right time for another entry I think.

I haven't had time to photograph my work and get it up on here, but I will in the new year, once I get back to Uni, as I'm home for Christmas now!

much has happened since my last entry back in November, so I guess i'll just dive straight in!

I feel like my art work is moving along quite nicely, even if i haven't yet had the time to do anymore painting or research for my painting work. I've had some great ideas and have been fortunate enough to come across some very inspirational people.  Have had to do a presentation on a contemporary artist, and we have had lectures since reading week where we've been shown the work of hundreds of artists to help us find someone whose work we're interested in. After being shown the work of so many artists the one person who really grabbed me way above anyone else was an Australian print maker called Kim Westcott, so I chose to do my talk on her.

Kim uses the dry point print process on large copper sheets. She responds to her surroundings and to the music she is listening to, and she is interested in the visual possibilities of the process. I felt a real connection with her work - it spoke to me, although initially I wasn't sure why, I just knew I really liked its simplicity and depth. Once I started to research her and I began to understand more about her as a person and the events that had informed her work and helped her to develop as an artist I felt the connection to her work even more deeply and in a way I never thought I would.

5 years ago I lost my Mum to Cancer and since then I have struggled with quite severe depression. My art work suffered as my Mum had been one of the biggest influences and supporters of my work. I couldn't bring myself to create anything, I wasn't feeling very inspired and felt like all sense of purpose in life had been lost, I reached the bottom of despair and tried to take my life. Looking back now I find it an interesting juxtaposition of the 5 years prior to her death, as they were perhaps the most productive and happy of my life so far. I was really enjoying my art work and felt I knew who I was and where I was going with my life. I had a big plan and the drive to get there, I had my Mums support.

Kim Westcott's early work is all black ink printed onto white paper and she talks about gouging into one copper sheet so much that she couldn't print it as it would've just come out completely black. She  had experienced something similar - the untimely death to cancer of the brain of her close friend and mentor Neil Leveson, whom she worked for at the Australian Print Workshop. she attributes the blackness of her work at this time as a reflection of her circumstances. These early works spoke to me about my own experiences with cancer and the death of someone close, they reflected how I remember feeling at the time, and how I feel looking back on that time now. So much blackness and the appearance of all hope slowly being lost, but there is hope - the white paper in the images appears to be forcing its way back through the black lines - the re-emergence of hope. I don't think I'd have seen this if I'd seen the images when i was at my lowest, but it is a nice marker for how far I have come.

"That which is bright and radiant comes from blackness. He who knows blackness feels the intensity of light. without darkenss how can you appreciate the beauty of light"

A quote by Kim Westcott which I find to be very inspirational, as it sums up how I now feel about life and my art. If you would like to see more of her work or find out more about her please visit her website www.kimwestcott.com which is where I got the above image from.

I am looking forward to Print now, as I can't wait to try out some Of Kim's Techniques. one that I can use more immediately - perhaps with a view to translating it into print in the future is to work to music and draw paint etc how the music makes me feel and the journey it takes me on. this is particularly appropriate as my art work has been inspired by The Cat Empire - an Australian band I also feel have helped me through the darkness of my depression. I plan on doing some work over the Christmas break to explore how their music makes me feel, where it takes me to and the messages it sends me and see where this takes my art - I'm not yet sure how i get his down onto paper, but I'm excited to see if I can.

until next time.

Ciao
xx

Well here we go - a forray into the world of blogging. I will be using this blog to document my first year at Bath Spa uni. Yes it is a requirement of the course, but I hope you find it interesting and I hope to use it to document what I have the chance to get up to! I also look forward to recieving your feedback as the only way I can grow as an artist is to let people see what i'm up to and get their reactions to it!

What have I been up to since term started - well In Art I've been studying painting. Week one and we began by doing blind drawing - something out of our bags - my phone decided to stand up to the task and I had loads of fun - it was a really good way to get the drwaing muscles going again after years of neglect! Blind drawing for those of you who don't know is when you are not allowed to look at the piece of paper you are drawing onto, instead you look only at the object you are drawing. This can produce some interesting results, I've put up a photo of my blind drawing below so you can see what i'm waffling about!

 

With the project brief given I started the lengthy research process for the first time in what seemed like forever by looking at my photos and using photoshop I began to distort and reduce them. I really enjoyed learning how to use photoshop to do this and i managed to create some interesting results which really inspired me. I began to play with what icould do with the image in terms of translating it into a painting and coming from a Costume background i initally looked at turning the image into some kind of painted dress, but i didn't feel the idea was right with the image i have been using, so that idea went onto the back burner for the time being. Instead i ended up pursuing the idea of using embroidery in my art work as an accompaniment to the actual painting and then after doing some amples was thinking about actually making it all part ofhte piece.

One large piece of canvas later and i'm on my way. gridding the image and the canvas so that i can transfer the image into a larger scale and i'm painting in no time and loving having a brush back in my hand. the painting has been quite time consuming, but i have had the chance to develop my ideas furthur whilst painting as the actual painting process has thrown up some interesting twists. The image is one of the lead singer of my favourite band - The Cat Empire, but i like the fact you can't excatly tell what it is without being told (i have been told the image looks like a bulls head!) it is brightly coloured and some ofthe shapes are quite interesting, in fact it reminded me of all the good times and the good friends i've made at their gigs as well as the fact that the music has helped me through some pretty rough times in my life. Istarted listening to the music whilst I was painting which started me thinking about soundwaves and in particular the ones made by their music, hence my little forray into garageband. the shapes were really interesting as they echoed my feelings throughout my life - all the ups and downs and i began to contemplate embroidering them over the top of the painting i've been working on. several samples later and a chat with Adele (my art tutor) and i've moved away from putting them over the top of my work and i'm thinking of creating a separate piece. i love the juxtaposition emboidering a soundwave creates, they are by nature a fast and momentary thing and embroidery is such a delecate and painstaking process. the piece i'm now looking at creating as a sister piece to my first paiinting is a part painted part emboridered soundwave which could go all the way round the room and this has become the concept for an instillation where the music is playing and there is lighting similar to the type used during their shows and also using projection which can track around the length of the soundwave as the song plays.

there is so much i could do with this idea I would love to beable to contiune it and see where it leads me. i'm curently looking into the locations of their tour dates over the past 5 years an ploting htem on a map as i think it could make an interesting next step - perhaps as strings suspended across the room but this is something i need to develop further.

time to stop waffling i think. i'll put up a couple of pictures of my work over the next few days so you can see what it is i'm getting up to.

Ciao
xx