FINAL PIECE: Based on the Fine Art Painting Project
Posted: March 23, 2014 Filed under: Documentation, Field | Tags: Acrylic, acrylic painting, alone in the city, Art, art conveying loneliness in cities, Art Student, artist, Black and White, city, city loneliness, city project, dry brushing, field, field final piece, final art painting, final piece, final project outcome, Fine Art, green underpainting, hidden city, hint of colour, loneliness, monochrome, no interaction, painting, painting project, shaped board, shaped painting, singled out, surrounded by others but alone, the hidden loneliness of city life, underpainting coming through, urban loneliness, white silhouettes Leave a commentI have decided to submit my monochrome shaped painting that I started within the last fine art project session as a final piece. It communicates all of the material skills that I have learnt throughout the painting project and accurately consolidates my body of work surrounding the hidden loneliness of life in the City. Participating in the project has taught me a wide variety of skills, I had never explored the technique of underpainting before and I learnt how much an underpainting really can inform a final piece. I also acquired a knowledge of dry brushing and allowing an underpainting to come through the top layer of paint. Creating a shaped painting was a new and interesting concept for me as well as like many other painters, I tend to traditionally paint on square or rectangular surfaces. I wanted my final piece to convey all of the skills and knowledge that I have gained from attending these sessions and I feel that this monochrome shaped piece with a green sort of under glow definitely does.
Previously, I experimented with making the people the focus in my work rather than the architecture and making the buildings more gestural. Like I said, I do think that this was highly successful, but in this piece, I think the buildings really add to the feeling of loneliness within the work because of the eery and sort of uneasy green underglow that is coming through the monochrome overlay. I employed the technique of dry brushing within this piece so that the green underpainting is really a valued part of this final outcome. I feel this piece really consolidates my city project. It portrays everything I have learnt, the things I have progressed with, the things I have not taken any further but learnt from and the meaning and concept behind my take on the city itself. I have included a coloured figure surrounded by white silhouettes within this piece because it has been my most successful portrayal of being surrounded by others in the city but alone. You might as well be alone in the city because no one interacts with you or notices your existence. You may as well be surrounded by bodies with no defining features – white silhouettes. I definitely feel that it is worse being around people and being made to feel alone in the city than actually being around no one. This piece represents how you are alone in the city regardless of being surrounded by others and that if the only people you see all day are the passers-by of the city, then your time in the urban environment can be an incredibly lonely, with no interaction or conversation with others.
As this is a final piece, I thought about the fact that it should be able to be presented and hung on the wall as a final outcome and so fixed a block of wood to the back of the board so that it can be hung upon nails or screws.
I definitely would not have made this piece without attending the painting project sessions, they have been extremely valuable to me and even though I have had to create a final piece based on what I have learnt in these sessions, I think I would have made a piece inspired by them anyway because of how many new techniques and methods I have worked with. Underpainting is definitely something I am going to be considering in the future as I feel it has really informed and added to the outcome created here. I think this piece is highly successful in portraying what I have learnt in the sessions as well as highlighting the hidden loneliness of City life and how you are alone and a singular figure in the city even when you are surrounded by others. I am incredibly happy with and proud of this final piece. It is definitely not something I would have usually created but that has taught me that experimenting with new styles and techniques can make for highly successful outcomes.
PAINTING: Working with Monochrome and Being More Gestural
Posted: March 15, 2014 Filed under: Documentation, Field | Tags: Art, Art Student, artist, Black and White, Brush, city loneliness, colour, experiments, Fine Art, gestural, lonely, monochrome, monochrome paintings, painting, Paintings, palette knife, singled out, surrounded by others but alone, tones of grey, white silhouettes 6 CommentsAfter attending a tutorial on Monday, I was glad that the tutor gave me some direction and new ideas and techniques to work with. After looking at my work, she suggested that I work with Monochrome and use the tones of grey to enhance the feeling of loneliness and make the individual coloured figure appear even more singled out and alone.
She also felt that my work was not really gelling as a whole and that I was working with three different realities and had to express the relationship between the figures, the single figure and the architecture. She said she thought the detailed buildings that were included in my work detracted from the figures and from the message within the pieces. She suggested that I experiment with contrasting colours, monochrome and full colour as well as contrasting languages, the gestural and the more realistic. I was encouraged to make marks and shapes that represent the buildings and to make them more gestural rather than focusing on every detail, window or door etc. I have experimented with making less detailed marks to create the city landscape with both brush and palette knife.
I feel that working with a palette knife definitely helped me be less controlled and more gestural but doesn’t really gel with the figures painted with a brush and therefore is unsuccessful so I have experimented with more gestural brush work.
I think this is far more successful and the monochrome definitely heightens the feeling of loneliness and the colours of the lone figure. After producing this piece, I decided to experiment with how much of the surrounding is seen within the painting, because even though the technique is successful, I feel that the buildings still are overwhelming the figures here.
This definitely puts emphasis on the lone figure and draws the viewer to wonder why they are the only one not painted as a white silhouette and consider their loneliness rather than being distracted by the buildings in the piece. These are highly valid experiments and have inspired me to create a final piece working with monochrome rather than the sepia alternative I have worked with previously. I feel this colour palette and deeper contrast portrays a more negative vibe and adds to the feeling of loneliness within the work.
PAINT WORKSHOP: Working on top of Green Underpainting
Posted: March 10, 2014 Filed under: Documentation, Field | Tags: Acrylic Paint, Art, Art Student, art workshop, Black and White, board, dimension, dry brushing, Fine Art, George Ayers, green underpainting, grey, monochrome, painting, shaped painting, tonal variation, tone, tones of grey, working on top of green underpainting, Workshop Leave a commentToday, I attended the paint workshop, where I started working on top of the Green underpainting that I have been working on this week. Prior to this workshop, I had a tutorial with one of our tutors – Susan Adams, who suggested that I worked in monochrome to highlight the one person that is in colour within my work. I think this is a great suggestion and I will experiment with this technique throughout the further stages of my project. In this session, based on the feedback I have been given, I decided to work with a monochrome layer on top of the Green underpainting, and I was interested to see how the green would shine through the greys.
I started to realise that I had already done a lot of the work by putting detail into the underpainting and that I could use it as a guide to work on top of. I focused on creating dimension and tone in the underlay and this definitely helped the success of the paint I was applying on top because I could follow the tones I have considered and thought out previously. I have employed dry brushing techniques here so that the glow of the green underlay is allowed to come through. I have been researching artists that use these techniques within their work and I came across the YouTube video’s of George Ayers, who incorporates much of the detail into a green underpainting and like me uses it more as a guide to work on top of.
I am really pleased with how this piece is turning out. Before these sessions, I never realised quite how useful an underpainting could be and how it really does inform the outcome. It is definitely something I will be condsidering a lot more in my future as an art student and an artist.
I will continue to work on this piece this week and finish it ready for next monday’s session where we will be exhibiting what we have created and presenting what we have learnt.
Experimenting with Tracing Paper
Posted: February 10, 2014 Filed under: Documentation, Field | Tags: alone, Art, Art Student, art with tracing paper, artist, Artwork, Black and White, black and white photography, documentation, Drawing, field, Fine Art, foggy, Ink, isolation, loneliness, lonely, masking tape, Pen, Photograph, Photography, tracing paper, transparency, urban loneliness, Visual Arts Leave a commentI have been experimenting with tracing paper within my hidden loneliness project. I wanted to highlight that when you are walking around the city, all the other people may as well not be there. I also thought about the fact that they are not important to you, they are just silhouettes passing you by that you may catch a glance with every now and then.
The existence of the other people around you is very transparent with not much significance or importance in your day. I thought the use of tracing paper highlighted this transparency. I started thinking about people being in a rush to do things or get to places in the city and how the world around them is foggy and muffled and not really taken note of. I experimented with placing tracing paper over my black and white photographs and drawing one person only in bold black fine line on top to highlight this observation.
I think these explorations are successful, they definitely convey an immediate feeling of loneliness and look artistically interesting. There is something highly charming about them. However, I’m not sure I will be incorporating the use of tracing paper into my art work or final pieces for this project. Experimenting with it has been valuable and made me consider more ideas and think about not noticing other people or the city around you when you are in a hurry. I may incorporate its use into the collaborative drawings I am working on in my field group.
Experimenting with ways of Portraying a Hidden Loneliness among other people in the City
Posted: January 31, 2014 Filed under: Documentation, Field | Tags: Acrylic Paint, alone, Art, artist, Black and White, documentation, field, Fine Art, isolation, loneliness, lonely, paint, painting, Photography, visual art Leave a comment
Here are some examples of initial photo manipulation that I have been experimenting with. After coming across the work of Laura Lima, an artist that draws on top of and manipulates imagery, I was inspired to experiment with showing the hidden loneliness of city life using my photographs.
Within these works, I wanted to highlight the fact that in the City, you can be around hundreds of thousands of people but lonely. I wanted to show that you may as well be on your own because you won’t speak to or may not even make eye contact with anyone. I started cutting out all of the people apart from one to highlight this point. I thought that if I cut out all of the other people then they would only exist as shadows or silhouettes. You don’t notice any detail about other people in the city, they just pass you by and I am confident that these silhouette like shapes convey that.
I have started experimenting with other ways of blocking out the people like using paint or scribbling them out. In the images above, I have pulled paint down the people in the photographs using a palette knife. This creates quite an uncomfortable ghostly image and definitely conveys being alone. I think these experiments are definitely successful in showing the loneliness you can experience in the city even though you are surrounded by other people. I also feel that the images look aesthetically interesting to the eye. I will continue my experimenting and maybe produce a piece of different scenes with people cut out, painted over and scribbled on top of.
Highlighting Hidden Loneliness: Photo Edits
Posted: January 31, 2014 Filed under: Documentation, Field | Tags: alone in the city, Art, art experiment, Art Student, Black and White, colour, field, Fine Art, loneliness, photo edit, photo manipulation, Photography, urban loneliness 1 CommentHere, I have experimented with highlighting the hidden loneliness of the city. I have produced black and white images captured whilst in Berlin and experimented with and edited them.
I have edited the images so that everyone within the picture is in black and white but one person is left in colour. I have done this to show the fact that even though you are surrounded by many people in the city you may as well be singled out and on your own. There is no interaction between you and anyone else and you are insignificant to them. I thought that leaving one person coloured would show how alone they were within the city.
I definitely think this is a successful experiment, however, I do not think it highlights the loneliness enough, maybe getting rid of the people around and only leaving one person would portray the meaning more powerfully. This is something I will experiment with either using photo editing software or collage and photo manipulation.
The Berlin Wall: Divide and Isolation
Posted: January 27, 2014 Filed under: Documentation, Field | Tags: Art, berlin wall, Black and White, divided, east Germany, graffiti, isolation, loneliness, Photography, West Germany Leave a comment
Above is a photograph I took of the Berlin wall whilst investigating and exploring Berlin. In terms of loneliness, the wall made me think about the divide between east and west germany and how lonely it may have been if friends or family were on a different side of the wall to you. I cannot begin to imagine how isolated and alone some people would have felt during that time. There was job opportunity in the east of Germany, however, people were made to work and had limited freedom. They were stuck in a routine of isolationism. People were not allowed to travel from the east to the west. The windows in East Germany were blocked off so they couldn’t see the west, living in the east was very isolated.
This is something I could investigate further, it allowed me to think about a new angle of loneliness in cities and to think about the history of my theme.
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