Collecting data, letting it flood in, score the paper, scratch the surface.
looking through the peripheral vision to collate a space. collecting moments or "glimmers" on paper to create a series of drawings.
the crit offered me a fresh perspective of how people are actually seeing my work. it was read the way I had intended , like a sculpture and glimmer of a moment. capturing those moments, in particular at the moment within the studio.
Keep being inspired by Gosia Wlordazack and her approach to drawing, capturing the moments with strangers and getting as much information from a entity onto paper. thinking about my approach to line and how to build up or work within drawings to create more of a structure, this could be stemming from my sculpture mind and thinking of a way to combine the two. I'm seeing both as intertwined and lending a hand to one another, like I was getting to in my undergrad. I'm interested in spaces but the people who are within them and what they touch, see, smell and remember. my drawings are beginning to allude to that. the kinetic energy within a space or from a person, object or being is what i want my drawings to evoke or facilitate.
Been going down a rabbit hole of videos on youtube in particular with Tracy Emins' work. I've always been an admirer of Emins work in particular her drawing practice and how she approaches her work. I have avoided it for a while in fear of the art school cliches or things along that line, but i've matured passed that now and don't care - if I like it, i like it. it's the fluidity of line wed with neutral and vibrant colours that really linger in my mind that makes me love her work. Emins monoprinting diary ( 2009) is something i've been thinking about a lot and ways to record my own marks. i'd like to make my own book or have a mark making diary, which essentially would be a sketchbook but would lend itself more to the marks and writing rather than sketches for things or sculptures. maybe I don't need to separate them, they will inform one another so no need to be too precious about it.
Tracy Emin, Monoprint Diary, 1991.
I've accepted the conclusion that my line work is staying. I tried to think more inward and tried my best to ditch my 'line rule' and throughout this development of drawing from sounds, environments and people. I've found a marriage between marks and line. It was something that was always there, lingering, but I'd never addressed it. It took this trial and error to revisit and explore the avenues I had closed for myself. Referring back to Emin and Beuys, it's their use of line that's helped enforce my love for it, the fluidity and the hint of something.
Hints Hints Hints!
The periphery feeds the work, it's something I'm adopting more and more each day. The
Gosia Wlodarczak, Dust Cover Chair, 2010.
Monoprinting has been a process I have ignored for a long time, in fear of it not bringing me the results i'd want. which is odd, considering I think my practice would benefit from more monoprinting. especially at a larger scale.
Was lithography the way to go? or should i have tried monoprinting again. I want to try everything and perfect it to the best but I fear I may be biting off more than I can chew again.
Sculpture and drawing , combining the two. During my tutorial with Alex she recommended some really great artists who tackle both of the aforementioned, Monika Grzymala and Vanessa Enriquez. really fascinated by their use of space in relation to the drawing and how it comes off the page and into the world. I really want to play on that more. Take drawn shapes or outlines and make them more noticeable within the installations I create. Installation as a future goal, which has taken a little step back this semester as I don't feel the need for it to start taking shape...yet.
Been thinking of the phrase "Three Dimensional thinking" by Richard Talbot. Sinking my teeth into the Writing on Drawing book and finding more and more things to be excited by. His essay on "Drawing Connections" really articulated what I've had swirling around in my head for so long. The links between seeing and orientating oneself through drawing and the memories that spark these drawings or processes. Talbot talks about the map and being in the car watching the landscape float by and that's when it clicked for me. maps and landscapes. Situating myself within a world of my own marks and drawings, building off of the real world - that's one way to summarise my practice as of now. But Beuys' presents the "What is mean by three dimensional thinking?" and it got me thinking, is it being able to imagine a new space or is it to feel the effect of a moving one or something to that affect. Beuys links his memory of map reading to this notion of thinking and rationalising what was happening in space. The movement of him, the car and the landscape and the role lighting and perspective play on a singular view. His way of orientating himself.
When I think of orientating myself, I think of where I am currently in the world, in my space, body and mindset. The drawings then become an allegory of that awareness.
Interesting talk by Rachel Bacon on her drawing practice and ways in which it materialises. Really fascinated by her approach to mark making and ways in which it is portrayed in her work, they take on a sculptural form. The diamond mine drawings feel almost lifelike as if a chunk of the ground is in front of you. This sculptural quality to drawing is something I want to explore further - potentially going back to paper sculptures? taking the flat surface and turning it three dimensional? I'm not entirely sure if I want to revisit that idea of creating sculpture with paper. But I feel an urge to see - given my new approaches - if there's a difference now compared to the years before when I had tried to. Graphite, coal and diamonds. lovely words. ever since the talk this afternoon I've been a bit obsessed. I enjoyed the link between graphite and diamonds, learned about the "Diamond Graphite Boundary". Interesting how certain processes of extraction lead to other outcomes of other matter. Felt like drawing with diamonds - a future idea perhaps? hahaha
Bacon talked about excavation and how she sees her practice as a way of excavating. Excavating the potential, the imagineable, the blank space on paper. Likening her process to mining on the pristine landscapes (paper) and her drawings become facilitated through texture, tone and a sculptural quality. Her practice as well as excavating the possible, also touches on orientating yourself within the scope of the world - of your world. I found this alluring, as that's what I'm trying to achieve. I'm placing myself within spaces, environments and trying to find that moment of energy , the morning rush, the kettle boiling, the phone conversation, my hand twitching, the ambient glow of outside. the mundane, the little moments. Maybe that's what I'm itching for. Turning these moments into drawings- the beginning of my practice. Evolving whats already there. Fighting my inner mind to not ditch what I enjoy, so what if I do sculpture again?
"Drawing as a means of de-acceleration and paying attention." - Rachel Bacon,2022
Continuing my observations and my own thoughts. Thinking of Bacons approach to building the 'fake' landscape, creating my own "fake" landscape of moments.
Belonging, my vision and my relationships are ultimately what I'm discovering through my practice.
Came out of Jaqueline Donachies talk with more ideas and a head full of knowledge. Her approach to her work is something I can relate to, the tracing, the mapping of it using scanners and large pieces of paper. it was comforting. I found her talk really profound and the ways she has highlighted the gaps in certain areas of research in particular to her sisters illness. It was refreshing to see her practice and how it can relate to people at large whilst filtering into research to highlight issues like infrastructure within Glasgow. It was provoking to see how able bodied people take these infrastructures for granted while those who are not as able are left to suffer and await change which, should be happening already or should have.
The following week we got to have tutorials with Jacqueline and it was great to allow her to see our practice and within the studio. We talked about getting out of spaces and going somewhere different, making ugly sculptures as well as drawings. This sparked an interest in the ugly or what I would perceive as ugly. I'm trying to challenge myself, But I don't want to make something that's ugly for the sake of it or purposefully ruin something. My aims were read well but I understand that my explanation for the purpose might not have been. it's a work in progress, it is about orientating myself and all of the ways in which drawing allows for me to do that. We spoke about actions and doing drawings of dancers or dancing when drawing alongside world building and creating our own spaces. Jacqueline recommended I look at Carolee Schneemann and Paul Noble in relation to movement and world building. I found Schneemann's work fascinating and I enjoy the way she talks about her work. The idea of her taking on her cats characteristics is fun and evocative. To think like an animal does, reminds me of the book "Why Cats Paint" and how cats actually paint and approach painting upside down and how they translate painting onto a canvas. The Restraint of Schneemann's work is what appeals to me, the suspension, the playfulness and the ideas the spark from the everyday. using your body as the tool or the material to create work. Scheneemann mentions that her work is often to do with painterly language and senses of environments. her relationship with body and painting and ways in that is explored is interesting. The inclusion of herself in the work alludes to a play or stage. As Schneemann is one of the founding members of the Judson Dance Theatre and witnessed the Living Theatre collective this developed her practice to a larger scale. Seeing herself as a painter who had enlarged her canvas as now she uses the stage as a three dimensional space to create compositions using people and an array of materials.
Raw Materials: Carolee Schneemann
It got me thinking of Matthew Barney's " Drawing Restraint" series in which he hinders his ability to move freely and draw. His body in return bounded and restrained by weights, rope and various surfaces. He creates an obstacle course which allows him to draw on ceilings and walls out of reach. I love the repetitive nature of some of his drawings, the squiggly lines and the allusiveness of a subject. forms and shapes diluted and sparse.
Ekphrasis - a new word I learned after attending Kate Mcleods talk. Really fascinating hearing her approach to her work and ways in which it manifests itself. I've loved her sculptures since 2nd and getting to see her discuss them in more depth and seeing the development was amazing. I enjoyed her honesty about studio life and life in general taking control at times over her practice as well as 'over doing it' . Another thing that struck me was the use of ekphrasis and ways to write about art. Particularly, in writing about art whether real or imagined. It got me thinking about what if I made a drawing or sculpture through text, not physically making the piece but writing about it so that that becomes the piece. It felt a bit weird but it might be something I play around with. It is weird that sometimes text feels sculptural to me, like I can feel it. I enjoy the flexibility writing offers so that I can mould my own sculpture or world off of a few sentences or a haiku.
Crit crit crit!
Set up my work in room 5052 and had our first crit of the semester! It went well, my work was read how I had hoped and everyone noted the conscious decisions I had made about the placement of my drawings. The dialogue I created was read and the story unfolded itself. A few of my classmates had noted that my work looked alive or as if it was moving. Alongside the sense of movement they noted that the lack of colour worked in the drawings favour as the monochromatic palette and the allusion of movement generated colours on it's own. Synesthesia keep relaying in my mind and I understand when people talk about being able to associate colours with shapes or letters. I think I have synesthesia? Neolithic cave paintings were mentioned and those are something I still admire as well as the imprints of hands and paws in stone or clay from millions of years ago. Kirsty showed me this bee that's been kept in amber for 100millions year - one hundred million year !!!!! I can't even wrap my head around that. But thinking back on my drawings from the crit there is something primitive about them like visual records of something. A different language or code.