Light drawings...

  I have been looking at the imprint we leave on a space after our movement through it.... I wanted to experiment with light drawings because it involves my own physical involvement... I have to constantly move to create the images, so the resulting images are really like a trace, the result of my motions.... As it is Halloween next month , I bought loads of sparklers from the 2euro shop !!  None of the drawings turned out great but it was really good fun and when I look at them they remind me of how I had to jump around to create them....:-)

The faces were inspired by Picasso's light drawings which I have in my contextual notebook...

Richard Sweeney

 This artist was recommended to me by my tutors on Wednesday. I love his work, two sets of works in particular and they are very relevant to me at the moment.
 Sweeney creates amazing sculptural pieces, usually just with paper. According to his web page 'Richard’s practise combines the disciplines of design, photography, craft and sculpture, resulting in a varied output of work'. This type of craft must be very time-consuming but the outcomes are simple beautiful.

 
 This piece, ' The Angel',a life size sculpture is made out of paper and the wings alone are 20 metres of pleated cartridge paper. I really like this piece but it is the photographs Sweeney took of this sculpture which really caught my eye....I cannot post them here but they can be seen here http://www.richardsweeney.co.uk/angel/angel.html  . It appears as though the figure has moved through the space because there is a ghost-like, blur to the images. I think it is hauntingly beautiful. It is just like the 'trace' effect I hope to achieve with my photographs of people and their imprint upon a space.




This is from the set of works 'Motion Forms' . These interesting pieces are made from folded watercolour paper and I think the effect is so elegant and engaging.


This is something I could look at in relation to human motion through a space or environment and the imprint this leaves behind.

He has some beautiful drawings and monoprints too,

           

  

Where I am at the moment.....

 So after beginning my project focusing on negative space, it has kind of merged with my other ideas involving space. I have been looking at the imprint/trace a human leaves within a space once they have moved through or left that space. I have been asking myself ' how do we influence the space we are in?' , 'do we leave a ghost-like trace behind us once we leave?' , 'do we imprint upon our space?'.... To begin with, last week , I found the easiest way to show this 'trace' was to focus on our movement through our space. I began to look at photographs of a human form moving through a  space (my talented little sister!) and focus on the space around her, looking at how she momentarily occupied this space.
 These quick drawings focused on negative space but I also tried to capture the sense of moving through a space quickly and the trace it leaves behind.

 This week I have begun to think not only of the trace we, as people, leave on a space but also of the imprint of a space on us, how it shapes us or effects us. After making lots of thumbnails and doodling ideas I feel like I will have a lot of avenues to explore with these ideas and I have been making a start.

 We had a group tutorial yesterday and I felt twice as excited and encouraged afterwards. I had been nervous about it but the feedback and discussing it in a group made me feel much better. I was flying through work afterwards....

 This is some of what I have been working on.... I try to put most things up on my wall so it doesn't look so bare. At least if I have a mental block I won't be (literally) left staring at a blank wall!!

So with this chalk sketch I was looking at how 'our space' or our environment influences us, how it imprints onto our lives....

 

This is sort of a staring point for something else, somewhere to go from......it's basically little drawings of my sister doing a back flip. This temporary, quick movement through a space made me think this image would work well with investigating our 'trace' within a space.

 

This is similar to the back flip images, except I drew each stage of movement upon one another to create a blurred, hazy 'just happened' trace of someone within a space.

 

 

This was originally part of my research journal. It is a badly photocopied image of a painting by Hope Atherton. When I looked at it there was something ghost-like about the photocopy, as if someone had just moved or left the space, so I drew back into the image to kind of exaggerate this.

 

My studio space, looking a little less empty!

 The image underneath the acetate is a painting I found on line which I worked into and over (on the acetate) to exaggerate the imprint left by the figures upon the space.

 

 This is the work that has made it onto my wall, I'm planning on getting photos up soon from my notebooks....

A touch of French haute couture....

 This is old news and totally irrelevant to my project...but over the weekend my friends and I went for lunch in a local cafe. When my friend received her order of Diet Coke I was really excited to see it was one of the cans designed by Jean Paul Gaultier. I had known about the new collection for ages but had never seen the evidence in person. Like with most things in life, now that I've seen one, I'll probably see hundreds!
 They are pretty so I think they are very worth blogging about!

So over the weekend I was researching contemporary artists with the help of 'Art Now, Volume 2'. I also used the ever helpful 'Google Image' technique! Overall I was greatly able to add to my list of artists and designers that inspire me or my work.

My research journal has begun to fill up quickly so this week I think I must focus more time to my other notebook, which may be feeling rather neglected.....
I am, as predicted, sort of addicted to Tumblr! The problem for me, is people post such beautiful and interesting images, so I have to spend ages clicking refresh....It's just like my addiction to Pinterest.

Any-hoo, I said I'd quickly post about how my project is coming along. I have no photos taken of my notebooks yet so here is an image of my rather empty wall. My ambition this week is to fill it up and give it some life!

 

This wall looks kind of pathetic right now, but it really is only a work in progress!

 

Hope Atherton

 I'm really getting into this project the last couple of days....it's really exciting to spend the day creating, drawing , making, brainstorming etc. And researching of course! I've just joined tumbler and of course I've found plenty more artists to love! I plan to blog some of my own work this weekend, just to record all that I did this first week.

 I discovered the work of Hope Atherton in a library book 'Art Now Volume 3'. I was immediately drawn to her paintings, which I  find almost dream-like. Her work has been described as' infused with atmospheric substance and the melancholic sense of an eerie, other-wordly fantasy'. I don't think I could sum it up better myself! Her work, in my opinion, ties in quite well with my current concepts, as there is movement and a certain sense of an event just ending, almost as though the space depicted remembers it.With some there is even aspects dwelling on negative space.

 
 

   Untitled,2006                                                                    Mirror 2006




Nocturnal,2007

                Via Dolorosa 2007.
'

Kara Walker...with a Tim Burton twist !

  So in keeping with the idea of negative space, another artist I really like is Kara Walker. I love her room-size tableaux of black cut-paper silhouettes . These are fresh and lively drama-like scenes but with a disturbing twist. They have a Victorian- Gothic like feel, which is, I think Walker's way of conveying the serious issues in her work, like slavery and race.  I don't know how relevant they will be for my work now as I am thinking about fusing two ideas...but they are inspiring all the same!

 

 
  These images really remind me of a Tim Burton animation, like 'The Corpse Bride', 'James and the Giant Peach' or 'The Nightmare Before Christmas'. I love these stop-motion fantasy films. They blend folklore, magic and fairy tales with a dark and twisted humour .







Tim Burton's 'The Corpse Bride' stills, sketches and model.

Rachel Whiteread

 An artist I really liked when I was researching today was Rachel Whiteread. She does some amazing work with negative space which is one of the concepts I'm delving into right now...I'll see how it goes!


Rachel Whiteread exhibited this work ‘Untitled (One Hundred Spaces)’ at the Sensation exhibition in 1997, it consists of a series of resin casts of the space underneath chairs. I think this work changes the space we ignore (beneath a chair) everyday and makes it into something entirely fun and different!


Rachel Whiteread's concrete negative space casting of the book-lined shelves of a library in the work Untitled (Library) from 1999 .


 Rachel Whiteread won the prestigious Turner award for House (above!) in 1993. House was a concrete cast of the inside of an entire Victorian terraced house (including fireplaces and doorknobs).
The structure was removed despite campaigns for it to become a permanent piece of art in the area. I watched the short video of the creation of this piece on youtube today and I think it's worth a watch!

 So I have been researching this project all morning and have found some interesting artists and works! I'm heading to the library after lunch to start printing and photocopying.... :)
  I have about 4 or 5 ideas and concepts at the moment and everything feels a bit up in the air , so I am hoping all this research will help ground them.
After, like, 4 hours of sitting on the ground watching youtube clips and looking at image after image you would think I'd be a little bored but honestly I'm really inspired. It sounds corny but listening to artists and designers who are so submerged in their work is actually exciting. I see how 'into' their art they are and it's really encouraging. So hopefully this week will be the start of that for me!

Blogging....

Just started a blog to document my work for year one, Art and Design course in LSAD...so excited!