drawing – Page 4 – prints and research

April 12, 2020April 12, 2020

Lockdown week 3

Digital drawing in isolation.

Its a tough time for so many. Being a lucky one that does not have any symptoms, so far, I am just dealing with self isolation. I am also lucky that my partner is sharing our family flat and we are supporting each other along with our family WhatsApp and zoom sessions. Video Conf with research colleagues bring more welcome sharing via screes. Day to day I have been digitally drawing subjects that feel valuable in these times. Rather than leave them on the iPad or instagram I collate them here alongside increasingly important lockdown reflections.

Week three sees some reflection on the lockdown situation. Personal feelings of isolation and helplessness in the face of a global pandemic. From time to time there are moments of positivity when a drawing, an instagram or twitter post or pointer to thoughtful thinking on how we can deal with the emotions of isolation.

My partner suggested I might make some small family drawings that could be inserted in a photo-frame from 10 years ago. There is only she and me here. Family photographs abound in shoe boxes, albums and online archives. One from a trip to India that Mother and Daughter shared three years back captured their closeness and caring nature of their relationship and could be a good starting point.

My phd portrait research continues albeit with difficulty under Lockdown. I experience desires to research and write, but the motivations are curtailed by the feelings of immensity of awfulness of the effects on many older innocent people locally, nationally and internationally. This is genuinely a global pandemic not experienced by people of my ‘baby boomer’ generation. Its difficult to go on as normal in these circumstances. Self isolation is what is demanded by Governments, but isolation from all productive activity while many frontline services are being delivered by people of all backgrounds leads to a feeling uselessness and what feels like grief.

Trying to explain these feelings has been helped by my daughter’s recommendation to read That Discomfort You’re Feeling Is Grief from the Harvard Business School: by Editor Scott Berinato with insights by David Kessler, the world’s foremost expert on grief and founder of www.grief.com. https://hbr.org/2020/03/that-discomfort-youre-feeling-is-grief.

Read the article to get to the last paragraph: Sometimes we try not to feel what we’re feeling because we have this image of a “gang of feelings.” If I feel sad and let that in, it’ll never go away. The gang of bad feelings will overrun me. The truth is a feeling that moves through us. We feel it and it goes and then we go to the next feeling. There’s no gang out to get us. It’s absurd to think we shouldn’t feel grief right now. Let yourself feel the grief and keep going.

Being signed up to a blog by Professor of Education, Pat Thompson brings a weekly post, that in regular times provides insight and support for PhD researchers. This week’s post did this in spades for students attempting to pursue their research in isolation. Getting by and Getting on

Like the HBS article read it all, its short, but you get to the last Paragraph:

So this post is really just to say to the doctoral researchers I work with, and those who I work with indirectly, it’s OK not to be on top of it all. I’m not. Take the time to sort out how to manage. I am. Acknowledge your feelings. Look after yourselves. Do the best you can. That’s me too. Day to day. One thing at a time. And importantly, don’t hesitate to seek social support online and with your peers, supervisors and colleagues.

I am lucky to have a couple of video conferencing groups that meet regularly: The Print Gang hosted by Justin, the Senior Printmaking Technician at BCU School of Art and ‘happy PhD Students, kinda’ hosted by Jenifer. Last week one of our group made a surprise on screen appearance after her successful pregnancy! It was a Happy moment deserving of the group name. During our video conference Mum Kenny fed 5 week old Theodore. A drawing to celebrate that moment.

Finally this week a domestic reminder of where we are.

April 2020 Calendar with April 2019 Damson Blossom

February 3, 2019February 18, 2019

Anatomy insights over supper

24 months since my hands began to feel numb and tingling. Not just an irritant, but something definitely amiss. Following GP’s appointments: hand specialist reviews: carpal tunnel elimination; Neurology assessment: traumatic MRI head and neck scans; posterior decompression (growth on the spine) diagnosis (Thank you QE, Dr Littleton and Seddigh): spinal surgery (thank you Mr Metcalfe), physiotherapy (Thank you Gina) and regular exercise, the symptoms are reducing. Shoulder pain is much less frequent, neck pains less painful, hands and fingers cold, but less numb and fewer pins and needles.

frontal scan self portrait #1. A1 Silk screen.

After the operation to remove growth at C3 & 4, I accessed my pre-operation scan images. ‘Seeing inside myself’ for the first time inspired the making of a self portrait. Something I had never embarked upon before. Selecting ‘meaningful’ scans of neck, growth, head and brain I enlarged the small electronic images and applied a bitmap (black and white) matrix to give a texture and the ability to be silk screen printed at scale. The resultant three large scale printed images created an interior self portrait.

vertebrae C3/4.self portrait #2. A1 Silk screen duotone

I had not shared the self portraits until, over an informal supper, I was introduced to an anatomy education expert. I could not resist enquiring about the diagnostic process and my anatomical make up. On showing my self portraits an enthusiastic informed discussion took off, where many of the questions I had been asking about the connectivity of my nervous system were clarified. Her enthusiasm for anatomy and ‘seeing into’ the neurorogical make up I had reflected, brought forth her knowledge of how brain and pain connect. Her ability to access online medical information through applying professional, rather than lay, language along with her engaging sharing of information made clear to me what vertebrae connected to which nerves. Which parts of the brain are responsible for which bodily function, and the relevant size of brain tissue for amount of sensory information.

horizontal brain scan. self portrait #3. A1 Silk screen print

To explain how different parts of the brain process and control she brought up the ‘Cortical_homunculus’. This is a distorted representation of the human body, based on a neurological “map” of the areas and proportions of the human brain dedicated to processing motor, or sensory functions, for different parts of the body. Taking this further the nervous system is connected through dermatromes. Dermatrome, in anatomical terms, is an area of skin innervated by sensory fibers from a single spinal nerve.

Dermatome Map

Cervical vertebra with intervertebral disc

This healthy symmetrical cross section shows how the spinal chord is protected and the spinal nerves are cushioned. There are a number of online examples of MRI scans in the Radiopedia platform which aims to create the best radiology reference the world has ever seen and to make it available for free, for ever, for all.

This simple, but clearly explained description of the causes of nerve pains from the neck that had led to my posterior decompression surgery was immensely useful. My anatomical supper expert had been able to explain as she had time. She was not under medical service pressure to move onto the next patient.

We returned to the printed self portraits and drew connection between the binary transmission of signals to, from and across the brain with the binary marks of information required to capture and print the interior self portrait images.

Our anatomy evening came to an end with the sharing of Leonardo Da Vinci’s 500th Anniversary catalogue, published this week and celebrated across the land and in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. Da Vinci’s drawings laid the foundations for anatomical study and the knowledge base of today. Current Magnetic Resonance Imaging techniques allow detailed images of inside the live, human body to inform medical diagnosis and treatment. I am eternally thankful for the medics and my anatomical expert for enabling me to create my interior self portraits.

brain neck and head. self portrait #1,2&3. A1 Silk Screen self portraits.

eye sockets
detail x2 brain
detail brain
Neck Scan
arthritic growth detail
vertebrae detail
detail face frontal 2
detail brain2
prints off the press
nasal close up, non symmetrical

January 12, 2019January 12, 2019

Surprise new Border bird

New addition to the border animals page is a Scots Grey Parrot resident in Coldstream.

1/5. Digital drawing on iPad with Procreate. 15×11

November 20, 2018November 21, 2018

WomenPowerProtest

This dramatically varied, insightful and warming exhibition opened on Saturday with spoken word performances and a fully engaged debate with four women MPs. Inspired by the bold work of feminist artists and activists, Women Power Protest raises awareness, provokes debate and asks how much has changed for women. The show was very well attended by a diverse audience throughout Saturday with visitors enjoying the thought provoking work on every wall of the Gas Hall.

It is curated to mark a century since the first women won the right to vote, the exhibition brings together modern and contemporary artworks from the Arts Council and Birmingham’s Collection to celebrate female artists who have explored protest, social commentary and identity in their work.

Condor and the Mole. Lynette Yiadom-Bookye

It showcases pieces by celebrated artists including Susan Hiller, Lubaina Himid, and Mary Kelly, as well as sometimes controversial artists such as Sam Taylor-Johnson, Sonia Boyce, and Margaret Harrison, the exhibition does not shy away from difficult subjects, nor underplay the genius behind these artworks.

Drawing of visitors viewing Rose Wylie’s Size 8: Orange. 1996.

In November 1918 The Parliament (Qualification of Women) Act passed allowing women to stand for Parliament. 100 years on to commemorate this landmark event in history, Birmingham Museum is delighted to host a panel discussion with four female MP’s from Birmingham and Solihull, chaired by leading feminist campaigner Caroline Criado Perez.

Debating Mps with Lynsday Rutter who conceived the debate event.

Participating politicians: Jess Phillips, MP for Birmingham Yardley
Preet Gill, MP for Birmingham Edgbaston
Shabana Mahmood, MP for Birmingham Ladywood
Dame Caroline Spelman, MP for the Meriden constituency (Solihull).

The debate explored what it means to be a woman in parliament today and what the future looks like for women in politics. Caroline led the panel in rich and informed discussion based on the MP’s extensive experience and knowledge of the parliamentary system. Dame Caroline Spelman was able to compare the changes in women’s engagement in parliament over her 20 year contribution in the house. Legislative changes and custom and practice were welcomed, but there is still much to do. The continuing social media abuse faced by female Mps and the need for social media platform companies to prevent or remove abuse was called for. The chair encouraged questions of no more than ten words from the floor from women, and one man. There was more valuable exchanges and debate than for much of the debate earlier in the week in Westminster.

#womenpowerprotest

The show is free and on until 31 Mar 2019. Go See.

Women Power Protest is part of the Arts Council Collection National Partnership Programme which sees four major UK galleries working together to curate, host, and share a series of exciting and innovative new exhibitions with works drawn from the Arts Council Collection. The National Partner venues are Birmingham Museums Trust, Walker Art Gallery National Museums Liverpool, Yorkshire Sculpture Park and Towner Gallery, Eastbourne.

This event is free

September 10, 2018September 10, 2018

Fruits of Drawing Ep 3: The Oak Gall

Following on from the surprise Damson drawing developments of episode 2, I was expecting to find new fruit subjects in Santander, Spain when I attended the IMPACT Printmaking Biennale. I came across some figs, but they were no more enticing than the surprise Welsh find of episode 1. No citrus fruits, lemons or oranges. Perhaps I was not looking in the right place.

However I met David Faithfull, a Scottish Artist when attending his ‘Squid Ink’ art work using sand silk screen printing on the Sardinero Beach : Playa Primera de El Sardinero.

He also presented his work on a panel which he began by handing out packets of what I thought were individual OAK seeds. He informed us they were OAK GALLS, a very different proposition, from which he had made prints using, focusing, inspired by the OAK, which was hanging in the Impact10 Central Library Exhibition.

Smart Phone Photo of OAK GALLS Courtesy David Faithful, Impact 10 — Photo of OAK GALLS Courtesy David Faithful, Impact 10

Liminal – Alchemical Aviary, David Faithfull

Subsequently I visited the exhibition, next to David’s Liminal, Aviary exhibit, and enjoyed the prints, BUT there placed on a small ledge, were the Galls on their branch, I could feel episode 3 of the Fruits of Drawing beckoning. My trip back from Santander was long an laborious, but it gave me the opportunity to draw the Oak Galls.

OAK Galls. Santander 2018. Courtesy David Faithfull

Links

http://davidfaithfull.co.uk/recentProj.php?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andricus_kollari

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_apple

August 4, 2018August 10, 2018

Andrew Tift – Walsall New Art Gallery

Sadly I missed the opening of Andrew Tift’s show of portraits a few weeks back, but today I headed over to The New Art Gallery Walsall. And I am so glad I did. The gallery from top to bottom was totally rewarding. Wonderful to see a show dedicated to an artist’s portraits made over 3 decades. Wonderful also to see a full wall screen of an entrancing dance film by Hetain Patel, Photographs from Pakistan by Mahtab Hussain, Cornelia Parker’s Thirty Pieces of Silver and as always the Garman Ryan collection of gems.

Andrew Tift’s portraits reflect the artist’s life experiences and people’s he has engaged with from his home town of Walsall and the places he has visited including a spell in Japan. Many of the drawings and paintings are from a hyper realist tradition and are framed in conventional rectangles as are many of his influences. However there is a piece that is not rectangular – Body Shop, It is a car door, but it is painted and hung vertically. At first unrecognisable as a functional part of a car. Like a piece of Rauschenberg pop art it reveals itself and goes on to offer more as the painted image, equally out of sync with the shape it is on, and the work of the artist that surrounds it – Japanese men in a sauna. This is from a study visit Andrew made to research Japanese car manufacturing. In 1995, he was sponsored by oil and gas giants BP to create a portrait based solo exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery titled Sayonara Pet. He focused on the cradle to grave work ethic in the Japanese car manufacturing industry, initially in Sunderland and shortly afterwards in Tokyo. He documented the car workers and their families. The painting in itself feels like a document of the men’s culture outside the work space. It feels like we are being offered the opportunity to share in the artist’s ‘look into’ a moment. Like much of Andrew Tift’s work the portraits are celebrations of his subjects, but also a document of their lives.

His paintings and drawings are in the main created from series of photographs that he compiles over a focussed time with his sitters. He took over 400 pictures of Kitty Godley in 2006 to help him formulate his triptych of her. She was the daughter of Jacob Epstein and first husband of Lucien Freud who painted her in 1948/9. The resultant portrait was the image used in the 80’s on a poster to advertise the collection in the old walsall art gallery and encouraged Andrew to cross the doorway into the hallowed gallery and be inspired to make paintings. He never forgot that image, even though he was surprised how small it was in the real. He arranged to visit Kitty in her home in Suffolk to make a triptych of black and white portraits which became a BP Portrait prize winner. He also embarked on a single portrait of Kitty in the same pose as for Freud’s portrait over 50 years ago. Its inevitable that comparisons are made between the portraits and how Kitty’s face reflected her life then and now. Andrew’s portrait is not a homage, it is his interpretation and reflection of the woman he met which feels deep and full of admiration of her life.

Kitty was born in Wednesbury, a town near Walsall, as was Andrew’s Wife Anne who posed for two drawings in the Show; The Bath and Woman with White dog. The latter is based on the painting by Lucien Freud of Kitty when she was pregnant. Again we are invited to make comparisons across time, but also the fact that the location of both subjects are the same: the Black Country in the West Midlands. Andrew’s large drawing seems more empathetic of his wife than that of Freud’s.

The catalogue essay, ‘Conversations with the Past by Charlotte Mullins’ 1. provides valuable insights into Andrew’s motivations and recurring foci on life and death, past and present, and portraiture itself. She refers to Tift’s contemplation of his portraits, the dedicated preparation with his sitters and the meditation of the process of drawing. She Refers to Roland Barthes concept of the good/valuable photograph capturing the ‘air’ of the subject.” Barthes cautioned, ‘if the photograph fails to show this ‘air’ then the body moves without a shadow, and once this shadow severed ….. there remains no more than a sterile body.’ 2. Tift strives to capture the ‘air’ in both photographs and paint, for it is ultimately through paint that he brings his sitters to life. The portrait is not complete for Tift without time being folded into its surface as it is painted.’ This is an important differentiation between the photograph and the drawing or painting. The photograph can capture the ‘air’ of the subject, however the skilled work and attention selection of the detail to be made by the painting and drawing artist brings something ‘more’ to the portrait and adds to the ‘air’ of the subject.

His My daughter and My Mother hang next to each other, decades between them, but painted in the same year, 2018. In the catalogue they each sit on a page next to each other with the fold between them, however the invitation to compare is even more apparent in this closer format. One is encouraged to make comparisons, and contemplate the passage of time, and the painter’s perceptions of his relationship with these two females so very close to him that he has presented to us, and himself.

As said above seeing Andrew Tift’s body of work in the New Art Gallery with the Garman Ryan collection that inspired him was a treat. The viewing was beautifully complimented by Hetain Patel’s film, Don’t Look at the Finger; Photographs from Pakistan by Mahtab Hussain and Cornelia Parker’s Thirty Pieces of Silver. My visit was helped by the brilliant gallery assistant that brought me up to date with the exhibitions and the recent acquisition of a Frank Auerbach painting from Lucian Freud’s collection made available through the Arts Council Acceptance in lieu scheme.

Below is a slide show from my visit.:

hetain patel - Dont look at the Finger

Watching hetain patel - Dont look at the Finger

hetain patel - Dont look at the Finger

Mahtab Hussain

Wall of Portraits

AT Noddy Holder

Andrew Tift detail

Detail 2

The body shop - japan nissan door spa

Andrew Tift Portrait-Life is Sweet.

Ekene

kitty triptych

Kitty L Freud

Kitty portrait 2006

walsall window

Auerbach via lieu of tax

durer

bird pictures

close inspection

cross light

Mahtab's straw room

mahtab Hussain

foyer from afar

welcome

cross light

Fantastic enthusiastic and knowledgeable Assistant

Charlotte Mullins, Immortaloise. Cornerhouse publications, home 2018.
2.Roland Barthes, Camera Lucida, 1980, trans. by Richard Howard. Flamingo 1984. p110

September 30, 2017

moon stories

Museum Enabler Steve S and Jonnie Turpie shake on it

Museum of the Moon is a new touring artwork by UK artist Luke Jerram.

Measuring seven metres in diameter, the moon features 120dpi detailed NASA imagery of the lunar surface. At an approximate scale of 1:500,000, each centimetre of the internally lit spherical sculpture represents 5km of the moon’s surface.

Moon Story, Drawing and social media.

The original drawing was begun when the artist visited the Museum of the Moon exhibition and spotted a ‘moonlight’ in the corner in the dark expanse housing Luke Jerram’s massive moon. On a closer view the moonlight was a table lamp beamed on a book being read by Steve to an entranced family. The illuminated reader and family provided a strong composition to base a drawing on. The artist took iPhone pictures, transferred them to an iPad, into adobe procreate and using an apple pencil the drawing was created through a number of states. An early version was posted. on Instagram channel where Museum Manager Jessica spotted it, showed it to Steve who was surprised and impressed. Jess used Instagram to contact the Artist to let him know Steve would like a copy if possible.

Once the drawing was finished proofs were made on a high quality Cannon inkjet printer on to a range of papers before an edition of 5 were printed on 300 gsm aquarelle off white paper. Two months on from the Saturday encounter in the Museum of the Moon the 2nd print of the edition was presented to Steve who along with Jessica enjoyed seeing the mounted fine print. Of course it quickly appeared on the @thinktankmuseum feed.

Thinktank

September 26, 2017September 29, 2017

Tracey Drawing Conference

Presentations from Day 1 at Loughborough University Fine Art Department in this slide show.

Tracey drawing and phenomenology
Tracey drawing and phenomenology

Following an introduction to Drawing / phenomenology: tracing lived experiences through drawing, by Conference Organiser and host Deborah Hartley, a diverse and insightful series of presentations covering intensely local to expansive global drawing projects ….

Deborah Harty: drawing is phenomenology?

Jane Cook: Drawing the Domestic: a practice-led phenomenological study through–drawing investigating notions of the experience of home.

Martin Lewis: Perfunctory Acts of Drawing.

Marion Arnold: The Sensing, Knowing Hand: a Phenomenological Drawing Tool.

Eleanor Morgan: Fixing the ephemeral: the materiality of sand-drawings.

Phil Sawdon: … feel my way … outline judgements … I made some pictures

…… there was a choice of 4 workshops for the afternoon session.

I selected the intriguingly titled : Gained in Translation: Drawing Art History presented by Sarah Jaffray from the Bridget Riley Foundation at The British Museum. Surprisingly this was a participatory session where we were encouraged to draw from the collection of British Museum prints inc great masters and more recent drawing works. Beginning with quick draw exercises to get us loosened up we worked through pictures at speed and then on to a longer 10 minute drawing session. My selected drawing for this longer session was Michel Thevoz in the library of the Art Brut Museum, Graphite by Ariane Laroux. This longer focus on ‘copying’ or ‘Re, Representing’ a drawing enabled me to begin to understand the flow of the drawing through the artist’s eyes, by copying her drawing with intense attention to detail to honestly copy and represent her drawing.

The drawing captured the subject, but left much of the subject out. Much of the paper remained white and untouched. Following the drawing from head to hand seemed to reveal decisions made by Ariane Laroux to draw her subject, which may have gone unnoticed without the attention to detail required to copy her drawing. This seemed to confirm the thesis that faithful copying from original art is valuable to the copier in terms of dexterity, skills and insight into the artistic process.

I was not attempting to make better the original, but to replicate it honestly to the best of one’s ability to make a genuine copy. I felt the process of drawing Ariane’s Drawing brought me closer to her process to draw her subject. It was no longer an exercise, but an engaged desire to be true to her drawing, and to be with her, in her mark making and her decisions to draw parts of her subject that illuminated her whole subject. I did not know or see her subject before her, as I did not know the Ruben’s or Leonardo’s subjects, but with licence and dedicated time to draw from her picture I got to know the subject and even closer to the artist’s representation of the subject. Whilst being drawn into the process and giving as much as I could into the timeframe I felt I wanted to talk to Ariane about her drawing choices, in this portrait, because I thought I ‘knew more’ than when I began.

Sarah Jaffray’s workshop focussed on translation, which is wholly pertinent, however I took from it ‘the right to copy’ as an educational, skills and insightful process of value. She, through the Bridget Riley Foundation, encourages drawings of the drawings, for the benefit of of the contemporary drawer.

This process encouraged me to question where Drawing and Phenomenology meet?

The workshop abstract :

Gained in Translation: Drawing Art History

Drawing from drawing is as old as the artist’s workshop: students drawing from their master’s work, tacked to the wall of a studio, began their journey to mastery through faithful copying. Today however, in the wake of post-modernism’s reaction against authority, copying from a ‘master’ feels outdated and has thus been erased from contemporary arts education.

For the past three years the Bridget Riley Art Foundation at the British Museum has worked with over 1,000 university art students to revive and interrogate the value of drawing from drawing as a contemporary research method. In the process of over 150 workshops we found that students who initially dismissed the practice as ‘servile copying’ began to legitimise the process with the language of translation.

Building on this qualitative research, our workshop will examine the practice of drawing from drawing through the lens of translation theory. We will discuss translation, in the manner of Walter Benjamin, as a mode of cognition that allows the translator to critically interrogate their own artistic language. Working through a series of drawing exercises from (reproductions of) drawings in the British Museum’s Prints and Drawings collection we will actively explore the question: what can translating teach the translator

Those interested in drawing from the collection can make an appointment at : www.britishmuseum.org.

The Artworks used from the British Museum collection:

1. Paul Cézanne, Study of a plaster Cupid, c.1890; graphite. 1935,0413.2

2. Bridget Riley, Untitled 2 (Circles with verticals), 1960; Pencil, blue ink and gouache paper. 2013,7097.2

3. Vincent van Gogh, La Crau from Montmajour, France, May 1888; Pen and brown ink, over black chalk and graphite. 1968,0210.20

4. Ariane Laroux, Michel Thevoz in the library of the Art Brut Museum; graphite. 2001,0929.12

5. Théodore Géricault, Study of Soldiers fighting Civilians, 1823; Graphite over red chalk. 1920,0216.3

6. Sol Lewitt, Untitled, 1971. Pen and yellow ink. 1981,1003.27

7. Antoine Watteau, Studies of a woman standing, seen from behind, a half-length woman with head in profile to left and women’s hands, 1684-1721; Red and black chalks, 1857,0228.213

8. Peter Paul Rubens, Mary Magdalene, c. 1620; Black chalk, heightened with white. 1912,1214.5; H16

9. Frank Auerbach, First drawing for ‘Ruth’, 1994; graphite. 2013,7059.48

10. Leonardo, The Virgin and Child, 1478-80; Pen and brown ink, over leadpoint, the lower sketch in leadpoint only. 1860,0616.100, P&P 100

11. Barbara Hepworth, Sculptural forms, c. 1938; ink on paper. 2008,7082.1

12. Honoré Daumier, Clown playing a drum, c.1865/7; Pen and black and grey ink, grey wash, watercolour, touches of gouache, and conté crayon, over black chalk underdrawing. 1968,0210.30

Tag: drawing