Final Assessment.

These are the selection of paintings I chose to show for my second year final assessment. I was lucky enough to be given a large space away from my studio area. I think getting it out of the place it was created has definitely benefited my work and I am grateful for having been given the opportunity.

In my studio space though, I have shown this small series: Elesym VI - XI. They are still all works in progress and I felt they would be better seperated from finished pieces. I suppose they did not need to be shown, but they will help as back up work.

I think I have done better this semester, I definitely felt better about it and was relaxed. I even managed to not have to do any work on the day of hand-in. I think that is a first! Instead, I spent the day helping others with their work. Many good deeds were achieved that day!

Elesym XII.

I must admit, this is probably the piece that I am most proud of this semester. It has had a lot more thought put into it than the others and I guess, I never thought I would ever create something like it. For me, it's very abstract. It must mean that I've made some progress. Yay me!

Why I Paint.

Group Crit. And Oil Paint Workshop: These helped me kind of understand why I paint!
 

Last week I had my group crit with a few other fellow students and it went ok. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to it and to start off the day I stupidly sat at my desk in my space. Doesn’t sound so bad, does it? Well, it meant I had to go first, in hindsight it was good to get it out of the way, it meant I only had to listen to other people for the rest of the day and occasionally ask a question.

During my session, in between being asked questions I didn’t understand and trying to avoid answering them, I was given several ideas about where I could take my work and other ways to present it. There were suggestions from sculpture all the way to a large scale projection. There was even the mention of glitter from the tutor! Now, I will warn you, I am not to be held responsible if anything happens with this medium. I’ve been looking to buy some, I get so excited just thinking about using it, but I need to wait until my money situation is a bit better.

The tutor kept pushing the idea of screen printing and some sort of digitally created symbol based on my work. Sigh. As soon as she mentioned them, I knew that that’s not what I want to do with my work, I just couldn’t put my finger on the reason why...

Still being obsessed with the thoughts of glitter the next day came about and I found myself in an oil painting workshop. Admittedly, that would never have happened if Michael hadn’t have come and got me, because I had completely forgot about it. I found listening to Michael talk about the way he works really interesting. The way he talks about everything makes it sound better than it really is. He also has a habit of wandering off to random stories and you can't help but laugh.We ended up going through why he wears a hat, violet flowers in woods, bees and red trousers... I know, right? I can't really remember why to some of it, but it possibly made sense at the time. The stages he goes through and little tips he had were good, I just wish I could see some more of his work and what his studio is like. He's a very difficult man to find anything about on the internet! There are a couple of videos of him by students but that's about it... Hmmm, I may have to bug him to see some work somehow.

Anyway, watching Michaels process and listening to him talk about other painters, made me realise why I paint and I don't really attempt much else. It is because I like the hands on-ness about it. Adding splodges of paint, layers and layers, colours, shapes... The process from an idea to a finished piece, makes it all so enjoyable. That is why.

I hope all this makes sense, I haven't read throught it haha!

Elesym I.

This piece is the first of many to come (hopefully)… It is called ‘Elesym I’ and will become part of a series, well that is my plan.

In my tutorial we started talking about why I always worked in an rectangular shape and I could not answer. I had no idea. She mentioned maybe try working in a circle and I can’t believe I have never thought of it before, it’s really great! I quite enjoyed drawing the circle, so that was a great start. You may wondered how I managed to get a near enough circle and I shall tell you. I found the rough middle of the calico piece and marked it. I then got my ball of string, tied the end on to a pencil and held the other end against the centre at a length I thought would make a good size circle. Making sure the string stayed taut I drew the shape. Not bad for a first attempt I reckon. Then it was time to prime!

We also talked about the possibilty of the elephant skull being a symbol of some sort, which I also liked the idea of. That is where the name came from ‘Ele(phantskull)sym(bol)’, it’s shorter and sounds better, I think anyway.
For some reason I decided that I wanted the image to be ‘symmetrical’, obviously it’s not going to be perfect because it’s made by my hand. I did my best with tracing paper and a pencil and the whole folding over so they’re the same thing… I know what I mean. From there I started to fill it in with colour, I used magenta because I wanted it to stand out and it’s not a colour I would instantly go for (a bit too ‘girly’ haha). It was suggested flat block colour might be good, but I’m not good at that and it’ll take time to learn. Right now I just want to make which they can’t exactly moan about. Instead I went for the dabby look, dabbing the oil paint on has created a ‘velvety-look’ about it. The texture doesn’t look the best, but it makes you want to come closer to look at it, which can only be good, right?
I thought about using other colours to use with the pink, I chose to get with what I already knew worked from previous pieces and went with cobalt blue and cadmium yellow. And then that is it, the piece was finished. I’m glad to be making work again and have moved on from the terrible rut that was last semester. I have ideas now which is AWESOME!

Elephantidae.

'Elephantidae'

I started creating this piece as a way to find out what I wanted to do last semester. Although, once I had completed it, I didn’t know what to do with myself… I got talked into entering for an Open Exhibtion in St. Albans, called ‘Eastern Approaches’ and decided to enter this piece. I also enter a study of a childs skull and video piece I made in my first year at university. This painting didn’t get accepted, but my video did, so that was good at least.

With this piece, I wanted to show what I see to be beautiful in something that has passed away and decayed, in other words, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder”. Elephants are magnificent creatures in life and to me, are equally so in death.

I had been fascinated by the different textures of the skulls surface and the deep, dark crevasses discovered with each new glance. As well as how the wearing of the exterior could tell you about its movement and previous being.

From creating initial sketches of the object, I familiarised myself with its form and enabled myself to make this work with some ease. A limited colour palette was used, because I was still learning about the medium and I knew the possible colour range available from the paint I had.

At first, I had intended to leave it up to the viewer to form his or her own personal interpretation and they still can, however, the work was more about me showing the world how I see and feel.

Not having had this piece exhibited before, I’ve decided to put it up in a show I’m doing with some fellow students at Courtyard Art Gallery in Hertford. The show will be up in less than 2 weeks!