My experimental piece

During this session we visited the shed and each picked out a piece of old board from past students experiments and reuse it to create our own. As well as the materials provided I also brought in my own which included; volcanic rock from a previous holiday, candle wax, and a rubbery foam material I had taken from a hanger. The reason I chose the rock was because it was unique and interesting due to it being for a different country as well as the fact that the composition I was creating involved beach vibes where I could include a rough, rocky surface. The candle wax and foam were picked because they are malleable and easily manipulated, although, if I had had more time I would've been able to using them more effectively such as melting the candle wax to create a dripped effect which I have previous used and loved through out my work. 

This was the final out come of my piece:

The top section of the pieces started with a first layer build up of a fragmented manipulated photograph that I had taken and edited myself during a trip to Leicester city centre which was my part of personal input. Then on top of that I applied black acrylic which slowed faded out as it went towards the middle. After this I used a mixture of red and white paint to drizzle over the top using a paint brush which was then faded into a pail yellow to create an ombre effect, the reason I did this is because the colours were inspiration from Scott Naismith's sunset oil paint canvas's. 

It wasn't till analysing and evaluating my piece after wards that I realised the top section had more personal influence than I first though because I compared it to a photograph I had previously took during a weekend away in Wales and this was the out come:

This picture clearly shows the similarities between the gorgeous multi-coloured stones of a Welsh beach and colourful dotted shaped I had created within my piece. This made realise that there can be several different ways to incorporate personal and artist inspiration into one piece or even just one section of a composition. 

Moving on to the middle part, this section was created with my artist Maggi Hambling in mind which is very obvious due to the curvaceous mark making and wave-like movements as well as a white washy surrounds accompanied by a darker centre to secure variety and contrast. This area isn't so personal to me put as the top and bottom are intensely personal, this part is simple the meeting between the both of them and I have used it to create an even balance through out my composition. 

Lastly, the bottom of my piece comes back to showing more personal identity. The reason for this is my use of the volcanic rock that I brought in myself, obviously the reason it represents me is because it is from a very important holiday to Cape Verdi in 2011 where we took a trip from the island we were staying at on a little propeller plane over to a smaller island called Fogo which was a complete village fully built upon a giant Volcano that was said to be safe but only a few years after we had visited this island the volcano erupted in 2014 which destroyed everything they owned and also killing a few villagers so they were left with nothing.

The reason that this is so personal to me is because is we met so many of the villagers, especially children and they were all so lovely and selfless and made us feel as welcome as possible as well as give us gifts even when they had so little themselves. 

As you can see in the first photo they are selling small houses which they had hand made themselves out of volcanic rock so I bought one from them, we also gave them loads of sweets, biscuits and toys which they were so grateful for.

I also have all of this documented in my evidence folder, pinpointing which part of the piece means what:

After we had finished our pieces and analysed them we then put them all up on the wall, each of us were allowed to pick a certain spot that we thought would be suitable to be present our final composition. I chose an area that was quite high up as was situated with a roof window above it, the reason I did this was because due to the sunlight projecting from above it, shadows were created by the large textured areas of my art work which emphasised the different contrasted areas.

The picture below isn't quite the finished product of all our pieces hung up but it just gives an idea of how we all worked well together as a team to create just composition on the wall that included a range of different techniques, colours and textures.

My development of installation on terms of research and the trip to Birmingham

On one of my previous blog posts about installation with research and my understanding of it, shows images of compositions using light, which I found really interesting. I also love how it hangs from the ceiling and the figure standing below puts everything into perspective which emphasises the sheer size of the installation, and I think scale is one of the most important factors for a piece like this:

During my trip to Birmingham I had this piece in mind as I was looking around - not necessarily the galleries but mainly the city of Birmingham itself as it has some amazing sights of old beautiful buildings. Despite this, the most interesting and relatable thing I found to installation (well specifically this piece) was actually a rather new addition to the shopping centre. 

It was the ceiling lights in the mall that caught my eye. from directly below they didn't look like much but at a higher angle I managed to create a collection of them which meant some of them connected, this made them form one single composition. This discovery also made me consider how different angles can create different prospective for the audience so I can try and incorporate this into my own art work. This also made me realise that anything can become a piece of art just by looking at it differently.

My trip to Walsall and Birmingham

During the trip we firstly visited The New Art Gallery in Walsall. This was my personal favourite gallery simply because it involves more up to date, modern art pieces and installation. This was better for me as an artist because I was able to relate to it easier, not only was it more recent but it also contained work similar to the artist work I've been studying for the duration of Component 1. Some of the work that was similar to the artists I study are these pieces;

The artists work that these pieces resemble the most is Scott Naismith, especially the one on the left because it involves a landscape containing a dark surrounding with a flicker of sunset clouds which reflect upon the calm waters.

This one of many of his Paintings that show similarities to the pieces above because it contains the features I have just described previously. I also have some manipulated photography of my own that was created through the inspiration from Scott Naismith therefore it also relates to this gallery piece I have chosen.

This isn't the only piece I found interesting, I also too inspiration from the many in very intricate and intriguing installations such as these ones below.

 The first two compositions above were just a couple amongst a wide collection of similar style, as a combination they are called 'Oracles' with several different artists contributing within different areas.

However the work below is slightly different in it's presentation as I feel like the piece in its self is interesting installation as it's positioning allows you to see all aspects of the creation and ever angle can be a eye opener for a brand new idea or opinion of meaning.

Not only did I focus on the art work, I couldn't help but admire the building its self and its amazing views. I thought it was amazing that they provided a rooftop balcony experience, I felt it made the gallery seems spacious and open and relaxed whilst allowing people to absorb the natural surroundings on offer.

Whilst I was out in the open I also tried to capture some images that would relate well to my artists work, which excluded Maggi Hambling as there wasn't any sea in sight for me to photograph any wave movements, therefore I focused on Justin Gaffrey with the flowers in shot and Scott Naismith with the cloud structures and light movements.

Justin Gaffrey inspired photography (several simple flowers backed with sky)

combination of Justin Gaffrey (flowers and tree tops in foreground) and Scott Naismith (structured cloud layers and light contrasts) inspired photography 

Scott Naismith inspired photography (sky structure with water reflections)

After this trip we visited Birmingham. Which I didn't find as good as the previous gallery therefore there was very few things that I was actually interested in, which include these two compositions;

I thought that this piece above was amazing because it was so unique and I have genuinely never seen anything like it. I loved how the contents of it were so old and eccentric yet it was all cased inside a bright white modern stand which contrasted so well with the deep colours of the composition its self.

This is the other work that caught my eye, mainly because of its complex alienated vibes, given off by the sci-fi like shapes and sparkly material used. What also really intreguied me was the size, the scale of it grabbed my attention to look at it more closely - this made me realise that I need to look into areas of scale myself because in could enhance the quality of my work and it something I haven't really experimented with before.

Although not much of the art work floated my boat, we did take a walk around the town of Birmingham to discover some amazing buildings, even the museum its self.

Although I picked out the photos above as some of my favourites, the one I absolutely love the most is this one below. Because in one shot it shows the progression of building development within this city, with the old structures on the outside and the knew coming straight through the middle.

Artist Analysis - Justin Gaffrey

Justin Gaffrey is a contemporary artist and there is massive contrast from his original pieces of work which were flat, untextured and folk styled with Woodie Long being his biggest inspiration, to the almost three dimensional pieces he creates in his newest releases.

Gaffrey was massively interested in how Van Gogh used thousands of tiny brush strokes, built up in layers, in order to create the effect of his work. Gaffrey found that his past experience of being a chef, which consisted of using several different ingredients in order to make a delicious meal, was the best way to relate to Van Gogh’s style of painting.

Starry Night Painting

You can see clearly how Gaffrey’s work relates to this specific composition because it includes several swirly representations of sun like objects similar to the ones in Gaffrey’s work. Although Van Gogh’s paintings consists of much darker tones where as Gaffrey’s pieces contain extremely bright colours on top of each other.

He then took up this inspiration and began painting sunflowers (a well-known feature of his recent work) by using mixed latex house paint with latex caulk and applying it in think stacked layers using a palette knife, to find out more about this specific technique I could begin by experimenting with these materials and analysing the outcomes. This process allowed him to form a heavily textured style. After this he moved on to using thick bodied acrylic paint which he continues to use in his current work.

Not only were other artists and life experience an inspiration to Gaffrey, but also nature and human nature. This leads on to the most prominent meaning behind all of his work; how nature connects all things and creates the passion to make and learn new things/experiences.

Although I am specifically focusing on the scenery pieces of Justin Gaffrey’s work, due to it tying with my other two artists.

All these images above are from the official http://www.justingaffreyoriginals.com/ website but are all untitled.

He also creates amazing animal paintings which I could experiment with myself and I might lead me on to a new, preferred type of art.

                                                Violet Speaks – acrylic 60X48                                              Miss Understood – acrylic 40X30

Two images above are from http://www.justingaffrey.com/work

Here is Gaffrey’s Coastal collection, containing Seascapes, Lakescapes, Waterscapes and waves. All of which feature in my other artist’s work, especially the pieces which involve the sky and sea movements.

I haven’t completed much work on this artist has I found him shortly after the other ones but if I was to start basing my work on him I would begin by really accentuating the texture and making it 3-D. One way I could do this is by building on a painted or photograph background with materials used by my other artists in their sculpture work such as plaster which I could maybe substitute for clay so that it would be easier and cheaper to work with.

During doing research I have come across an ‘organic’ section of his work, the reason I like this style is because the pieces are lot simpler in terms of on figurative item on the page and although they are flat pencil, they all include an area of built up material in order to add depth and contrast. Although these ones don’t involve much colour, which is my main focus with in component one, they are much easier for me to relate to compared to the big paintings as I am familiar with using dry mediums in my work from last year.

http://www.justingaffreyoriginals.com/

Although still life would be an interesting topic to study, a good amount of the animals used with in Justin Gaffrey’s work are birds which can be really difficult to get up close to without disturbing them. I noticed that throughout my research, Gaffrey’s work changes because within his acrylic paintings there is very think bold expressive marks created in bright vivid colours with a curvaceous, loose effect where as his drawings are extremely delicate, precise and intricate with either simple colour or non-at all.