Glitz and Glam

You know, half the time when I post here, I apologise for being quiet. This time, as I sit up on my bed (with a twinge in between my shoulder-blades) I'm not going to do that. Firstly, I've been working flat-out at my part-time (more like full-time during summer) job. Not only is my student loan this year a little less, but there's a chance that I may not have a job during my final year of university. The company that I'm working at will be bought out at the end of this month, so I have been working there while I still can. I'm looking on the bright side as I've had two and a half great years here and I'm sending my CV out to employers, but I'm also sad, as I really do like my workplace.

Secondly, alongside working at my job I've had a very busy and creative summer. I have a lot to tell!

This Saturday is the Tea Party Club's 5th Anniversary event down in Charing Cross, London (it's not the political sort of Tea Party, it's the frilly dress sort). As detailed in a couple of posts below, I'm going along, and have been helping out by doing a little artwork. I've now done a bit more, but this is something completely different and something I'm very excited to reveal.

If you've known me for ... uh, five years, you might remember my first A-level canvas piece, and you'll know my huge love for Gustav Klimt's work. For the pieces below, I've gone back to this way of working, of playing around with mixed media and just having some real fun with it.

Without further ado:

"Frivolity" - mixed media, 10 inches x 10 inches

"Opulence" - mixed media, 10 inches x 10 inches

"Intricacy"- mixed media, 10 inches x 10 inches

"Intricacy" was the first to be painted, and the one that I submitted for the Gothic and Lolita Bible (GLB) Illustration competition, in association with the Tea Party Club's event. On the day of the event, three winners will be picked and published in the Gothic and Lolita Bible! I leaped at the chance to enter, and given the style of the Tea Party Club and the GLB, I didn't think that my usual cartooning would suit it. I chose instead to paint something, and something crazy at that. What else to suit the fussiness and frilliness of Loli than a piece inspired by Klimt, whose paintings are the epitome of affluence?

I found that I'd enjoyed doing the piece so much, that I wanted to do at least two others. At the same time, there was a call for artists to bring some of their work to the event for an exhibition nearby. I took it as a sign that yes, I should do more, and "Frivolity" and "Opulence" were created, both of them more crazy and busy than the last! I will be bringing all three pieces, framed and ready to be shown, to the event. I'm really quite nervous, but excited.

Some of the media used are: watercolours, needle and thread (normal cotton sewing threads and metallic decorative thread), shards of mirror, Daler-Rowney Pearlescent inks, Sakura glaze pens, normal fineliner pens, and beads. I used masking fluid in-between layers of paint, and worried at many stages that the paper would buckle. It held up perfectly, though, and had no issue with being framed.

(Intricacy is upside-down, I've just noticed. Ahem.)

And, because I feel I should give them a shout-out: PictureLizard is who I bought the frames from. They may be only clip-frames, but they are custom made, and got to me well-packaged within a matter of days of ordering - which is excellent, given it was relatively short-notice. They're well-made and arrived with their own clips and instructions on how to frame the piece correctly. They also apparently have a print service as well, which I'd like to try out at some point.

Bring on Saturday!

Also, if you haven't already: Like my Facebook page! Once the page hits 100 likes, I'm going to host a giveaway - not for a silly cartoon, but for something useful, that you can make use of for your own creative endeavours. Your mum probably taught you that it's nice to share, so be nice and share this blog with everyone (and keep that box of chocolates all to yourself)!

The Exhibition

I think it's the YouTube video stretching it out, but the bar where the comments-count is looks a bit borked to me. Oh well. On to more important things:

EXHIBITION PHOTOS!

I didn't get a photo of everybody's, unfortunately - in fact, I only really got a fraction of Fine Art students when there was some really awesome Textiles and Design work going on in the other rooms (thanks a lot, camera batteries). However, I hope this gives blog visitors a taster of what went on. Everyone who visited had great fun and there was lots of lovely feedback (and free food).




Ah, it's my wall, all painted up and nice before I set up my piece ...



And here are all the opening times ... OH CRUD MY PIECE IS MEANT TO BE SET UP NOW.



A nice shot of the sign outside the studio door ...



... and I set up my piece in record time! Haha~ (In all seriousness, my photos had to be fixed back up after some fell down after my work was moderated, but I think they look better after they fixed them than they were when I originally put them up!)




Full length shot.



This army and war-related piece was done by Jim (he had some great postcards, too, free for people to take)



Alex's tarot cards; I want to see his take on all 22 one day.



Out in the corridor. I actually don't know who these pieces belong to, they weren't labelled up. My guess is they're (really, really lovely) examples of portfolio work.



Jess's work, in her sketchbooks she had a really nice textile approach with the use of sewing machines and the doll she'd made. ^^



Rosie's really interesting piece, with use of medical equipment and newspaper clippings.



Emily's work! I absolutely adore how she works with textures.



And last but not least, Mary's. The concept behind her work was absolutely amazing; she studied barriers and cages and their effects on our perception and feelings of sympathy.


Now ... it's all over. We took down our stuff on Friday and students loaded up their cars with their work (I took my table with Bunches and the book inside it back on the bus), and some have taken some of their work now, and left the rest in the studio until Monday, when they can pick it up. We tidied the studios and put the tables back, and it looks exactly as it did at the start of the year, when we began the course.

It's actually pretty bittersweet. Although we've only had one year there, it feels like so much longer (and at the same time, it's gone extremely quickly).

Monday is our final day, when we get our results.


Meanwhile, I got a pack of these bad boys, and am having fun with testing them all out:



It's like I'm back in primary school again!

Little Nostalgia Box

Adding the finishing touches to my comments book and leaving it to dry (then placing it on the shelf under the table) was the last thing I needed to do for my final piece.

I'm very proud of it.


I'm tired right now (and will be sleeping shortly) but my next post should hopefully have more detail and more photographs of the lino-prints I did (as I'm very proud of those, too). For now, goodnight.

'It was a difficult but nostalgic time, being 15'.

Hello, art blog! Long time, no see!

This month has been veeeery busy. Sorting out student finance and accommodation, having a part-time job, stuff at home as well as getting college work done! I don't mind, though, it certainly keeps me occupied.

I almost went nuts yesterday, because I thought my memory card had broken. My computer was registering it (as in, it would make the 'new hardware detected' beep) but it wasn't showing up under My Computer and Windows Media Centre hadn't kicked in, so I thought my card had kicked the bucket. Apparently ... it hasn't quite as I tried again tonight and it's fine; but as it's been playing up for a while now I think I'd better start using my spare one.

These photos of my table in progress were taken ... ooh, a couple of weeks ago now, I'd think:




Ah, maybe it was later on as the bottom of the table was already papered with words. Today I managed to complete papering the table, and it's in the process of being varnished now so everything's all nice and sealed. What are the words, you ask?



They're all handwritten memories, written on crinkly brown paper towels. I love the texture of these things, and paired with written 'diary entries' or memories - it gives a really nice historical feel. As part of my final major project I'm covering - or rather, covered, as it's now done - a table in this, and in it a doll will be displayed along with battery-powered lighting. A handmade book with lino-prints will be with it, too - a fairytale story about a prince and a flower-girl.

And now for something less twee: this table's compartment was lined with green padded satin with tassels. This looked pretty tacky, in my opinion (I'm sure someone out there would have loved it, but it wasn't me). However, the appearance was nothing compared to the odour - the previous owner had left in a couple of mothballs, and the smell of them was awful. Really, really overpowering. Thankfully there's a candle shop near the college, and I ended up going down there in my afternoon break to get a wax tart (what?! That's what Yankee Candle call them!) just to freshen this thing up, and even then I had to leave the table open for a while. It's worked a huge treat in there, and also worked quite nicely on the doll I made for the exhibition too (who had to be stained and made to look less neat - this included various types of coffee, tea, asking my friends who smoked to stub their cigarettes out on her clothing after they were done, and bits of charcoal).






Aaaand some shots of my studio diary, which is a converted old photo album I had. I love sticking samples and photos into it.

(Yes, the words Lino Printing are meant to be backwards.)

Posty McPostersons strikes again

Alright, last photo of the Book o' Mess for a while, I promise. Perhaps, when it comes home with me today, I should do a speed-video of working in it. I tend to improvise the pages instead of plan out what I'm doing beforehand, though.

Next Monday, I'm off to my second university interview. It's approximately four and a half hours each way on the train (I'll have my journal with me for entertainment) so it's going to be a long day but hopefully a very interesting one.

More from the Little Book o' Mess

So, this morning I prepared two pages with coffee, watered-down yellow acrylic, PVA and the odd bit of spray-paint after the PVA was laid down and still sticky (it had quite an interesting effect). I got a little impatient and aimed a hair-dryer at it afterwards.



Yesterday I picked up some coin-bags at the bank. They gave me quite a lot, so I used a couple for experimentation in weaving and trapping items - it's a very soft, stretchy plastic so I also wanted to try ironing 'em ...



... which actually worked really, really well. I want to try putting a couple of pennies or some wax-crayon shavings in one and running the iron over it now.





Sewing in the pages~ The back of the 'stamp bag' was interesting in itself, so I kept it as it was.



With the second little bag you can see on the coffee-page, I ironed some cappuccino powder onto the bag and the plastic that melted sealed it (it has a strange but nice texture to it).







A second stamp and coin-bag experiment onto the pages I prepped earlier, after it finally dried (although right now it's upstairs with tissue in between the pages just in case there is some stickiness).

The Little Book o' Mess is working quite nicely.

A Little Book o' Mess

Those of you who have done a Foundation course in Art will know the importance of mark-making, especially in those first few weeks. The 'Day-to-Day' project I'm doing now involves a lot of experimentation with media, and I figured I should have a little book to accompany my large sketchbook and sheets of A1 - a little book o' mess. But a book of nice mess, I feel it draws the eye and appears interesting (I'm a sucker for tactile pieces and textures). Weaving, cappuccino powder (that smells awful, I may add), PVA, black dye, glue-gun strands, pinpricks, acetate that's been printed on, extra sheets stitched and wax all feature in this, and I'm not even a third of the way through it yet.




The first two pages of this book - the very first is weaved with newspaper and splashed with wax, PVA and coffee after having a little spray-paint applied. The wax and PVA was also there to stop it falling apart; it wasn't the most secure of weaves and it kept falling out x_X





The 'lemon' page and acetate page were both stitched to the spiral binding. One was a wrapper from a lollipop and I wanted to use it for something as I found the little drawings cute, and the acetate ... darn, I wish the PVA had dried clear but because there were a good few layers in it and I'd trapped the glue, it didn't. Still, no matter - it worked quite nicely. I used the acetate I'd previously used for screenprinting; I'd had no idea what to do with them afterwards and this seemed like a nice use of them.



I then experimented with taking parts out of pages and replacing them with other materials (in this case, another bit of acetate that was printed on). Also there you can see some weaving with receipts and carrier bags (two things I seem to collect a lot of).



Experimenting with graphite shavings, and more writing. On the opposite page you can see some glue-gun strands and pin-pricks (the latter is a bit time-consuming but it's lovely for texture 'specially if you apply coffee or tea afterwards).



More fun with spray-paint. I really like the left page on this one because you can actually see the print on the acetate and the coffee-stain on the prior pages - a nice touch. I don't think I'll be doing anything further to that page even though it's still quite plain compared to the others - the little window is nice enough.

I Return

I need to update my blog - oh no, wait, that box of belongings needs sorting. I need to update my blog - but I'm so tired tonight, I'll leave it until the weekend. I need to update my blog - but that assignment needs doing for college. And finally, I have a spare moment and I need to update my blog - but I can't think what to write. Especially as so much has gone on since I last updated, including two field trips. I'll do separate posts on each field trip, I think, and I might as well get down to them after I finish this post while I'm on here. It won't be in chronological order, but that can't be helped @_@

The vast majority of you reading this right now are probably already aware of my CMTV work and the new portraits revealed, but here's the image holding all the new ones anyhow. These are, again, so much fun to do!:


And as for college work ... I'm going to specialise in Fine Art, funnily enough (regarding my Foundation work, I'm still fully intending on applying for Illustration for my BA). I was originally aiming for Design, but after a word with my tutor and a review of all my work Fine Art really does seem to be the way to go even if I did find it difficult at first (it was my first ever tutorial, though, so I guess that had something to do with it). This month and December are going to be UCAS months as well, where we get personal statements done and applications sorted out. I've also finished my trials for a part-time job, and am currently waiting to hear if I get one of the three positions available. My family and I have also just moved house; we're extremely happy to be here and the place is relatively tidy considering we only just moved in last weekend (only the bathroom and garage are cluttered) but, as expected, some things aren't usable right now. So, right now, although I'm remaining optimistic about everything, I get periods where I'm stressy or I just look harried. I apologise in advance if I end up snappy or if I'm being a bit quiet, especially offline. Please do pardon me. It's really nothing personal.

Anyway (after that personal-life update), here's what I've been doing in Fine Art. Last Friday's work:





That middle one there is taller than I am. I'm quite small in height, so that's not saying a lot, but still. It's weirdly therapeutic; I had the paper taped to the wall, some paint, a roll of masking tape, and a chair to stand on. No paintbrushes - it was all done with my left hand and fingers. Paint has a nice texture to it; I completely lost myself in the piece for the afternoon (about three hours of work).

The other two were done in the morning's session, and they didn't take me as long. Both of them are A1-size, and may end up in my uni portfolio (so may the taller one, but it might have to be in photo-form as it's a biiiig piece). They were based off our 'Armoury' mini-project, which in turn is based off a trip to Leeds Armoury (more on Channel Polyrhythm later about that). I'm not usually into military things, but it was a cool visit, I really enjoyed it.

That's all for now; this post is getting long as it is.

To do:
- Leeds Armoury post
- Liverpool visit
- Updated studio-diary post and sketchbook post
- Seminar summary post