Lots of questions
How are spaces documented? What is the difference between space and place? What information do I want to record? What are the methodologies to use? Will the experience of drawing dictate the methodology? Why choose Abu Dhabi as a subject? What is the aim of this project? How will it be realised? Who is it for? What use will it be? How to begin? Fig 1: Layout page: Initial ideas from voice recordings. I began with my mindmap, and indentified some possible areas of research. Colour coding was a useful way to link ideas and reading material. I found articles and books on place, placelessness, and non place. I loved the taxonomy in George Perec’s ‘Species of Spaces’ and his book led me to the work of Auge and so to Rachel Gannon. She has a phenomenological approach to drawing space and her project was very much about her relationship with her subjects and the act of drawing. This idea led me to think about the personal relationships that we have with places, and so to memory of place and virtual places. Drawing a memory (and I had established this was to be a collective family memory) needed an approach, which was inclusive of many viewpoints. The methodology therefore needed to gather information from many sources. I identified four main areas of research;
Looking at the subject through different disciplines informed my process. I discovered that some themes were similar, and this validated my approach. I looked at the methodologies of two illustrators, Leah Fusco and Anne Howeson. Both are working with place/time/memory, and both use multiple sources and methods of collecting data, which they then interpret through their creative work. This method really typifies Werner Herzog’s ‘Ecstatic truth’, which is exactly what I wanted for my drawings. I worked out what I wanted to draw in layout pads (fig1) and wrote lots of notes around my drawings. I like to see everything at once and not be precious. The drawings, that I wanted to work on, began as A2 pieces of work, which I photographed before the digital colour was added. Research was a really important part of this project. I recorded interviews and collected stories and anecdotes about the places I drew. I scoured local history websites and family photo albums, and I looked at historical and contemporary maps of the area. I read up on the local history. I had to base the project in fact, and with primary research because my interpretation of it was intentionally incomplete, subjective and disjointed. I enjoyed this part of the project My process seems logical to me. The ideas progressed as I was working, and particularly once I had gathered the interview material. It took a few weeks to begin on the right path, and I suddenly woke in the middle of the night with the idea. This wouldn’t have happened without all the dead ends, reading and drawing that went before. I've learned: Not to worry, if you do the work, you’ll get somewhere! (Some) digital skills To read widely, outside your discipline Thorough research is like having something in front of you to draw - a sound base in fact. That there's an excellent book delivery service in the UAE (Magrudys) if anyone needs to know and that you can sneak into New York University's library! Arbeia Fort: Experiment with maps This image was an early experiment using archaological maps and their labelling. Barrett's: Experiment with analogue nostalgic colour. I sampled colour from damaged old photos and heightened the contrast. The Long and Three: Interview and narrative. I introduced text as part of the image, which told a story about the location.
Fig 1: C. Lim, M, Mutanda,T. Marchewka: Discontinuous cities (2007) Collage C J Lim is the founder of Studio 8 Architects and Professor of Architecture at the Bartlett UCL. Lim created Short Stories as an alternative way to communicate the complexity and narratives within city spaces. Lim uses fairy tales and myth as his inspiration, and invents architectural scenarios which meld narrative and place together (fig 1). It’s an ambitious and creative way to think about where we live, and it ties in with the history, and fiction of the city. Architects traditionally use plans, diagrammatic visuals, and slick computer generated images to project future invention, but not everyone can read a plan, and polished visuals stifle creative thoughts. To counteract this, Lim and his team have instead used delicate and complicated paper assemblages, to re imagine parts of London. This approach is intended to engage the public imagination and to encourage speculation and discussion about how space is used, and the role architecture plays in society. It’s an exciting and lateral way of looking at place and narrative
It’s worth looking at Lim’s previous book too, ‘Virtually Venice’ which he constructed for the Venice Biennale in 2004. In it, he imagines Venice as Kublai Khan after conversations with Marco Polo. LIM, C.J. and LUI, E. (2011) Short stories in two and a half dimensions. Oxfordshire and USA. Routledge. THATFIELD. (2011). Virtually Venice. Now urbanism: Mapping the city [online] Available at: https://uwcitiescollab.wordpress.com/2011/12/16/virtually-venice/ [Accessed 15 December 2016] Fig 1: Maurice Sendak: Where the Wild Things are. (1963) Harper and Row SIPE, L. (1998) How picture books work: A semiotically framed theory of text-picture relationships. Children’s literature in Education Vol 29 (2) p97-108 [online] . Available from: http://web.a.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.herts.ac.uk/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=52fb9a64-da7b-46b2-8ea3-ac13be3fa4d4%40sessionmgr4010&vid=1&hid=4109(Accessed 13 December 2016)
Sipe has a PhD in Children’s literature and has a research interest is in the development of literary understanding. I’ve chosen this article as I’ve introduced text as an integral element in my illustrations and want to clarify how they are read and understood with each other. In this article, Sipe examines the image-text relationship within picture books, but it is relevant wherever image and text exist together. The article begins by referencing alternative descriptions of the relationship using metaphors from music (antiphonal, duet), science (interference) and geology (plate techtonics). Sipe then briefly explains other approaches to defining the image text relationship, and includes the ideas of Barthes, Nodelman and Lewis, among others. Sipes theoretical approach is phenomenological. He identifies the relationship as a synergy, where the value together is stronger than the values individually. Sipe then systematically refers to a range of literary theories that examine the reader response to a text, and their perception of meaning. He goes onto explain the reflective process of reading a book and how this creates a tension between wanting to read on with the words, but dwell on the images. He suggests that the way a picture book is read invites re-reading because the tension stops a full-speed-ahead read. The second part of the article is about transmediation, and uses the semiotic theories of Pierce to explain how a reader moves between the dual sign systems of visual and verbal to create an understanding of the whole text. A double page spread from “Where the wild things are’, by Maurice Sendak is analysed through a Piercean semiotic triad (simpler than it sounds!). Plainly put, it’s where the eyes travel over the narrative space, and how the reader interprets and relates the visual and verbal signs. This is a useful and concise dissection of how text and image work together. It has a thorough bibliography for further study, and an overview of the leading theories. Particularly useful for my own project is the idea of hyperlinking between text, image and from page to page. Fig 1. Robert Weaver. Kennedy's last chance to be President. (1959) Esquire Magazine. Robert Weaver is one of the great visual journalists. He was passionate about drawing from life, and was influenced by contemporary young artists and film makers such as Ben Shahn and Roberto Rossellini. Weaver believed that Art and Illustration were very closely allied, and sought to include personal expression, comment and content-full narratives into his work. This attitude really changed the perception of illustration practice in 1950's America, when most illustrators were considered craftspeople, commercial artists who decorated, but didn’t comment. There's a background to the emergence of illustrators like Weaver. When television arrived in more and more homes, it began to siphon off advertising revenue, so magazines, dependent on their money, were left with smaller budgets, and more pages to fill. In addition, the late 50’s and 60’s were a time of major political and social upheaval in America. Weaver identified with the idealist ‘new frontier’ politics of Jack Kennedy and with the youthful optimism of post war America (fig1). “Robert Weaver was Jack Kennedy, and the old guys were a bunch of genial but corrupt Eisenhower’s” (Dowd 2008). In the Art world from the early 1950’s, contemporary painters were embracing abstract expressionism. Figurative work was unfashionable, and painting was about the act of painting. As the decade progressed, Pop Artists back-lashed against this intellectually elite practice and painting started to reference comics, adverts, and graphic design. It was inclusive, accessible, and its narrative was about real lives and popular culture (Heller, Arisman 2004 p.43) Weaver drew on the expressionist aesthetic, using colour as an emotive tool, with broad expressive strokes of paint. He juxtaposed elements of story in multi layered composite drawings, using graphics, posters and typography to contextualise and inform. It is no accident that alongside books, websites and other resources devoted to visual journalism in the 60’s, you’ll find the names of the Art Directors who commissioned them. These men and women gave Weaver and his contemporaries the space and the freedom to investigate and draw what they saw in the world. They were trusted to fill sometimes up to eight pages in an issue. Leo Linni who worked for Fortune magazine 1948-1960 sent Weaver to illustrate an article entitled “What’s come over old Woolworth?” (fig 3). Weaver sketched on the spot, a hierarchy of employees, starting with the Stock room boy all the way to the board members. He barely altered the illustrations for print except to wash over with colour. Richard Gangel, Art Director for Sports Illustrated, regularly commissioned Weaver, including 'Spring training', an iconic series of Baseball players published in 1962 (fig 2). Others include Robert Benton and Henri Wolf at Esquire, Charles Tudor at Life Magazine and Cipe Pineles, Art Director at Conde Nast. Without the vision of these people perhaps illustration wouldn’t have developed in the way that it did. Fig 2. Robert Weaver. Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle (1962) Sports Illustrated What we need today are some more visionaries: In an ideal world, where power is back in the hands of Art Directors, who aren’t scared or too hand-tied to commission, and who see a value in the voice of the illustrator. There’s not much money that’s true, but there’s a lot of space in a digital news story (I really like how Matt Whilley and his team at the New York Times are presenting stories). On the other hand, Robert Weaver might have something, allying himself with Fine Art. Maybe producing a set of beautifully printed illustrations, which inform, comment and shed light on a subject in a new way would be something worth keeping. I’ll steal Benjamin’s idea of the 'aura’ here, and suggest this as an alternative reason to commission. Fig 3. Robert Weaver. What's come over old Woolworth? (1960) Fortune Magazine The chairs get more and more elaborate as you go up the corporate ladder. Art Directors Club (1980) Henry Wolf. Available at: http://adcglobal.org/hall-of-fame/henry-wolf/ [Accessed 12 December 2016] DOWD, D. (2008) Super Tuesday: Robert Weaver’s Kennedy suite.[online].Available at: http://ulcercity.blogspot.ae/2008/02/super-tuesday-robert-weavers-kennedy.html [Accessed 12 December 2016] HELLER, S. and ARISMAN (2004) Inside the business of Illustration. Allworth Press. New York ZALKUS, D. (2012). Visual Journalism; the Artist as Reporter - Part 2.[online]. Available at: http://todaysinspiration.blogspot.ae/2012/05/visual-journalism-artist-as-reporter.html [Accessed 12 December 2016] ZALKUS, D. (2012). Visual Journalism; the Artist as Reporter - Part 1 [online].Available at: http://todaysinspiration.blogspot.ae/2012/05/visual-journalism-artist-as-reporter.html [Accessed 12 December 2016] The Twins (2000) The Independent. Conte and pastel As I read Male’s keynote presentation about the power and influence of illustration (see blog post 11/12/16), it brought to mind a commission I was given about fifteen years ago.
I was working for an educational publishing company, making lots of illustrations for different projects to be used in home schooling in Africa and the States mainly. All going well until I was asked to work on a Christian teaching project. I’m not religious, but the subject was the nativity story, and that has such a weight of existing iconography behind it that I thought I’d be on safe ground – no ground breaking here. I must admit that part of me was a bit wary of the influence of these teaching aids and I did feel a responsibility towards the audience. I decided to approach it with rigorous research into the history, architecture and dress of the period. My clients were happy with the reconstruction of the setting, the dress and artifacts in the illustrations. My camels were on point. The first revision came because they thought the characters were too ‘Middle Eastern’. Of course, I hadn’t realized that I had to draw from a middle class, white, western aesthetic. The final straw (that broke the camel’s back) came when I was called in to discuss the angels. “Can you make them look more like real angels?” I couldn’t and so we parted company. A lesson learned and a commission, which I doubt, I’d accept now. On a lighter note, I had a fight with my husband whilst illustrating a children’s story for the Independent newspaper. The main character was a very fat giant, chasing twin boys. I was able to turn that very fat giant into a portrait of my husband, complete with his very distinctive Newcastle United tattoo. Revenge is sweet and illustration can be a powerful thing. There are so many sites that discuss this subject, but here's a few interesting and quite diverse links about ethical design. The first is a piece about the Vatican's report into advertising 'God and the ethics of advertising' and featured in Creative Review as part of an ethics edition. The second, is written by the Simon Moore, the designer who rebranded UKIP in 2015. and poses some controversial questions (is bad design worse than poor ethics?). The third is a link to Milton Glaser's famous 'Road to Hell' essay, in which he gave his students increasingly difficult ethical questions to answer. BURGOYNE, P. (2007) God and the ethics of advertising [online] Available from: https://www.creativereview.co.uk/god-and-the-ethics-of-advertising/ [Accessed 17 December 2016] MOORE, S. (2015) Rebranding UKIP [online] Available from: https://www.creativereview.co.uk/re-branding-ukip/ [Accesed 17 December 2016] GLASER, M. (2002) Ambiguity and truth [online] Available from: https://www.miltonglaser.com/files/Essays-Ambiguity-8192.pdf [Accessed 17 December 2016] (fig 1) Rhiannon Adam. Dreamlands Wastelands 2014 During my memory of place project, I began to research ways to convey nostalgia. Part of this research took me to the aesthetics of analogue media (notably photographs and home cine film). I wanted to try and identify the colour palettes which conjured up nostalgia, and also discover why this might be so. I looked at my own family photographs and films, and I trawled instagram and pinterest looking for old polaroids and Kodachrome photographs. I found that the colours were a reflection of the chemical deterioration and exposure to light, and that this was dependant on the type of film, how it was processed and how it has been kept. Polaroids are particularly sensitive to light and air pollution, and will crack, fade and discolour (they shouldn’t be stored with other photographs or be exposed to a maximum light of 40 candles!)(Wilker 2004: 5). Photographs can have a yellow/ orange cast, or blue, the colours can fade uniformly or have a high contrast, with some colours more unstable than others. Why are these old photographs so emotive? It’s not just the subject matter, but the materiality of them which is so appealing. Over the last 30 years there has been a massive acceleration in the development of new media technology, and the more this has advanced, the more nostalgia there is for technology of the past (Shrey 2014 p27). It seems that the aesthetic materiality of an old film, record, postcard, is very desirable today. These things show their age, and each time they are used and handled, they decay even more. The marks of deterioration are signs of someone else having appreciated the media. Robnik calls these ‘textual ruins’ (Robnik 2005 p.59), and mimicking a textual ruin is a common enough aesthetic approach (just Google ‘distressed effect’ ). When this is duplicated, it connotes this history, pleasure and connection to the past, when it doesn’t actually exist. Rhiannon Adam is a photographer who explores the aesthetic of deterioration as a symbol of memory and nostalgia for childhood. Rhiannon spent most of her childhood living on a boat at sea. Her photographs in this series 'Dreamlands Wastelands' explore a 'rose tinted' view of a British holiday(fig 1). Colour palettes: Old photographs and postcards In addition to this research, I was also curious about the popularity of Instagram filters, many of which, replicate the 'vintage' aesthetic of old photographs. There are plenty of studies into the subject, Instagram is just one of many apps which aim to recreate analogue film processes, for example Retrocamera, Camerabag,and Hipstamatic. In one such study,' Pictures or it didn't happen', Gant suggests that the addition of an aging filter gives a materiality and authenticity to an otherwise transient collection of data.The idea is that because the faked accidental light leaks and deterioration are not accidental, the subject becomes twofold, the thing that is being photographed, and the photographic process itself (Chopra Gant 2016). He also makes an interesting observation that most social media photographers are younger than the technology they are emulating. He draws the conclusion that real or personal memories aren't the goal, but rather an aura of the past, a general rose tinted, 'wasn't it better then' feeling of the past. CHOPRA GANT, M. (2016). 'Pictures or it didn't happen:Photonostalgia, Iphoneography and the representation of everyday life' Photography and Culture.[online]. Vol 9 (2) p121-133.Available at:
://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17514517.2016.1203632?scroll=top&needAccess=true [Accessed 8 December 2016] ROBNIK, D. (2005) Mass memories of movies: Cinephilia as norm and narrative in Blockbuster culture. In DE VALK, M. and HAGENER, M (eds). Cinephilia, movies, love and memory ) [online] Amsterdam. Amsterdam University Press. Available at: http://www.oapen.org/search?identifier=340201 [Accessed 8 December 2016] SCHREY, D (2014). Analogue nostalgia and the aesthetics of digital remediation. In: NIEMEYER, K. (Ed). In Media and nostalgia, yearning for the past, present and future. [online]. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Dominik_Schrey2/publication/287508471_Analogue_Nostalgia_and_the_Aesthetics_of_Digital_Remediation/links/56775b5a08ae0ad265c5b79d.pdf [Accessed 6 November 2016] WILKER,A (2004). The composition and preservation of instant films [online]. Available at: https://www.ischool.utexas.edu/~cochinea/pdfs/a-wilker-04-instantfilm.pdf {Accessed 7 December 2016] Paul (2016) Oil on board Home movie stills We tend to keep old family photographs, even when they are faded and the chemicals are deteriorating. We keep them if they are a bit blurred or accidently composed and cropped. These qualities are really a metaphor for memory, and I thought it would be an interesting aesthetic to explore. I used an old family film as my resource for a painting of a child in a pedal car, which borrows the pinky, blue colour palette, and then softened the edges to indicate a blur. In later images I emphasised this even more. Many artists are exploring this idea, but the master of blurred painting technique is Gerhardt Richter. In 1973, in an interview with Irmeline Lemeer, he explains: “I've never found anything to be lacking in a blurry canvas. Quite the contrary: you can see many more things in it than in a sharply focused image. A landscape painted with exactness forces you to see a determined number of clearly differentiated trees, while in a blurry canvas you can perceive as many trees as you want. The painting is more open” (Richter, Dietmar, Obrist 2009 p 81) Gerhardt Richter. Herr Heyde (1965). 65 x 55 cm. Private collection A really interesting experiment was undertaken by Korean duo Shin Seung Back and Kim Yong Hun. They developed a software which would scan an entire movie, and every 24 frames, would record an amalgum of all found faces. The resulting prints offer a visual mood and a memory of time spent. It's worth looking at the whole series which includes films such as Amelie, Old Boy and Black Swan. Shinseung Kimyonghun Avatar Portrait (2013) Pigment inkjet print.Variable dimensions An alternative way to look at blur and memory can be seen in the 'Sea' paintings of Phillip Barlow. They are reminiscent of an overexposed holiday snap, taken from the wrong angle. He uses blur to describe a saturation of light with a high tonal contrast. Just the kind of image that occurs when the sun is behind the subject. Phillip Barlow. Glassy (date unknown) Oil on canvas. 1.2 x 1.8 m MCARTHY, T. (2011) Blurred Visionary: Gerhardt Richter’s photo-paintings. The Guardian.[online] Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2011/sep/22/gerhard-richter-tate-retrospective-panorama
[Accessed 5 December 2016] RICHTER, G. DIETMAR, E. and OBRIST, H. (2009). Gerhardt Richter: Texts, writings, interviews and letters 1961-2007 Thames and Hudson. London. Gary Embury, Dr Sapkota (2016). pencil. http ://reflections.org.np/lens_portfolio/008-dr-sapkota-arupokhari/ Reflections 25.4.16 is a cross disciplinary project, involving reportage illustrators and artists, photographers and journalists. It seeks to raise awareness of the issues in Nepal one year on from the devastating earthquake. Illustrator Harry Morgan was in Nepal at the time of the disaster and began drawing. He stayed, organising aid and shelter, and began this experiment in cross media storytelling. Each story is composed of interview, drawing and photography, using the language of each to add to the narrative. Some of the illustrations are layered with additional information, maps, text, diagrams and data, as in for example, Gary Embury’s drawing of Dr Sapkota, and Harry Morgan’s drawing of Lhakpa Lama and Karsang Palmo. Harry Morgan.Lhakpa and Karsang. 2016 pencil, watercolour. http://reflections.org.np/lens_portfolio/019-lhakpa-karsong-langtang/ This kind of cross media storytelling is a developing trend in reportage illustration. Journalists are having to respond to consumers who spend longer media multi tasking, have a shorter attention span that ever before, but also have an increasing appetite for news (Kolodsky 2013). Kolodsky suggests that the way to cater for this changing consumption, is to practice ‘convergence journalism’. This is journalism that gives you what you want, when you want it in a multitude of ways, allowing the audience to dip in, or focus in depth on one specific aspect of a story. To do this, she advocates that journalism be ‘tool neutral’ (Kolodsky 2013 p.7). Stories need to be told in many ways, using audio, film, still image, graphics, text. I believe that reportage illustration is a valuable, additional way to add context, emotion, and a subjective view to a story. It’s also a way in, when photographs and film aren’t permitted. Some drawings, like Embury’s and Morgan’s mentioned earlier, add data, maps, and spoken reports to the image which give further context ,immediacy and humanity. Olivier Kugler is another good example of an someone who works with text and image as a journalist/illustrator. His work in Iran, documenting a journey across the Arabian Gulf, won him the top V&A illustration award in 2011, and he was awarded again in 2015 for his portraits of Syrian refugees in Iraqi Kurdistan. Kugler layers his drawings digitally, combining several drawings together, adding text and diagrams, so that it can be read as a non linear image. A comparison to 'clickable' screen based illustrations has been drawn (Embury 2013. 66). "Convergence Journalism', has some similarities with Bo Soremskys interactive reportage experiment, which was part of his Masters Thesis (see blog post 7/11/2016). His narrative is interactive,'clickable', and allows the viewer to select a route through the narrative. The non linear approach is a much more appropriate way to recount the stories of many, as there is no singular timeline and many viewpoints. Olivier Kugler (2014) Habib. Pencil, photoshop.http://www.olivierkugler.com/syrian_refugees/ EMBURY, G. (2013). The new visual journalism. Varoomlab. [online]. (1), p 67.Available at: http://www.varoom-mag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/VaroomLab_Journal_IssueOne.pdf. [Accessed 20 October 2016] REFLECTIONS (2016).Reflections25.4.16.[online]. Available at: http://reflections.org.np/about/ [Accessed 30 November 2016] KOLODZY, J. (2013). Practicing Convergence Journalism: An introduction to Cross Media Story telling. New York, Oxon. Routledge.
Bo Soremsky and Der Kachelmann-Prozess Bo Soremsky is a Berlin based reportage artist. His recent Masters thesis looks at future possibilities in reportage drawing, in particular focusing on interactivity and non-linear narrative. Jorg Kachelmann is a popular weatherman, and involved in a legal trial. Der Kachelmann –prozess, is Soremsky’s method of recording this trial as a reportage artist. During the trial Soremsky drew as much as he was allowed, some information he had to retrieve from newspaper reports, witness statements and visits to relevant places, as the courtroom was closed to him. Gathering information in this way, from various sources led him to the conclusion that a non-linear, interactive resource was the most comprehensive way to document the trial. Viewers can select the participants, read their testimonies, and compare the available facts (and fictions). It is subjective and reflects in a way, how a judge would hear evidence. Digital technology is a perfect vehicle for reportage illustration. Drawings offer an emotive and experiential account of events and can emphasise and comment as well as document. In addition, sound, animation, photography, maps and text can complement the information. A nonlinear reading allows for multiple stories and relationships to become clearer. Part of my research into a narrative of South Shields has resulted in bringing together stories (audio), maps and illustrations to ‘place’ the narrative in specific locations and give an overview of their relationships to each other. This approach has much potential for future projects. Reportager (2012) ‘Reportager’: Projects: Bo Soremsky: ‘Passengers’ and ‘der Kachelmann-Prozess’: Research group and Programme at the school of creative arts, university of the west of England.[online] Available from: http://reportager.uwe.ac.uk/projects12/soremsky/kachelmann.htm [Accessed: 8 November 2016]. Experimental map of South Shields; 2016, I thought about linking the drawings and stories in a similar way.
Anne Howeson, Kings Cross Railway shed, 2015 Exhibition: Present and the Past: Renovation and revival in Kings Cross Central. 40 Cross Street, Islington. 16th September-1st October 2015. Kings Cross/ St Pancreas was the biggest area of urban regeneration in Europe when Anne Howeson was commissioned to make a series of drawings commenting on the changes. To illustrate the history and the passing of time, Anne used archival prints of the area, which came from The Foundling Museum, The London Metropolitan archives and the Museum of London. She incorporated them into her work by manipulating their content through drawing and erasure. They became palimpsests, which explore memory, fiction and documentary (Howeson 2015) In an interview which she gave to the online Design show, ‘Section D’, she discussed why and how she made the work. Anne has always explored the idea of place in her work, and as a local to Kings Cross, wanted to record some of the transition in the area. She was invited to use the archival prints following an exhibition at the Guardian. She began each drawing with the print as a starting point, and explained how this was like having a conversation with the artist. The work has a strong narrative, and as she rubbed out and added her own interpretation, she imagined what could have been there. She mentions passages in Dickens, where he describes dust heaps, and so she draws these in. It’s unclear what is fact and what is fiction. She talks about the work being a palimpsest, not only of physical layering, but in a historical sense. She also talks about "strange repeated moments" (Section D 2015), and compares the outrage at the opening of a new line in 1850, to the Crossrail protests today. Cath Donaldson,Westoe Colliery, work in progress, October 2016, digital and conte/ charcoal. In my project research, I have been looking at the depiction and recollection of place, in memory and history. I began with my childhood homes, and earliest recollections of South Shields where I lived until I was three. A central memory is one of the smells of coal and of the sea. The coal mine closed in 1993.
To try and illustrate this I experimented with drawing and google maps, drawing a blackened coalmine, collaged with the mock Georgian, mass-designed housing estate that has been built on the site. To suggest the industrial, vital nature of the mine, I used aggressive mark making and tonal contrast. By comparison, there is a uniform blandness to the new build. This is a very early experiment, and the only visually pleasing part of the image is the foreground, however I do think the idea has potential for development. ANNE HOWESON (2015) Imagining Kings Cross solo show [online] Available at http://www.annehoweson.com/current-work/ [accessed October 20th 2016] SECTION D (10/02/2015) From South Korea to Kings Cross [online] Available at https://monocle.com/radio/shows/section-d/174/ [accessed October 20th 2016] Howeson interview from 18.58-28-33 minutes 'What am I doing in my work? that's has been a tough question these last months, given that the reason for the MA is to explore new visual languages and ways of working. This summer I have spent drawing, that is how I make images for the most part. I don't often work digitally, preferring the tactile pull of chalk/ pencil on paper. I am aware of the limitations of my 'usual' medium - pastel, chalk, pencil; you have to work big, it's tricky to scan, it smudges easily, but it is good for 'on the spot' drawing. Recently, and in preparation for the MA, I started using other mediums, a Wacom tablet, coloured pencil, collage, in a bid to extend my visual language and to better describe my intentions. Movement, controlled accidents, and layering are typical of the way I have been drawing. There are a few reasons for this. Firstly, I draw a lot in my sketchbook. The pencil line is searching (not always 'correct'), but it does wander over the subject, and tries to express form and emotion or character. This quality, gives a truth and immediacy to the drawing, and it's a quality which I try and capture in my illustrations. This doesn't feel like an aquired 'style', because it's come from a lot of observational drawing. It is more a shorthand visual language that has developed as a way of working over a long period of time. Louis Netter, a reportage artist who is currently studying for a PhD/MPhil at the Royal College has written about his illlustration practicehas said that "drawing from life is a process of invention and modification of drawn marks that collectively imbue the work with an individual voice" (Netter, L. 2014). Some of my work, particularly the buildings, start with a chaos of marks, or an underpainting of colour which has an engineered randomness. I'll then pull together detail, and emphasise some of the accidents. It is a technique that works well with the medium. My first degree was in Graphic Design, and my tutor was Terry Dowling. Varoom claimed him as a founding father of radical contemporary illustration (Shaughnessy, A.(2007),'Abusing the Process', Varoom (5) pp 72-85. He introduced me to illustrators like Sue Coe, Anne Howeson, Chloe Cheese, and animators the Quay brothers (who came and taught a bit of animation). George Grosz was another influence.
NETTER, L. (2014) Drawing and Visualisation research: Brief notes on reportage drawing, visual language and the creative agenda of the artist.[online]. Available at: http://eprints.port.ac.uk/19890/1/Louis_Netter_TRACEY_Journal_DIS_2014.pdf (Accessed: 16 October 2016). Shaughnessy, A.(2007), 'Abusing the process' Varoom, 5 pp72-85 For this project, I am investigating the idea of ‘place’. To help clarify ideas, it seemed obvious to begin by drawing the place I’m in, and through these drawings, investigate some of the different kinds of ‘places’ that exist. If the end product is an illustration, then it makes sense to think through drawing. I decided to begin this way after reading Rachel Gannon’s paper ‘Being there, conversational drawing in a non-place” (Gannon, 2013, pp. 68-77) The ‘Non-place’ project began as a month long residency at Luton Airport in August 1995. The brief was to record and document the space, travellers and staff as they went about their business, and to end with an exhibition at the airport. The drawings came from an initial interest in documentary, but during the process, the focus became one of the experience of drawing, and the experience of ‘drawing as thinking, not thought’ (Gannon 2013,p.69). She uses the dictionary definition of ‘drawn’, being drawn into a conversation, as a description of the way she works, ‘not a conversation with someone I know but with a stranger. Someone I am struggling to get to know, searching for common ground (Gannon 2013,p.72). I visit the local shopping Mall to make some drawings. It’s a good example of a non-place (Auge, 1995), and is full of people passing through, passing time, and waiting. Also, like the airport, Photography is forbidden (also so is drawing, but I find that out later). Drawing from life, gives a first hand account of the place. It is time based, so I’m recording 5 seconds -5 minutes in the lives of other people. Most of them are waiting for about the same length of time. Rachel refers to Berger’s idea that ‘photography stops time, whilst drawing encompasses it’. Drawings that take longer than the moment witnessed, are more a product of memory. (Gannon 2013,p.73). I only draw while they are in front of me. I prefer to draw from life. Photographic reference is often necessary when making an illustration, but if it’s possible I’ll always to try to collect reference for drawings from observation. It is easier to filter out unnecessary information, and to select at that point what the emphasis is going to be. I can take what I need and supplement later with a photo. I am also making notes for my blog so my written recording is simultaneous with the visual.
I began as an observer, not in their ‘place’. However, once, eye contact and occasionally, conversation has begun, my relationship changes with them and their place. Have I broken my own 4th wall? I am aware that I don’t want to change the relationship of observer and observed and that this affects whom I choose as subject. For example, singles and couples are usually absorbed in themselves and each other, whereas someone in a larger group will often disengage and also become an observer (and watch me). Perhaps this is what Rachel means when she writes about Fabians ‘denial of coevalness’ (Gannon, 2013 p73). His notion is that in the field of anthropology, there is a contradiction between people viewed as contemporaries and in dialogue, and those that are seen as ‘other’ and separate – and not inhabiting the same time and space as the observer. To try and understand this (and test myself), I drew a lot closer than I normally would and stood in clear view. All but two subjects were aware I was drawing them, three smiled (two at me, one to themselves, one got annoyed I think) and the rest ignored me. They all carried on as if I wasn’t there, and didn’t appear to modify their behaviour in any way. My conclusion is that there are two ways to approach on site drawing. Eiither dive in, become involved and be part of the event, or be a detached observer, collecting information. If I have permission to draw, then the first approach will yield the most information, but it needs more courage. Gannon, R. (2013) ‘Being there: Conversational drawing in a non-place’, VAroomLab, (2). Auge, M. translated by John Howe (1995),’Non-places: Introduction to an anthropology of Supermodernity’, Verso, London New York |
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