Why are Wednesdays so unproductive?

The second week of Graphics means illustration time!  This time around we are allowed to forget about type and bring across the meaning of our metaphors purely through images and ideas.

Surprisingly challenging to come up with something smart and clever when you are tormented by creative blockages all week!

I began by taking my metaphor literally.  I made the cucumber come to life and made it into a cartoon character who shows how cool he is in different scenarios.  I had great craic doing this but unfortunately, during an auld bant with Pat, I was banned from drawing him anymore...sad face! :(

Here he is in all his glory...in some he's loosely based on a man named Paul who bullied me into mentioning him in my blog...he'll do anything for a bit of fame and exposure that one..

So after getting over my devastation of no longer being allowed draw my lil cucumber, i began to rethink my whole concept.

I still wanted to work using inspiration from the 60s/70s so i did a bit more research on the era looking at things such as the music and the history of that time.  The Beatles were pretty much in their hay-day at this stage so a lot of the music world is dominated by them.  But also at this time war was rife as the Vietnam War was in full force.

From this, I started to look at images of war and of finding ways to some how use them with my metaphor.

I then came up with the idea of substituting guns and missiles for cucumbers.  In a way it's showing an initial idea of war being "cool" but absolutely ridiculous and unnecessary.  I'm just starting to work on this idea so hopefully i'll have something more solid before Friday's final crit where we'll be marked.

Graphics - challenging the few brain cells that RAG week spared...

So after the madness that was RAG week,  it was straight into our final elective.  Graphics or Vis Com was my final choice.  I was iffy about this one because i had done Graphics during my PLC course last year and hated every minute of it.  But i decided to give it a try in college and prayed that it would be different.

On the first day, we were given metaphors with which we had to work for the two week period.  My metaphor was "As cool as a cucumber."  This instantly conquered up images of relaxing, laid back and being carefree.  So beginning with a mind map, i wrote a list of words which i felt described my metaphor.

Metaphor



Mind Map

For the first part of the project, we had to work purely with text and no illustration to bring across the idea and meaning of the metaphor.  I began by researching font types to find a suitable one.

From this research I began to work out a concept.  We had to design two before Friday's crit.  I did some experimenting with the type and tried my hand at a 3D representation.  Playing off the "cool" aspect of the metaphor, i literally froze the words in a block of ice.

Following on from this, for my first one, i based it on the 1960s/70s era.  To me, this era is the epiphany of relaxed and cool.  It was an age when hippies and flower-power were in full force.  I researched some ads from that time and noticed that the majority used a blubbly style type and lots of colours which i incorporated into my concept.  

Then for my second, I decided to go a little different with the meaning of "cool".  What makes you say the word cool?  Something that's different right? So I thought why go with the cucumber as we know it, why not change it.

Because a cucumber is a natural thing, i decided to make it look unnatural and make it something you wouldnt expect.  Cucumber = natural = edible. So why not have it made of metal?

I used a straight almost severe text to get across the idea of modern and to show the concept of metal, the word cucumber was made from tin foil.

At the crit on Friday, my work got a pretty equal reaction.  When a vote was taken of how many in the class preferred one over the other, they both got equal votes.  So i was free to work with whichever i felt better about.  I think the first one, the 60s/70s one appeals more and works better as a concept.





Illustration next!

I hear Rag Week calling....

And so sculpture has come to an end.  During those 2 weeks i've learned that I am not 3D orientated at all and that food poisoning has to be the worst sickness ever.  I had it at the start of this week and it meant i missed a day plus chances to do work....so not a great week to say the least!

I focused a lot on the melting of different materials this week.  Actually really enjoyed this side of things....the child in me came out when I got my hands on the hot gun! Loved melting crap!  I felt like Phoebe's brother Frank in Friends who tried to melt her phone....i was looking everywhere to see what i could melt next!

Melted sculpture made from UNREAL bubble wrap with hot wax thrown over it

Melted forks and knives

Melted spoons

More melted spoons!

Melted bottles

I didnt want to completely forget about the twisting side of things so to introduce some colour, i rolled paint on to numerous brown sheets, twisted them and left them for a few hours.  When i came back i unravelled them all and saw the different effects that this had had on the paint.

But as much fun as melting was, i did eventually run out of things to melt.  So like i did with my paint throwing video (which was sooo fun to do!) i thought about how things were after they had melted.  So using paper, i showed a solid block of colour that slowly melts away on to the floor.

Assessments are on in the morning.  I'm happy to be moving on now at this stage, i didnt do great but at least i can say i tried it.  Now home for the weekend to catch up on some badly needed sleep and then RAG WEEK BABY!! 

So Far, So Not Good...

So one week down and one to go.  Sculpture, i have decided, is so not for me.  I dont think in 3D, I think purely in flat 2D work so i'm finding this 2 week elective pretty challenging.

I've changed direction yet again and gone with the words "to twist" and "to melt".  These seemed more interesting as i got a creative blockage pretty early on with my original words.  So seeing as I had no clue what I was doing and apparently Sculpture is all about experimenting, I started to twist random materials.  I began by twisting the rubber tubing from bicycle wheels along with paper to make an installation of sorts on my studio wall.

From there I started messing with wire and twisted them into different shapes and then hung them under the installation piece.  no idea what i was doing, i was just trying things out.

I was starting to get stuck and lose interest at this point....which is why i spent many a day in the library.  But i was being productive!  Well kind of.....I did start daydreaming at one stage only to be greeted with a lovely sign which almost worked to get me back concentrating on the job of reading magazines!

And of course when i had loads of work to do, I found other things to do.  Which is when i decided that my plain pink folder looked boring.  So I made it pretty!!!!!!!  Amazing the things you can do when you're bored and start playing with a Sharpie marker!

Then on going home at the weekend, I started to think about the melting side of things.  But instead of just melting stuff straight away, I started to think about how things looked once they were melted.  In other words i skipped a step in the actual melting process and decided to show the end product first.

I thought the best way to show this was by using paints.

So on a freezing cold Saturday morning, I headed out...climbed on to the roof of a shed...taped massive rolls of paper on to the side...and proceeded to randomly drop paint down over the edge.  And what i got on finishing was actually pretty cool.

Sincere thanks to my brother Gary who braved the cold and did the photography for me....as well as making sure that i didnt break my neck climbing on and off the roof!!


So for the final week of this elective, I'm going to incorporate the two words and try and make more experiments before the final assessment on Friday.  To be honest I cant wait for it to be over.  And then Rag Week, yayyy!!

Sculpture Baby :P

So today was the beginning of the second rounds of electives and I'm doing Sculpture for the next two weeks.  I chose this purely out of curiosity if I'm being honest.  I'm crap when it comes to 3D but having gone to the talk and intro about the Sculpture and Combined Media awhile back, i thought it was really cool and something i could maybe do.

Today we got our "information sheet"....which we're not allowed call a brief cause that's too restricting apparently.  And we're not in a studio, we're in a "laboratory"....the next two weeks are going to be mega craic I'd say!

I found it really vague when i first read it, it didn't have much structure or direction...which of course freaked me out just a tad.  But then we started a group brainstorming session which actually turned out to be really useful and kinda fun to do.  we were split into groups of 3 and 4 and each group had to sit at a massive sheet and brainstorm a different topic, which ranged from Touch, Sight, Smell, Blood Pressure, Respiratory, Taste etc.  once you had one sheet done, you moved to the next until you had visited all the sheets.  and of course with everyone going around, it got more challenging to come up with new words and ideas.

But i found this really helpful as it pushed you to come up with kind of out there ideas.  we then had to re-visit all the sheets and pick out words and phrases that popped out at us.

What i noticed was that i picked a lot of words like to panic, to stress, to hyperventilate, to faint, to shake, to explode etc.  I think i probably did this sub-consciously as they are all the feelings and thoughts you have when you're experiencing panic attacks which i have unfortunately suffered from for years now.   I am claustrophobic so i don't work well with crowds in small spaces...which is why i cant go into TK MAXX without having a panic attack, it's happened quite a few times!

so because of this I've been looking at materials like balloons, tyre tubing, elastics, rubber-bands etc. basically anything that can be stretched and have tension.  I think these show the feeling of panic and stress that come with a panic attack so for now this is what i will focus on.

I havent a notion what i'm doing or where this is going but apparently its what they want.  Thankfully video can be used in Sculpture which i love working with so that should keep me sane.  We were also told not to make any art for the next two weeks, because art college doesnt work like that...who'd have thought?!

Is it Friday yet?

The past two weeks have been the busiest in a long time!  The fact that we only had the bare two weeks to focus on the print project really pushed me to work faster and make decisions quicker.  I found that i wasnt obsessing over things being perfect....more a case of just doing things and seeing how they work out.

I have really loved doing Print though and genuinely think it's the discipline for me.  I love being in the workshop getting messy and designing prints.  I find the whole process of printing really interesting and fun to do so would love to study it further and learn more about that area.  But with the high interest in Print, it'll be a miracle if i get a place....so hopefully i get good marks!

Speaking of marks, got the results of Semester 1's project and low and behold, I PASSED!!!! Genuinely thought i was going to have a freak attack afterwards, was delighted with how i got on.  And my mommy was mega proud of me too, so you never know now she might feed me at the weekend as my reward!

Des decided to give us a mini project to do along with the project we were already doing.  He gave us the title of "Clutter" and we had to design a print with regards to what the word clutter means to us.  So seeing as I'm an expert in the area of mess and clutter, this suited me great!

I decided to look at clutter with regards to a girl's everyday life...how much more cluttered could you get like?

But when i went to take photos for the project, I found that for once my room was immaculate.  This NEVER happens, so why would it have to happen when i actually needed mess?!

But thankfully, i slept in one morning and got ready in a mad rush which resulted in make up and hairdryers and clothes and shoes and what not being thrown around my room.....it was a bitch to tidy up but brilliant for research!

So these are the photos I decided to go with out of all the clutter in my room.  For my actual print, I decided to go with the last one which has the close up of my boot which i actually squeezed myself into my shelf to take...the things i do for art!

Thought this would make a cool print once done.  So working from a standard photo size of 4x6, i etched on to a sheet of acetate using a scribe and then printed it.  I really liked the way they came out once I had decided on using the rusty orange, red tones of ink.

My Favourite one

So now, the 3 groups that are doing print over the coming weeks are going to do this same project so that these prints are going to be put together to make one huge collage....about 120 in total which should look cool!

As well as that i've still been working on my main project and did a few more prints with regards homelessness.  i also did a lot of contextual work this week and came across an amazing photographer called Tom Stone.  His photographs of the homeless were truly inspirational and i used a lot of them in my research.  Each picture shows the eyes of the homeless person and gives their background stories.  Shot in black and white they are simple yet extremely effective.

Homelessness was never something i gave an awful lot of thought to prior to this but on doing research i actually really got affected by it.  Just reading these people's stories would kind of get to you and i think they helped me to get a better idea of what to present in my prints.

Gonna miss doing print seeing as tomorrow is assessment day and i've finished the two week elective! On to Sculpture next week which i'm kinda iffy about...not sure if i'll be any good at it but sur we'll give it a go anyways!