RESEARCH
I felt a little stuck after doing many experiments with no obvious direction. After doing research on 8 artists like Kika Karadi and Kadar Brock, it gave me inspiration and the direction of how I’d like my emotions to look like.
It also gave techniques that I could use in my lines. For example, sublimation (melting of materials), collage, piercing, layering paint and playing with negative space.
Below is a link to my research. More detailed annotations can be found in my Journal.
TECHNIQUES & EXPERIMENTS
From the research I gathered all the techniques I wanted to try to use in my emotions. And I experiment on them.
- Stencil-like compositions – using tape, cardboard. Paints the stencil with black ink and uses it as a stamp(like monoprinting)
INSPIRED BY: Kika Karadi
This technique is sharply felt, puzzling and striking to look at.
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- Layers of thick paint. Then do scraping, puncturing and slicing. “wiped paint”
INSPIRED BY: Kadar Brock
- Curves, Archs, Swirls/Geometry + Negative Space
INSPIRED BY: Davide Balliano & Robert Holyhead
This technique portrays the concept of time and stillness. And the negative space gives a fragmented feeling.
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- Collaged Elements. For this, I collaged a white net into the painting. I twisted it, painted it black and I added dry shampoo to see what effect is gives.
INSPIRED BY: Molly Zuckerman Hartung
This technique is refreshing to look at.
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- Sublimation of Elements (Artist used Oil Slick but it was hard to get. So I melted Oil Pastels)
INSPIRED BY: Frank Ammerlaan
This technique is supposed to look psychedelic and magical.
- Eroded Swatches of Colour (I painted eroded ink on bandages)
INSPIRED BY: Liam Everett
This technique gives the whole look a very emotive vibe.
DEVELOPMENT
After experimenting and getting to know what works and what doesn’t, I came up with a step by step development on how I arrived at each emotion and why. Here are some of them.
CONCLUSION
I realised I should have done my research from the start of the assignment to give me better direction and for inspiration. I also think that I should be more organized in my process and in presenting my process in my journal because it would be less confusing for me to reflect on in the later part. It would also be easier for me to refer back on to think on what my next steps would be.
As for the assignment itself, I feel that the being abstract is a hard thing to do especially when you have intentions of making the person feel something. What I feel may not be what the other person might be feeling. And both parties might not visually agree on how an emotion would look like.
In this assignment I realised it is not about how different your emotions look from others or being unique. Or coming up with the most unique technique to give off a unique visual. It is all about being relatable. As long as the audience does not relate to your work, it is less likeable and less likely for the person to feel an emotion from your work.
In the end the most relatable work would attract most of us because we all feel something when we see it. And that’s a successful work.
But I think that it is important that we don’t stop from expressing what we feel inside even if it means not being understood at first glance. It just represents who we are inside.
