Expressive in more ways than one.

SIREN
An up and coming art exhibition involving 21 artists in the next week. It will be a great opportunity to see some amazing artwork, so if anyone is available in the UK then please feel free to pop down for a  visit. Exploring a wide range of issues from mental health to capitalism to eco-art and beyond with this interdisciplinary exhibition there will be a wide range of pieces for others to experience.

Over the summer I spent most of my time just relaxing and chilling out mainly, I did not really have anything planned so I just did whatever I wanted because I don’t really have any commitments in the end so I am free to do whatever I want. So all threw the summer I was just relaxing by going on short walks by the river, which was rather relaxing. The walks I went on was rather interesting and relaxing there where some fishermen fishing which was fun to watch because on the difference in techniques between each fisherman. While I was out walking one day I also found a fishing hook and a weight which was an interesting find but at the minute I don’t really have much use of them however I was well chuffed to find them it was rather excited.  Well what else did I get up to over the summer, I did a bit of drawing and have taken many photo’s but I think I will talk about these ones in another blog. This is just a quick catch up blog for the summer.
   Well I went back home for around ten days which was fun, I got to see a few of my friends which I have not seen in a while so catching up with them what kind of relaxing, some of them seemed to be more relaxed that what I remember them being like which was good. It was a shame I did not get to see a few more of my friends. I got to say with some good friends at the same time as well as spending some time with her amazing daughter, which was nice but loud, I do not think I am use to how noisy she can be sometimes. However so is funny and very clever for her age and she loves reading, she is amazing. While I was there I saw a interesting exhibition which I will also talk about in a latter blog. I got to spend some time with twinkle the dog; she is a cute little creature, who is always happy and excited to see people. I kind of miss both of them, even though she was not my daughter I kind of treated her like family but oh well, I think that’s enough about that.
    When I came back all I did was move into my new how which is a relief because it was nice to be somewhere without all the noise of living with students. I now I am a student but other students are rather annoying and noisy but I think I will be happy now that I am with people are nice and not to noisy The move was easier than expected and I have less stuff than I expected so now I have nearly everything I own in my house but oh well I do not have much it will be easier to move next time I hope. Also material objects are not everything but I do have some amazing, interesting book, which will be useful for the coming year.

Statement of Practice for year one life drawing
This nine week drawing project consist of life drawings from the figure during this time we used a divers range of male and female models which improves the development understanding of drawing different body shapes. In these sessions we where interested in developing our technical understanding of drawing by exploring different medias and techniques with each session we explored a different aspect of the theoretical side of drawings to the expressive sides of drawing.

During the sessions there where not that many pieces of work that where any good they where all lacking something however the pieces do explore different ideas. In the first session we first considered the ways that we could become more expressive and free with drawing this session consists of creating marks by using bamboo sticks and other such materials because these materials helped to become less self-concussions. This made the images rather abstract expressive, even though the images where less self-concussions. With this the there is an understanding of how to create makes without using the traditional materials to become more expressive and experimental with the media used. With this the theatrical technique we developed was the using the head to measure the body, this was introduced in the 1500- 1600’s in Florence and Rome, the theory behind this technique was started in 45BC with Vitruvius an Ancient Greek Artist/ scholar, this was discovered while interpreting perspective and how to translate this perspective on a 2D surface. After this the Renaissance refined the technique by Leonardo De Vinci’s, ‘Vitruvian Man’, which is creating a figure, which is in relative proportion to visual perspective. This is rather relevant to my practical work because I am exploring the Ancient Greek society as part of my work so the ideas behind this theory where linked to understanding the mind set of the Ancient Greek society and how the scholars of that time thought, this may not be relevant in what I am doing at the minute but in the further future this will influence the understanding and mindset of the past. This session was rather useful in opening up my approaches to drawing with the understanding of how the theoretical side has developed and expanded over the many centuries.

The tonal session we looked at the different ways of using tone to emphasis the shades and shadows within the body, this technique is used to get an understanding of the structural shapes within the figure, this technique would be useful for sculptures because it explore the tonal differences within the pieces. We used this technique for two sessions in two different ways. The First session we used charcoal and erasing the charcoal to create the high values and adding extra charcoal for the lower values, this technique was rather interesting because it was a way of representing the figure without drawing the whole figure within the page because the concept behind this is to consider the contours and tones as one, and make the marks count for the piece. This technique is rather interesting, because the piece does not just focus on the figure the piece looks at the negative spaces around the figure and how they pay a part in developing the figure. With this technique we also used an ink wash where we used oil or wax water resistant material to create the higher tones and used the ink layers to create the low tones. This method was rather useful in understanding how layers can be built up to create an image and how the different layers interact with each other and affect the next layer and the previous layer.

The next technique that we looked at which I would say is one of my favorite is the three point technique because in this technique we had to pick three points within the room and build up the image from there the makes created the perspective within the piece and how the perspective can be changed by one mark. This technique also explored using mixed media to images by the differences in the media used and how this influences the marks created so in this session the focus also was on choosing the right material to create the marks needed to make or break the piece. This technique was easy to grasp the concept however I think I still need to work on the execution of the technique, so this is why I wanted to try and recreate this technique for the finial 2 week drawing because this technique can be used as a starting point and it can incorporate all the other techniques methods and materials learnt thought this project. I also decided to use this technique as the focus for the finial piece because I thought it was necessary to take a risk and retry a technique, which I need to improve and develop.

In these sessions I have developed my understanding of the different techniques involved in drawing, even though this is focused on life drawing I understand how this can influence drawing within my practical work. Within this drawing project I have developed the understanding of the tonal relationship within the special area and how a each section a drawing an affect another section of the drawing by the strength of the marks and how necessary the mark is to make the piece. Over the cause of the past nine weeks I have develop a greater understanding of how the theoretical understanding can influence the present practices and within my drawing used in my practical work by exploring how the figure can be broken down into different shapes to create the overall shape. Even though my life drawing from the figure has not vastly improved I have learn a lot about different drawing techniques I can use with the practical work. During this time I think the accuracy of my drawings has slowly progress and if I carried on doing life drawing I think I would be able to create a descent accurate life drawing.

Week Two.
This is the second session in this series of workshops is looking at how tone is explored and represented within a figure. If you would like to try this technique out for yourself, then all you would need is; a putty rubber, a hard rubber (a normal rubber will be fine), some charcoal and some compressed charcoal. This technique can be other used with other media however for the two hour involved we used the media stated above.

The process involved in this is rather simple, there are on three stages;
1. Choose the size of paper and tone the paper so the paper is a mid- tone so that the paper is a greyish tone.
2. Afterwards erase the high value, which means erasing the lighter tones on the paper.
3. The last stage is to erase the low values which is the darker tones or the shadows, is this part less is more because this is just to emphasis the shapes of the figure.
This is involved with this section, this was rather short post. Ohhh I have forgotten something’s. This technique has been used by many artists and is rather good for sculptures because the shapes are tones are more defined, artists that use this technique are: Henry Moore, Frank Arerback, Kalle Kottwitz, Peter Howson, Georges Sevrat, Leon Kossof.

This technique is rather interested and I will like to carry it on in my practice however I already do use this technique but it was a good was of developing the method. The pieces I made where still rather poor because I am not very good a life drawing of the figure however over the course of the sessions I think I will improve in the drawings.

Week 1
The first life drawing session consisted of getting to grips with the different tools used to create expressive marks within drawing. Even though this project/ workshop focused on life drawing from a figure, but the principles learnt within these sessions can be applied to assortment of diverse drawing practices. The techniques that have been discovered in this first session are exploring the use of different tools to create expressive marks. The Marks where created by using a long bamboo stick on a piece of paper which is set up on easel. These sessions will be two hours long for around eight to ten weeks long within this time a wide range of techniques and materials will be explored.

Setting up an easel
Make the vertical part at nearly 180o parallel to a wall with the feet spread out for stability. Afterwards move the bottom bar across the front to just above the waist line, (so the hand can reach the bottom without bending over.) Place the top bar above the board so it fits the board snug in-between. (The size of the board will change the height of these two bars so adjust to be able to reach the top and bottom without stretching) Then turn the board depending on left or right hanged to the right of left. Well I am right handed so for this example I will use right handed however lefty’s just do the same except turn the board the other direction. Turn the board and easel so all of the board can be visible and the entire figure is visible without looking round the board. (If there will be multiple sessions with the same pose mark the feet on the easel on the floor with some tape.)
The practice.
The techniques that have been discovered in this first session are exploring the use of different tools to create expressive marks. The Marks where created by using a long bamboo stick on a piece of paper which is set up on easel. This exercise is a starting of point because it relates to encouraging the participants to draw more free and expressive and less self- concussions.
So the stick drawings are quick line drawings in maximum of about 15 minutes and going down to around one minute. This technique can be used with a wide range of media, in this session I used some soft charcoal and pencils because they were at hand. We did this for the first half of the session.

In the second part of this session we look a more academic structured method. In this session we looked at the technique which explores measuring the figure with the head. Holding a pencil at arm’s length; by putting the bottom of the pencil at the top of the head and measure with your finger to the bottom of the head. This will give the measurement of the head, then count how many of these heads fit into the whole figure, this will be different depending on the size of the of the figure and the pose will change the amount of heads. Depending on the size of the paper will depend on the size of the image, (for this example I am using A3 paper) if the measurements were translated straight on the paper the image would be rather small so depending on the number of the heads involved depends of the scale needed either a 1.5 or 2 times the size of the head measurements. With this technique any part of the figure can be measured just by measuring from either the top or the bottom of the figure by measuring from either ending the figure will be better proportion because the measurements can be checked. Also with this technique the angles by putting the pencil arm length away, turning the pencil so it is parallel to the angel the move this across to the paper, this well give a near accurate description of the angle in question.
The origins of this technique was in the 1500- 1600’s in Florence and Rome, the theory behind this technique was started in 45BC with Vitruvius an Ancient Greek Artist/ scholar, this was discovered while interpreting perspective and how to translate this perspective on a 2D surface. After this the Renaissance refined the technique by Leonardo De Vinci’s, ‘Vitruvian Man’, which is creating a figure which is in relative proportion to visual perspective. This technique was dominant for the next four hundred years and influenced the works of; Brunelleschi, Michel Angelo, Raphael, Artemsia Gentileschi. After 400 years this technique was challenged by the Geometric period which involved using geometric shapes to create the contours of the figure, this was during the dark ages.

EVALUATION.
The first part of the session was useful because we got to experiment with different tools, however the outcomes of these are rather poor because some of the lines are not delicate enough and need to be refined. The second part of this session was useful for developing my practices however I need more practice with this technique because I am rather slow at this technique. This session was rather educational and a good introduction into drawing as I said in the introduction, these can be used in different drawing types.

Gordon works in different media's from audiovisual, cinematography and literature. He has explored a wide range if techniques so you can't really say he has not specialized to one branch. This has made it so that he can explore his ideas to whatever end and is not refined to only using a narrow range of mediums. For most of his life he has an interested in recycling old films and enphasising the emotion in the pieces.
   One of greatest pieces of work is called '24 hour psycho' from the film psycho by Alfred Hitchcock, where David Gordon has slowed the film down so it lasts a full 24 hours. It sounds excruciating by the length however I think it sounds pretty amazing. This piece is projected onto a clear-threw screen with the film projected onto both sides, this is so that the audience feel apart of the piece because the viewer on one side can see another viewer more closer to the screen on the other side, like they are part of the piece. I don't know how I feel about this because I am yet to experience his work in real life. (Hopefully one day I will, because seeing photo's and video don't do the piece justice, I need to see the real thing.) In some ways you could say this show transition because he has changes the context and the way the film will be preserved by changed the speed and the display. It really makes me think a about the content of the original film.
      Gordon's use of photography explores using similar images and only changing them q
slightly, an example of this can be seen in the piece 'Monster,' (1996-7) which is a colour photograph. This piece of work shows the face of a man as it usually is and after it has been distorted this is rather interesting  because the artists has titled this piece monster which gives the impression that the distorted figure is wrong and almost another way of changing the appearance so he is no longer human but a monster.

Drawing part one. 24/09/12.
Today I started of with some buttons which I brought from the shop they where all detailed and pretty and I thought they where random and cool. This is what I started of with so I decided I would do some drawing from that. I have used only my basic equipement today so I don't think I have been very experimental at all. I have done some mark making in the pieces but I still think they are missing something. Some of they marks I made where strong and showed some expression and where rather interesting but I still think I could have tried another medium or something because all I used was charcoal, fine-lines, marker pen and my fountain pen which can all be found in my basic kit. I did enjoy sketching the buttons. On this really small scale they look okay but in real life I don't think they look as good as in real life.
After this I decided I wanted to develop it on a bit by adding another prop, I decided to add a manakin I had already seen early that day because it looked rather cool and random. So I started off by just doing quick scetchs with just a couple of the buttons stuck on this was just to gather idea and then I thought the manakin need something so I decided to add a piece of matterial. The manakin looks rather odd in this picture it looks like the red material overtakes the piece however it is the only piece of matterial I could find so it will have to do. However it does bring some colour to the piece and make it look more interesting. I decided to do one large sketch of the composition so far. This is still a work in progress but it looks okay it has charcoal and ink. This image makes the piece look better than it actual does look in life, some of the details in the material are starting to show up a bit more however I think it needs something else I might need to think about putting some colour in the next one to make the buttons stand out a bit more.
However I think it is still missing something. It need to be put in context, I also need to think how I can link it to the project 'transition'. I was thinking of something like exploring the way the figure is seen in todays society compaired to the past but I am not to show because we have to take another object in tomorrow and I haven't decided on what I am going to take in yet. I was thinking of taking in the Parrot but is that a bit to random and I would have to think about how it would fit into context with the project them and the rest of the objects.
WHAT I NEED TO THINK ABOUT FOR TOMORROW. (QUESTIONS.)
1. The content of the piece and what it is trying to portray.
2. Another object to take in.
3. How to uterlies the space around me.
4. A way of relating the two or more objects to each other.
Drawing part one. 25/09/12.
Well I think I should start by answering the questions I raised yesturday.
1. Well I did think about this a bit. I where has been a few ideas up in the air. 'The way the materials and the figure are working together. These two things ended up being my two main objects I have used and the buttons are started to get pushed to one side. That also answered question two and four as well.
3. I decided to try using other paces. I found a stairway which led go the boiler room which looked rather dark and dingy and the manakin looked rather cool in that space and then I decided to see what it looked like outside so I decided this was rather cool. In the end I think everything went well.
Today I have just done a lot of sketch book work and a bit on some brown paper. The sketch book work is rather cool. I think the pieces are a bit more free but they are still lacking in a lot of detail. I also think that they are still missing something like they aren't capturing the essence of the objects. I still think there is a lot more development to be done to them because they could be so much better. How as the bigger piece still needs a lot of work on it before it is up to scratch. I think I want to make the edges simular to Toby Paterson's, Remnant, his pieces of because it made the pieces of work look like part of the wall, sort of like they had been taken from the wall and placed there. However I think I want to make the background look like part of the wall and become one with the space sort of thing.
WHAT I NEED TO THINK ABOUT FOR TOMORROW AND WHAT I NEED TO PREPAIR FOR TOMORROW.
1. I need to think about how it links to the theme transions.
2. How to finish the big piece. Well I think I know how I am doing the edge but nothing else. Well thats not exactly true I have an image in my head but I am not shaw how it is going to work.
3. Think was I can do next or as a finial overal outcome to ths section.

Drawing part two. 29/09/12.
Well the second drawing project ended yesturday. I think I should start by explaining what the drawing project was all about really. Okay this workshop was exploring randomness.

We where put into groups of three and had throw two darts at a map of carlisle and walk between them two marks on the map. It was rather random but pretty cool because random is cool. The path we got was from near the train track to not far from Brampton road captus its like 20 to 25 minutes walk away from one end to the other so not that far. We went past the castle and threw a park and by a river so there ewas a lot of nature involved in the walk which was cool because it was rather relaxing. On the first day I only did quick sketchs from location because it was easier that way. These where really a starting point for these drawings.

Posted via m.livejournal.com.

Hi well I haven't been on her in a while so I think there is alot I need to right about. Well where to start from I think I will start from the begining. I finished college whuch was epic and I got a Merit which is cool. So know I am just starting university in a new city near Scotland which is pritty cool. The people are really friendly and everyone is welcoming, so all is good at the minute.
Yesturday we went on our first offical university trip where we went to Glasgow. I saw some other gallerys which where really amazing. A lot different to the ones back home. They seemed to be more modern and open plan than what I am use to. However they where really interesting by all of the different styles and artists that are about. It really made me think about my work and how I want to represent it. Well I shouldn't really ramble on about that to much because this is just to say hello and I am back from my break.
ohhh I forgot something important I have been on holiday. Which I will tell you about in a later post.

Just saying HI and I'm back!!!

Posted via m.livejournal.com.

The Quad gallery exhibition explores different aspects of Film Noir which has been divided into five key area’s.
      Macguffin is repetition and familiarity of an object or scene. Nicole Wermer’s, ‘French Junkies’, explores the use of cigarettes. Which has been described ‘as functional as an ash tray’. Showing the evocative nature of the Film Nor. Which shows the secret nature of the character behind the cigarette buds. Leads onto Johan Grimonprez exhibition based on Alfred Hitcock work, Psycho by the in corporation of place, space and site to create confluent layering which was a key aspect of his work. Douglas Gordon recreated his work into a 24 hour psycho which is an experience, by stretching out the film each section can be analyses and studied in detail to create a stronger darker film.
      The Chase is exploring chaotic movement in. the scene. In Mike Cooter’s, Scarlet street which portrays the aesthetic qualities of car headlights at night. Shows the movement of the chase. Stuartevant Duchamp Wanted is a elaborated version of Marcel Duchamp’s piece Wanted, which explores the use of media and publicity in a provocative manner. This piece also explores the use of multi-personality in context of creating a new persona. Playful aspects of the use of criminal activity and disgust, the context of the piece. However I find this piece has character and is rather sinister because it is looking at consequences of ones actions by the false, over the top, vulgar representation of the aspect of chase in a clear cut way which is mocking the idea of the suspense of the chase.
     Darkness is show by exploring the contrasts between light and dark. In Mike Cooter’s Scarlet Street. A replicate of a sign taken from the attempted suicide scene in Fritz Lang. Which explores the contrast in the tones. Also the way the piece is partly broken by some of the lights out, gives the feeling of what Film noir is really about. How a few bulbs can chance the dynamics of the piece by making the piece feel old, decrepit but with some glimmer of light.
     Scene of the crime is exploring the narrative of the film which can be cast in first or third person perspective. In film Noir they like to use an amalgamation of the two. The use of flash backs and subtitles to add laying and confusion. With a focus point, which is usually the house because each leave in the house shows of a different persona. The stairs is the passageway to the different levels. Represented in John Divola exploration of stairs.
     Metanoir is which something references itself. Fergel Stapletons piece explores the dark and gritty sides of life. The artist says it represents the, ‘Hope expressed in loose change, woozy surface mixed-ups, semi-curious squints at uncertain shapes and irrelevant light sources.’ This one can also be liked to darkness by the contract between the light and the dark tones which are represented in this piece.

Bibliography.
Film Noir Internet Research.
http://www.crimeculture.com/Contents/Film%20Noir.html
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19950130/COMMENTARY/11010314/1023
http://www.filmnoirstudies.com/home.asp
http://www.noircity.com/foundation.html
Film Noir other research.
Quod gallery guide and talk.
Art Review Internet Research.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-reviews/8998490/Rubens-the-artist-who-helped-to-shape-the-future-of-Europe.html
Art Review other research.
Guardian newspaper clippings.