Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Creating a bold sign

20/06/16

Looking back at my earlier idea to use a bold pattern, I like the idea of creating a sign that looks different depending on where you stand, and only makes a full picture when stood in a certain place, much like the sign at the Nottingham Contemporary:

I like this because it gives some flexibility in terms of where the sign could be, and isn't a conventional sign. 

After thinking about this, I though it would be best if the sign were brightly coloured and bold, and because the sign at the Nottingham Contemporary was somewhat an illusion, the artist Bridget Riley came to mind.

Bridget Riley:

Bridget Riley is a British artist who first started studying at the royal college of art from 1952 to 1955. She first started painting figures in a semi-impressionist manner, them moved on to Pointillism, painting mainly landscapes, and in 1960's, developed her own style of Op Art.

Op Art:

Op Art, also know as Optical Art, is a style of visual art that uses optical illusions. Op Art i s abstract, with many better known pieces done in black and white. Typically, they give the viewer an impression of movement.

Another Artist that came to mind was KAWS, who's paintings are especially bold and brightly coloured, and to me, are similar to graffiti, and who also uses his own adaption of a lot of well known characters.

KAWS:

Brian Donnelly, professionally known as KAWS, is a New York based designer of limited edition toys and clothing. He briefly worked for Disney as a freelance animator painting backgrounds.

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Sculpture Ideas

13/06/16

Going back to sculpture and my FMP theme of using found items, I want to try something similar to make a unique sign, or a small machete to show how it would look. 

The found items I would use would be something that is very easy obtainable, such as things you see lying around most days, like bottles, plant pots and bricks, as well as any similar items.

The idea behind this is to use something that would else wise be considered rubbish and recycle it, and to give it a purpose, rather than it just littering the environment.

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Colour Experimentation

13/06/16

Within the college building entrance, we were given the task to create a piece that could be used for posters to promote the end of year exhibition. Since this also fits in with what I am doing, I experimented with different ways of applying paint in a manner that was more controlled than just throwing paint bombs at the wall. 

Originally, the piece was started by the first years of the art department and was to be built on top of by both the year two's and the foundations because of the lack of composition.

The piece they had done was especially dark, so our task was to not only add some composition, but to lighten it as well. And because there were a lot of gaps where there was no colour, we also had to fill them in more.

The main colours that we used were white and purple, with a few other colours mixed in.

At first I started applying the paint by spraying it straight from the bottle in arches, after that, I started experimenting with straight edges, and seeing how pouring paint onto something and then removing the object would look. I used a mixture of white paint and sand for one of the experiments, and another of just watered down white paint. 

After a while, the colours of other paints that were already on the wall started to seep into the white paint and turn it a different colour.

After trying this technique, I had a lot of paint left over on my hands, so I flicked it on the wall. I really liked the effect, so I started doing this to fill any darker areas or empty areas.

Eventually this turned into handfuls of paint, which were applied more in some places than others, and after that, we did the same with purple paint.

Lastly I went in with some orange paint to add in more colour.

My favourite part of the piece is where there is more white paint in one area than in the others, mainly because the other colours that were already on the wall had started to melt into the white and give it a nice watercolour affect. The old piece is still visible through the heavily layered on white. This exposure makes it obvious that we were building on top of something.

If I were to do tis again, I would experiment more with other colours and ways to apply the colours, and would also experiment with applying other materials, such as plaster, more sand, and paper mixed with glue and water.

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Idea Development

13/06/16

Following on with my idea to have text within the fan, I thought about having the font within a spherical cage, in which the text would be connected at the top so that the weather could move the font around. The cage would also be brightly coloured and would have to be of a size so that the font could be seen within the cage.

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Idea Development

13/06/15

While I was thinking about moving away from making a sculpture sign and more towards making a 2D poser, I wanted to make something that still had texture and 3D elements on it. 

Taking some experimentation I did using paint bombs and colour, I wanted to incorporate that onto a 2D sign, but also wanted to include some 3D materials.

Recently we were experimenting with late scale 'murals' to decorate the building in time for the exhibition that we will be holding at the end of the year. To do so we were making small paint bombs (Clingfilm filled with paint) and throwing it at the wall. I like using the idea for a sign because while you can choose the colours you use, the outcome would look different every time. This technique would give me the colour I want, and I could use a similar technique to add on different textures and materials.

Moving more towards 3D, and keeping my theme of using found items, I thought about using a neon pink painted fan cover as a base, and adding acrylic text in the middle, but so that it is only sightly attached so that it looks like it isn't attached at all.

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Initial Ideas

07/06/16

My initial idea was based off of the work created by an artist called Claes Oldenberg, who was well known for creating a sculpture of an ice cream that was placed on top of the corner of a building. I wanted to continue using bright colours, so I thought about using sweets, specifically lolly pops. 

The place I looked at putting the sign was at the top of the driveway where the road went in three different directions. I wanted to place the sign on the corner of two of the different roads that would lead towards the car park for the arts building

The colours I chose to use were bright and warm colours so that they would stand out against the green of the plants in summer and against the browns in winter.

I wanted the sign to be reasonably big, but not too big because I wanted the colours to catch peoples eye, not the size. The text would go over the top of the orange.

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Signage for the building

6/06/16

This project is an extension of Unit 76, in which we develop ideas and experiment with different ideas to produce an outcome. This extension of the project is to create sign postage that will draw more attention to the arts buildings at our college in a creative manner.

My start point  for this project is to create something using work I have made and am developing for my FMP rather than create a small poster that will be largely ignored.

My opinion on the poster is that it is too crowded, and the bright colours of the background use blend together with the font they chose to use, as well as the colours within the font. The illustrations also stand out as garish because they don't follow any theme of colour and clash with the background. The necessary information like the date of the festival and the place is hardly noticeable because of the placement of it and the size, but also because of the bold font used, which from a distance isn't distinguishable as text, but looks more like a black line. I also dislike the bold colours clashing against a black and white logo for one of the bands, as well as the college logo at the top left corner which has been left as the White font and logo within a red box. 

Overall, I feel as though the poster lacks reference, and is too crowded by bright colours and doesn't have enough spacing to fit in the necessary information.

I want to steer clear of creating something like this, as it is, for a start, too small, but is also too unclear to use as a reference to create signage for a building, which needs to be easily understood. 

I want to create my signs whilst incorporating colour and sculpture.

The colours I wish to use will be bright and very eye catching, such as the kind of colours you find within the work created by artists such as Will Kendrick, Franz West and Jackson Pollock.

Will Kendrick:

Franz West:

Jackson Pollock:

As well as using a lot of bright colours, continuing on with my FMP theme of fine art, I want to create sculptures that either act as the sign, or that have writing on them to point people in the right direction. The artists I am looking at for the sculptures are Claes Oldenberg, Julianna Cerqueira Liete, Rachel Harrison and KAWS.

Claes Oldenberg:

Julianna Cerqueira Liete:

Rachel Harrison:

KAWS:

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Locations

07/06/16

Because of where the creative arts buildings stand, the signage needs to be in a place where you can obviously follow it, but so that you can also see the signs as you are walking up to the building sites. I took some images and videos of what is visible as you walk up to the building site and specifically the art building. 

Some of the buildings in the area are listed, meaning that they cannot be touched or changed because they are protected, so painting the actual buildings wouldn't be possible.

As you walk into the area that the building entrances are in, there is a green gate with a tree in front of it which could be used to out some signage on.

As you walk up to the building site, you can see the music building, which is higher above the actual road, and isn't actually fully visible until you reach a certain point. There is a lot of grass space that could be used

There is a small driveway leading up to the building site that we may be able to paint on, specifically on the kerbstone or speed bumps.

When you actually get into the building site, the driveway leads either up to a carpark, up towards the childcare centre, or back around to lead onto the main road. Because of how it is laid out there are numerous places that could be used to place signage.

These two videos show the walk up to the buildings and what you can see on the walk up.

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Patterns and Structure

06/06/16

Continuing with my theme of bright colours and Fine Art, as well as looking at creating just sculpture pieces, I want to experiment with paintings and pattern making. 

I especially like the idea of using houndstooth and incorporating bright colours into it, moving away from the typical and traditional black and white houndstooth.

I like the idea of using a bright coloured pattern to create a sigh that isn't very obvious, but that catches people's attention, and I like the idea of placing it as something to lead people somewhere like arrows in roads

I feel like this sort of idea would be best shown if painted into something oh wouldn't usually pay attention to, such as the kirb stone and speed bumps on the driveway that lead up towards the creative arts buildings.

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Generating Fine Art Ideas

Final designs

23/05/16

My designs were all based off of the actor, Donald Pleasance, who was born in Worksop. I chose to create designs based off of three of the films that he had played a main character. The films I chose to do were Dracula, James Bond, and Halloween.

For the Dracula designs, I used a mixture of Graphics and fine art to create something that almost mimicked the film poster. 

I had chosen specific images of the actor and had edited them so that they fit in with the style of the design, as well as created some paintings that I could then edit in Photoshop to add in to the design. 

To create the clouds that I would put behind the design I chose a specific page from the internet that different colours in it and set about making a watercolour and pastel version. 

To create this, I made a simple background using watercolours which only had the shapes I needed, and then I started walking over the top of it once it had tried with pastel, which I slowly built up with different colours. 

Once I had finished the design, I then scanned it so that I could edit it within Photoshop. I mainly focused on making the course more vibrant and darker.

to put all of the images into the shape of the postbox, I used a clipping mask after placing everything where I wanted it.

Because the design would only fill the front of the post box, it was suggested to me to make a design that would wrap around the entirety of the postbox, rather than having the focus in one place.

I kept the design the same for the dracula postbox, but made it bigger.

The next design was the James Bond design, which was the design that I had planned the most. I wanted to use an image of pleasance as people would remember him (with his cat) and also wanted to use the very well known James Bond opening with the gun barrel.

For the image of the actor, I changed the contest and brightness and decreased the saturation to get it to a stencil like stage which I could then draw from and later scan in, but I was more fond of using the digital image than a drawing, as I wanted it to be recognisable.

Because the gun barrel opening had the colour red in it, I felt like it would work well, since a postbox is known for the 'pillbox red' shade.

Once again, this design was based solely in the centre of the postbox, and so would only have the image on one part, leaving the rest blank, so I started to make a design that would wrap around the entire postbox.

Once again, I just used the same design, but slightly different.

After making this design, I realised that the colour of the image of the actor didn't match with the colour of the background, and while I liked the effect, I decided to see what it would look like if it were the same colour. 

To do this, I took the fully saturated image, adjusted the curves, contrast and brightness, and added a greyish blue hue to it so that it matched the background more. I like this design more because it seems more put together.

Lastly, I started working on a design for the Halloween film. Because this film was a horror, I had to be aware of the content I was putting on the design, and so I stuck to the logo and the poster image, as well as an edited image of the actor so it fit in more with the design.

Because of the shape of the poster image, it was very difficult to make the design work, mainly because so much space was taken up by the design that there wasn't enough space to fully separate the different components of the design.

After this, I started designing a full wrap, but this time, I only used the poster image to see how it would look alone with just the logo.

I liked these designs much more, but I was conscious that because it lacked the image of the actor, it became less obvious as to why it might have been linked to Worksop. 

Once again I tried to incorporate an image of the actor into the design, but even with much more space to use, the design was still too cramped, and if the images were taller, there would be too much blank space. 

The halloween design was the weakest of my designs.

As an extra, I decided to create a design with three images of the actor from the three films that I had based a postbox on. While I didn't like the design, I liked the idea.

I disliked the design because each image of the actor was different colour, however I was told that while they are all different colours, they all still fit into the postbox design because of some element, such as the colours of the image of the clouds, or the darker tones within the design.

Overall, I feel as though this project went well, considering it was a shorter project than usual, however I feel that I couldn't developed my designs a lot more had I produced more sketches and planned each design a little more, or tried variations of the design.