Another scary week!

On Monday we discussed our PLP's with Paul and he told me how I could work on mines to make it better and what to add to it. However he also asked me if I was going to be ok looking at such a big part of my life. I instantly said yes as I knew that I wouldn't have picked it if I didn't think I could do it. However since Ewan wasn't in this week we just worked on our own in the afternoon this gave me a chance to really think about what I was getting myself into. It was a little scary thinking about the fact that people were going to know how I feel as when people ask me about the disease I usually just rattle off the facts and rarely go into how I feel and how it affects me. However I think that looking at it in this project it can only be a good thing, I doubt I'm going to get upset but rather relieved to have a chance to express myself. Also Paul said similar things to Rebecca as she is tackling a similar theme it was nice to discuss it with her as she understood what it was like to hear people ask you if you could handle such a project. We both agreed that we could.

I continued with my had painting this week, I put my headphones in, started painting and the hours flew by. Dot wasn't in this week either so mostly just got on with what we needed to do and discussed with each other what we going to be doing. In the afternoon I showed Catherine my PLP and she pointed out somethings that I should fix and gave me some pointers so for project.

Friday was a scary day. I actually came in early not because I was doing any work but because I was stressing myself out by sitting around the house. So I was standing outside the  room with Rebecca (we were the first to arrive) which worked in our favour as we went first. I'm glad that I was 2nd as I think if I had sat through everyone else's presentations first I would've freaked myself out. It didn't go fantastically well, I stuttered a lot, lost my place (which meant that I lost a few slides) but I kept going and got through it in the end and once it was over I was able to sit down and enjoy everyone else's. For the mid modules I was 3rd or 4th to go and that was pretty good too, this went a lot better and helped me to firm up what it was I need to to do for this project and what I wanted my final piece to be like.

Week beginning the 17th March

On Monday we listened to some more of the presentations that people need to give, interestingly I enjoy listening to other presentations I just hate giving them. I like hearing who everyone talks about the same thing differently. In the afternoon we worked on our pathways stuff and I'm definitely sure I'm going to work on the Huntingtons idea as I think it'll give me more options and more things to talk about.

In the morning on Tuesday we continued with our paintings this week I started a large A1 piece of a hand. However I didn't use traditional colours, I went with blues and purples. This was because I wanted it to look odd and out of place as a way of symbolising how some people felt about the industrial revolution. We learned about using a grid to split up an image to make it easier to scale something up (that's why this painting is A1)  For pathways we continued working on our ideas and started a 1st draft of our PLP's.

On Friday we had directed study we all worked on our powerpoints individually. I've decided that I'm going to look at Lady Gaga's new album "ARTPOP" and where she is a contemporary artist or not. It's subject I find very interesting, looking at how people can be different artist and how their work can merge into more than one art form. Think that the reason that I find that this is so interesting is because I don't know where I want to take my own art and I don't know what category I want to be apart of. In Dee's class we worked on our sketchbooks because we have a mid module tutorial next week.

The rest of the week

For Transformation on Tuesday we painted the canvases that we stretched last week. We were to concentrate more on colours, tones and shapes rather than creating an image so what we did was take in photocopies/black and white print outs of images that related to out theme and cut them up and work with a small section of the image. I liked working like this and I quite happy with the outcome, it allowed you to create an image with focusing too much on getting it to look like something. Something else that I did was paint onto textured boards and pieces of wood as to see the textured effects that I could achieve. I'm quite enjoying working in this way and I like create these little samples, I think that I want to create some sort of mixed media piece for my final that would allow me to use the painting techniques that I've learned and use the collage pieces that I love creating.

On Friday we were looking at Pecha Kucha which is a Japanese form of presentation. It has 20 slides and each slide last 20 seconds and you talk about your chosen subject in those 20 seconds. It seems really interesting and as I hate giving presentations I'm hoping that by trying something new it won't be as bad.
In Dee's class we each worked on our computer work individually, so I made some more collages, something that I'm really enjoying and think I might use within my final piece.

Pathways Project

Today we handed in our warm up brief for this project although I like what I've done I wasn't happy with the amount that I produced so for the next part of the project I want to work harder as to create a larger body of work. Think the problem was that we didn't have to make a final piece so I didn't really know how far to take some ideas and I didn't know where I was supposed to be taking my work.
However for the new brief (which we got today) we will be making a final piece so I think that it will be easier for me to work as I have an end goal to work towards. This is something I think I really need, I need something to visualise, not only in my project work but in my career as I need to figure out where I want to take my work and what it is that I really want to do.
As for the project we have to create an artist book based on a 'Journey'. Two ideas instantly came to mind first off insects: comparing the distance of a journey for them and us, looking at the size of them and how they move, fly, crawl. The other idea was something different from all the other project work that I've handed in so far: Huntington's (which is the disease that my father suffers from) this would be a far more personal project and would allow me to explore my own thoughts in a way I haven't before. I think that looking at something more personal will benefit me not only with my project work but also to clear up in my head how I feel about it all.

Art student blues

Putting all my sketchbook pages into the right order. Fun, fun, fun!

Week beginning 3rd March

So we started this week off by giving presentations based on the analysis techniques that we learned last week. Seems PowerPoint just hates me as it deleted some of my text for no reason what so ever it seemed but other than that I think it went not to badly. I think I'm getting better at presentations and I'm not as nervous with what I'm saying. 

Tuesday was really good as we learned how to stretch canvases and different methods of sealing them. We made lots of different samples and we are going paint them the following week. Then in the afternoon we continued with Pathways. 

Friday we got feedback on our critical reviews I think I did not to badly and I now know the areas that I need to work on. In Dee's class we worked on illustrator and photoshop and learned how to create repeat patterns, whichwas  pretty cool. 

Over the weekend I worked on my pathways sketchbook as that's due on Tuesday. 

Photoshop

We've been using photoshop for a weeks now and it's been pretty fun and I'm quite impressed with my myself and with what I've created.