Our Frank

I'll admit I found the second year of my degree quite challenging, I had an extremely slow start and when I did begin to get going it was hard to muster creativity. To put it bluntly, I was a magician who had run out of tricks. Making work was a hard thing to do and concentrating and knuckling down was even harder.

However, once the Workshop Module started and we began to bring in ephemera I found that I could easily adapt on something already existing. Ephemera is something I love and have a considerable amount of, I'm not a hoarder but a lover of things, of objects. I'd bought some old books which were possibly worth a bit of money, but as I didn't care for selling them and felt that cutting them up might be of some benefit, I did exactly that.

The work I made with this ephemera was something very different and I really liked what I'd made, I was proud of it and I could see it going somewhere. I love words and I'm very fond of them so it seemed natural to combine both word and image to make work. The stuff I wrote as part of this investigative journey complimented the images I'd selected, I'd managed to impress myself. Not only was it using typography, collage and ephemera but it was incorporating my views on relationships and love - I'd not made work about these two subjects for some time.

So my Workshop Module and Studio Practice were working alongside one another and this was the whole point, to allow the two modules to intertwine. It was around this time that things got on top of me and everything just went by so fast, I didn't have time to catch up, all I could do was to stand there looking gormless, doing nothing.

At some point during the Exhibition Module I sorted myself out, I realised what needed to be done, what was important and how I could careen this sinking ship in a more stable direction. The stained glass windows proved to be somewhat of a saving grace. For all of the late nights and marker pens I plowed into them they were the one thing that managed to get me back on track.

When it came to report writing I found that I didn't struggle with this quite as much as others might have. I can write, and dealing with the facts and putting them in some form of logical order was something I didn't find hard to do. In fact, I thoroughly enjoyed the report writing and there's no doubt that it will come in handy in the future, for whatever career awaits me.

As I've wrote about the ephemera, it really did help me to vision things differently and allow me to be able to create work in a new way.

Another 'highlight' of my second year were my Jesus screenprints, these too were made with literally seconds to spare; I was fighting off deadlines with my limited kung fu knowledge. The outcome is one that I am incedibly happy with. By taking some engravings from my ever-growing collection of Bibles I was able to create some beautiful and very profound screenprints. The typography of which was influenced by the colours, decided through trial and error, and subject matter.

In conclusion, my second year is one of mixed emotions. In the end everything worked out and all of the worry really wasn't worth it. Overall I've learnt that finishing this degree and doing something I'm extremely fond of is what matters. Onwards and upwards, so they say

Susan Hiller

Monument by Susan Hiller

Not strictly printmaking, but interesting, inspiring and beautiful nonetheless. Susan Hiller’s work stood out to me on a recent visit to Leeds City Art Gallery. Her work seemed to have an assemblage quality to it, reminiscent to that of the art movement Fluxus.

The work was immediately eye-catching; it had what appeared to be a memorial bench inside a museum which completely threw me off guard. On closer inspection the inscription read ‘Susan Hiller, Monument, 1980-1’, it wasn’t dedicated to somebody who was deceased as I previously thought, but to the artist herself.

The wall on which the epitaphs were mounted attracted me, firstly because it made me question whether the curators had cut into it to display the pieces and secondly because of the hugeness and symmetrical presentation of the work. The whole installation seemed out of place, it was out of the ordinary and drew you in rather effortlessly. I was not the only one who was curious to see what this piece was all about and it struck a chord with others who were also admiring the work. Some of the epitaphs were funny, some were heart-wrenching, some spoke of heroic acts, and others of misfortunate incidents.

This work focuses on the dearly departed and does so with respect and dignity. I found the works compelling, moving and poetic; the work fitted into the environment and allowed you to be absorbed within it. Although I didn’t hear the audio that accompanied the piece, I enjoyed it greatly and will definitely be returning to hear it.

FUCK SAKE PART DEUX

First and foremost I would like to thank you for being so accessible and a patron of the arts, it really means a lot. It's humbling to know that there are people like you who are willing to showcase artists and provide them with a platform on which to be seen.

However, the first exhibition I attended at Mexico Project Space was 'Title to be Decided'. I'll be frank with you, I imagine I'd have had a better time at a Nickelback concert. The work was dreadful, I've since tried to erase it from my memory. I'm still undergoing therapy, but the doctor says I should make a full recovery providing I never see a Daniel Eatock piece again.

After that I thought it couldn't possibly get any worse, but well done, you proved me wrong. The FUCK SAKE PART DEUX exhibition was catastrophic and diabolical, in fact I'm pretty sure words haven't been invented yet to describe quite how bad it was.

If the intention of the exhibition was to make us think "Fuck sake, why have I been studying art for four years if people like this get to exhibit this bollocks here?" "Fuck sake, why have I brought people who I love and care about here? They now hate me and are wondering why they are friends with a person who could do this to them." "Fuck sake, if this is art then why don't I just jack it all in now?" Then it was a success.

But if indeed the title 'FUCK SAKE' came from the artists being fed up of the close-knitness of Perth's art scene, as it states in the programme, then I feel it was a categorical fail. It has failed because I can empaphise with the curators of Perth for not wanting to exhibit this, these artists are more than like exhibiting in Leeds because they are in exile for making bad art.

In conclusion, I've been to two shows at Mexico Project Space and they leave a lot to be desired. Harsh you may think? Not harsh enough would be my response. It's a fantastic space and I just feel it's not being used to its full potential. I did however enjoy the programme, if only for the fact it prevented me from looking at the work on display. The work itself was, to put it simply, dross. I'm an art student and to me it just looked like a half arsed attempt at something masquerading as art. My tutor says if it's in a gallery it's art, I'm sorry but what I saw on Friday 1st June wasn't art; it was shit on walls. Thanks a lot Mexico, thanks a bunch.

Kind regards,


Adam Lee Jones

The Something Old, New, Borrowed and Blue Testament.

Pack of Print

In my studio practice I have been concentrating on stained glass windows, how they look and their ornate, decorative features. Previously I have used cut out images from an old bible in order to inform my work, this has enabled me to add to something already existing by modifying it and putting my own stamp onto it. Seeing how these prints were turning out and due to my interest in typography I wanted to combine the two and create a narrative with both image and text.

As I am a catholic, not a very good one, but a catholic nonetheless; I take note of churches and show a keen interest in religion, symbology, and art. Walking past churches it made me realise that there is a form of advertising going on, I’d describe it a guilt-tripping people into religion, luring them in, it’s as though if they weren’t to go to church they would be struck down by God or some other such thing.

Despite being baptised, I don’t go to church or worship Jesus nor do I believe in God- maybe it’s just organised religion I’m not taken with? Either way, I’m open-minded and the signage outside churches stands out to me. I’m genuinely fascinated by religion and how they all differ yet seem to all follow the same person/thing/entity.

Below are the prints that I’ve created in response to my findings.

The Crocodile on the Glass Rolling Pin

These are the images of the work currently on exhibit in Dewsbury Museum, Crow Nest Park, Dewsbury. Over the course of 12 weeks, 19 students planned, organised, managed and set up an exhibition in the public domain. The work was in response to the objects on display in the museum as well as sourcing inspiration from the town itself. The exhibition opened on 4th May 2012 and is on until 10th June 2012.

 

Slang King

These are the drawings of stained glass windows that I have produced for the Second Year exhibition at Dewsbury Museum, Crow Nest Park, Dewsbury. I did them in monochrome because colour isn't something that features heavily in my work and if it does it is very minimal. Although, looking at them, I am intrigued as to how they would look painted with gouache. As drawings I like the vast scale of them, they are the largest drawings I've ever done and I'd like to carry on producing work much bigger than I did before.

The stained glass windows were in response to the ones in the museum, I chose the stained glass windows because I've always been fond of them and they are the first things I notice when I walk into any church. The decorative and ornate features stand out much more prominently when done on lining paper with marker pen and biro.
   

Mrs Vandebilt

Is this me making excuses? I'm not sure. This past year has been godawful and as a result a lack of creative output has followed. Things have got to me and made me feel like I'm not capable of anything and the idea of throwing it all away has been very, very tempting. I think at the beginning of the second year of my degree I was at a loss of what to do and I was stuck for a while.
However this dry spell wore off and I created something that I was moderately pleased with. Then things went awry for a number of reasons, neither of which were my fault but these things have a way of making it seem so.
Psychologically my head is a mess, I think. I've toyed with the idea of changing my place of study, switching my course, jacking it all in and getting a job. I'm fairly certain that neither of the options would make me happy and would make true the statement that I'm "incapable of anything," as I was told by someone. The statement probably worsened the state I was in, but then I considered the person who said it and looked at their position in life; I'd happily say they haven't made much of it and that they're a horrible and callous person. Nobody should be told that they're "incapable of anything". It's a disgusting thing to say and it really affects people, but I seem to be getting back on track now.
I'm looking forward to summer, finishing my second year and moving onto the third. I can safely say that the time out will be much needed and very benefitial for me. As long as I get a pass for this year I'll be happy and I know it hasn't been easy and I'm not fully to blame for the disasters that have occurred.
I'm going to stick out this degree until the end and finish what I've been working for, hopefully I'll get to where I want to be.

Tache Up!

I'm a big fan of moustaches despite being unable to grow one myself, I have compiled what I deem to be the greatest moustaches ever into this little book. You should grow a moustache, I think it would really suit you.

The Life and Times of George Hamburger

Here is my sketchbook graphic novella which I wrote and illustrated, the characters were created by Josh Whittington during a mundane English lesson at high school. The scanned article is rough, but as most things, it looks better in physical form.

Endlessly