Danny Rolph - Triple Wall series

These pieces by Danny Rolph have inspired me to create the works I have, his use and exploration into geometric shapes and colour was something that I could really relate to. Another way that I can relate to Rolph is the way he takes the shapes from everyday buildings, objects or scenes then applies it within his paintings. Rolph also insists that his paintings are 'overtly pictorial' rather than textual. This stands out in his work purely through the vibrancy in the colours he combines and also how his paintings just overload your eyes with an abundance of colour and geometric imagery.
 
 “I still crave to imagine the unimaginable and project a kind of pictorial oppulence through a variety of visual conversations in my practise.” - Danny Rolph

Another thing that really stands out about Rolph's work is how he bases his work on the present taking inspiration from the world around him. It's what gives his work a freshness that is making him increasingly popular each year.

Overall Rolph is an inspiration to me not only because of his work but also the way he became known in the art world, although being in the right place at the right time may have helped in some cases overall he achieved what he has through hard work and persistence.

Colour Collages.

At this point I was starting to think about getting together a portfolio for Uni interviews which was a harder task than I first thought. So I really started concentrating and analysing my work so I could identify an under lying theme that is carried throughout my work. One was pretty obvious and that was my use in colour exploration. Every since rotations I was fascinated with colour and found experimenting with colour really intrigued me.

After using overlaying different coloured inks to create an effect I moved on to experimenting with different coloured electrical tape and plastics. I tried to make more of a minimalist piece so the lines were incredibly defined alongside the wood grain. Some lines ran with the grain others went in the opposite direction hopefully making them stand out even more. The definition of lines in this piece was something that I thought worked really well. So did the texture used, the shiny plastic created a really nice contrast against the wood and matte effect the tape gave the piece, however I think if I had worked into it a little bit more the end result would've been even more interesting; either by expanding the piece itself or by adding more contrasting textures or mark making.

In my next piece I tried to be more free flowing with the way I composed the piece. As I felt I had thought to much about the end piece and in turn restricted my work from evolving organically. So in this piece I started it with no preconceptions of the end result, although alongside colour texture is something that also really interests me so I tried to put a lot of emphasis on the texture in this piece.
Combining bubble wrap with the cardboard and tape and a really interesting effect but once I had stuck everything down I felt I was at the same stage as my previous piece so I decided to work into it more by adding different typed of mark making using inks and then I the element of false chance was a compelling factor to add which I did using spray paint. This created a surprisingly interesting effect by highlighting the circular shapes within the bubble wrap and then as the paint ran down the cardboard when it came in contact with the tape it took the same straight, steep gradient that the tape had created.
In this piece I thought all the components worked well alongside one another however like my other ideas it could have been expanded into something bigger perhaps. Although I feel it works well On the bit of cardboard I found as it looks as though its a bit of draft wood. I feel this gives the piece a very organic feel to it despite being made up of man made objects.

 
In my most recent piece I felt this really summed up an overcoming of all the problems I previously had when I first joined the course. This piece was created completely organically and inspired through not just other artists or ideas put forward by teachers but also by the world around me. When I first sat down to do this piece I really just thought to myself in frustration f*ck it let's just through all this together and see what happens. Although once I had started creating this piece I started analysing it and working out which ways this piece could progress and how I could work into it again and again until I was satisfied that the piece didn't need any other modifications. So although the manic emotion was still behind what I was doing it became a lot more calculated and controlled in some parts.
What I really tried to achieve in this piece was the sense of overlaying so that other elements where able to come through from the back of the piece. Something else I considered when making this piece was trying to create a contrast between my crazed frustration and controlled thought processes, so I made each half of the piece separate in this way but still keeping certain elements within each section.
In reflection it was not only colour and texture that became important in my pieces but also the use of found objects. This became highlighted in this piece. The use of ripped tesco bags have quite a big impact on the viewer as it's an incredibly familiar symbol that is comforting to most people. Along with this it also raises question on recycling or how a colour filled world could be tainted by such huge corporations, from money all the way down to litter.

Once I thought i had finished the piece I looked over it and thought it there was any other way I could improve what I saw in front of me. As I didn't want to make the same mistake as in my last work I decided to expand on the piece. I did this using the same underlying technique on a coat hanger, I then attached it to the left hand side of the piece. This is an aspect that I thought was really effective.
I don't feel I could improve on this piece as I finished it with complete satisfaction however I have thought on ways to progress from here. One way will be to look at more corporate logos and other found materials and maybe create an even bigger piece with even more layers. I shall continue experimentation within my sketchbooks and eventually get to the same stage of satisfaction with my next piece.

Drawing Machines

Drawing machines is a workshop that really intrigued me. Our aim was to create a series of mark making using a mechanically powered object therefore giving you a lot less or a lot more control over what the final outcome was. I was incredibly interested in creating and building our drawing machines and there was a definite feel of nostalgia when building my first attempt at a drawing machine. Which was a combination of two different macano toys. However the outcome of the mark making was about as successful as building the piece itself. Although a lot of thought went in to working out which components moved and how effective they would be when it came to mark making, attaching a drawing utensil so it was stable enough to actually create marks was near impossible. However for a first attempt it wasn't a bad effort and the components were there to make a more successful machine.

Macano - Helibike

  After my first attempt at a drawing machine I moved on to using a machine that already had a motor attached this was an incredibly slow rotating disc which I wrapped wire round and then attached different thicknesses to them and I then held the rotating disc above a piece of wood and then left it to rotate for about half an hour. At the end of this process there were some incredibly interesting marks all varying from perfect circles to jagged lines. *put photo here* However to improve this idea would be to use either different coloured pens and to fix the rotating disc above the wood so I wouldnt have to stand there. I also felt that as I was holding the rotating disc I edited the end result to make it more interesting which took away the spontaneity of the piece which was something that really appealed to me at the beginning of the workshop.

One video that really inspired me was a video created by a degree class involving many different types of drawing machines and if I were to ever incorporate drawing machines into my work in the future I would use a lot of the ideas that are presented in the video.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xw6sDli1iA

Important things about sculpture.

- Form
- Design
- Colour
- Function or decorative?
- Surrounding space
- Texture

Sculpture

Sculpture was the first workshop I took part in. I felt I didn't know a lot about sculpture so I thought this workshop would be helpful. I started looking at sculpture artists such as Pablo Reinoso and Drew Daily.

Pablo Reinoso - Pret a Thonet

Drew Daily - Merging

 What really interested me was the sense of balance/ unbalance and this gave me inspiration to show my own view on this. I only had a single chair with a metal based frame so I collaborated with Joe in order to merge two chairs to create the intended sense of balance.
What immediately became a challenge was the fact our chairs had metal frames which made them a lot more difficult to work with. Although working with metal did involve using tools that I'd never used before such as a welder and angle grinder. Our first problem with our design was where and how to connect the two chairs and where the balancing point would be. We sketched out a few designs although the keep the strongest sense of balance and symmetry we welded the chairs back to back but then re-attached the legs in a different place taking away the chairs conventional source of stability.
Once we had re-attached the legs we discussed whether to maintain the chairs function or to create a more decorative piece. Overall we decided to at first keep functionality and then maybe progress to a state where the chair would lose function but gain a more decorative status.

 When finished, to keep the feel of equilibrium when is use two people had to be sitting back to back to keep the balance. We then discussed where to take the piece from this point on and we agreed to create a series of photos of us sitting on the chair in places that were already hard to keep balance in even when just standing.

 

  

 

 

 

 Over all I feel the end product was incredibly successful although to I feel the structure could have been stronger and pushing the boundaries on different ways to balance the chair could be another way of progressing this idea even further.

Independent Study: Development.

To develop my ideas further I made a total of 3 installations the first was a fitting that would fit over a lamp, made out of wire and different coloured plastics cut out into triangles. This created a very bold geometric design on the wall. Although after constructing the piece I realised it could have been a little more sturdy. My second piece looked a lot more like a conventional lamp shade and was made out of the ink covered plastics that I had previously made. The problem with this piece is that the colours were no where near as vibrant when the light was turned on. This was probably either because the when the plastic was bended it spread the inks so they weren't as dense or because the light wasn't strong enough. My last design was made from the test tubes I used in my shop window installation and an odd novelty light that cost me 99p. I smashed up the test tubes into sharp, angular shapes then I tried to create almost an explosion of neon colour. Over all this piece acts as more of a Marquette and would also become a lot more effective if it were a more substantial size.

I really thought my installations related to the works of Dev Harlen, Masaru Ozaki and Luke Abby.
I was incredibly interested in Dev Harlen's work. I think that the pieces that he creates could have started out as maquettes not dissimilar to my own. Along with this his use of geometric shapes and lighting really creates some outstanding effects. I feel his work also shows how the size of a piece can also effect the end effect in an extraordinary way. Another way his work links to my own is the way he used projectors to create the effects on the geometric installation. This is something I would also like to explore further. Although my financial standing is slight worse off than Harlen's.

Another artist I looked at was Luke Abby who's work did not involve a very geometric design although I really like how the light travels through this specific installation making the colours within the piece incredibly vibrant. This piece also has a feeling free a free flowing movement despite it being a static piece, this is probably one of the main reasons why I like the piece. Creating the sense of movement out of a static object is something I found incredibly difficult and made me appreciate this piece even more.

Masaru Ozaki was another artist who's work really held a sense of similarity to my own work and the works of the previous artist I had looked at. I really like the way his Christmas tree installations are illuminated as it highlights the edges of the geometric shapes within his work. This is one of the strongest aspects to my test tube piece. Because although the light isn't incredibly strong it traveled through the edges of the test tubes surprisingly well. 

To develop my work even further I would like to experiment more with colour, different types of materials and different strengths of light. I would also like to if possible to increase the size of my installations. 

Independent Study.

One my first day of independent work, I was a little unsure on what to start on. It was only when I started to link aspects of my previous work to what I was presently thinking that I began to gain inspiration. I wanted to look at the way light passing through an object effects the way we may interpret it.
I started experimenting with placing inks on sheets of clear plastic then layered them on top of each other. I felt my work strongly linked to Gustav Metzger's liquid crystal environment, the spontaneity feel of his work is something I found intriguing and matched the way my work was created. Which was through luck depending on how the inks reacted with one another. Another thing that really stood out to me when looking at Metzger's work was the vibrancy of colour. This is also something that I strongly based my work upon. After putting ht einks on the clear plastics like Metzger I projected what I had done onto the wall to create a more striking piece. This worked quite successfully, although to keep the colour the same stregnth I had to wait until it was almost pitch black outside to get the best results.  Overall my it came together quite well and the element of luck and chance did benefit my work. However testing inks on different services would've developed my work even further.