Easter 2014

Easter holidays:
This Easter I planned to get quite a lot of work done, I planned to do a few A1 painted portraits, paint on at least one of my A1 boards and get my sketch book completely up to date.

The first thing I did was this painting of and old women that I took a photograph of, I really liked the photo and thought that it would make a really good A1 portrait. One of the artists that I am looking at is Jonathan Yeo, and this painting was inspired by his very detailed but seemingly unfinished style.
I am pleased with how this painting turned out and think that it is one of my best, this woman was quite old which made her face more interesting to paint, as she had a lot of wrinkles and discolouration to her skin and eyes. What I found most difficult about this painting was probably her glasses and around her eyes, her glasses were hard as they were made out of a clear plastic which had a pattern on, and it was difficult to make them look transparent and 3D and not invisible. Around the eyes was particularly difficult as she had quite red looking eyes, but I didn't want to make the look over exaggerated, and it was very difficult to get them to look the right colour.

This image is not completely finished as I still need to add in the outline of her body and clothes.

During the holidays I also completed this painting of the back of my Mum's head, I painted this as I was inspired by Gerhard Richter's 'Betty', I had previously done a portrait of the back of someone's head in life drawing, but wanted to spend more time on making it more accurate. I painted this on board as I wanted to try something different to paper, however I found this difficult to do as it is very different to paper and the paint reacts in a different way. This took my longer than the ones I have previously done on paper as I had to change my painting style slightly, and use a lot more paint to cover the board so you could not see the background.

I am happy with how it looks now that it is finished, I think that it is an effective piece as you can only see the back of the head and not really any of the face. 

Acrylic on board.

I also tried these alternative ways of painting, using watercolour, ink and tea, and a fine liner pen to add the detail such as the wrinkles.

I am pleaded with the way that they turned out and they are a good contrast to the acrylic paintings i have done so far in the project. This is also a much quicker technique compare with the way that I paint with acrylic, and creates a much more subtle portrait.

To create these images I added quite a lot of water to the materials that I was using which made the colours a bit lighter, but it also meant that it was easier to spread and move around and meant that I could use a straw to make the colours run. 

A1 watercolour, ink and tea painting on paper.

A1 watercolour, ink and tea painting on paper.

I worked into a few of these studies to make them a little bit more interesting. First I scanned them into the computer and edited them on Photoshop to make the colours a bit darker and more defined, I then printed them out onto good quality paper so that I could work back into them easier. I then used a fine ink pen to outline all of the different colour variations and to add in some darker and shaded areas over the top. 

I am happy with the outcome and think that it adds more depth and interest to the images compared with the originals, and the out lines define and sharpen the initial detail.

  

A3 worked into study, using pen.

A3 original watercolour, ink and tea study.

 A3 worked into study using pen.

A3 worked into study, using pen.

Thursday April 10th 2014

This afternoon I did life drawing, I wanted to link this in with my current project so I decided that I would paint the back of his head, as I was looking at Gerhard Richter's 'Betty' this morning and wanted to create something similar/inspired by him. This was because I didn't want to be doing the same thing over and over and decided that this would be an interesting image and it would also still be a portrait.

I am happy with the out come, as I think that it looks effective. I think that this is because I used much bigger brushes and bigger brush strokes when I was painting, I think that this adds more texture than the way that I would normally paint. I think that the proportions are pretty accurate, apart for the ear, which I think is a little too far back and it is also just slightly too small, compare with the rest of his head. But other than that I am pleased with the out come for the amount of time we had, as we only had one session to get it finished, and I think that the bigger brush strokes helped me get it finished as it was a quicker way of working.

Acrylic on paper (A1). 

Tuesday April 8th 2014

Today I did some printing from my collograph, and they actually came out pretty well and the ink really picked up all of the different textures from the different materials that I used. However I wanted to print them in black but I only had blue so I will have to do some more prints in black and may some using multiple colours if I have time.

Monday April 7th 2014

This morning we had tutorial, were we focused on developing our evaluation and reflection in our journals.

Reflective practice:

• Critique
• Successes and areas for improvement
• Processes and techniques 
• Discussion
• Development 
• Evaluation
• Progression 
• Evidence/photographs
• Peer review

We were split into pairs and we each had to read and review the other persons reflective journal. I  feel that this was a big help as it is good to see what other people think of your work, but they can also tell you if  what you have written makes sense and if they understand what you have done and what you are planing to do next. I was also nice to read the someone else's reflection to see how they word things and if this is the same or better than the way that you do it, and it also gave me ideas of the types of things I could put next.
I was in a pair with Chris and he told me that my reflection so far was good, but I needed to make it a little more in depth, by further explaining the processes and techniques I have done, and by going into more detail about my strengths and weaknesses, and what I did to improve my work.

This afternoon I did some mono prints to go into my sketchbook. I created them using black ink and drawing from some of the photographs that I had taken. I am pleased with how the turned out and think that they look effective as they were quite quick, small studies.

Quick mono prints. 

Saturday April 5th 2014

Today I create a collograph board that I will used to create collograph prints, I used one of the photographs that I took at Newark to create the image I am going to print. I used a piece of mount board that was just slightly bigger than A4 and glue my photograph on it, as a sort of guide that I could follow to create an accurate image.
I used a variety of different material to create different surfaces that the ink would pick up to create the image, such as:

• Card board for his jacket, eyes and nose
• Some old socks for his scarf
• String for his jumper and wrinkles
• Sand paper for his beard 
• Fabric for his hat
• And glue to create his glasses

I am pleased with the out come, however I don't know how much it is going to work or if all the textures will be picked up by the ink and how good they will print, but I am pretty sure I will get some of it to work, and if it doesn't print well I can always work back into the print and add more or less texture to the actual printing board.

Collograph

 

Friday April 4th 2014

Today I finished my painting of Margaret that I had started on Wednesday. I created this from the photographs that I took and painted an A1 portrait of her on her own. I did this because I had previously started one of her and George together but I didn't finish it as I didn't really like how it was turning out, and I thought it would be better to paint them separately.
I am pleased with how this painting turned out and I think that I got a pretty accurate likeness, this is also the oldest person I have ever painted and at first found the wrinkles difficult to paint as it was hard to get the paint the right colour to make them look realistic. However in the end the worked out well and I much prefer this painting to the one that I had started before.
I feel that the more that I paint the better I am getting at making it look like the person I am painting, and that I am getting more confident and developing my own painting style, if I have time I would like to use a different type of paint, maybe watercolour or oil, to try and create a different effect and experiment with some different painting and drawing techniques.

Acrylic on paper.

Thursday April 3rd 2014

Today in life drawing I finished the two week painting I had started last week. I focused on just doing the portrait so that it would link directly to the rest of my work and to my project. I decided to do it A1 as we had two weeks to complete it and to use paint as I had used paint to create some of my other work for this project and that it would be quicker than using pen or pencil, and so I could get it completely finished.
I am happy with the way that it has turned out, even though it is slightly different to my other paintings as I have used looser brush strokes and it is not as neat, but I do think that I looks effective and is a good contrast to my other work. I really like the texture the bigger brush strokes have created and I was inspired by one of the artists, (Ian Cumberland) to let the paint run towards the bottom of the page, and I feel that it makes the painting a little bit more interesting/unusual.

Tuesday April 1st 2014

This morning I had a one to one where we discussed that my visual work was strong but that the written part of my project still needed work and making more detailed and in depth. And that I should continue doing more painting of portraits and less work involving the skull and skeleton.

This afternoon I did some printing from the plate that I finished yesterday, I only got two prints done today as there were a few other people printing as well. I am quite happy with how the prints came out, but they were not as good as the prints that I have done from my first plate, as I think that this time my paper was a little too wet and I may not have had quite enough ink on the plate. However they are pretty good and I can develop them and experiment with them further by working into them with paint and collage to add some colour so they aren't just black and white. If I have enough time I would like to do some more prints from this plate to see if I can get some even better prints.

Not enough ink.

Monday March 31st 2014

Today I final finished my printing plate of my sister and the skull and I am really happy with the way that it looks, however I will not know until I have printed it how good it actually is, but I do feel that I have a good variation of shallow and deep marks, and thick and thin lines, so the main thing I will have to think about to get a good overall print will be applying the right amount of ink.

Printing plate for intaglio printing. 

Saturday March 29th 2014

Today I decided that I wanted to create another printing plate, so that I could do some more intaglio printing and develop my prints on further.  I wanted to incorporate the skull into one of my prints so I decided that I would take a photograph of my sister and Photoshop part of the skull into the image. However this was a little more difficult to do than I had first expected as the skull was a lot longer than my sisters head so I had to crop some of the skull out so that it fit and line up with her eyes, nose and mouth. In the end I feel that it worked out well, and there is an interesting contrast between the to images that works well, and would look good as a print. I edited the final image into black and white so that it would be easier to engrave into the plastic and make the lights and darks easier to see. I will start the engraving tomorrow.

 

Thursday March 27th 2014

Today I continued my artist research in my sketch book. The artists I am looking at are:

• Jonathan Yeo
• Ian Cumberland
• David Hockney 
• David Caldwell
• Dean Marsh
• Jenny Saville
• Chuck Close

I really like all of these artists and feel that they influence my work and relate to my project as their work is mainly based and focused around people and portraits, and I have seen Jonathan Yeo, Ian Cumberland and Chuck Close's work in the flesh at different exhibitions and art galleries. And I just like there styles and techniques.

Portraits by Ian Cumberland.

Wednesday March 26th 2014

Today is a day when I am not in college so I decided that I would start an A1 painting from the photographs that I took of George and Margaret. I decided that I wanted to do one of them both together sitting down, but just there portrait and not the whole body. I printed off a photograph and gridded it and the A1 paper and drew it out in pencil. However when I started painting it I didn't really like the way that it was turning out and that I didn't really like it. I just felt that having them both together on the page didn't work as well as I wanted it to and that there faces were to small for me to be able to paint and be able to see how old they actually were easily, and that it would be better to have them on their own but bigger so I could paint their wrinkles in accurately and so you could actually see that they were quite old.  

Tuesday March 25th 2014

This morning we were split into groups to do a peer review, I found this very helpful as it is good to see how other people see your work and what they suggest you do to improve and develop your project. I also like looking at other peoples work to see what they have done and the techniques that they have use. I also like look at the artists they have used and see if I could use them in my project or if they relate to what I am doing, also even just see artists I had never seen or heard of before, and seeing how they have influenced the other persons project.
During my peer review I was told that my visuals were very strong and the techniques that I have used are very broad and interesting and work with the project that I am doing and my style of working. The group suggested that I continue doing more painting as they work really well and are my strongest pieces.
They also suggested that I takes some more photographs of a range of different people and have some in different positions and not just facing the camera straight on, and continue to create more prints and printing plates and experiment/develop them further.
I was told that I needed to work on my annotation and artist research, as some of it was missing, but what I have done as good but needs to be more in depth and more detailed and they suggested the types of things that is should write.
Overall I totally agree with everything that was said and I have taken on board all there suggestions, and I have already started to develop my written work. I have also taken some inspiration from the way that they work and the techniques they have used and I have got some more ideas for other visuals I could do.

This afternoon I did some more intaglio printing in the print room, a continuation from what I did yesterday.

Monday 24th March 2014

Today I finally got my intaglio prints, from the collage that I had created a few weeks ago, done. I am quite pleased with the out comes, although some of them did work better than others. However I did find it quite difficult to get the right amount of ink, without having to much, but rubbing too much ink off was my biggest problem. However when I worked out what the right amount was my prints came out really well. And I got a few really good print, some of the others printed well but they came out a bit dirty around the edges. The reasons why some didn't work so well was because there was too much or too little ink, or the paper was to wet so the ink spread a little, but I learnt from my mistakes and I will work into the prints that aren't so good, with pen and collage.

I worked back into this with my original photo collage and a fine liner pen.  

This was my first print and the paper was way to dry and there was not nearly enough ink.

Today I also caught up with the evaluations in my journal and added to some of the annotation I had done in my sketch book.

Saturday March 22nd 2014

Today I finished my A1 painting of my friend Polly that I had drawn out on Wednesday, I had done some painting on it on Thursday but I didn't get it finished until today. I am very pleased with the out come as
I think that it has a good likeness to the photograph that I took and to her in real life. I also think that it is the best painting that I have done so far. I think that this is because I have become more confident using the paint (as I had not done much painting before) and found a technique that I like.
I feel that my painting style works well on paper but in the future, for another painting during this project, I would like to paint on something else maybe board and perhaps even on a large scale too.

Acrylic on paper

Wednesday March 19th 2014

This afternoon I went and took some photographs of my mums friends George and Margaret, as the theme for my project is age and they are quite old. They agreed that I could take some photographs of them. So I took a few different photos of them standing and sitting, full body and just portraits, which I plan on painting A1 scale in acrylic paint. I think that the photographs turned out well and I have at least one that I can paint from.
These images are a nice contrast to the ones I took of the baby.

Today I also drew out Polly for the next painting I am going to do and I will paint it tomorrow.

Tuesday March 18th 2014

Today I was going to do some intaglio printing from the printing plate that I created last week, based on my photograph collage. However my plate was too thick so the roller wouldn't go over it without breaking it, and the technician wasn't in so I will have to do it next week, when I can get the roller lifted.
I didn't waste the day, I continued to add more detail to the plate, to add more of a variation in darks and lights when printed. I did this by engraving deeper in some areas and lighter in some places, so that the ink goes in deeper and more ink will be transferred, when I print. Hopefully this will make my print even better and more detailed.      

Monday March 17th 2014

Today I experimented with drawing techniques using different sized and shaped pieces of paper (1cm x 1cm squared x10, 10cm x 10cm square x10 and circles x5). These were mainly quite quick timed studies, ranging from 30 seconds t 5 minutes.
For the first 10 (1cm) squared they were very quick studies.

1. Colour - For the colour study I used water colour paint to create a sort of abstract image of a finger, from one of the photographs. You can't really tell that it is a finger and not just a blob of paint, but I quite like it as the composition is good and sort of interesting and the orange colour makes it stand out.   
2. Composition - For the composition study I worked from one of my photographs of the skeleton. I decided that I would keep it quite abstract, as they are very small to work on. I used a fine liner pen and drew the collar bone. I think that this study is interesting and again you can't really tell what it is.
3. Tone - For the tonal study I used  pencil to create the shadow and shading and to contrast with my second pen study. I again drew part of the hand from my photographs.
4. Perspective - I found it quite difficult to find something to draw from my work and photographs, with perspective, so I chose to draw in between the ribs, I used fine liner pen and sharpie to create the darker shadows.  
5. My own idea - For my own idea I decided to use a fine liner pen to create a study of a very zoomed in part if a hand from my photographs.
6. Abstract - For the abstract study I used Pro-markers to create a series of lines based on some of my collage work. 
7. Line - For the line study I also based this on my collage work.
8. Controversy - For the controversial study I decided to draw a finger with all the veins exposed, using a fine liner and blue and red Pro-markers.    
9. & 10. Concept & own idea - For these two studies I decided to do the same idea using the eye and drawing over the top using Pro-markers to make to eye look aged and old.

For the circle studies I used Pro-markers, fine liner, ink, watercolour paint and sharpies. The techniques I used random placement, abstract, composition and my own idea. I think that they turned out well, and I really liked working on the circle shapes, as it was different to working on a square or rectangle like I normally would, although I had to think a lot more about the composition as it is an unusual shape to work on, but I think they worked well and my images maybe even worked better on the circles compared to the squares. 

On the 10x10 squares I created studies based on my photographs and the smaller studies that I had done so far, so they look very similar but I tried to develop them on more as we had more time. 

   

Sunday March 16th 2014

I finished the printing plate for intaglio printing. I created this from one of my collages, that I created out of photographs. I am pleased with the outcome but don't actually know how good it is until I print it, which I plan to do next week.

Saturday March 15th 2014

This afternoon I started to create my plastic printing plate for intaglio (dry point printing). I create this from one of the collages that I created using photographs that I took of people of a range of ages. I did this as thought that it would look good as a detailed print, in just one colour.

Today I also finished my self portrait painting.

Acrylic paint on paper.

Friday March 14th 2014

Today I went to Birmingham art gallery to see the Grayson Perry exhibition 'vanity of small differences', to see the six tapestries he created all about the British class system. They were really interesting and big and colourful, they were so detailed and complex.
I also went to the Wolverhampton art gallery to see the BP Portrait award exhibition. This was really interesting and some of the portraits were amazing.
I particularly liked the self portrait by Ian Cumberland as it was so vast and detailed. I really liked his painting technique as from a distance it looked really smooth and flat, but as you get closer you can see that it is very textured and actually quite messy, and you can see that the colours aren't really mixed that well and a lot of the colours are quite separate but look mixed as you move further away. I also really liked the background of the painting as it is interesting even though it is quite a plain colour, but I especially liked the way that the paint runs towards the bottom of painting.

I started to create my self portrait painting based on the portraits that I saw at the galleries, I printed out a photograph of my self on A4 and gridded it, I also gridded an A1 piece of white paper so that it would be easier to draw out my face. (I plan to finish it tomorrow.)    

Thursday March 13th 2014

Visual Studies:

Today we went on a walk around Silverdale lake, inspired by the work of Richard Long and the exhibition he has on at the Potteries Museum, that we visited a few weeks ago. we also saw artists responses to his work at the Airspace Gallery, it was very interesting to see other peoples responses to his work and the different ways that they interpreted the meaning of his work.
however we didn't get many photographs or drawing as it was very foggy when we went out so it was very hard to see anything remotely interesting, eventually it did clear a bit but by that time we were back a college.

Afternoon: Life Drawing

In the afternoon I did life drawing, I experimented using mixed media:

• Pen
• Ink
• Collage
• Paint
• Pencil

I  had been inspired by the work of Jonathan Yeo when I created the A5 mixed media studies. I really liked his collage work and some of his pieces where he uses paint, and leaves some areas blank. I wanted to recreate this effect but by combining all the techniques I had already done together.
I think that these studies work really well and I particularly like the two studies with the brown background, where I used flesh toned paint, fine liner pen and map/ book collage. I just think that the techniques used worked really well in the short amount of time we had (around 10-15 minutes).
I wish to develop these techniques further in my sketchbook, by giving myself more time to experiment with the materials.

 

Wednesday March 12th 2014

Today I have being doing some more collage out of photographs inspired by my artists and some images that I found on Pinterest, mixing photographs of old people and young people together.
I am pleased with how they turned out, but I did find them quite difficult to do, as it was hard to fit the pieces back together to create a good face, but I played around with them and eventually got them to fit together.

Tuesday March 11th 2014

Today I have been experimenting with collage influenced by the work of  Michelle Claesson Eismann and David Hockney, (his photomontages).
I think that so far they have worked well and the samples that I have created with the photographs that I took of  hands worked well as they are quite subtle but effective, as the different aged hands together, contrast really nicely and create an interesting image and exaggerate the differences between old and young hands.
However the collage that I did of the faces didn't work quite as well, they looked ok but the photographs weren't quite the right size and the faces were at slightly different angles so they didn't line up as well as I would like.
To improve and develop these samples I will print out some more photographs that I think will work better by resizing them and changing the angle of the image so that they fit together better.