Design ideas for final piece

I have created a visual design ideas page which shows the links between the artists I have researched and how I have come to produce each of my final pieces. Since I have multiple final pieces, I feel that this is a very important page in order to understand the linkage between each piece.

At the start of my project, I started by looking at the literal meaning of 'Reflection' and the values needed to be able to reflect. This led to look at artists such as M.C. Escher who drew from reflective surfaces. I developed this idea further by drawing my self-portrait from a mirror. This sparked my inspiration of drawing people. I began to somehow try and include my family in this title. I started to move from literal reflection in to personal reflection. Once I had decided that I wanted to somehow incorporate my family into the project, I knew that I would need to practice drawing the human form in order to show development in my portfolio. As a result, I enrolled myself into life drawing classes once a week on a Tuesday evening at the Jam factory in Oxford. The drawings I produced here would be my response to various life drawing artists such as Jenny Saville and Edgar Degas. I took inspiration from these artists because of their interesting compositions and the techniques they used to draw which included pencil and pastel.

I then attended various gallery visits with the On form exhibition having the greatest impact upon my work. I started to move towards garment preservation. this would eventually link to my life drawing as I would draw the garments that belong to the people that I would draw. Since visiting the On-form exhibition, I came across the sculptor, Mark Powell. I was completely inspired by his works of carving personal garments out of solid stone. I emailed this artist, asking him a variety of questions about his works. He then became my main inspiration for my project. From here, I produced my own sculptor out of sand stone after visiting Joslins Stone Masonry. I chose to carve a sculpture in the shape of a cube. On this cube I carved the initials of every body in my immediate family, including my mother, father, sister, nephew and myself. By doing so, the cube was no longer a block of stone but rather a symbol of family unity. This was inspired by the concept of Mark Powell who added personal meaning to the stone he was carving. I then visited the Saatchi Gallery in London and came across the installation artist Rafael Gómezbarros. he had produced an installation of ant, made out of casts from human skull and other natural materials to symbolise the plight of thousands of immigrants who die each year whilst seeking refuge. This gave me the idea of using such symbols within my own work and this helped me to place a greater meaning behind my own stone carving.

After many emails of correspondence with Alasdair Tomson, I became more and more inspired by the idea of preserving garments. From here, I began researching drapery artists such as Leonardo Da Vinci and Alison Watt. Because I wasn't skilled enough to produce a stone carving of a garment like Mark Powell, Alison Watt inspired me to preserve garments in a different way. I used plaster. From here, I practiced preserving various articles of clothing in plaster and mounting them on to white boards. I chose garments which had a personal relation to be such as the clothing of my nephew. This gave me the concept of preservation and the allowance to reflect upon the people whose garments I had preserved.

I then decided to draw from these preserved garments in the style of Leonardo Da Vinci. I used compressed charcoal and chalk on top of brown and off-white paper.

After much practice with drapery studies, I decided to go back to my family members who were the owners of the garments which I was drawing. I took inspiration from Mark Powell who draws within significant detail to the face. He places large emphasis on the folds/wrinkles of the face which to him is a symbol of a live lived and a story within the folds. Using this idea, I drew my garments with great emphasis on the folds in the fabric. This is evident within my final pieces of the baby grow and wedding dress where the folds and crinkles of the fabric and significantly emboldened and highlighted. I also took the inspiration from Mark Powell of drawing on top of a meaningful surface. Powell chooses to draw his figures on top of envelopes, or old pieces of paper that somehow related to the person being drawn. I have taken this idea and developed it by drawing my uncle on top of a letter which my mother wrote about him after his death. This has great personal meaning and great emotion attached to it.

I then decided to take photograph of the garments which I was going to plaster or draw. I took inspiration from Tom Hussey and from a photograph which I found on the internet of a girl in a white dress. This sparked my imagination of drawing my mothers wedding dress. This would be in the style of Mark Powell and Leonardo Da Vinci and would be place inside of my installation alongside the garment itself. The photographs would also be placed inside of my installation.

Consequently, all of my pieces link. I have three main themes running through my work. The idea of garment preservation, the idea of drawing family members associated with these garments and the idea of photographing these garments from which I would drawn from. However, each of these themes is united by one large concept. the concept of personal reflectivity and the idea of a personal journey which opens up the past.

Because of my multiple final pieces and because of the themes running through my portfolio. I needed a way of unifying them all. For this I decided to create an installation which would include each of my final pieces. I took inspiration from the installations of Rafael Gómezbarros and the French-American artist Louise Bourgeois. I settled on the idea of creating a room or area which would be filled with my symbolic final pieces. I used the idea of a chest which is a symbol of hidden treasure. This would enclose the various object such as the board of my uncle ray, in the style of Mark Powell, and the plastered baby grow of my nephew. The chest would also contain various other objects from other family members including my mother. From inspiration from Alison Watt, I would also have a large piece of plastered fabric emerging from inside of the chest which would be a symbol of the spillage of memories or reflection. Surrounding the chest would be drawings of the garments of objects which feature inside of the chest. I would draw the plastered baby grow in the style of Leonardo Da Vinci and this would be positioned alongside the chest. I would also draw on a large scale my mothers wedding dress which would be photographed in the style of Tom Hussey. These photographs will be hung around the chest. This large scale drawing of the wedding dress will be hung next to the chest.

This installation is a way of unifying all of my pieces. This installation will be on a large scale and will hopefully be positioned in the corner of a room in which the viewer the openly question the meaning behind each object.

As a way of showing development and my thought processes in my project, I have produced a small book showing my design ideas. I have produced a small drawing of each A1 sheet I have produced in this portfolio. This is a way of showing how I have thought about each and every single page. Towards the end of this book are my sketches of my final pieces.