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| Here are my two lemur friends hanging out in the studio. |
Showing posts with label Artist. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Artist. Show all posts
Tuesday, 12 April 2011
Friday, 8 April 2011
Spring Time and Power Tools
Today I am working in the sun-lit studio room in Peckham, fixing up a portrait of two brothers, and keen to try out a new jigsaw and electric sander on some MDF boards. More updates coming soon!
Sunday, 31 October 2010
Shoreditch!
My new favourite place, as far as an afternoon wandering around can tell.
Since we last talked, I have been selling a few portraits (oil on canvas), soon to be posted, and working on a large painting for my uncle, also soon to be posted. BIG NEWS-->
This Wednesday I am up and moving from the southern sticks into the big city, the capital herself. A few days ago curiosity culminated into a little exploration of the East side, where I went to hunt out galleries and artists and generally people who might wish to befriend me. Shoreditch sounds like the place I would least want to visit in most of the world, but, ignoring the name and going on other superficial things, like what people look like and what type of over-priced creative outlets there are, how many tacky shoes you can buy, how many galleries are around and the fact that a couple stores cater for artists, I'd say it's the first place in London that I'd wish to be.. based on one visit.. based on being an outsider who knows nothing. Based on the fact that I'm not actually going to be there. I felt very comfortable walking around and making conversation. People seemed nice and not like they were out to attack me with guns and knives. I like this.
I checked out White Cube, a gallery in Hoxton Square (ok, so not Shoreditch), and had the pleasure of seeing the first exhibition in the UK by Mark Bradford, an artist from LA. I was struck by the construction of the large artworks, though I left wanting some bigger movement across the canvas (boards) to be felt (in a compositional sense). A piece that drew me in consisted of 44 blocks organised in a grid, each one plastered with built up layers of newspaper sheets and graphite ink, then sanded back to expose monochromatic tones and physical depth. Though the materials are reused and man made, the overall effect for me eluded to something organic, like the layers of bark on a tree. I sincerely enjoyed the experience of looking and trying to figure out what this work was saying, if anything, and if looking was just enough.
To top it all off, I happened to find Bar Kick, recommended to me by a friend, for any football table/fooseball enthusiast who considers it illegal to spin the handles when playing a serious game of football (that is, every game).
ps) If you look up any Mark Bradford work online, like a Rothko, it's better seen close up. Maybe make the rest up in your head..
Since we last talked, I have been selling a few portraits (oil on canvas), soon to be posted, and working on a large painting for my uncle, also soon to be posted. BIG NEWS-->
This Wednesday I am up and moving from the southern sticks into the big city, the capital herself. A few days ago curiosity culminated into a little exploration of the East side, where I went to hunt out galleries and artists and generally people who might wish to befriend me. Shoreditch sounds like the place I would least want to visit in most of the world, but, ignoring the name and going on other superficial things, like what people look like and what type of over-priced creative outlets there are, how many tacky shoes you can buy, how many galleries are around and the fact that a couple stores cater for artists, I'd say it's the first place in London that I'd wish to be.. based on one visit.. based on being an outsider who knows nothing. Based on the fact that I'm not actually going to be there. I felt very comfortable walking around and making conversation. People seemed nice and not like they were out to attack me with guns and knives. I like this.
I checked out White Cube, a gallery in Hoxton Square (ok, so not Shoreditch), and had the pleasure of seeing the first exhibition in the UK by Mark Bradford, an artist from LA. I was struck by the construction of the large artworks, though I left wanting some bigger movement across the canvas (boards) to be felt (in a compositional sense). A piece that drew me in consisted of 44 blocks organised in a grid, each one plastered with built up layers of newspaper sheets and graphite ink, then sanded back to expose monochromatic tones and physical depth. Though the materials are reused and man made, the overall effect for me eluded to something organic, like the layers of bark on a tree. I sincerely enjoyed the experience of looking and trying to figure out what this work was saying, if anything, and if looking was just enough.
To top it all off, I happened to find Bar Kick, recommended to me by a friend, for any football table/fooseball enthusiast who considers it illegal to spin the handles when playing a serious game of football (that is, every game).
ps) If you look up any Mark Bradford work online, like a Rothko, it's better seen close up. Maybe make the rest up in your head..
Wednesday, 18 August 2010
Erik Otto and the love of found throwables.
One of my favourite creatives is artist Erik Otto, who spends his time making things out on the West Coast, California. I was fortunate enough to see some of his work first-hand in New York last year, when me and my travelling accomplice made our way to 191 W. 4th Street, to hunt out Charming Wall. Charming Wall is a gallery which hosts imaginative, illustrative work by a host of creatives. Many of them are self taught, which in this case, works out to be rather pleasant. They have an equally charming website, which is worth looking at even if you can't stand art or artists and have no idea why you are still reading this blog. Go ahead and enjoy yourself.
It was in this little gallery that I stood so close to Erik's creations, I wanted the wall to swallow me up so I could somehow enter his world of floating houses and rain clouds. I probably wouldn't stay there for long, but still, there's something about finding things and re-creating them to have a new purpose that is irresistible.
Some of these thoughts perpetuated my mind during the third year of my degree. I began to think about the passing nature of everything we can see and touch and claim to have ownership over, that passes through our hands as our bodies eventually pass through this world. Everything we see is transient. Which means that this place does not exist just for me, and "reduce, re-use, re-cycle" is annoying because it's inconvenient and no one likes being told what to do. However, this air of consciousness, the desire to make something bigger than me, plus my student status, resulted in the making of Le Rubbish out of cardboard, newspaper, bubble wrap, crockery, paper bags, milk bottles and, of course, paint. etc. Here are some images of said collage in the Sofa Gallery at IU, 2008.
It was in this little gallery that I stood so close to Erik's creations, I wanted the wall to swallow me up so I could somehow enter his world of floating houses and rain clouds. I probably wouldn't stay there for long, but still, there's something about finding things and re-creating them to have a new purpose that is irresistible.
Some of these thoughts perpetuated my mind during the third year of my degree. I began to think about the passing nature of everything we can see and touch and claim to have ownership over, that passes through our hands as our bodies eventually pass through this world. Everything we see is transient. Which means that this place does not exist just for me, and "reduce, re-use, re-cycle" is annoying because it's inconvenient and no one likes being told what to do. However, this air of consciousness, the desire to make something bigger than me, plus my student status, resulted in the making of Le Rubbish out of cardboard, newspaper, bubble wrap, crockery, paper bags, milk bottles and, of course, paint. etc. Here are some images of said collage in the Sofa Gallery at IU, 2008.
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Sofa Gallery BFA Painting exhibition 2008.
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