Fashion + Textiles week: Collaging

we were asked to bring in magazine cutouts of models, i used my MASSES magazine for this. I took out the pictures that i found the most interesting, we were then asked to collage, draw, scribble, cut etc to make the images more exciting, in the photo on the right i used bright colours to contrast the black and white nature of the original photograph. in the one on the left i used body parts from other images to create a distortion but kept to the colour scheme of the original, for example i have put hands where the feet should be. In the group crits i found it really interesting what everyone had to say about my work, they all seemed to enjoy it but said it would have been more interesting if the paper stuck out more a bit, i did try to make it slightly 3d by crinkling the paper before taping it down however i think it would have been good to experimented more, next time!

Fashion + Textiles week:
Life Drawing: i really enjoyed my day of life drawing, the wide range of techniques, materials and methods i used was really liberating and fun. We started off doing 5 5min drawings on top of eachother on a sheet of paper, i used a different pen each time and i was really pleased with the outcome, although i did not at the time enjoy drawing over my first drawing the final result was worth it. We next did some drawings where we explored ways in which to keep the proportions of the model correct, we did this by holding up our pen and using our thumb to make a measurement of the head and then count how many heads fit into her body. we then mapped out say 5/6 sections on the page (it was similar to gridding techniques) which was really helpful because proportion is something i usually mess up. we then tried drawing the model standing up with the paper on the floor using a piece of charcoal tied to the end of a bamboo stick which was really fun, it made me think about the movement and positioning of my whole body a lot more than usual.

Lens Based Media- Storyboard

we were asked to bring in a series of six images that followed a beginning middle end structure, the image above tells my story of a penknife who cannot make friends because it cuts up everything it comes across: paper and a water bottle, the lowest point of the story is box 5 where the knife is nearly close because it feels so alone, the floor is covered in water and there is torn paper everywhere. I enjoyed this activity because it was fun and challenging, trying to animate inanimate objects into a remotely interesting story is not easy but i appreciated the effort that i put into it. We had crits on our work, we worked in groups of 5 and asked questions and gave feedback on eachother's work, we asked about things such as lighting, colour and story. It was very useful to ask myself the questions other people posed and i found it very interesting what other people had to say about my work. In the afternoon we sat in circles of around 9 people and we would take it in turns modelling in the middle whilst everyone else drew that person. By the end of one drawing we had a 360 degrees animation (it was scanned later) of a person, it was really cool. drawing under time pressure has been something i have struggled with since starting at ravensbourne but i think i have finally grasped it and stopped worrying about what i think about my work and instead appreciating it for what it is.

tate modern and white cube gallery visit:

we first visited the tate gallery, then the white cube, the purpose of this trip was to be the main research of our essay: comparing and contrasting and museum and an art gallery. The main idea that was held in my mind throughout was that the white cube's main aim was to attract wealthy buyers, whereas the tate, which is mostly free, tries to attract tourists and art lovers. This contrast between the commercial and non commercial fascinated me and will be one of the main focusses of the essay. The two pictures i have chosen to include was an aim to describe the difference in art being shown, the top picture is at the tate, an interesting piece but not a very aesthetically pleasing item one would have say in their home, compare this to the modern white neon lights and revolving palm trees at the white cube.

drawing people in our lives that make us ask questions, this man seems to spend all his time at my local pub, we were doing this to come up with characters for a story board in our group, although we didn't end up using my character, i still enjoyed drawing him and highlighting certain features of his personality. the storyboard was interesting to make, we made the storyboard by first drawing the beginning then the ending, then filling in the middle, to make sure the story had a good structure. Also in the afternoon we were making 1 minute films using a vhs camcorder without editting, using what we learnt in the storyboarding session to create a clear storyline. 

cropping my drawing using another sheet of A1 paper to frame an important part of it, this taught us how framing in photography can be so important, whether highlighting certain information or removing certain elements. we looked at a four part series of photos which had been cropped from one photo, each separate image determined the person laying on the floor's death.

drawing from photos in lens based media, tom hooped was talking to us about the significance of what to and not to include, and it was interesting to see which aspects i naturally left out and which insignificant details i subconsciously chose to include. i chose to use a blue biro because i thought it would stand out more than black ink or pencil, i like the way the blue looks.

experimenting with different ways of collaging to create a full alphabet in graphics, the letter D was my favourite, because as soon as i saw the image, the D appeared. I experimented with collaging, using yellow and black ink, using straight lines, i did enjoy this exercise however i was slightly disappointed when letters weren't so obvious as to what they are. Although, Andy showed us some work from a typographer who had made an alphabet by removing edges from a cube, and although it was hard to make out, i still thought it was really engaging, which made me feel better about my less obvious letters.

photoshop lesson, placing myself underwater. In this lesson we used illustrator to create text, photoshop to edit images and InDesign to create a clear layout. Although i had never found the need to use illustrator up until this point, it did seem quite useful for certain things. I am experienced in photoshop so i found that part relatively simple and using InDesign for the first time wasn't too tricky. InDesign is used for layouts and will be very useful in the future when making posters, booklets, magazines etc.

interesting typography + graphics in the library 

saw some cool old architecture magazine designs at the ICA today 

masking tape on the cover of my finished passport, the tape that messily covers up the black cover represents a scramble to hide or cover up certain aspects of life, whilst still providing an interesting and eye catching aesthetic 

what is luxury exhibition review:

the what is luxury exhibition explored various themes of exuberance in many different mediums which I thought was interesting, for example the words passion, which was accompanied by some expensive looking jewellery. the pieces themselves within the exhibition seemed slightly critical of today's capitalist society, the most obvious being the vending machine (see picture attached) which was filled with DNA samples, perhaps suggesting the capitalisation of people's identities. also featured in the exhibition was a table cloth made entirely of little girls' hair, this poses the question of: 'luxury, but at what cost?' Another artist in the exhibition imagined a world where plastic was as precious as gold is today, he constructed a set of a table and a chair made out of melted down chips of plastic in a very individual and geometric way, I found this very interesting. 

            

experimenting with different techniques and materials in my passport to try and create a picture of identity 

interesting piece of clothing at the V&A, looks like feathers (?) (luxury exbtn)

contrasting colours and themes at the serpentine gallery (oil on canvas) 

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