Pallant House visit.

These images show pieces of work from a visit to Pallant House Gallery in Chichester. This visit was for us to gain information on how Civil Wars influenced artists at the time and the impact it had on civilians and surrounding land they lived on. I think that the exhibition was good because it displayed a good range of different styles and some of them had a very powerful meaning behind them.

Raoul Hausmann.

Raoul Hausmann born July 12th, 1886 was an Austrian writer and artist. He was one of the key of the Dada movement. He created many piece of different styles of work such as drawings, sculptures and photographs however he is know to be the creator of photomontages. A photomontage is where you bring together more than one photograph to create an illusion of an unreal subject. As well as photographs he also uses areas of collage and combines them all together. His pieces of work link to the theme of exquisite corpse because he creates unusual compositions and juxtaposed imagery. He was around when World War One was occurring which influenced his pieces and so of the images he uses are linked to it, such as weapons and German characters. I like the his work because I like the styles he uses and the combinations of materials that he incorporates. The images he brings together makes you look twice at the piece and to think about the meaning of it.
                                                                                          



This is his piece 'The Art Critic'. Within this piece he uses all the Dada techniques; collage, photomontage and typography. The background are German characters from a poster poem. The middle ground is cut out photos and the foreground is a figure of a man that is made up of photos and other collage elements. The text in the background makes the image stand out however because you cannot see all of it, it makes you consider what it says. When you first look at the image you may think that the item in his hand is a weapon, however when you look closer at it you can see that the item is just a utensil.  

Final piece health and safety.

Within my development and creating my final outcome there were some health and safety factors that I had to consider.

When working with the wire I had to be aware of the sharp ends and the ends that flung of when cutting the wire, so I had to work in a large area where there wasn't people.

When working with clay you have to consider 'COSHH' which is control of substances hazardous to health. The main hazard when working with clay is crystalline silica which is dust. Breathing in to much of this can cause silicosis which is a disease of the lungs. The hazards of this can be minimized by;

• Wearing a mask.
• Keeping exposure as low as possible by working away from others, using slurry bins, covering tables when working and washing surfaces, tools and equipment.
• Having a well ventilated room.

When I was merging the photography and illustrations together I had to use the programme Photoshop. Within the programme I used a range of tools including the 'magic wand tool' and the 'magnetic lasso' tool.

Photography.

To create a joiner photograph you firstly get a model you wish to use. You then pick a location whether it be in a studio or on location. You take a separate photograph of each section of the body, making sure they are all roughly the same composition and taking more than one of the same section so you can then later choose which photographs work better. When you have a good range of photos you then use the programme Photoshop to manipulate and join the photos together.

Kevin Meredith is a British photographer that uses this method in his work.

This is an example of Kevin Merdith's work.

Rene Magritte.

Rene Magritte was born in 1898 in Lessines. Some of his earliest paintings from roughly 1915 were very impressionistic style. His paintings from 1918-1924 were more influenced by Futurism and occasionally Cubism. He created his first surreal oil painting, 'The Lost Jockey' in 1927. When he was a child his mother committed suicide by drowning herself in a river, and when her body was found her dress was supposedly covering her face. This image has been suggested as the source of many of his paintings between 1927 and 1928 of people with cloth disguising their face, such as in the piece 'Les Amants'. During World War 2 he was living in Brussels. For a short time he used a painterly style known as his 'Renoir Period', and this was a reaction to his emotions of abandonment that came with living in Germany when it was occupied by Belgium. During 1947-1948 he went through a period painting very provocative images. He became involved in the production of fake painting during the postwar period and this is how he supported himself at this time. At the end of 1948 he went back to his style of his prewar surrealistic art. In his work he uses ordinary objects but places them in an unusual composition such as in his piece 'The Listening Room' he places an apple in a room but enlarges it so it is the size of the room itself. Also in his piece 'Golconda' he places males in suits floating around houses. His constant use mash up of reality and illusion is known to have come from his mothers death reflecting his shifting from what he wishes which is his mother to be alive, to what he knows which is his mother is dead.

This is his piece 'Golconda'.

This is his piece 'The Listening Room'

This is his piece 'The False Mirror'

Ben Heine.

Ben Heine born in 1983 is a Belgian artist. He has produced many pieces of artwork and some of his best known pieces are 'Pencil Vs Camera', 'Digital Circlism and 'Flesh and Acrylic'. He is interested in a variety of art movements such as Surrealism, Pop Art, Geometric Abstraction, Expressionism and Social Realism. He has exhibited his work in many countries such as; South Korea, UK, Brazil, Romania, The Netherlands, Italy, Germany, France, Canada, US and Turkey.

'Pencil Vs Camera was invented by Ben himself. It is his trademark and one of the most creative art concepts which has influenced many other artists. The style combines drawing and photography in a unique and unusual way. You can always see his hand in his pieces because it represents the connection between the viewer, artist and the piece itself. His pieces he tells a story using imagination, illusion, poetry and Surrealism.

'Flesh and Acrylic' was a project started in 2011. In this he creates abstract paintings on wooden panels using acrylic paint. He then uses a living model to blend into the background by painting them as well, he does this because he wants the model to become invisible. The unusual fact about this project is that a living person is incorporated into the piece itself and becomes part of the composition, this makes it more intriguing to look at because it almost becomes and illusion.

'Digital Circlism' was a project started in 2010. With this project he created portraits of celebrities digitally using only circles. The style of the pieces take elements from the art styles of Pop Art and Pointillism. He recreates iconic faces from history and pop culture with circles in a range of colours and sizes which gives them a 3D look.

This is an example of one of the pieces from his 'Pencil Vs Camera' series.

This is an example of one of the pieces from his 'Flesh and Acrylic' series.

This is an example of one of the pieces from his 'Digital Circlism' series.

The pieces of his work that most interest me are his photography and illustration pieces because he makes his own interpretations and stories from the photographs he uses. This adds interest to the piece and may lead to the viewer having to look twice as the subject of the illustration of the piece is unexpected. Ben Heine has influenced my own multi-disciplinary outcome because I have used the same technique using my own photograph and illustration. I have used a different style of photograph because I have used a portrait of an animal whereas Heine usually used landscapes in his pieces, however I have still used the idea of imagery you would not normally see together which is linked to the theme of exquisite corpse.

 

Oil painting.

When creating a detailed oil painting it is important to plan it out properly for reasons such as; it makes it easier, you have to give time as oil takes a while to dry, it will save unnecessary work, it will help cut down on mistakes and the correct layering will add depth. Creating a ground is the first step to the painting, this helps cut out a lot of work as it gives you an all over mid tone to work from, it will also help bring all the colours together. With oil paintings you have to work from dark to light and pure whites are saved until last so they stand out. I had to create an oil painting from observation.

This shows my piece with the ground of green painted on, also the branch and the darkest areas of shade on the squirrel.

This is my piece when I had added the rest of the tone and detail. As you can see the colours blend together quite well to create shading and it also gives the piece texture. I am happy with the overall outcome of my piece however I believe I could have blended in the lighter areas more.