Unit X - Reflection




Unit X - Reflection 


Throughout the course of Unit X, I’ve definitely found myself being more open to alternative ways of working due to having to work as a part of a team.  I felt apprehensive at first, worried that I wouldn’t be able to maintain my individuality if I was restricted to working with other people. I’ve come to release that working as a group allows you to further explore your ideas as you have a group of people supporting you and giving their own thoughts on your work.
I worked closely with Sophie in my group, producing collaborative work and using our own ideas to develop our work further in the same direction. I found that this close collaboration made me much more confident in experimenting with materials and scale as I felt I had someone supporting me with my ideas. As well as this, I felt the group tutorials, especially the ones we did with 3D design were really beneficial to my own practice as I was exposed to alternate ways of working, and different routes you can take to develop your practice.
It was interesting have to present your work to a group of people, as it forced you to refine your concept and make sure that everything you were doing could be explained and also made sense within your project. I think I will take this with me in the future and be more vocal about my work to other people, as only when you speak about it do you recognise gaps in your work.

During this project, I began to realise that drawing could become a much more valuable part of my development process, as mid way through this project I took some time away from making and focused on drawing and using this to realise and develop my concepts. Thinking through drawing allowed me to understand the types of materials I wanted to use as I could visualise, through varying brush marks etc., the quality of materials I wanted to combine and how they would work together. However, my material selection process was also heavily influenced by Kate Haywood’s work. I rarely find myself taking such inspiration from one artist, and have this be a constant through the course of a project. This allowed me to really explore the ways I could use specific materials, almost prescribing myself a boundary in which to work in.

So, although I feel I have developed a new way of working (through drawing and prescribed boundaries) I think I still have a way to go with this project and my development of materials, and I plan to continue this project over summer. I have become really interested in using contrasting materials and seeing how to react with one another, but also using photography/film not only as a form of documentation but also as a different way of drawing and making.
I also feel I could become more aware of how my work could become commercial or imagining how it could live in an environment. The Inspirer talks provoked this thought, as it was a reminder that one-day we wont be in the ‘university bubble’ and will be working in the industry and will need to find our place in the industry.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

PULP

Image
23rd September  PULP AIM - use recycled paper waste to create pots, vases and bowls that can be used in a variety of ways (both functional and decorative) How will i find the best method? test different types of paper different ways of moulding the vessels different ways of adding colour  different soaking times/amount of water length of drying time before de-moulding adding in other materials? thickness of paper - how does it affect stability/ability to dry fully First test -Using waxy papers and crushed broken old paper bowls and tissue.  -Using a mix of fibres to see if that allows the pulp to hold together better. -Left to soak for a couple of hours then blended with a lot of water -Applied to mould still quite wet and applied in a medium thickness. Thickness worked well/held together relatively well but the removal from the mould is what cracked the edges - need to find a better way of doing that. Maybe grease mould/add a laye
Read more

PULP Development

7th October PULP development  Evident in the previous blog post, my pulp pieces have not been very successful thus far. I decided to proceed with the project i needed to switch up the method drastically, my main problem before was the removal of the pieces from their mould.  My plan to eliminate that problem is to make flat pieces of paper pulp and mould them once they are dry/partially dry. This stage of the experimentation will focus mainly on drying time and thickness of the paper. The videos above show the process of making flat sheets of paper using a frame and deckle and pulp. Since my frame is so small i am attaching 6 pieces together to allow me to create larger pieces. The problem with pushing them together is that you end up with weak points in the paper so i will try and craft a larger frame using a photo frame and some fine mesh of some sorts. I'm going to leave this piece to fully dry and then mould it into a shape. In the meantime i will continu
Read more

Evaluation – Self Initiated

Image
In my self-initiated project, I aimed to push myself to work with materials I don’t regularly work with as I have found in previous projects it is easy to allow yourself to become comfortable with materials.   So, after deciding in wanted to focus on rock climbing walls, and the feeling of climbing as my theme I began making 3D samples, using different materials with 3D capabilities such as clay, sponge and fabrics filled with rice/wadding.   Visually, I found my samples really interesting but felt the initial ideas I wanted to portray had been lost through my making process. This is when I started adding more interactive components into my samples. This is also when the idea came to build a non-functioning climbing wall. Something that would appear to support you but in actual fact would cause you to fall, emulating the feeling I have when rock climbing. For example, below is a sample made from Baked clay and para cord, seemingly strong but when weight was ap
Read more