13/12/2016 - PRINT - WOODCUT

Having now written my specific statement of intent for my practice I thought it would be best to move on from the chinese proverbs and towards a topic which was more on theme with my intentions for the rest of the unit. As this was mainly an induction workshop I wanted to keep my concept simple so chose to focus it on the diminishing iceflows which are pushing polar bears to the edge of survival.

8-9/12/2016 - CURATING - NIAMH WHITE

In the Fine Art lecture with Niamh White I found several aspects of her curational experience very interesting, including the variety of institutions and scenarios she has worked in. One area which took my interest in particular was her work with SHOWStudio, a film and fashion broadcasting company which live streams the setup of many of it's photo shoots from stage 1 to completion then exhibits the finished photographs. For me as an artist the fact that so much of this process becomes accessible gives the experience great intimacy and a real sense of involvement. 

06/12/2016 - PRINT

I printed my half tone designs onto drafting paper to create the positives used to then create my silk screen. The process of curing the ready coated screens took a lot less time than I anticipated due to the stronger light at the uni that I had previously used. Watching my design appear on the screen as I washed away leftover emulsion was interesting. Also learning how to carry out this process in a mass production way as opposed to the way DIY way I had experienced it in my foundation course was interesting and definitely expanded my ideas of what print could achieve.

05/12/2016 - PRINT PREP - CHINESE ART

For our first print workshop I was assigned to screen printing wherein we had to create a two colour screen print with text. I tried to think of a fresh way to incorporate image, concept and text without my final product appearing as some sort of tumblr blog image or internet graphic and thought of the pictorial way that text and image is combined in traditional Chinese visual arts. I also thought Chinese letter forms were a more interesting way to convey a phrase or meaning without having plain text written across the piece.

04/12/2016 - DRAWING MACHINE

I had to create a piece for a winter exhibition at Moosey Art Gallery, and chose to use my Drawing Machine from the first projects to create a background for the canvas. I didn't think too deeply over the concept behind this work, as it was mostly created to tight time constraints, to fit within a winter colour scheme and be an easily saleable piece however I really like the way the drawing machine created a completely unique and visually interesting pattern for me then to work over.

SIGIL Personal Street Work - END OF BA1A -

In addition to my Ba1a submission I also included some new developments to my own personal street art agenda, with new t-shirst printed, a new sketch as part of of my 'Urban Decay series, and some new pieces I pasted up at the start of the term. For a full look at all of my street work under the pseudonym of SIGIL I have included a link below to my instagram page. They are heavily inspired by the work of street artists Alexis Diaz and Walden.

Week 8 - 14th-18th November - IMAGE/OBJECT Outcome + Assessment

In this final week I mostly prepared for assessment, finishing my 1000 word text and writing my self evaluation, however I also looked more closely at the work of Cornelius Volker (click here for full research) and found his methods and ideas very interesting. The idea of capturing the leftover wake of a person as portraiture instead of the literal image of the person, summarising the trail they leave behind instead of them as a presence in the moment. The way he also creates a series of similar but different paintings of linked objects to analyse their nature is also similar to the work we did in OBJECT, so I felt creating some Volker-inspired outcomes could be an interesting link between my IMAGE and OBJECT workshops.

Week 7 - 7-11th November - IMAGE - Copy

In the final week of our FUNDEMENTALS unit we not only had our final IMAGE workshop but also a group crit of our research files. I found this very interesting as it was useful to see what level my peers' research is at and share and compare methods. Filip had a great way of keeping his Journal and Research pages in chronological order, by immediately creating a blank blog post with just a title on the day he needed to create a page for, and then updating it later. This meant he didn't lose track of what occured when, and could leave a reminder for something he wanted to come back to so it wasn't overlooked. 

In the workshop I was interested to learn the technique of painting a cross on the back of a wooden board, corner to corner, to prevent it warping. Cornelius Volker (click for further research) and Wilhelm Sasnal were two of the artists I found most visually engaging and felt could draw close parallels to my own figurative practice. I loved Volker's use of thick paint and brush strokes to give his work a glossy, fluid, even gelatinous quality.

Week 6 - 31-4th October/November - COPY (Edit+Object)

In this week I was unfortunately ill and missed the first part of my COPY workshop, however I was able to make it in by 1.30 for the latter end. I had missed everyone creating acetate triangles with induvidual designs on, and these being turned into a group screen from which to print. Luckily I arrived just in time for the most important part of the workshop, pulling the screens. Although I had attempted this in my foundation year, this was with bare screens and no actual press or mechanism, so I found this more indepth induction fascinating as this method of printing was not as messy and unpredictable as my previous experience.

Week 5 - 24th-28th October - VISUAL SCAFFOLD

This week didn't see the continuation of 'Fundementals' however I had important things to discuss in my one on one tutorial on the 25th. Firstly I asked for brief feedback just to check this Reflective Journal blog was up to scratch which she mostly agreed with however did highlight lack of evaluations of effectiveness for my outcomes which I will endeavour to improve on from here on. I also expressed my uncertain feelings about the ongoing development of our unit so far outside of the taught sessions. My tutor suggested I combine the skills learnt in my EDIT workshop with the footage captured in my OBJECT session, plus some extra films from my own time, to create an outcome which would satisfy both areas yet still push me to explore new methods and practice the skills I had already developed. I like this idea and feel it will summarise both projects neatly so decided to set this as a goal to achieve as soon as possible. She also suggested some useful contextual linking for my EDIT project and proposed me to start another blog for my Research File as well as my Journal. As a blog has worked so well for me in this instance I think it could be the perfect way to organise my research as well.

Week 4 - 17th-21st October - OBJECT

In my second week of 'Fundementals' we started OBJECT, a workshop encouraging us to fully explore all the possibilities of what an object can be, what it means, and the different ways it can be made to relate to the world around it. Our workshop lecture fully explored the concept of bricks to their full thematic potential. I found it surprising how many more hidden meanings, connotations and themes a brick can represent, particularly the reference to the Berlin Wall and the different names for ways of laying the brick, such as solider and sailor. I often pay close attention to the deeper symbolismic meaning of my work during the planning stage and I found this of interest. It also definitely opened my mind to the greater potential of objects and helped me progress better in the coming workshop.

Week 3 - 10th-14th October - EDIT - Guest Speaker - Vivian Ezugha

This week saw the start of our BA1a 'Fundementals' unit, with my first session being 'Edit'. I had no idea what to expect when entering into this session and was slightly apprehensive as, having read each of the briefs, this one seemed the most abstract of the concepts we were going to be exploring. I had never previously covered Erwin Wurm's '1 Minute Sculptures' however I had researched many other aspects of Relational Aesthetics, including Duchamp, in other projects. I found it interesting how Wurm encourages a dissociative outlook on the subjects in his sculptures, moving away from our associations of them as human beings and instead interpreting them as stationary objects to form part of the composition just as any other workable material would.

Week 2 - 3rd-7th October - Drawing Machine

In this week I focussed on the 'Drawing Machine' mini brief. I created a frame and first suspended a pen as a pendulum from the middle. I tried initially spinning the pen to attempt to create a drawing but the physical act of the pen nib swinging against the page was enough to slow the pen to a complete stop after a couple of passes. This was frustrating, as from this failed attempt I could begin to visualise the forms created in the swinging motion, even if they were ultimately uneffective, and could see there was something interestng being created if I could work out the correct way to do it.

Week 1 - 26th-30th September - Inductions - Drawing

In this first week of normal schedule we had a lot of introductory sessions and workshops to various areas of the university. One particular department which stuck out to me were the 3D workshops on the 28th, specifically the casting and model making suites. The basic casting process was briefly explained however I was told I would need further specific inductions if I was to use some of the heavier pieces of machinery. This is something that is very important to my practice which occasionally features elements of woodworking or other resistant materials. Ensuring I have this induction as early as possible will make me fully prepared to follow any ideas I have regardless of the medium.