Media Class: 20 Ideas in 20 Minutes

 To begin generating ideas in class we completed 20 ideas in 20 Minutes.  I completed the grid and here it is!

As it quite difficult to decipher my little scribbles here - I will explain the ideas that I thought were good further:

Create a photographic cabinet of curiosities in the manner of the Victorians like these images here:

Cabinet of Curiosities

Cabinet of Curios

Something on the nature of touch and isolation so using photography to show how we have not been able to go near people.  Maybe photographing skin or isolation some photographers have been doing this at this time - here this with the window between them.

Pete Kiehart

I have been doing yoga and so I could use timelapse for a yoga routine perhaps there could be something different about this that would make it more interesting.

Yoga Photography

There are many more ideas here but I need to find one that is challenging and that will become something that has some universal meaning so people really want to look at the images! 

Further Exploration of Ideas: Alpha & Omega

 As discussed in my last post my initial ideas on my concept were considering the beginning and the end, the circle of life, and the idea of time.  

Looking further into this and considering Revelation in the Bible, it seems to me that we could be in the time of revelation.

Swarms of Locust in East Africa

Let's start with the plague of Locusts, locusts appear many times in the bible but they are a symbol of end times  - the bible states: in Revelation 9.1-7 '1 The fifth angel sounded his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss. 2 When he opened the Abyss, smoke rose from it like the smoke from a gigantic furnace. The sun and sky were darkened by the smoke from the Abyss. 3 And out of the smoke locusts came down on the earth and were given power like that of scorpions of the earth. 4 They were told not to harm the grass of the earth or any plant or tree, but only those people who did not have the seal of God on their foreheads. 5 They were not allowed to kill them but only to torture them for five months. And the agony they suffered was like that of the sting of a scorpion when it strikes. 6 During those days people will seek death but will not find it; they will long to die, but death will elude them. 7 The locusts looked like horses prepared for battle. On their heads, they wore something like crowns of gold, and their faces resembled human faces.'  

Then there is a plague - with Covid we certainly have this however it is important to note that we have had plagues many times in our history, The Black Death, Spanish Flu, HIV/AIDS and Cholera - these are the big ones.

HIV/AIDS - The figures at present stand at 60 million people infected and 25 million have died.  We are still fighting this throughout the world.

The Black Death (1347-1351) This ravaged Europe and in the space of four years took at least 75 million lives but some estimate up to 200 million.

Spanish Flu - This began in 1918 and ended quickly in 1919 but affected a third of the world's population and took  50 million lives.

Why am I discussing these unhappy topics in relation to my concept?   As I have chosen Expressionism as the theme for my work I think the concept here would go well as the German Expressionists depicted the horrors of war.  Consider these images from Otto Dix:

Wounded Man (Autumn 1916, Bapaume) [Verwundeter (Herbst 1916, Bapaume)] from The War (Der Krieg) (1924) Otto Dix

Otto Dix, Sturmtruppe geht unter Gas vor (Stormtroops advancing under a gas attack), 1924 

These images of horror remind me also of Goya's Disasters of War

 Los desastres de la guerra, plate No. 3, (1st edition, Madrid: Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, 1863) Francisco Goya

Although in my own lifetime I have not seen the horror of war in the UK.  there are many wars still raging around the world and as I was stating at the beginning about revelation there is a feeling that though this might not be end times - it certainly is a moment where the world will be changed after this pandemic.  

References

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (05/03/20) The Five Deadliest Outbreaks and Pandemics in History [Online] Available from: https://www.rwjf.org/en/blog/2013/12/the_five_deadliesto.html  (Accessed 11/01/21)

KD Outsider Art (10/06/14) Otto Dix: The Madness of Modern Warfare [Online] Available from: https://kdoutsiderart.com/2014/06/10/otto-dix-the-madness-of-modern-warfare/ (Accessed 11/01/21)

BBC Future Planet (07/08/20) The Biblical Locust Plagues of 2020 [Online] https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200806-the-biblical-east-african-locust-plagues-of-2020  (Accessed 11/01/21)

Bible Study Tools (08/05/20) Locusts in the Bible [Online] Available from: https://www.biblestudytools.com/topical-verses/locust-in-the-bible/ (Accessed 11/01/21)

The Martians have landed: Alpha & Omega

 As part of the class session, you are going to generate ideas in just images to show the Martians your initial thoughts on your CONCEPT for your major project.  So here is one I created for my own initial ideas.  I created this on a digital tablet. As you can see this does not show my best drawing skills but does try to communicate the ideas that I was thinking about.

The eye here - is the all seeing eye, which could be God, it could be technology, it could be CCTV! It is the idea that we are always witnessed and our actions are always witnessed.  The Alpha and Omega are teh beginning and the end.  In the Bible this is in Revelation 22.13: 'Behold, I am coming soon, and My reward is with Me, to give to each one according to what he has done. 13 I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.” 14 Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by its gates.…' and this is referenced elsewhere as God being the first and the last.  Obviously, the alpha and omega are from the Greek alphabet.

The clock is life ticking by to represent our short time on earth with the symbol also of the baby and the coffin.  The box is like Pandoras box - we do not know how life will turn out as there are so many variables and this is about fate, free will and whether we are in charge of our own destiny.  

These are the themes I would like to research further for the project concept. 

Set Project: First Thoughts

 This term we have a set project this can be viewed here.  The idea is to consider the brief and write down first thoughts.  My first thoughts are that I am drawn strongly to both Earthly Delights and Expressionism. 

I think the problem with earthly delights is that I may do something that is too simple and that I may get lost on a tangent.  

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Marzella, oil on canvas,1909–1910

Expressionism on the other hand I have some strong ideas and I would really like to explore and improve my drawing/painting skills this term.  I could do this in conjunction with photographs and mixed media however I think I am more inclined to not try to use photography as something to help me here as this is too much in my comfort zone.  

My thoughts are to go with expressionism, learn further drawing techniques particularly, and if I feel confident enough to experiment with painting as well. 

I could do this by hand on paper or I could use a digital tablet or I could experiment with both and explore whether one works better than the other for me.  

In terms of the actual concept for this series I think this will need further thought and experimentation with ideas to see where that might lead me...

Self-Portrait: Icebreaker

 Here is my 15-minute self-portrait, which was inspired by Egon Schiele.  I used a 3b pencil and charcoal coloured pencils.  Here I feel I have captured some of my inner pain, frustration and anger!  Very therapeutic!

Egon Schiele was a German Expressionist (1880-1918) who, in his short life - he died of Spanish Flu, achieved so much.  The Leopold museum states; [Schiele] 'managed to create an oeuvre that was both symptomatic of and groundbreaking for his times, making him one of the most formative and colorful figures of Viennese Modernism.' (Leopold Museum: 2020).  Schiele created many self-portraits and these pained and divisive images exposed his own inner turmoil but also reflected the zeitgeist of the times.  Schiele used a continuous drawing technique which created intimacy between himself and the sitter.  As Schiele often drew nude figures, he was also arrested and charged with public immorality for distributing obscene drawings (originally he was arrested for seducing and kidnappinng a minor - luckily the charges were downgraded) in 1912 and the police confiscated over 100 drawings. He spent 24 days in jail. (Tate 2021) 

Egon Schiele, Self Portrait in Crouching Position 1913.

Later on, when Hitler came to power in 1933 Schiel's work was considered to be degenerate art.  Schiele's and other 'degenerates artists work either ended up being auctioned in Switzerland or it was burned in Berned by the Nazis. The joy of expressionist work is that it aims to express what is inside not surface beauty - this is part of the reason that many found this work difficult and private sitters would not pay for something that they would consider to be ugly. 'His decorative commissions for the Wiener Werkstatte - either too abrasive or too sexually explicit - almost invariably went awry, and his portraits were frontal assaults on a sitter's vanity. His profligate habits eventually exasperated his patrons - mostly older men, from whom Schiele expected a fatherly devotion that they were ill-prepared to provide.' (Egonschiel.com 2011) After Schiele was imprisoned and he grew older he became less introspective and more outward-looking and his self-portraits reduced.  Schiele went to war in World War I for the Austro-Hungarian army and this changed his outlook and his work.  Schiele in his own life only managed a fairly small amount of success as an artist and a very small income.  

A brilliant man, ahead of his times, managed much in his short life. 

References

Leopold Museum (2021) Egon Schiele [Online] Available from: https://www.leopoldmuseum.org/en/collection/egon-schiele (Accessed 09/01/21)

Tate (2021) Tate Liverpool: Five things to know: Egon Schiele [Online] Available from: https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-liverpool/exhibition/life-motion-egon-schiele-francesca-woodman/five-things-know-egon (Accessed 09/01/21)

Egon Schiele (2011) Egon Schiele: Paintings [Online] Available from: https://www.egon-schiele.com/ (Accessed 09/01/21)

Welcome to Spring Term 2021!

 Welcome to Spring Term 2021!  Another lockdown so another opportunity to really explore new artists, new skills and create new work.  

I wanted to start this term with the artist Peter Blegvad.  He created a series I was taken with called: 'Observed, Imagined, Remembered' and I thought since we are now often in the position of imagining and remembering this would be a great place to begin.

Peter Blegvad Imagined, Observed, Remembered. Ink and watercolor, 1984.

Born in 1951 in New York City. Blegvad created a name for himself as a musician, songwriter, cartoonist and writer.  I first encountered his work in Atlas anthology III published by the Atlas Press.  In this he discusses his Observed, Imagined, Remembered series of works as shown above.

Blegvad states: 'At work, I was often required to depict things that I could not, without recourse to a model, render 'realistically', but for which I could usually invent recognisable hieroglyphs (as a cartoon is a hieroglyph) by basing these on an eidetic approximation of the particular item which I could 'see' with that undissectible organ, the 'mind's eye.  In my immaturity, I sometimes experienced a kind of vertigo when drawing, for a client, things purely imagined or remembered them to be.' (Brotchie A & Green M. 1985)

Blegvad also wrote a book (much later on) Imagine, Observe Remember - Here is an example page below

Peter Blegvad Imagine, Observe, Remember 2020

Blegvad : 'I wanted to be a poet and/or an artist, but I was very lazy (frightened of failure, I guess) and drank too much. I spent years in the Forty-second Street library planning a book about how to freeze time, and began an encyclopedia of everything in the world depicted thrice. That’s a project I’m still working on.' (Bruno F. 01/11/2009) 

Why I find this work so interesting is that he created it out of not knowing how something looked and was interested in how things changed in your mind's eye after you had spent time away from it.  There is a curiosity here and Blegvad has created many of these throughout his lifetime.  The original images in the Atlas book were of Listz (the composer), Larynx, Loch Lomond and Louris.  

Take a look at a couple of these here:

References

Heller S. (12/09/20) Design Observer, Imagine, Observe, Remember [Online] Available from: https://designobserver.com/feature/imagine-observe-remember/40364/ (Accessed 08/01/21)

Bruno F. (01/11/2009) The Believer, An Interview with Peter Blegvad [Onlne] Available from: https://believermag.com/an-interview-with-peter-blegvad/  (Accessed 08/01/21)

Ed. Brotchie A & Green M. (1985) Atlas Anthology III. Atlas Press, London

History of De Montfort University: Focus on Architecture

 In this post, I am going to show you the start of the process of writing an article with images.  It is assumed you would have researched your article thoroughly in earlier posts so I will condense the research here ready to use for the piece.  

De Montfort University campus sits in the heart of Leicester City.  An ancient city that began as a military fort in AD 43.  The city grew and prospered through the ages and was at the centre of the industrial revolution (1837-1901) and the city grew from 40,000 residents to 212,000 residents.  The Victorian building erected during this time still dominates the Leicester landscape.  

'The Leicester Municipal Technical and Art School was then formed in 1897, when the Leicester School of Art was merged with the Leicester Technical School, under the control of the town council. Construction began in the Newarke on what we now call the Hawthorn Building. Initially, only the wing facing the Hugh Aston Building was completed. The other parts were added later, with the Richmond Street wing built in 1909, the Gateway Street wing in 1928, and the wing facing Trinity House in 1937.' (History of De Montfort University: 2020)

Today to really start to get the feel of the university into this article and to create the focus I took some initial photographs of The Queens Building

Test Shots 

Olympus SH-2, F3.7, 1/40, ISO 200, FL 40mm

Olympus SH-2, F4, 1/50, ISO 250, FL 49mm

Olympus SH-2, F4.2, 1/15, ISO 800, FL 60mm

Olympus SH-2, F4.2, 1/60, ISO 500, FL 60mm

'De Montfort University set out to design Europe’s largest naturally ventilated building in 1989; it was completed 4 years later in August 1993, costing roughly £9.3 million. After construction on 13 August 1993, the Queen herself christened it as The Queen’s Building. ' (Compton M 2006)

'According to Bill Bordass, “The architect’s concept for the Queen’s Building was for a highly insulated, thermally-massive envelope with both a shallow plan and generous ceiling heights to facilitate natural ventilation and daylighting.” (Compton M 2006)

'The original brief for the Queen's Building called for innovative solutions that would reflect the creative nature of the then-new university. The architects were Short-Ford Associates and environmental engineers Max Fordham LLP, backed-up by a team of advisers, such as Cambridge Architectural Research on the stack-effect chimneys, and Bristol University on the physics of airflow.' (Bunn R. 2006)

There is much written on the Queen's building above I have just added some snippets of what I might include.  R. Bunn who wrote in 2006 wrote about how the building faired since its creation and on many levels, it has not faired so well.  There are still issues with the ventilation and although it has been improved and altered over the years to adjust with the times the building itself now is more about its status as an iconic building rather than what it does well, at the time this was high innovation but as with all architecture, it has to stand the test of time the users (students and staff) need it to work for them.  Bunn writes: 'The saving grace of the Queen's Building is that its occupants seem willing to forgive the building's transgressions on comfort and lack of user control in the belief that they are working in a building worthy of being loved for its very idiosyncrasies.' (Bunn R. 2006)

I will now begin to draft this part of the article and I will retake these images when it is not raining so I can avoid rain spotted images.  

I want to add an element of psychogeography as I would like to include my own connection to the city, the university, and my own history.

References

Bunn, R., 2006. Queens Building. [online] Bsria.com. Available at: https://www.bsria.com/uk/news/article/queens-building [Accessed 25 November 2020].

Storyofleicester.info. 2020. Home - Story Of Leicester. [online] Available at: https://storyofleicester.info/ [Accessed 25 November 2020].

Dmu.ac.uk. 2020. A History Of De Montfort University. [online] Available at: https://www.dmu.ac.uk/campus/history/history-of-dmu.aspx [Accessed 25 November 2020].

Compton, M., 2006. [online] Webpages.uidaho.edu. Available at: https://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/arch504ukgreenarch/casestudies/queensbldg-demontfortu.pdf [Accessed 25 November 2020].