gallery 3/4 Scottish National Gallery

Gallery 1/2

As a group final visit we when to the Edinburgh Gallery of Modern Art.

Here is my thoughts and indeed my own feelings on the place and the artworks I seen.....

I must add that I'm conscious of my own awareness and the JUDGEMENT I unfortunately express in these times of viewing and learning. Firstly, my thoughts and  feelings hold no right or wrong in the bigger picture of feelings and at the time it was very much a sense of  MYSELF as I wandered around laying judgement down. Who I'm I to judge right!!

As a group I thought we would wander as a whole, discussing our thoughts or interests of the works we were about to see, looking back I'm glad it wasn't the case. I'm glad because while seeing I realised the SELF within me and I feel this can only add to the knowledge and understanding of one's own self......

Norah Neilson Gray 
Mother and Child



For me this work was the first work that I enjoyed viewing. It was different in the way it used tone and shadow to create the final work.. Mother and child of old were mostly, from my point of view religious and of an renaissance time and period. This contrast in colour, light and tone gave it anew feel without losing the sentimentally of the bond between mother and child.

Beatrice Huntington
Th models Artist

This one was another I could appreciate because of the closeness to cubism (I think) and the palette of colour. Its composition and the way her eyes are gazing beyond..

Sounds a little weird but I felt that while I was looking at her, she was kind of inviting me to see the bigger picture.......What is the bigger picture? Are we really seeing or do we just think we know something because we view it?

Colour need I say more;! Again another contrast in colour...

This artwork I didn't get or relate to... It said that the piece was to represent the sexually between the male and female form....to me it just looked like a headless chicken from something out of angry birds.....a peg or god knows .....

On the way around I wrote down my feelings and thoughts.  I was told off for taking photo's in this part of the gallery as some of the works were from a private collection.

I had felt that the work of Joan Miro, Head of a Calalan Peasant  and most of her works didn't do anything for me.  I had however wondered about the meaning of the set outlines that you can see through the translucent wash of blue oil paint.




I had wrote at one point that I didn't get the more abstract stuff and how I didn't enjoy viewing this type of work as it seemed to take up to much energy and I couldn't be bothered analysing it to the point of understanding it.

Something I had thought about on the way around was the contrast in colour and the bold shapes. The likeness of male and female identity. Something about the intensiveness of metallic colours, gold and bronze for instance.

Phoebe Anna Traquair painted in enamel in the work called 'The Awakening'  I did like the vibrate colours and warmth and happiness reflected on this.



Frottage and Grattage

Grattage is a surrealist painting technique that involves laying a canvas prepared with a layer of oil paint over a textured object and then scraping the paint off to create an interesting and unexpected surface.

This excites me and I seem to enjoy working in mixed media. My mind is so full all the time that I feel the mixed media represents the velocity and speed of my mapping in abundance. The surrealist colleges I did like viewing. Picasso I haven't spoke of and while his work was there, and bloody good all the same I do like the idea of mixing monoprints /etchings with grattage. I do think that to work as an artist at this time must of been full of fun, mischief and creative intention,

I have been trying to slow my thoughts and ideas down, but maybe I should stop living in judgement of myself and others and just create. Easier said than done!
If you follow my blog over the past year of my life you will see the struggles and searching for my self, the anxiety, mental health, acceptance and in truth the limited vision I have had growing up! This course has let me, look beyond myself and enter a surreal virtual vortex.

So now I entered the work of Surrealism...........

Surreal Encounters

I will explain my own surreal encounter. While sitting in the cafe, having my Carrot and Coriander soup, I sat next to two females dining.
I wrote down my thoughts here,  as I reviewed my time at the gallery thus far

Shut the fuck up was what I wrote, Shut up from talking you mundane pair of fuck up's! God give me strength to endure this trash and piss, I THIS , I THAT, ME,ME,ME!!
The two women in they fancy get up, in all honestly with nothing interesting to say!! I'd rather be in my own mind, that pretend to exist in a world than exists in they pretentious world. I would of liked to create an image of them sitting here right now!!  BUT stop that's me judging! Yeah the conversation was boring and I do think they were talking to be heard or they liked the sound of thy own voices! But they also may have been talking crap to forget about something more worrying for them or to forget! The truth is I don't know, yet without realising I was happy to judge or show my annoyance in words! Its hard not to judge!

Surreal indeed. I felt a moment of overwhelming happiness! understanding in my mind! I worry that I have some kind mental illness with anxiety or that I'm weak. In truth I'm stronger than many as I know my weakness and I endure my own need for growth and understanding! Some people never have to look or care about one's own self the way I do.......When you look at the history of great artist's many have troubles! While I can't compare myself to them in greatness of work I can relate to passion and need to be more. A higher power or tranquil placid existence. I can connect with surrealism because of all this.

Max Ernst

Pietà or Revolution by Night



The painting replaces the traditional scene of Mary clasping the body of Christ with an image of the artist himself, held by his father. A staunch Catholic, Ernst's father had denounced his son's work

I liked the understanding and feeling the image gave me, the colours for me speak with the emotions, I also liked the outline of the hands holding the figure. The shadows that is cast adds to the realism of the work. Is it about acceptance or more of a defiance against his father and his own beliefs.

Salvador Dali

Espangne


Well what can I say! I loved viewing this work, The viewpoint and set up of the women/scene is incredible, I belief the painting was about the Spanish Civil War and the women was to be the ghost of mother Spain viewing the war and destruction. It was in truth one of the best works I've seen that really captured or questioned what I was seeing before me.

Dali couple with the head full of clouds was another of Dali's works I liked! It was fresh and the set up was one of fun yet upon viewing it I sensed loneliness or wanting. Some kind of abandonment. Maybe because of the detachment of the couple, the dark clouds and the open desert.




Impressions of Africa




The self portrait style of this work was and interesting way of working. Putting himself in the scene, along with memories of African he'd had without even being there. His hand is a good example of foreshortening and I like the collage type feel to the work. again I was drawn to the mixed media. The colours on this work were so intense and it had a 3 dimensional feel to it.

I have been questioning the details of what makes a good artist and have felt that while I can never produce a work at the moment for public consumption, The one thing that all artist have is the ability to actually paint..... I wonder if I will ever will be able to paint a work to be proud of! I'm learning and I realise that, but I never do any painting.  I need to draw more and also think about the relationship of colours together and the feelings they can create! I really do think that I need a strong solid base so that in the future my works can be the best they can be and I have the knowledge and understanding to back my work up.  Does this comes with time! At 33 do I have time? Then do I really wanna do art or do I want to go down a different route, fashion, interiors and furniture design.....New technology excites me, like the fact I was reading about science is taking the cocoons and threads of the silk worms and creating pins that can be put into bones to aid fractures. furniture and technology together. Amazing stuff, but I need to come back to reality.  For now I will have to just keep expanding my knowledge. Im in no hurry really! (sorry when off on some kind of path there)


Magritte - Real


So life like. The work for me again was another talent, as to the meaning I'm unsure.  The composition I thought took you into the picture. Interesting and I like the light and contrast of the wall in the mirror.

Wilhelmina Barns-Graham

Wilhelmina Barns-Graham was born in 1912 in St Andrews, Fife. She studied at Edinburgh College of Art from 1931 and became a pioneer of British Abstraction.

Barns-Graham made prints at intervals throughout her career, producing just over 100 prints between the early 1940s and her death in 2004. However it was in the last decade of her long, varied and prolific career that printmaking techniques became integral to her practice. She collaborated with master printmakers to investigate new techniques, but focused latterly on screen printing as her preferred printing medium.

 

For these I wrote my interest in the screen prints and the colour relationship and the feelings they can express.




This was a work called Scorpio 1.....This excited me. The technique is called Sugar Lift Ectching on Aquatint paper, this creates a brush mark effect. For me I started thinking of the possibilities that could be used to crate work with this effect. That and the frottage. The colours and set up. Different pieces together to make a whole. Cubist or 3 dimensional....I have spoke of the wanting to create the likeness of nature, the colours and textures. All of these are things I will intend to study more into in the months to come!

This type of abstract art again was the first time I actually felt a liking for the bold shapes and lines that can come for abstract work.

yr 3 level 2 presentations

YR 3 level 2

The end of year exhibition for the level 3.

While listening to the presentation from the Level 3's I forgot to take photos of the students work, so have decided to use a brief description of works and my thoughts.   Either from my notes or from memory!

Charlotte Miller

Cosmos - blue  - bolt - large - confident - engaging - atoms - visual - persuasion - factual - belief - exploration - excitement - opinion - informative - explanatory - planet - space - searching - black hole - expressive - cox - research - warboy - turnbull - doig - inspired - start - middle -end - movement - £££ - canvas - colour - mix - blur - bright - time - expression .

Charlotte kept good eye contact, had shown she had researched her work. She also talked about her learning along the way which as her audience were students was in keeping and appropriate. This kept her talk interesting as she did her best to give us facts along the way...         Did you know??

   She talked of how she was inspired by a painting by Peter Doig and how this in turn had left her wanting to know more.  For me her talk gave a great sense of passion, passion for what she had been doing and for learning.  I will remember her talk and her work because of the way she spoke with confidence, engaged the audience and expressed her work. With time I think Charlotte's strengths for speaking it larger groups will grow and because she is a student still I felt her presentation was well a little shaky but still strong. Overall, a good expressive presentation.

Morgan Robinson

TIME - dark - negative - images - photography - children - play - fun - flash - light - energy - berton - acerate - small - lack - think - unsure - descriptive - set up - acceptance

Morgan's talk was in itself a strong enough talk but she herself expressed her regret of the final execution of the work, like scale and naming of the work. She had noticed how with the development maybe renaming would of be appropriate for the end exhibition.
Morgan could of looked at the scale and set up of the work in the place intended and then worked along with that to quickly make any last minute adjustments. This didn't take away from the quality of the work she had produced, I just felt it could of been more. By researching or looking at installation work she could of maybe had a stronger outcome. She had known this while doing her talk and for me I feel she should learn from the negatives and grow from the positives she had shown.

Some things to consider (for all of us) were Scale - Planning - adjustments - reference.

Likes - good images - understanding - acknowledgment - talk - expression - idea.

I did like her talk as I thought she showed knowledge in the field she was interested in, like talking about shutter speed and adjusting it to give the image a more energetic feel. The printing onto acetate I also didn't realise was possible and was an interesting factual point of how and why this happened.



Ivy Geo

black - white - positive vs negative - photography - photo-gram - light - shine - dark - room - tone - research - development - fun - engaging - process - detail - perseverance - determination - example - progression - strong - different - £££ - derges - neusass -

Ivy's talk she had decided to hold up and talk through her sketch book, this was a good way of showing us her progress, learning and understanding. (us) being students I thought this was a good and insightful way to present her work. It gave her prop's to talk about and also a sense of how she learnt along the way. This is another talk I will remember because of the personal touches she had expressed and talked about. But also her passion and wanting to achieve a good image. Her expression when talking about the senses and how working it a dark environment had also gave her another level of process and detail. Setting her sense's alive in the dark. Her work I feel could be progressed into an installation and an interactive work...this I think excited me as I could see growth for her and her work.  Ivy's work in general is very good, strong and delicate. I feel her talk showed us a level of determination and passion that should be required all this stage, but also how a work can progress along the way.

James Stewart

box - photography - black - white - poverty - interesting - viewpoint - thinking- pattern - tone - interior - brick - tiles - royal - grand - eerie - development - personal

While James seemed a little shy I could tell from his talk that he had researched his work well. Talking about the passion and inspiration from the 1940's and the poverty back in these days. He reference photographer Bill Brandt's photography which I could sense a similarly from mainly because of the time period mentioned and black and white images. His work I think he should of been more confident about because it was good. It worked! He had thought about the meaning and shapes, the once forgetton wealthy building now derelict and now in disrepair. His work was neat with a white bordering, which wasn't needed as the disrepair and old style could of been portrayed and depicted out by thinking of a less uniformed outlook. Overall I think James did well and showed his working. Just needs to find his confidence more!

Catherine Bird

childhood - growing - memories - environment - block - repetition - repeat - events - colour - book - cards - perseverance - dedication - purpose - personal - narrative - story - illustration.

For me Catherine's build up of decoupage shown perseverance and control. This kind of work will need planning and time so this shows her strength's. Her work displayed a narrative next to it, reading this along with the images worked really work. Overall, I feel she did good work and I thought about how her work being mixed matched layout had for me resembled the work of  Anthony Green's
Embassy Lodge 1990. When I had seen his work in Glasgow's Kelvingrove Gallery I had thought of how interesting the layout was and how it had gave a great viewpoint and different perspective.
I think Catherine's work could be a bigger scale work that really jumps out at you, and at the time we discussed this with her. I feel that she could also be a illustrator of children's decoupage style books. Nice work with a nice personal touch.

Kane Kennedy

soft - brutal - talk - animals - pet - food - following - passionate - planning - fact - shock - calm - cruel - centered -  effect - realisation - similar - dogs - butchery - horror - untold - heard

Dog meat trade in china, well I didn't know much regarding this issue so for me the thought of it was a little brutal. I think Kane's work was to softly and he should of shocked more. I wished he had showed how much the effect of researching this kind of stuff (watching video's, cruelty, passion and effect) had made him feel. I didn't get this from him work, it could of really effected each person on a higher level and I think if your doing this topic you need it to have an impact.  Not because he hadn't thought about the work or it was lacking anything but because for us as human's we tend to forget about or ignore the things that can effect our mortals or feelings. To get attention you need to make people think and look and sense. To add sound I felt could of gave another way of adding a personal touch of the graphic nature of the subject. Some of his facts were enough to send horror and nasty images to my mind...This would of caught everyone's senses and scared them into remembering or acting. To sign the petition as to a way of connecting to the work.

His sketches or research could of added a another level as well as temperature and smell of the environment. Overall the ground work was there but for me the  wow factor was missing because it was lacking the brute truths and his passion and effect. Very brave topic and a hard one to judge because of the nature of it. It is only my opinion and do think his work and talk was good.

These talks helped me to realise the one thing we all we as artist's or designers is passion. The talks all gave a sense of excitement and connectivity to they work. Whether you belief in the cause or the effect, the reasoning behind the work is important but not always necessarily needing to be on show.

Things to consider are 

1. layout, set up and scale
2. lighting and different times of the day or seasons etc (weather, environment, could effect the feel of the how the person is veiwing or impacted by the work)
3. intention or impact
4. audience
5. research and development processes
6. passion understand and knowledge
7. review and planning
8. don't be frightened to change it
9. think about talking and confidence (knowledge is power but how you come across is very important
10. opinion of others or a trusted person (comments from audience afterwards) 
11. incorporating technology or computer graphics to add impact (something no-one did here)