Summarised-My Summer Project...

For my summer project, I began looking into elements that would then progress and eventually lead to my final year’s project. I began mind-mapping words that I found inspirational throughout all of my previous projects and it turns out there was a lot. Narrowing it down to my particular interests was difficult but in the end, I began researching into specific order, chaos, pattern, repetition and structure.

Small-scale samples showing these elements were created along the way. Most of my inspiration in which these samples were created from came from my holiday trip to Lanzarote. For example, shopping in the Teguise Markets I came across a beautiful selection of handcrafted lanterns that inspired me to create these rough and recycled lanterns, which look beautiful when lit at night. Light has always been an interest in my work, I think it makes my work look extremely better, therefore I wanted to look into working with light/sunlight but also with nature as sunlight is a natural resource and it seems fitting alongside each other.

I began looking into natural forms and found a bunch of amazing images and photographs to work with. I began picking out elements that stood out to me and began drawing from them, trying to capture what I admire and want specifically to work with. As I was looking into nature, I found it useful to also research into its seemingly opposite of man-made, where I also found great imagery to work from.

 

The main reflection that came from looking at both of these areas, is that at some point they began to correlate on hidden pattern, shape and structure, all elements that I was keen to cover. At this stage, my summer project was leading me in the right direction. I began taking out elements found from man-made structures and nature and experimenting with them, I did some printing, paper folding and stencilling.

Along the way of all this experimenting I found some amazing artists work that influenced how I approached experimenting. Selecting a few, I looked at Francisa Prieto, Abigail Reynolds, Claire Brewster and Richard Sweeney.

Francisa Prieto works with a wide range of old printed text and imagery pages taken from old books, she then works and manipulates them by skilfully making cuts, creases and folds to the pages to create unique structures. Prieto’s structures are perfectly refined and precise; a significant amount of time has been spent of each single piece. The results are restrained and fragile. Prieto’s work has some elements that I want my project to contain such as; her material choice, her dedication towards precision of her shapes and scale. Even though my design development scale started small, I would like eventually to work towards a larger scale. I already consider myself precise when working with shape and pattern but I want this to be evident through my work.

 British artist Abigail Reynolds creates collages that combine pages from old books, atlases; encyclopaedia’s and travel journals, usually of urban and sometimes rural scenes. Her work is impressive, as it seems to flow well together. I like how Reynolds works with layers; it is as if with every cut and fold she makes is uncovering another piece below the surface.

Claire Brewster’s work is always beautifully presented, just from how it is presented, I can tell her work is delicate and fragile and made using an assortment of papers. Brewster uses discarded pieces of papers, old maps and atlases to create these intricate detailed cut outs of different animals. The simplicity of her work is what makes her pieces stand out for me, they are beautifully refined and simple. What I particularly admire about Brewster’s work is how she has worked her intricate cut-out designs to create shadow silhouettes; by doing this she gives her work added dimension. Nature is clearly Brewster’s inspiration as well as mine, her choice of using paper a natural resource seems appropriate. Using old maps and atlases gives the simple shapes cut out detail, a detail already existing.

I am fascinated with Richard Sweeney’s structural work. Sweeney creates paper sculptures that hold qualities that I did not think could be gained through paper, a smooth and flawless finish that contains curves, making his paper structure ideas endless. Sweeney explores paper folding alongside constructive forms. I find it difficult to transform a flat piece of paper into a worthy 3-dimensional form but this comes naturally to Sweeney, he makes the limitations of paper seem false, as he shows there is not many. Paper is explored and investigated to demonstrate paper models; in his work, Sweeney combines geometry, curved lines and modularity to produce unique modular structures. Apparently, no pre-determined outcome was specified which I consider would help his experimental work; having a particular shape in my mind for me at the minute is hindering what could become enhanced outcomes.  Richard Sweeney’s work has helped to remind me to explore more broadly, without limiting my outcomes with specific thoughts so soon into my project.

I created this small installation of 3-d lanterns because making one of these lanterns seemed to work beautifully, so I wanted to see how a group of them together would look. The installation definitely looks better than one solo light. The birdcage structure came from a triangular shape that I had seen on a building and the structure and shapes works well together. The lights did not project geometric shadowing that I originally aimed for but the results were still impressive. I hung the lanterns up using ordinary string but if I was to do this larger and with a lot more lights then I would use clear wire for a better result. I could see an installation like this being placed in a bar or a shop, somewhere with comfortable seating, that would give the area extra detail and maybe a focal point to the space.
 

I like how at the moment I was focusing on working with paper and exploring all of its qualities. Paper is a natural resource that represents nature clearly; it is also a good source to be experimenting with as it is cheap and has a variety of sizes, thickness, weight, colour and pattern. 

This post is a summary of my summer project, condensed, with my main experiments and research. My summer project has helped me narrow down concepts of interests, media and processes that I want to use in my third and final year and my context in where I see my work. More importantly, it has pointed me in the right direction for what will inspire my third, final and minor project, this starting as nature vs man-made.