23.10.13 - Final Five

The final five have been chosen!

I only just realised that i had about 8 passages of text stuck up on my wall and hadn't edited them down yet.
The way things are going, i want to take a more abstract approach to the illustrations so some of them had become more relevant and others not so much.
They have been finalised down to Actaeon, Phaethon (how many times am i going to spell that wrong), Echo and Narcissus, The Rape of Proserpina and Callisto and Arcas.
4 out of these 5 all have a running theme of the moment of metamorphoses or speaking of changing from one thing to another, all accept Phaethon funnily enough which is the one Ive been working on the most at the moment.
So yes, just a quick one to let you know the cut!
Update Soon!
(P.s ooo look you can see yourself on the computer screen little old blog)

23.10.13 - Patheon Abstract and Colour Study

After spending a little time at looking at the falling figure i wanted to put into my first illustration, i wanted to look into maybe putting abstract pattern that gives a feeling of mood and atmosphere of the idea of falling through a spaceless place.
The lines i've been working from the most is "His eyes, Dazzled and Darkened"
I wanted to get across this through colour and pattern today.
I've fallen a little bit in love with my new watercolour in "paynes gray" if you couldn't tell. I just think it works extremely effectively for this illustration and i wanted to get that blues and greys in this piece.
Update Soon!

23.10.12 - Phaethon Ideas

Yesterday in the morning before our review session i decided to look through some of the texts and get the ball rolling and do some drawings. Im a little bit fixated on Phaethon at the moment, and want to keep working on that poem so i just let myself go with it and did some studies of figures falling as i want to show him falling through the sky in some way, i am a bit worried these a still a bit to literal so they're a working progress.
Update Soon.

23.10.13 - Review Day Sum-up

Yesterday afternoon, we had out group session review day led by our lecturer Chris. This was where about 10 of us from the class, sat round a table, read through each others reviews and discussed ideas with the class.
We spent the first half reading through everyone's project proposals, one thing i did notice when looking through everyone's proposals was that they had a really strict time line to what they were going to do and when they were going to do it, this is something I've not actually done but am now considering. It seems to work to your advantage to set small little deadlines often to keep up a pace to your outcomes and research. I think at some point today i will type up a semi-serious outline to make sure i stay on track. Everyone seemed to have strong ideas to go on from, and its actually a really enjoyable experience sharing ideas with everyone when they actually speak up and talk about their work. We then went round the group and discussed our own work and shared what we liked about the projects and what might help us further our work.
My feedback forms actually varied a lot in the feedback given. Some people advised to look into specific art movements such as impressionism and renaissance paintings.
The majority of the question raised were to do around how i will show my work and if i will include text within the finals
I decided to answer this when having the discussion and advised that i wouldn't be including the text in any way with the paintings. I don't want to have a verse of text on one page and then my illustrations on the other, i do not know enough about typeface or text layout in general to try and scrape something like that together, it won't work in my behalf and will take up precious time. I advised that i will most likely make a series of illustrations that showcase the general themes being brought up through my research and display them in a creative way, as my talents and skills do not lie in using computer editing to bring my pieces together. This seemed like the right idea to go with when speaking to Chris about it, who advised to keep to your strong suits and let the work speak for itself.
It was also brought up how i would bring my research together to achieve my goals of what i wanted to look into and if i had a specific thing i wanted to say throughout my work. This i couldn't really give an answer on right now as I've not thought about it, but i will definitely go away and spend some time thinking about whether this is something i need to address in my work or not.
So yes, overall the session was really helpful and i think a much needed boost of momentum to get everyone going with their work. Today (Wednesday) i plan on continuing my initial drawing ideas and see where they are leading me. I'm also going to make mind maps of general theme and things i want to bring up within each passage of text, so i can start some ideas rolling for everything
Update Soon!

21.10.13 - Aleksandra Waliszewska

Alexsandra is a polish graphic artist currently working in Warsaw. Her narrative gothic painterly style evokes a unsettling, eerie feel to the viewer, as if this is a snapshot of a much longer darker story.

I always try and find quotes from the artist that sum up why they might be relevant to my research. Here is a quote from an interview i found:

"I see a really strong sense of sublimated storytelling in your work, as if some of your drawings catch a ‘frame’, an insightful glimpse out of a longer, more complex narrative. Is that the case? Do you too see it as a bit of larger picture? Are you familiar with the work of Raymond Pettibon at all?

I'm more interested in depicting states of emotion. Narratives tend to arise by themselves, they kind of evolve by their own will. I know several works by Raymond Pettibon. When I was a teenager I made a hand-done copy of his Sonic Youth cover on a friend’s t-shirt."

Her use of storytelling in her paintings is so explicit. Its a lot more direct than i could ever imagine to be but i had to include her in my research for yet again evoking a mood and response out of me when viewing them.

The gloomy, murky colors give off so much description without even focusing on the actual scene thats being depicted. I think if you were to crop out the actual figures and main points that get across the narrative, you would still have an amazing sense of what was going on.

Update Soon.

21.10.13 - Allison Scarpulla - Atmospheric Photographs

These photographs by Alison Scarpulla looks at a broad range of nature and mysticism. I found these so incredibly atmospheric. The use of lighting, composition and colour give an overwhelming mood to the photographs and sets to right in the place of what might be going on in them.
The use of colour to relay mood especially resonates with me, as its so effective.
I've noticed a running theme through what i've been looking at is a really interesting way of showing emotion is not specifically depicting a figure facial features, which is something i do a lot to relay emotion.
It might be interesting to start branching out my paintings so im not specifically showing a face for the viewer to latch onto straight away.

Update Soon. 

21.10.13 - Colour Study - Blue, Grey and Navy.

After doing some very quick paintings on sunday, i was unintentionally leaning towards looking at murky purples and blues.

I thought it best to keep a mood board style place of images that i find with the colours in the areas of blues, greys and navies that i can refer to for specific colours references if needed.
Colour plays a massive part in displaying mood and emotion and is something i like to spend time on and one of the most enjoyable parts of the refining process.