29/11/2018 - PRESENTATION

After having attended the majority of the other presentation lectures, I had noticed similar themes, exhibitions, expositions and workshops all popping up. I felt like maybe in my presentation I could shed light on another area of art culture which is often underappreciated in the fine art world, with my progression through the graffiti and street art scene. In my presentation I wanted to talk about my path over the last five years in both an artistic and curatorial/journalistic sense with a heavily image based display of visual styles and inspiration not unlike the heavily visual cultural world of urban art. I also demonstrated my interest in visual concept development and animal narratives and imagery.





However as well as this I was also mindful of the fact that the brief for this presentation specifically stated we were supposed to talk about our creative motivations and engagement with current issues. And so I felt driven to include my ecological imperative.
 

This then felt once again like the perfect opportunity to test my theories about using images and art as a way to introduce new strategies of understanding and receptiveness to problematic issues. I wanted to use the english poetry technique of a 'volta', or turning point in voice or argument which is employed after the majority of the poem (after the octave) but also before the final portion (before the sestet) and used to place particular emphasis on the 'turning point' or second half of a topic.

As well as this I also wanted to pave the way into my ecological standpoint in a way which foremost mirrored my passion for animals which was of the upmost importance as it framed my environmental concerns in a way which was non hierarchical or preaching. Also, after the first half of the
presentation about street art culture, I hoped the sudden imperative would catch the audience slightly off gaurd thus helping them to truly absorb the severity of the information. Placing responsibility into the hands of our generation with a mention of how our parents didn't take it seriously enough was also a gesture of empowerment and new hope in a more conscious future born from the mistakes of past generations.


I really felt the power grow in my presentation as I reached the ecological point, which was also empowered by a quote from Brandon Ballangee discussing the power of artists engaging with the iminent eco-cultural issues. This was also mirrored in feedback from both Carl Rowe and my peers which said  they felt the way the point reached home at the end was very effective. Filip Kramarsic even stopped to debate with me afterwards, and as head of the NUA Conversation society, the fact that I was able to match him intellectually on the topic and question each others discourse really demonstrated to me how much my understanding of my field has grown since my reading into the topic has greatly increased. Overall I was very happy with my presentation.






You can read my full annotations for the speech of the presentation below, however they are in shorthand and very colloquial in some areas.

Try to take you on a visual journey through the development of aspects of my practice and through the urban & street contemporary art scene


2 So I first experimented with wheatpaste even earlier than this in 2016, but this was the time starting to move towards a credible artist style development and when I first began to conscientiously apply animal narrative onto a street setting.


It was interesting because I had no real critical contextual backing or research but even today I think they are visually & conceptually quite provoking pieces to implement in the street. At this stage I wasn’t brave enough to go out in Norwich so hit the local towns in my area


3 I then began writing and working with Very Nearly Almost, a creative team who worked together on a quarterly publication which documented a broad scope of aspects of contemporary urban art culture


This was an amazing opportunity for me to build up awareness of the scene internationally. The disembodied of the human artist and the persona created by their street praxis was something I was interested in, aswell as truly public access art, along with all the other ways this art seemed to both sit outside, and at some times actively dismantle traditionalist ideas around art and expression. There were also a growing number of artists bringing animals and the climate to the forefront of their engagement. The only thing was this was all happening in London whilst I was finishing my A Levels which meant for the most part I was writing about exciting things going on elsewhere sat at home still being invited to gallery launches and staff parties in the captial


5 My work then because more aesthetic as I was captivated by the multitude of styles I was being exposed to although I did start to explore ideas of fibonnaci and sacred geometry. This was when I began to work in the city also – more interesting because street traffic was more likely to interfere with the works which I liked – dialogue between local culture and artworks


6 When I went into my Foundation Year at Lowestoft I also began volunteering with Moosey. I was desperate by this point to get on the front lines of the scene in some way so that I could still get the sense of involvement from all the things I was aware of missing out on. These are some of the exhibitions I directly helped out at, be it photographing, setup, serving drinks, interviewing artists and creating supporting articles.


7 Through Moosey I then began to become aware of live painting events when I was invited by them to paint at the Norwich Lanes Fayre in 2015. These events not only increased technical adaptability when battling the elements, but also provided me many great networking opportunities for meeting and working alongside artists and breaking the ice into getting you working together. The sense of everyone being in the same boat on the day working their craft really connects people.


8 So then in first year the main thing that I found to be of particular interest was the printmaking process. Until now I had digitally printed my designs onto normal printer paper, and this felt like a much more ethical method. As you might be able to see, a particular interest of mine is working through each aspect of idea creation to truly absorb the work I’m making and the life of its own I want it to have. Printmaking allowed this as in the creation of lots of multiples I really study and go-into every inch of the image.


9 In these early works though I wasn’t as interested in pushing the medium, and was more concerned in frequent reproduction. I created 100 bees and disseminated them around the city, along with my ‘save our seas’ idea of creating an ad campaign for the environment of sorts employing advertising tactics to make a case for the environment in metropolitan way and employ the ‘freedom of strategy’ which art is able to utilise and transmit messages of science in ways which are easier to interpret.


10 Over a year ago I was officially taken on as the Co-Ordinator of Moosey art, and was immediately tasked with re-building the gallery website, ordering stock and preparing a professional house style for all aspects of the business but mainly product photography and display. We also held our first London exhibition at about this time last year, and began releasing our very own Moosey Official prints, both of which were very big deals for us as a business.


Now since I first started volunteering with them 4 years ago, the fine art course here had really began to build my skills and most importantly my self belief that I was actually more than able to solve problems and respond to different requirements as they arose. So after a couple of issues with our old printmaker, when my boss asked if perhaps I might like to give it a go myself to finish off a piece which couldn’t be done by hand, I felt prepared to give it a try. I worked on finishing a few details of this piece first, and just down the very bottom right is one of the first finished examples of a complete professional print done by myself from start to finish. I’m going in next monday to finish things off and then they will be available as a product of the gallery.


11 Last year my main street-initiated investigation used the motif of the white tiger as a symbol of human misinformation and objectificiation of the animal/ nature. A vast proportion of the public were told and still believe white tigers, or arctic/Siberian/snow tigers are a perhaps rare or endangered species in their own right however white extremely recessive gene visible through generations of inbreeding. Crosseyed, cleft pallete, health problems. Through zoos and institutions exoticism has been created to increase the animals value.


As you can see in my work, going through the process of developing an image is a key interest, paying careful attention to capturing animal gaze and ‘spirit’ of it’s own in a unprescribed way. Allowing not only the person to look at the art but also feel like an essence of the animal is ‘looking’ back at you which is something touched on, both theoretically and literally, by other creatives such as Mark Dion and Ted Hughes.


12 In second year I also became more interested in intervening with the prints as you can see here, and also was becoming more brazen and artistic with my placement, in equal parts finding spots with a high footfall of traffic and also often aesthetic appeal / involvement with the image. I also began to explore the idea of defacing my own works partially myself, a step ahead of the typical rips and tagging of the public and also hinting to the notion of these animal images being part of the fabric of something bigger – cultural sphere


But out of all the things I could choose to make art about, and more importantly thrust to the forefront of public eyes around the city, why animals and ecology?


13 That’s because right now it matters more than anything else.


Im sure you will have all seen the headlines and have some relative ideas about what might be going on. Although media coverage and general awareness of the subject does appear to have been on the upturn recently, but what is really startling is that we have been aware of this downward spiral for so long. You may have heard of the ‘Scientists Warning to Humanity’ which came back into popular understanding last year which had more cosigners and supporters than any other journal article published EVER. However this was not a new writing, and was infact updated from the original version 26 years ago, before many of the people in this room were even born. Yet still only 3 days ago statistics were published showing that CO2 emmissions were infact rising once again for the first time in 4 years. What is going on? The most important realisation above all else is that unless massive changes happen right now, the outlook really, truly, doesn’t look good for us. In our lifetimes. When that paper was first published, our parents and grandparents were in the position they we are in right now, and not enough was done. The generation beneath us may not have the luxury we do currently, of being in the position to do something about it.


I cannot make art about anything else.


14 And I am not alone, a growing number of artists are starting to engage with these issues. This is of the upmost importance as once of the biggest challenges of the ecology movement is struggles in translating the required necessary home truths and severe societal upheavals to as many people as possible in a way which is without blame, judgement or superiority as is necessary to avoid apocalypse fatigue or dissociation from the topic. Art helps engage and empower the public into taking action, as well as allowing people to produce their own dialogues and reach conclusions around a topic on their own in a much more powerful way than a difficult to decipher scientific statement for example.


15 So where is my art headed next? In this unit I am working on a selection of different projects as well as exploring a bit of activism, however my plans for the rest of the year are taking a very different step towards public performance and puppetry as a new way to bring animals back into the human cultural landscape.