Reflections upon the last term....

My initial responses to the themes Appropriation, Interpretation and Adaptation for 3rd project, Studio Practice 4, were firmly rooted with an intent to continue the strategy I had first considered during the previous semester.  That was and continued to be, to emulate in some personal way, the traditional artistic learning mechanisms of the Great Masters (Aristides, Classical Drawing Atelier, 2006). I’m still confident that this approach has not only helped to develop my tactile epistemology, particularly within the practice of drawing, (which I still firmly believe to be the most important foundation of all art (see https://www.ucl.ac.uk/medical-education/publications/Reprints2010/2010-PACA-ArtStudentsWhoCannotDraw.pdf).  (McManus, Chamberlain, Riley, Rankin, & Brunswick, 2010).
 (- however I do appreciate that others may differ with this assertion), but also, in due course, has helped me to tease out contemporary applications of this core skill, so that my creativity can begin to emerge into more diverse practices (Davidson, 2011).

My drawings have therefore been centred on copying a small selection of Great Master’s sketches (Appropriation), but then representing them in a completely contemporary style (Adaptation), magnifying them to painting-drawings.
The Studio Practice environment affords me the opportunity to explore & develop my drawing skills on a much grander (literally) scale, than what I could accomplish in my home studio.  (Inspired by (Sheringham, 2006) Page 196).   Interest in creating artworks on a much bigger scale has allowed me to free up my expressive painting abilities and the example of Harold Speeds drawing, of 1905, (Fig.1) (Speed, 1913), where I have interpreted some of the notions of George Baselitz (i.e. Painting upside-down), and together with the original appropriation of this image, adapted it to a very large and then recreated it quickly (Approx 1.5. hours) on a scale of 6’ by 4’ with acrylic “paint-drawing” (Fig.2) - (Appropriation, Adaptation, Interpretation);I hope slightly menacing representation should capture the viewer’s attention with an affect to draw the spectator towards my work for a closer investigation.

With regards to the interpretation of materiality, a new relationship and a deeper appreciation of the works of Anselm Keifer (born 1945), the German Neo-Expressionist (Arrase, 2001), together with his peer, George Baselitz (Bn 1938) has emerged.

The idea that paintings are just about pigmentation being put onto a surface, are far too shallow for today’s sophisticated viewer.  I am fascinated by the colours, but I think the most common on this planet, the closest colour that I have found to the Pacific Ocean, being Ultramarine and the closest colour to the Earth itself being Burnt Umber.  I realise also there are many other colours to choose from, but I have decided that a long-term exploration of just this limited palette will enable me to represent everything that I need.  Blue and brown are also associated with mood.  When one is browned off or feeling blue, it says everything about their importance. Having chosen to mix my own blacks through Acrylic paints, I’ve purposefully left some of the blending of these two colours “un-mixed”, in order to capture a sense of speed of deployment, so that the ranges of tones and tonality are represented not only in the traditional greys, but also the underlying blues or browns.
I have also explored other artistic methods such as print (silverpoint via Perspex, Lino-cut, wood-cut) and plaster moulding as experimental methods of representation.

 Whilst further exploration of these methods will be of benefit to my body of work, I feel that for the moment, I will continue to hone the core skills of choice of subject matter, composition and translation as a priority.  This will, in my humble opinion, help me to mature my artistic language and enhance an emerging, more personal and unique signatory style.  The drawing as imitation approach of the learning style taken from the Grand Master / Atelier route has served me well as a foundational step.  However I have consciously moved away from the ‘soft’ psychological boundaries that this method was confining me within.
I have also begun to move outside the representation of the figurative form, (Vanderpoel, 1907), and want to explore a far more contemporary engagement with the quotidian, not only in the selection of subject matter, but also in the depth of enquiry, (Sheringham, 2006).  As a result of some recent experimental works, I am searching for the ambiguity of representation, rather than the imitation of it.  This has led me to use (in a similar vein to Kiefer), additional and perhaps unusual materials to mix together with the pigmenting and suspension medium of acrylic.
My continued fascination with the idea that ‘we all leave something behind’, at whatever moment, be it relatively long (in terms of hours, days, months or even years), or short, (minutes, seconds or fractions thereof), in any place we visit (either physically / geographically, or now, even virtually in the internet-cyberspace), has been gnawing away in my mind.  In the first year I created a piece of work relating to the internet ‘finger-print’ and the notion of it remaining long after we are no longer ‘physically’ present.

 I will therefore not explain in more detail here, (other than the brief adumbration outlined above), all the separate meanings from the components used in my final piece (from my use of domestic dust, waste lint (taken from tumble dryer filters), human hair and other detritus).
The piece is called ‘Comfort’.

The representation is at first glance, possibly a rock or stone? …
But on closer inspection, an old coat, slung upon a chair back.

What does it mean?

 I want the viewer to imagine, to find out for themselves.

References

Aristides, J. (2006). Classical Drawing Atelier. New York: Watson Guptill Publications.

Aristides, J. (2011). Lessons in Classical Drawing. New York: Watson Guptill Publications.

Arrase, D. (2001). Anselm Kiefer. London: Thames & Hudson Ltd.

Bargue, C., & Leon-Gerome, J. (1869). The Drawing Course. Paris: Goupil & Cei (The Project Guttenberg).

Davidson, M. (2011). Contemporary Drawing. New York: Watson Guptill Publications.

Elkins, J. (2001). Why Art Cannot Be Taught. Urbana, Chicago & Springfield: University of Illanois Press.

Lauteerwein, A. (2007, 2nd Edition). Anselm Kiefer, Paul Celan - Myth, Mourning and Memory. London: Thames and Hudson.

McManus, C., Chamberlain, R., Riley, H., Rankin, Q., & Brunswick, N. (2010, April 26). Retrieved from University College London: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/medical-education/publications/Reprints2010/2010-PACA-ArtStudentsWhoCannotDraw.pdf

Petherbridge, D. (2010). The Primacy of Drawing. New Haven & London: Yale University Press.

Sheringham, M. (2006). Everyday Life, Theories and Practices from Surrealism to the Present. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Speed, H. (1913). The Science and Practice of Drawing. London: Dover Publications Ltd (The Project Guttenburg).

Vanderpoel, J. (1907). The Human Figure. Chicago: The Inland Printer Company (The Project Guttenburgh).