Category Archives: 2D I Foundation, G7, (AY2016/17 Sem 1)

Project 3 – Ego: Process

Hello folks! For project 3, since it is pretty personal in my opinion, I wanted to include subjects and things that I like in my recent years. Hence, I jotted down my initial ideas during my long train ride in my ideas notebook. inspirations-and-final_page_02

for the first column, i had the idea of using different parts of my body as a representation of myself. as for the second column, i had the idea of including the things that i came across with in my recent years like going to my favourite sushi bar, reading a boring harry potter book, playing touch rugby or being introduced to cosmetics. the last column would be about results and outcomes from the subjects mentioned in the previous columns. although these were the ideas, i didn’t use all of them eventually and had some changes here and there.

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so i get on with work like doing these drawings during the initial stages for this project. as for the reason for the idea of minimal drawing, i’ll mention it later! so after i’m done with the drawings, i scanned them in the computer and basically painted over my drawings and tried to be align to the flat-design/ vector style that i was going to aim for in the first place!

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During my research for colour schemes, I chanced upon Malika Favre‘s works and I was intrigued by the choice of colours which I thought was super charismatic. There is somehow a “strong” vibe from her work, totally not dainty and soft which was exactly what I wanted to try for this project. Looking more into her work, I love her style of Gestalt and the use of negative space to form the shape of subjects in her illustrations which I thought was super clever but hard to compose at the same time.

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Since I was also looking into a more vector-centred and flat illustration, I researched into Hey’s work which is also very simple and minimalistic at the same time.

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This is really random. Once, I was on my way back home listening to the music of this particular singer above. I saw the border around the album cover and I really liked how it gave a vintage vibe around the design itself. I immediately thought of using that idea for my works, just somehow, in one of the rows.

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For the first row, I wanted to portray my thoughts when I am feeling hungry which is pretty common nowadays. But there’s always a contradictory – the urge to eat whenever I think about raw sashimi in between the rice rolls and the irk of eating them whenever I think of how I always go out of control eating them which could lead to a gain in weight.  Also, I wanted to use the idea of the vintage border which I mentioned earlier so I put it in this particular row! Also, the weighing scale over there is inspired by Hey. So there you have it, the focus on the red lips, representing the urge to eat, my favourite food, and a weighing scale.

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As for the second row, I wanted to portray my feelings whenever I get on field. The first illustration is again, another part of my body and I’ve tried using Gestalt this time to create the shape of a hand. The setting would be a rugby field and the last illustration would illustrate the feeling of ecstasy. I used pills to illustrate it since Ecstasy is also a name of a drug and thought it would be interesting to put it that way. A light blue colour is chosen as I wanted to create a bright and vibrant look for this particular row.

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Again emphasizing on negative space for illustration, I tried to create shapes of a pug and lipsticks. The pug represents how I perceive myself in the past recent years – not appealing, just like how i see a pug as. The lipsticks represent the world of cosmetics which I was introduced to just this year and that eventually led to vanity which is represented by the women with lipsticks in the last illustration! I thought baby pink would be a cute colour to represent femininity as well.

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As for the last row, i wanted to portray a more spiritual side of me. The first illustration means ‘Soul”. A soul shouldn’t only belong to your head, your heart or just some parts of your body but as a whole, which explains the body illustration.  The setting would be inner peace which is always represented by a picture of a buddha. The last illustration would mean zen and is represented by the chinese translation of it to just give an oriental feel. Black is chosen to be the background as it creates a calm feeling in this case.

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In order to make it my own, the texts below the illustrations are all hand-written (just like the one above)!

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Couldn’t get the actual file to be uploaded due to huge file size so i screenshot it (which explains bluriness) .

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There you have it, that’s project Ego by yours truly.

 

 

Project 2 – Forrest Gump: Ideas and Process

Hello all. For this project, I have taken some reference from the move, Alice Through The Looking Glass for my quotes. The four quotes are:

“I knew who I was this morning, but I’ve changed a few times since then.”, “Where am I?”, “You cannot escape time.” and “He stuck us all at one literal tea time.”

Since this movie is sort of a twisted version from the original story, I thought that it would be interesting to have a twist to my project as well. Instead to using the vintage and western concept, I have decided to use some Chinese references to my images. It all started when I gathered some inspiration from a professional chinese performance I saw in China once. There is a specific name to it and it is called “變臉”. Basically, it consists of a performer who usually wears a traditional chinese costume and with a swift action of his hand, he is able to change his mask on his face.

To give a clearer picture, here is a video of how it is like.

I thought that the idea of changing his masks is like changing different sides to him, which I thought was pretty relevant to my quote, “I knew who I was this morning, but I’ve changed a few times since then.” Hence, this kick started the Chinese concept to my project.

I’ve chosen the design aligned to the quote mentioned above for the totebag. It was really interesting as to how we coated our silk screens and imprint our designs on it such that we can print it on bags or on paper.

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Trying it out on paper first! photo-15-10-16-2-10-37-pm Attempts 1 and 2.

The other quote from the movie like  “He stuck us all at one literal tea time.” reminds me of someone who has a dictator-like quality to him and someone who has the authority to order peasants around and whatnot. Hence, aligned to the Chinese concept again, I thought of using images of emperors or kings, just basically individuals who had power during the olden days in China. Other images used would be anything related to royalty or being majestic.

The third quote would be “Where am I?”. This quote to me is a representation of entering into the dimension one is not sure of. In the original movie of Alice in the Wonderland or any renditions of it, there will this very iconic scene of a long table with a very generous amount of food, sweets, and desserts. I can’t really find a picture of it but I found an imitation of it in an MV of  a song called “Twenty-three” by IU. This MV also follows the concept of Alice in the Wonderland as well.

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Source from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42Gtm4-Ax2U.

I feel that there is something fantasy-like when it comes this, like entering into a magical world with food that you’re not sure where they’re from but they all seem very appealing at the same time. Hence I decided to use this concept to the quote. Just that I added a twist to it by separating it into 2 styles – Chinese and European to add a little puzzlement and confusion in the design itself. Since that is what the quote is all about.

I have another design to the same quote of “Where am I?” This time I wanted to add a mythical creature to my designs since this quote is, as I mentioned, very fantasy-like to me. Hence, aligned to the chinese concept yet again, I used the picture of a dragon. This was also inspired by Studio Ghibli film of “Spirited Away” as they have the characters of dragons as well.

Source from: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/462322717974213615/

The last quote will be “You cannot escape time.” When I read this quote it feels like there’s a very monster-like characteristic to the subject of time. Like a monster that catches you and you’ll be engulfed by it. I decided to design this with an antique clock as the subject, giving a mysterious vibe to it accompanied by the entrance gates of a temple as I felt that it gives a very authoritative and majestic quality to the clock itself.

So there you go! My ideas to the designs themselves.

Project 1: My Line is Emo

Hello! For this project, I’ve tried a few techniques. The first one would be monoprinting which contributed significantly in creating the lines. They were produced digitally after scanning the prints.

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After scanning the prints, they look like these! The trashbag seen above made the print shown in the picture below (on the top right corner).

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other prints are created by taping scotch tape (for the print seen on the bottom right), using crushed paper (print seen on top tight in second photo), thread gauze and others!

after scanning in, these are the products!

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The photo labelled 08 001 above reminded me of Ed Moses’ Rose screen he created in 1963 which inspired me to edit the picture such that it is in a repetitive pattern. I will mention about this later in the post!

As for the digital prints, they’ll look like these after editing.

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Other than the monoprints, this is one of the mark making tool that i’ve used to create more textures. a sponge wrapped with a cotton gauze.

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The texture below is done by pivoting the sponge about a point in the middle of the paper.

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Another mark making tool I used is by bundling 2 roses together but the effect done by the petals wasn’t as nice as expected.

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I’ve also tried some automatic techniques. The first one would be fumage art.

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But I find that the effect created by the fumes isn’t as “free-spirited” and does not give off the “unrestricted” feeling that I’ve expected. Hence, I didn’t use any fumage art for my project but it was worth the try!

Next, I was inspired by chromatography, which is usually done in science experiments but the effect created by the movement of the water turned out to be quite nice.

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this is taken from www.lifeofplant.blogspot.com

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Another method I’ve adopted is Decalcomania. Decalcomania, from the French décalcomanie, is the technique of placing paint between two sheets of paper or between paper and some other material and pressing down and spreading the paint. This produces a random pattern over which the artist has no control. The term originates from the French word, “décalguer”, which means to transfer. I dabbed black and silver paint on one side of the line and folded the paper into half such that that they created symmetrical patterns. Using the colour silver for this piece, I hope to bring out the emotion of passion.

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taken from http://art-design-glossary.musabi.ac.jp/decalcomania/

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Next, I’ve seen some of Jackson Pollock’s works, which involve splattering of paint and i really like this technique as well. I feel that this technique gives off attitude and can have some potential in expressing some positive feelings so I decided to give it a try! I’ve researched about him and will mention about him more below in this post.
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Using somehow the same method as decalcomania by folding the paper into half, these ambiguous marks are created by dipping a thread into black paint and maneuvering it around while pressed between the folded paper.

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I’ve tried out different techniques that involve blotches of paint that gave ambiguous shapes. Hence, i decided to do some drawings that involve straight lines as well to have some definition in my work. I had some inspiration to create the lines with black paper, going with the astronomy theme. As for the second piece, I have purposely created a pattern with an ample amount of space, giving a sense of emptiness, misery or dejection.

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After creating some lines, i felt that many of the lines I’ve created seemed to have more potential in carrying out emotions such as anger, frustration or dismay. Hence, I decided to hand-draw some more pieces which can show positive feelings. The first piece below was inspired by Indian henna painting. Since henna painting always involves patterns which are very full and “fruitful”, i feel that i can relate that particular strip shown below to “contentment”. The second one was inspired by oriental japanese drawings which usually give off very strong vibes to them, and i thought that those drawings can signify “infuriated”, something along that line.

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i tried out 2 different kinds of waves and see which one has more impact in expressing a strong and rigid emotion.

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also, i was thinking how i could express feelings towards being scared or horror with the techniques I’ve tried. but i realised one good mark making tool would be a name chop that I’ve bought from china. We all humans are afraid of things we are not familiar with. since we are not familiar with ancient chinese words carved on the chop as well, i thought  the marks would create a horror vibe with black ink. (as shown in the last line in the photo below)

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This is the end result!

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Hence, as for works that are hand-drawn, they will look like these.

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Artists Reference

When creating these lines, I’ve taken some reference from artists that have created works which I understand from an emotional point of view and that their works have probably inspired me to recreate pieces which are similar to theirs. As mentioned, one of the artists that have made some impact on me would be Jackson Pollock. He is an American Painter and a major figure in abstract expressions.

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taken from https://remodernreview.wordpress.com/tag/jackson-pollock/

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taken from http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/57.92/

The piece above called the Autumn Rhythm especially inspired me to try out his unique style of drip painting. He once said this line. “When I am in my painting, I’m not aware of what I’m doing. It is only after a sort of ‘get acquainted’ period that I see what I have been about. I have no fear of making changes, destroying the image, etc., because the painting has a life of its own.”

I feel that from what he mentioned and the technique that he favours, this way of creating works by instinct and without caring too much of the end outcome is also kind of a beauty that I would like to try in my work as well.

Another artist reference would be Ed Moses.

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taken from http://alchetron.com/Ed-Moses-(artist)-269782-W

From what I have mentioned earlier, Ed Moses created a work called Rose Screen which actually influenced me to edit the specific monoprint in a way which was similar to his piece. It seemed to consist of repetitive white patterns on the graphite work, very similar to the dark shade on the monoprint with stretches of white.

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taken from https://unframed.lacma.org/2015/05/08/weekend-lacma

While artists developed a mature style, Moses has managed to resist any stylized approach and remain more experimental, playing to his curiosities by moving past what he already knows. This particular idea of his influenced me to try out the different automatic techniques that I have heard of, although I have not actually decided to utilise all of the works created for the final pieces.

Another artist that I have referenced from is Katsushika Hokusai. I had the idea to include a few oriental pieces, resulting in lines made from the chop and the line that consists of “oriental-looking” waves. I wanted to do something related to waves because I feel that the motion of water gave off a very strong and rigid vibe. I happened to chance upon Great Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai and decided to give it a try to replicate the waves but with my own style.

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taken from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Wave_off_Kanagawa

With that, I shall end of this long post.