Project Updates

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For my project, i want to create a fantasy world that I would love to be in. I chose this idea because i like the thought of creating my own people, and not have to worry about whether or not they look real because they're in my mind. I also think that it's an interesting way to escape, when i make unusual paintings of faces, i feel like I'm not really thinking about what's going on around me, I'm purely focused on the world/person i've created. With this as my starting point, i think there are definitely many ways I can take this, but to start with I want to just play around with it and have fun with painting and using different materials.

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1. This was the first character I created, being heavily inspired by Dustin Bailard. I really liked the way this turned out, I used watercolour and acrylic paint for the highlights. I think what was interesting for me when making this piece was that I was thinking about how would this person fit into my world. It made me think about what their personality would be like, what they'd dress like and little things like that. I really enjoyed using watercolour because I think the way it gets absorbed by the paper gives it a really nice look overall, and it gave me the opportunity to really play with opacity.

2. This painting was another character that i created. It was again inspired by Dustin Bailard. I used acrylic paint on a canvas board. I wanted to try to push my style, which I think gave me harder edges to some of the features, which I like. Areas such as the eyes and the mouth really stand out because some of the lines aren't blended out which I think makes it have more impact. I chose unusual colours for the skin and eyes because i knew that my fantasy world wasn't going to be a normal place to be. it will be full of things that are unusual and creepy because that's what I enjoy. Whilst I painted this piece, again I was giving her some sort of personality and thinking what she'd be like. It made me think these are attributes that I would like to have. i've made them all confident, outspoken and they all have features I would like to have, like big eyes, pronounced cheekbones. I think this will help me find out what direction i'm going to take this project.

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3. I decided I wanted to work more with watercolour, because I really liked the way it was washed out and gave my characters an 'undead' look. I created this set of 3 to have all the negative features I see within myself. Not everyone is perfect, so I thought it would be interesting to show what my characters would look like when I saw them as not perfect. Interestingly, they look virtually identical to my 'perfect' ones which made me question what I was creating. The painting on the left is to represent how argumentative I can be for ridiculous reasons. I don't mean it in a serious way but I can get irritated easily at stupid things which I obviously see as a negative thing.

4. The painting on the right is to represent how I can be a bit messy at times. I try to keep up with things but I let them get messy sometimes which I absolutely hate. I think it was good for me to make this set because it actually pushed my ideas further, and I now know what I want to explore more with.

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5. These are a couple digital screen prints I made in a workshop. I thought it would be interesting to explore a different material, and I really like working with prints. I think the overall appearance to these is really interesting, I'm not quite sure what it is but they have a soft but rough texture to them. The process we used of creating the original image into a bitmap was really fun to do because I got to choose how I wanted it to look. Instead of having dots, I could have had lines which would have completely transformed the image. The first print on the left is just my image screen printed in one colour, which I personally think is my favourite. I like how simple it is, I feel like I can appreciate the individual marks more. The red and yellow prints are examples of layering my image over something already screen printed. I really like the way these turned out also, it's nice to see the way the colours overlap and slightly change with the other ink. I do feel like it slightly distracts me from the image, as I feel more focused on the pop of colour over the image itself.

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6. I decided I was going to use text within my work, to give my pieces some context. I wanted to explain the issues I had outlined with my previous set of 3, because I felt like they were just there without reason. I've moved on from the idea of creating a perfect fantasy and I'm now engaging with my audience by telling them personal things about myself. I find it so much easier to engage with people through writing instead of speaking, so I thought this would be an interesting way to get my thoughts across. I want my text to be somewhat enjoyable to read, not just me putting all my problems in it, so I want to write in a way that I'd be able to use dark humour, sarcasm and just a blunt tone. I think I need to just explore writing lots of text to find a way I'd be able to achieve this.

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7. After further research into Ralph Steadman, I really liked his graphic style of working. His free drawing style really inspired me to play around with how I was going to draw my characters. His lines aren't perfect, he's really relaxed with his materials so I decided I was going to explore with that. I also played around with how I was using text, which allowed me to develop my writing further. I also decided I was going to explore more with gender, as I had mainly focused on female characters. This actually gave me a better opportunity to talk about things men were struggling with, which was interesting for me to do. I think I will continue to talk about men and their problems,

FINAL EXHIBITION PIECES:

The picture above is a series of characters I created. The piece on the left is one of the most relaxed pieces I made. I wasn't really thinking about what I was going to make it about, I just went with it because most of my pieces are more planned and thought out. I kept it fun and really lighthearted. The piece in the middle was one of my favourite pieces that I made, I pushed more with my style and how I wanted to place the lines and colour. The text behind the character are words/issues I have with myself that I have mentioned throughout my project. I thought I'd highlight those particular words because they are the ones that bug me the most. Finally, the piece on the right is talking about issues that men have. I addressed this because I was so used to talking about my issues, I thought it would be interesting to look at what other people had issues with. I googled what issues some men had and it gave me a really detailed list, so I went through and addressed a couple of the points, one's I thought really stood out to me.

The piece below is a large canvas that is a self portrait. I kept it really graphic because I feel that suited my self portrait best. I saw this piece as a conclusion to my project, so I thought I would summarise with a silly little caption. My whole project is me complaining about myself so I thought it would be fun to spoil it and make it obvious with that statement.