The End of the Pathway Road...

Helloooo everyone,

I've come to the end of my pathway stage in my Foundation Year and finally ticked all the checklist boxes to start my final piece. As the title says 'The End of the Pathway Road' this is pretty much self explanatory.
After completing all my ideas, research, drawings and annotations I finally got to produce the final piece of work that sums up this entire project!

To finish off everything that I have looked at so far, I started to look at the art movement Pointillism which is a technique of painting in which small, distinct dots of pure color are applied in patterns to form an image. Divisionism  is concerned with color theory, whereas Pointillism is more focused on the specific style of brushwork used to apply the paint. As notably seen in the works of Seurat, Signac, and Cross.
The technique relies on the ability of the eye and mind of the viewer to blend the color spots into a fuller range of tones.

I had also looked at reflections and how artists in the Impressionism period started to express them through materials and techniques. The term " Venus Effect" for a common phenomenon in picture perception. It occurs when a picture shows an actor and a mirror that are not placed along the observers line of sight.
When artists depict a mirror in a painting, it necessarily lacks the most obvious property of a mirror; as we move around of the painting the mirror, the reflections we see in it do not change. And yet representations of mirrors and other reflecting surfaces can be quite convincing in paintings.

SOOO...In order to complete my final piece with the concluding research I have at hand I decided to look into Seurat and Monet's work to compare both opposing artists and techniques.

An example of Monet Reflections.

Example of Seurat and Pointillism.

In most of Claude Monet's work he produces reflective setting scenes; examples include; the water lilies series of how Monet depicts the flower garden at Giverny.

He was the most  consistent and prolific practitioner of the French Impressionistic's Movement's philosophy of expressing one's perception before nature, especially as applied to 'Plein-air landscape painting'.







Seurat was a French post- impressionistic painter and one of the most famous icons of the 19th Century.
He moved away from the apparent spontaneity and rapidity of Impressionism and developed a structured more monumental art to depict modern urban life.







The developed final piece...

"Seasonal Time" I named it considering the timeline of aligned trees in seasonal order. And to depict the time I used the reflections in the foreground to oppose the bright sky.
I had merely got this idea from Monet's ambition of documenting the French countryside which led him to adopt a method of painting the same scene many times in order to capture the changing of light and the passing of seasons.

I feel that in my final major project I am going to focus on my strengths after all and to extend my use of materials and techniques even further.

De-constructing the Abstract Painting

Helloooo everyone so last week was all about de-constructing a painting by eliminating texture, tone, shape, colour and all the preliminary aspects in order to prepare myself for understanding; what makes a painting and what does it represent (if you cant make out the image, history, etc. ) So now I will talk through some of the paintings I saw when I visited the Walker Gallery and what peoples first reactions are when they see abstract paintings.

When you visit a gallery, you’ll see all kinds of paintings hanging on the walls.  Beautifully painted landscapes and still lives, seascapes and sky-caps, elegant floral and evocative figures, and plenty of abstracts, too.  I love the mix and I've learned over the years that the key to understanding and appreciating abstract art is to quieten our minds and let our instincts and senses do the talking.

Some of the questions and comments you get when interpreting a painting could be either of these examples:

“I don’t get this. What’s it about?”

"A five-year-old could paint this.”

“I like paintings I can understand.”

I love this dynamic abstract by Audrey Phillips. Light Vision, 38 x 43, mixed media on panel.  The palette is soothing, but the composition is energized and compelling.

Abstract art, by definition, is a painting, sculpture or installation that does not depict a person, place or thing of the natural world.  Art can be intimidating and scary and leave you feeling unsure and uneasy – all of which goes against our grain at Huff Harrington. So, here are a couple tips to make the whole process of understanding abstract art more enjoyable and rewarding.

Martina Griffin’s Lovesick Blues (36 x 30, mixed media on canvas) is all about form and palette.

I'm Nervous!  Yes…abstract art can be a little nerve-racking.   And that’s because the responsibility of understanding it falls directly to the viewer.  When this happens, the artist likes to gently lead the client into the painting with this analogy:  imagine the painting is a symphony.  Instead of closing your eyes and listening to the music, try closing your ears and just look at the painting.  Explore the painting on your own terms and come to your own conclusions.  Abstract art is all about form, line, palette and composition. And when those elements come together on a canvas, the results can be magical.

This lyrical painting by Liz Barber will effortlessly draw you in with its repetitive composition. Inspired by water? I think... Sunset Surf, 48 x 60, mixed media on canvas.

What’s the Right Answer?   There’s not a right answer and there’s not a wrong answer either – but you may have to work a little bit to figure that out.   Because there’s no familiar image to relate to while viewing an abstract painting, you really have to open your mind and re-align what you've been taught about art.  You have to let go of pre-conceived notions and let your sense take over the driving.    We’ll hear this: “Is the artist trying to convey water or a wave?  Because I'm not sure if that looks like a wave but I really like the way he/she put the paint in that one spot.”  That visitor to the gallery just got an A+ for looking at the abstract painting for what it is, not what it’s supposed to be.  It’s all about being open to interpretation.

I love the composition of Melissa Payne Baker’s Milestone I (30 x 22, mixed media on canvas) It’s also full of textural nuances and the palette is warm.

Make It Personal:  It’s best to see abstract art in person. Because there’s often not an identifiable subject in the painting, the nuances that create the painting can be lost in photography or on the internet. Because abstract art is rooted in non-tangible subjects, the technical aspects of the painting become even more important.  The use of media can add texture, depth and dimension – all of which could be lost in a photograph. 

Aaron Whitehouse painted this piece for a client. You really have to see his work in person to get the texture, depth and dimension that he incorporates. This one makes me think I'm looking through a pool of water to a bottom made of beach glass.

My Five-Year-Old….:  it takes great skill to create a meaningful abstract piece. And what may look like random squiggles on a canvas or blotchy areas of paint are actually the result of a  perfect little storm of composition, form and aesthetic.  Study an abstract that you’re drawn to for a while and all of sudden it all makes sense.

8 Crazy Experiments Passed Off As Art

Hiyaaaa,

SO...I've started doing quick experiments and when i started to browse the internet I came across this article, which I thought this looks interesting and weird. I think its quite shocking but imaginative have a look here:

Over the centuries our definition of ‘art’ has changed a lot. Three hundred years ago, it meant paintings of trees. A hundred years ago, it meant paintings of squares. Today it means ‘insanity’. Yeah, since the advent of pop art and postmodernism, art has apparently gone from being an outlet for tortured poets, to something practiced exclusively by mad scientists. How else do you explain deranged social experiments like…?

8

The Suicide Sculpture

You could write an entire article titled ’10 Reasons Chris Burden was Crazier than a Shithouse Rat’ and still have plenty of examples to spare. For one, he once asked a friend to shoot him with a rifle (which the ‘friend’ then did); while another bout of insanity saw him nail himself to his car—a feat so uniquely crazy, David Bowie wrote a song about it.
But the absolute most-lunatic stunt he ever pulled was in 1975. Interested to see at what point an audience might intervene, he placed himself under a glass sheet next to a clock and lay there completely immobile. The plan was to not move until a visitor to the gallery got worried and tried to help him, but here’s the kicker: they didn’t. Even after Burden had crapped his pants and gone nearly two days without water, people just nodded politely and left him to it. The only reason his desiccated corpse isn’t still lying there now is because a gallery attendant got nervous and left a glass of water next to him: at which point Burden finally cracked and ended the show.

7

Visual LSD

Most of us who hear the words ‘video art’ instinctively turn and run as fast as we can from whoever said them, but Tony Conrad’s work is a little different. While it’s not exactly The Godfather, or even Godfather Part III, it aims to do something no mainstream blockbuster ever would: give you acid-trip hallucinations.
You read that right: the entire purpose of his 1966 film ‘The Flicker’ was to send the viewer into a state of advanced schizophrenia (for the love of God, DO NOT click that link if you suffer from epilepsy). Featuring nothing more than flickering lights projected in a darkened room, the experience was said to be such a ‘trip’ that it acted as visual LSD, giving rise to all sorts of crazy visions. This being the 60's, people loved it—leading to a whole heck-load of imitators: including Paul Shartis’ ‘TOUCHING’—which went one sense further by screwing with your hearing as well.

6

Tempting the Internet #1

Given what we know about the internet, it’s safe to assume the last thing any of us would want to do is plug ourselves into it—unless we wanted to spend the rest of our lives as the abused plaything of remorseless teenagers on 4Chan. Yet, in 1995, performance artist Stelarc did just that. Inserting electrodes into his muscles, Stelarc wired himself up to a network that allowed members of the public in Amsterdam, Paris or Helsinki to literally manipulate him from afar. By touching a button, they could cause his limbs to spasm on command or even move independently of the artist’s will. Surprisingly, participants didn’t use this chance to make him repeatedly punch himself in the balls or dance Gangnam style around the auditorium for twelve hours straight and Stelarc survived. In fact, he enjoyed it enough to do the whole thing a second time.

Seems as though my Blogger isn't allowing me to post the whole article I've listed it below:
listverse.com/2013/05/31/8-crazy-experiments-passed-off-as-art/