Photoshop work. It seem to have worked out quite well but I do not think I would like to take it further into my final pieces. Although I can see the connection with this and the way I am hoping people will understand that the images in my work are not supposed to be recognised straight away.The green circle grid on top of the paper makes the image look kind of lost which also links with the way I am feeling since the loss of my granddad. I am glad that I can see all of these significant connections with my work, my feelings and my theme.
I also tried using the laser cutter the etch onto a piece of plastic, I wasn't sure if it would work as I thought that the heat would melt it. The heat was on a lower setting and it seemed to work out quite well. The image was very hard to see so I felt that if I rubbed a bit of acrylic on top of it, then the image would show through and this did happen . The image can be seen a lot more clearly if you was to stand back and look at it from a distance.
I started to do something with my handmade paper. I used my previous drawing of the dead rose and layered materials, I also added the smaller sample pieces of material that I printed on using the laser cutter. Words and notes will also be added onto this to pull it together as a final piece and it will then look finished. I am unsure of how it will look when I am finished working on it but hopefully I will look as successful as I am thinking it will be.
I have started to plan printing my final pieces off and I needed to plan what size I am going to print them. This is a small but important aspect as the size may make the viewers look at the work differently.
I feel that the smaller sized image is more successful as a final piece because it looks ore delicate and may draw people in to my space at the exhibition to concentrate on each image, this is because the details are harder to see from a distance, including the words.
It was also useful for me to work with other artists and discover other ways of working. I found that it was an eye opening experience, I was always used to working in the same environment as the other pupils that study on the same course as I do and it was nice to see how other artists work.
Images of the exhibition space at Bolton University.
This was quite a large venue for artwork although I feel that it may not be big enough for over 20 students to display work. In my opinion I feel that it is always professional to have more than one or two pieces of work on display as it can show more of a journey as an artist.
Here is my work displayed at the exhibition in Bolton Market Place.
Curating our show !
There was some complications with the space as we weren't allowed to hang work on the walls, only the boards. When we arrived on the first day , we had to fill the holes in the boards, sand them, put gum strip on them and paint them. We didn't realise that this had to be done as the last time we visited the boards were clean but there was a different exhibition on before ours. We worked as quickly as possible to get this done and we did it in time as we had good team worked and gave ourselves different tasks to get things done efficiently.
We did end up hanging some canvases on the walls as well as the boards because the owners decided we could do this for the opening night. We wanted to use as much space as we could to put our work up and have a successful and professional exhibition as FourSightArt.
We was also unaware that the exhibition space would also be used as a multifunctional room for classes and meetings. We made this work by carefully curating the exhibition so that our work wouldn't get in the way of the classes and meetings. We thought of this situation positively as we felt that more people were able to view our work whilst the room was being used for different things which meant better publicity for ourselves as individuals as well as an Art group.
Although it seems to be less professional that the room is used for more than an exhibition space it was a brilliant sized room and also out of the Wigan area where we would usually exhibit.
My personal statement that I had displayed at the side of my work. I feel that if people was to read this before looking at my Artwork, it would help them understand more what it is about and maybe relate to it in some ways.
I decided to chose the perfect spot for my main pieces of work for the exhibition. It was placed at the back that seemed separated from the rest of the spaces as they were mostly a similar sized space. Mine was quite different to the rest and I felt that this was important for me as my theme was very different to the rest of my peers, and the theme is personal to me.
I set my work out into three group of three and then I had my words on the last wall, this worked well to have the words as the last thing to be looked at because the words bring the pieces of work together and sums them up as a whole, I hope that the viewer would see it that way as well.
Here is an image of all my pieces of work together. I feel that they turned out to look more successful than I expected. I did want to lay out the pieces so they looked like a grid and this is what I did and it links with the techniques I have been using all the way through this project that link with the artist Chuck Close. Although I did look at him as an influence, I wanted to push it further by experimenting different ways of representing the grid as well as portraiture. I understand that I tried my hardest to do this and use my own initiative to find my own way an individual artist.
Here are my final fabric pieces that was displayed on the opposite side of the room at the exhibition. I didn't mind that my work was spreaded out into different areas because the areas I was in fitted my work perfectly.
To create this I cropped some of my Photoshop images in the most interesting parts and then had them printed onto fabric. This had a delicate quality which is another significant link with my work and I was hoping to create this type of work because the them is delicate just like memories. The way I exhibited these was by hanging them with pins and using double sided tape to hold it in different places, it looked like it was the way it naturally hung which is the kind of look I was hoping to create with these. They may make people walk closely to the work to find out what the image is and what material it is printed on. I feel that if people do this, I will have achieved something as my work will have had an effect on the viewer. Another way I want my work to effect the viewers is with the feelings that are felt when you lose someone.
I created these pieces especially to fit into these frames which are successful pieces. The layering doesn't make it too complicated but it is interesting to look at which hopefully draws people in to them to loo closer and understand the pieces more. I only added one word to each piece so that it had more meaning and didn't make it too complicated. I feel that I have now found the techniques that work best for me as an artist. Mixed media and digital media have been the most successful so far for me in my experimentations to find my own art language.
Here are my two final handmade pieces. I wasn't sure if I could make these pieces work individually as they were originally supposed to be put together a long with other pages to create a scrapbook but I found that they were too fragile and delicate to handle. I added different materials and media to these pieces as I also feel that layering is another successful technique that seems to work well for me. The delicate media I used which made these fragile are the plaster and the note paper I attached to it, as well as the fabric I put onto it. These pieces of work look as though they have been destroyed and have an old quality to them which is a perfect link with the point I wanted to get across to my audience. Memories are delicate and even the physical images you keep start to fade. I was optimistic about these pieces as I felt that they may have fallen apart once they ha been pinned up onto the boards but because I put a coating of PVA glue on the back of these to add strength and hold them together better, they attached to the wall and held quite well, which gave me a sense of relief.
Here is the other space with my other works in. This space was quite simple looking as there isn't too much going on which is how I was hoping it would look. The space seems quite dark and lonely which, again is another link to my theme as well as my feelings throughout this final personal project. Seeing people gather in this space and seem interested with my work during the opening night made me feel happy and proud that I had worked hard and put my all into creating these meaningful pieces of work.
The night
Although we all had different intentions and themes for our final project as level 5 Fine Art students, I feel that our work as a group flowed and showed our whole journey as artists throughout the HND course. It was a great way to show how much we have improved as professional artists and come together as an art group.
The principal, me , my Tutor ( Lee Paton)
I was happy that I was given the opportunity to explain my work to the principal and he seemed to understand and enjoy my exhibited work. We spoke about how I came across my theme and how I felt towards creating this personal work. I then went on to how I created my pieces such as the media and materials, he was intrigued at the fact that I had created this work on Photoshop as well as by hand.
My family seemed very happy and some of the time overwhelmed at my work and was surprised at the theme I had chosen as I had kept it to myself for the whole of the project. I didn't tell my mum especially as I wanted to see her reaction to me creating work and basing my final major project around the loss of her father. I feel that she understands the feelings that I wanted to get across in my work as it is also personal to her. I felt proud and relieved that my family enjoyed the exhibition as I was worried about how they would react, it was a positive response from all, including other people that visited on the night which made me feel emotional. I felt emotional that I had managed to create work based on this theme without giving up, as I found it hard at times to carry on and felt that I wasn't able to create successful pieces but I overcome this by pushing through and using my emotions as an advantage to create meaningful and delicate pieces of art.
I received other positive feedback from a former tutor of Wigan School for the Arts, she told me that my work was mature and touching. She also encouraged me to carry on creating Art and finishing off my degree by continuing onto the third year at Bolton University as she thought that I was talented. I was overwhelmed at her response to my work which again, made me feel proud of how hard I have worked to achieve this outcome.
Here are some examples of the feedback that I received from my work.
When the show was over and all the work had been taken down I was asked to collect feedback from Elizabeth and Wayne of how I did at the workplace throughout installing the exhibition. I also had forms to fill in and sign as proof of my time spent here and the health and safety procedures that I was told. Here is evidence of the filled in form.
I stuck to an action plan for as long as I needed to. This helped me realise what needed to be done and how long I had to do it , that way I could get my work done efficiently. I will use these in the future as they help me stay organised and calmer throughout my projects. I tend to do more work whilst using an action plan as I set myself tasks each day and challenge myself to get them done.
Overall I am proud of myself and my fellow artists that we have created work on such a professional level and came together as a team to curate and organise the exhibition. We each took responsibility to work on something to help bring it all together. e.g. Sponsorships, transportation, refreshments, tools and communication. We came together and used our teamwork skills to organise everything and make our exhibition a success.
To help us in the future to improve I feel that instead of each having different jobs that we all do the jobs, this way we can use our skills help each other and get things done efficiently. I came to this conclusion because with some parts of the organisation we did all do things together and it seemed to work better for us as a group.
I know that there is always room for improvement with my Artwork because I feel that it can never be finished. A theme can be experimented and explored for a life time with a few changes a long the way and I feel that the theme I chose could definitely be pushed further and worked on to discover more techniques and inspirations as well as using different imagery and drawings.
For the future I would like to carry on practicing my drawing skills as they can only improve with time and practice, the same applies with the idea of creating work using digital media, as well as by hand. To improve in this project if I had the chance to go back , I would definitely make more use out of my workbook by jotting down more ideas and possibilities so that I could create work to the best of my ability.
Throughout my development I do see a significant link with the Artists that I looked at for inspiration which were Chuck Close and William Kentridge, although I do have my own style as an artist, I find that I can take different Artists work into consideration whilst creating my own. Both of these Artists had links with me and this theme such as the techniques I like to use and the meanings behind my work. Chuck Close's portraiture and the grid method he uses really interests me and I felt that I could make use of the grid method by trying to portray it in as many different ways as I could. For me, this was a challenge but I was excited about what I was going to discover and I now feel that I have represented the grid method in many different professional ways and I am proud that the ideas came from me.
Kentridge's work influenced me to create emotive outcomes by making use of my feelings towards my theme. I did this by writing down all of my feelings as they came to mine and using the words and phrases as part of my final outcomes which I feel worked out well for me and had a significant link with my imagery.
I am now excited to see how I can take the techniques I have used during this project onto a different theme another time.
No comments:
Post a Comment