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Negotiated learning plan.
During this term I would like to continue my exploration of line drawings which I began to explore in my previous module. I like the idea of having a confusing piece of work where the viewer needs to stop and pay more attention to the piece to figure out what it is. I find that viewers tend to move along quite quickly when looking at pieces of artwork therefore I intend to use line drawings in a way that will make the viewer spend a little more time looking at my pieces. I intend to do this by using string and nails to make the subject matter not as obvious as a typical pencil drawing or painting might be. The initial idea came from  a children's activity book where I found a dot to dot activity that I found rather interesting. I think the materials that will best serve my investigations will be nails and wool, however I plan to experiment with neon lights and wire as well just to see which materials work best for me. I am planning on experimenting with participatory art where i want to create almost an 'adult dot to dot' where the viewer will join in and create the picture.  i will measure my success with the growth of my idea. if my idea completely changes during my experimentation I will not view that as a fail because I am using this time to experiment with a basic idea that I love hoping that I will find where I want to be.


Live Outcome Idea.
My idea for the live outcome is to get a collection of my works into a gallery. After a lot of research I have managed to find a gallery called The Exchange Theatre in North Shields. I am going to have an Art Exhibition from the 3rd to the 6th of April 2022 where eight pieces of my artwork will be on display for the general public to view. 



 

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POST 1.
 

POST 2.
 

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POST 3.
Own Artwork Reflection

 

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For this piece I decided to try something different and decided to draw the line drawing straight onto the wood using marker and then obscuring the drawing with pastel coloured wool over the top. I really like the outcome of this piece I think it looks very aesthetically pleasing and defiantly draws in the viewer. I like the contrast in the dark pen and the light coloured wood and string. The fact that the subjects face is being covered adds an air of mystery to the piece and makes the viewer wonder why.
 

POST 4.
Own Artwork Reflection

 


For this piece I created almost a mini installation under my desk where I drew multiple different line drawings on tracing paper and collaged them together then attached it to the back of the desk. I then proceeded to create a cats cradle sort of situation around the table legs to create a very confusing messy installation. I then took a lot of different photographs and edited them on photoshop. I really like the outcome of this experiment, I did this as I new I wanted to create an installation and I new I wanted to experiment with colour so I did this as sort of a small taster session to see if I enjoyed it before I dedicated a large amount of time to my next installation project. I found that I really liked the use of the bright colour and I loved the effect of the messy cats cradle and will be experimenting with both further. my favourite outcome is the first image in the slideshow due to the fact that it is so bright and colourful I love the contrast between the colour and the black string I think it looks very striking and very professional considering it was just a little experiment made under my desk. 
 

POST 5.
Creative Live Reflection

 


I really liked this creative live talk by Narbi Price as I found it one of the most interesting out of all the creative live talks. During the talk he told us about his work and his paintings and showed us some examples. Although his work is nothing like my own I found that his work was very interesting and I was drawn to it. I love how he mixed realism with abstract during the same piece it creates very interesting layered pieces of work. I think this talk was very successful as he told us the history behind his pieces and the places they are biased on and created, I found this helpful as it helps you understand the pieces a little bit more. I also like how he told us why and how he created his pieces and what he hoped to achieve while creating his work. I really liked all the interesting pieces of history he told us about as I had previously not seen the pieces or heard of the history before hand. 

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One I have been apart of- My Crits.






 

POST 6.
Reflect on one Exhibition you have seen and one you have been a part of. 

 

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These are the pieces which I decided to display for my Crits. The response to my work was good everybody seemed to like it and thought it would be interesting as it developed further. I was given some very interesting artists and I was happy with the outcome. I was a bit nervous as it was the first time my work had been in a exhibition sort of setting. However it was after my crits when I had a tutorial with Natalie that I received the guidance I required. I explained that my idea was to create something confusing using nails and string so the viewer had to spend a little bit more time looking at my work in order to figure out what the subject was. Natalie then explained that she thought my work was very obvious she didn't struggle to see the subject of my pieces and she said that she found the background of the pieces too decorative. she then suggested I look into slow looking and maybe try experimenting with layering and using the same colour string as the background. which I agreed could be very interesting. She then gave me a few artists which she felt could be beneficial to me and then left me to experiment. The tutorial with Natalie has defiantly helped me progress my work more. 




 

POST 6.
Exhibition I have seen.
The Baltic.

 

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I recently viewed an exhibition at The Baltic in Newcastle where I viewed an exhibition by Al Solh, the exhibition included embordered pieces as well as drawings relating to the topics of migration, domestic issues and the mourning of loved ones. I really liked this exhibition it looked very different I had never seen anything like this before. I really liked the embordered pieces as they looked quite soft yet very powerful I liked the overall effect of these pieces and would like to experiment this way myself. I found that I didn't have a favourite piece from this exhibition as all of the displayed works were just as beautiful and just as interesting as each other, I love how the artist has chose to tackle such difficult subjects. Although this exhibition did not relate to my own practice I did take some notes on how I would like my own exhibition to be laid out. I  love visiting The Baltic as there is always something new each time I go. 




 

POST 7.
Reflect on five books about artists relevant to your research.

 

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Ghada Amer.
 

I found this book on Ghada Amer in the library, Amer is a contemporary artist who uses issues such as gender and sexuality to create her work. Her work involves pornographic images which she layers with acrylic paint and embroidery. This is one of the main artists that I have been looking at during this project. I have found this book very interesting and very helpful. It has been interesting to look at Amers processes during the creation of her work. I also found it very interesting to see the timeline of her work how the artist has progressed and developed her art practice over time. my favourite piece of work I have found in this book is the image to the left, I really like the colours of this pieces and think I could create some pieces similar using the riso printer.  

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Brice Marden
 

I found these two books on Brice Marden in the library. I first noticed the books because of the beautiful front covers. I initially thought that maybe the artist worked with line drawings but after reading the books I found that the artist works with paint, I learnt that Marden is a contemporary painter who works primarily with colour and lines. What stood out for me was the fact that Brice Marden uses his work to experiment with abstract to figurative which links to my own work practice. So although I don't enjoy painting, and and didn't find bits of the books which explained about the creation process useful, I did find the examples of Marden's work very interesting. I found that I quite enjoyed his work because how abstract it was. I found that I could look at the piece for an extended period of time and not get bored due to the fact that the longer I looked the more i saw which kept his work interesting. my favourite thing about this artists work is the subtle use of colour, as an artist who adores colourful pieces I found the subtle colour against the black lines quite refreshing. It isn't overpowering yet stood out very dramatically. I am very happy that I just happened to pick up these two books because of the very beautiful colour as I may never have found such an interesting artist. 

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Bruce Nauman works with light and Bruce Nauman mindfuck
 

I found two books by the same artist Bruce Nauman which I really enjoyed as they gave me a new idea for the progression of my work. I hadn't previously thought of using lights in my practice until I saw these books. I loved the artwork displayed even though the pieces in the book were simple and nothing special, I just loved the bright colours and neon lights. I also liked the idea of using inappropriate subjects such as swearing or naked people like the artist has shown in the second book which I viewed. I thought they were very aesthetically pleasing and would look very striking in person. The first book did have a down side I didn't find the writing interesting as I found the text to be very autobiographical telling me about every aspect of the artists life instead of about the pieces of work themselves. It would have been a very interesting book if it told me more about the creation process or about the meanings behind the pieces. My favourite piece that I found was the end piece of artwork above, I found the use of text very intriguing due to the fact that the light is very bright so the text almost disappears and is hard to read which kind of links to my theme of making people look a little bit harder. After seeing these two books I initially wanted to get neon lights to create my own work in this style. I found a neon wire which was battery packed and it turned out very well I found It was easy to mould and it looked very aesthetically pleasing. However, I found the battery pack quite restricting as I couldn't easily move the piece without being conscious of the battery pack so I had the idea to use neon string with a black light to get the same results with a little more freedom. I really liked this book as it has given me a lot of good ideas which has lead to the creation of my installation. 

POST 8.
Own Artwork Reflection

 


'The Complexity of humans; A Transgender life for me''
the purpose of this installation was to represent the complexity of humans using string and nails. I have specifically looked at being transgender and how chaotic and confusing it would be in the mind of someone struggling with their identity. i have done this by using the colours of the transgender flag, pink white and blue when creating my piece. I used the pink wool when creating the female portrait and blue wool when creating the male portrait, I then connected them together with white wool creating almost a cats cradle between the two portraits. I created this installation using nails, neon wool and a black light. Firstly I made the neon wool by getting balls of plain white wool and dipping them into my two different colours of paint. Once my wool was dry I then proceeded to create the main two faces out of blue and pink neon thread. I used a overhead projector to project my drawing from my acetate onto the wall, I then hammered nails into the wall mapping out the outline of the portrait. Once all the nails were in the wall I then wrapped the chosen colour of string around the nails to create the image. Once I had completed the portraits I then used a white wool to connect them together. I then used neon tape to create some speech bubbles on the last wall eventually connecting them to the portraits as well. I loved the overall outcome of this piece because of the shock factor, it is both aesthetically pleasing as well as thought provoking. I think this experiment has defiantly been successful and I will defiantly be experimenting like this more in future.
*The rest of my work can be found by pressing the buttons 'Home' 'Art280' and then 'Artworks' 

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Post 9.
My Live Outcomes.
Exhibition.






 

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My live outcome took place at The Exchange Theatre in North Shields where I had my very own exhibition where eight pieces of my work was on display for three days. The Gallery took charge of hanging my pieces so I didn't have to worry about that, I was just in charge of choosing my favourite pieces that I needed to drop off as well as creating a poster to be displayed. These are the pieces in which I decided to display for my Live outcome. I decided on these pieces as I felt that they were my most successful experiments that I have created so far. The overall experience of getting my work into an actual gallery was surreal and amazing, it was very different and interesting to see my work on display for the general public to see. My gallery was up from the 3rd of April until the 6th of April so although it was not for an extended period of time the gallery is quite popular so my work was seen by a lot of people. The response from my exhibition was very positive, I have received a lot of positive feedback from both the general public as well as the gallery staff. 

 

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Post 9.
My Live Outcomes.
Instalation.






 

Due to the fact that I did my live outcome quite early into the year I decided it would be appropriate to do another as my work progressed quite a lot and I felt it would be interesting to reflect on where I started and where I have ended up. For my second live outcome I envisioned a large neon installation. I started by gathering my supplies, to create my piece I had to dye a large amount of wool so it took a while for it to dry. Once my supplies were in order I got to work creating the piece I had been planning. I absolutely loved the entire process of creating this piece, I found working with an installation very freeing as my idea could develop as I worked due to not being confined by paper or canvas. I had previously thought that I would be very daunted by the large scale as I had never previously worked so big however I took it all in my stride and I am very proud of the results. The final outcome in my opinion was very successful, I received a lot of positive feedback from people in the university as well as lectures who viewed my work, both during the creation process as well as when it was finished. I am very happy that I chose to do a second live outcome as I have learned so much about myself and my hopes for where I want my art practice to go, I will defiantly work in this way again. On the other hand I do feel like because of my huge success with my second installation it makes my first exhibition seems very small in comparison. For this piece I decided not to make a poster to tell everyone of the exhibitions presence as the room where my installation was created was a very public area, I wanted to create a bigger shock factor for the viewers when they accidentally stumbled upon it. I don't think this has lessened the amount of viewers as a sufficient amount of people have seen and have given feedback. 

Post 10.
Assessment summary. 






 

During this module I feel like my art practice has grown immensely. I started off this project with a brief idea of what i wanted to achieve, I started by creating continuous line drawings using nails and string, in hopes of creating a confusing piece of work which would force the viewer to take a longer look at my pieces. After my crits my feedback was rather positive I was given some artists to look at and I thought I new how I wanted to progress. However, after a long tutorial with Natalie she explained that my work was too aesthetically pleasing "something you'd find on etsy" and she gave me some very interesting ideas which I hadn't considered. She introduced me to 'slow looking' and the artist Ghada Amer, and so my artwork took its first turn as I decided to develop my initial idea to create something more confusing and more layered. From here I started to create a number of pieces of the female figure using wood, string and nails, I experimented with layering the same colours on to of each other as well as experimenting with wire. I decided that my strongest pieces were pieces in which I had layered the same colour string as the background as the pieces achieved my goal more then the others. During my experimentation I created some pieces where I drew an image onto the wood and then attempted to conceal it with the string by wrapping it around the image, but again this created a piece that was too aesthetically pleasing and the viewer wouldn't struggle to see although the outcome was one of my favourites it wasn't quite what I wanted to create. Around this time I had my live outcome where I displayed my work in a gallery in north shields, I chose my favourite pieces and they were displayed for several days, I got a lot of positive feedback from my pieces however when I viewed them myself I wasn't initially excited, I wanted to create something that I was proud of, something I was in awe of. From here Natalie then introduced me to parcipatory art, which I toyed with after I decided that if my goal was to get viewers to spent more time with my art what better way then to get them to join in and interact with the pieces I create. I proceeded to create two pieces in this style that the viewers would interact with, I created a 'dot to dot' piece where the viewers would use the given string to follow the numbers to show the image. I also created simply a grid of nails in which the viewers could create any picture or word using the string provided. Although I did enjoy creating these I didn't feel like this was where I was supposed to be so I went back to creating the same pieces as before using females figures. this is when my work took its final turning point which got me to where I needed to be. Natalie asked me during a tutorial "are you hiding behind the figure?" a question which I wouldn't get out of my head, after a few days I realised that I wasn't hiding behind the figure, the aim of my work was to create something so layered that the viewer is forced to stop and take a second look at it in order to work it out. When I think of layering, I think of humans, specifically females due to humans being the most complex and layered things I can think of. I was subconsciously choosing to create my pieces using the female form as that is what came to mind when I thought of layering. From here I decided to expand my work more looking at what makes us complex. This is where my idea for my installation came from, where I presented the complexity of struggling With gender identity. Although my work has took many twists and turns I feel like it was a path I needed to follow in order to find where I was truly meant to be, I am happy with where I have landed and I look forward to experimenting more with it. I am extremely proud of my end result and although it isn't perfect and there is a lot i could do to improve it i think it was a very successful live outcome. 

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