Why draw out the plans of my English roof design?
As always, I like to plan things out through drawing to get a feel of what could become a reality and using critical thinking in how to make things work for me. I wanted to draw out the english roof plans just like my Chinese roof because again you have that English and Chinese mirrored image connection. So whatever I done for the Chinese roof, I have to do the same for my English roof as well.
How has drawing helped me throughout my final year of my degree?
All the plans and drawings I made throughout this blog has really helped me to plan out my projects and degree show very well because its like I am taking out my memorable thoughts and putting them on to paper with black ink. So far so good it has enabled me to see clearly to how its gonna be made and telling me how I can make it.
I could honestly say that drawing is a very helpful part of the artistic process before actually trying to make or construct anything. It is like taking the blueprints out of your mind and using them to make things rather than trying to run before you can walk. I will continue to keep making drawings because not only it is something I enjoy doing but it is also a very helpful part of my working process.
The bad Chinese supermarket memory fading away?
In my last post about my work called – China Is Not Just A Bowl Of Noodles, was a temporary work that I wanted to create just like a bad memory becoming a temporary thing to keep in the mind. The whole idea for this project was to create my chinese bowl from half a watermelon so that soon it would start going spoil and fading away but also the fruit is mostly Chinese so it presents their culture too.
I knew the chopsticks would be quite risky to leave on the half watermelon whilst it was going spoiled and one of my chopstick broken by an unexplained accident. So… this gave me more of an idea of this whole bad supermarket memory trace fading away. First it was the watermelon fading and now the chopsticks broken and the wooden noodles disorientating at the same time. This was exactly what I wanted to present of me and my girlfriend having an argument in the supermarket but some memories just fade away and we look forward.
What was the outcome since the last post of the second vase designs?
Outcome was indeed successful in the end because at first the main colours of the second vase designs from the last post looked too plain and thought it wasn’t gonna be as good as my first ones. Now… I completely understand about printing process because in the first stages of my prints, they did not seem like much but when it comes to the second phase, the stencil part gathers it all up and makes my prints look complete.
What will I do next?
I might think about moving on now to some other vase designs because now that I have a comfortable thing going on here, I feel like trying out some more vase designs to see what effect I get with them. I deeply feel that this is just the tip of the iceberg to be honest because now that I have fully defined my printing methods, I feel I can try out anything now. Will keep you updated in my next vase designs and will try to show a movie on this kind of printing process.
How is my previous work contributing towards my degree show?
I would say that I have really tried out many ideas when it comes to installation and making art work. All the work that is shown in my blog not only reflects my working process and finished work but it also reflects upon the way I have shown some of my works. In a few of my works, I have already been planning my degree show at the time when I was making the Mahjong house installation and I wanted people to see it and to write down what they thought about it.
This was also great research for me when people can view my installation works and other works that I have on show to try and get some positive feedback from the viewers. This will give me crucial evidence to what the viewers may think of all my work when it comes to giving a show to the viewer. This kind of research will enable me to piece my ideas together carefully ready for the degree show.
Can all the works that I create on the blog give me a possible degree show?
I would say that I am very confident with what I want to do because seeing all my ideas and works on the Blog gives me a better clue to what I want to do for my degree show. Just seeing all my recent and past works together in my Blog makes it easier for me to pick out ideas from all the works to put together a nice degree show and I will still keep developing more ideas to perfect my end of year show.
Any degree show in mind?
I would say I pretty much have a nice idea for my degree show which shows some sketches that I made in my previous posts of my possible degree show. There are infact two possible degree shows that I could go for which is either The Time Mahjong or the Chinese/English Vase shop. Because I am good at lensed based media and printing, I have had to come up with two possible degree shows for both of them.
This way, I have more opportunities and ideas for my degree show and its good to have more than one direction just incase one idea fails. I am very certain that I will still carry on to try make The Time Mahjong as it was my first choice and I believe this will be a stronger image towards me and the viewers. With the Chinese/English Vase Shop of my prints I will treat this as a side exhibition for other people to see and still make this idea in a few weeks time.
Next steps to make for my degree show?
Now that everything is drawing closer and closer, I have to start thinking about what I should plan and do in good time to make The Time Mahjong become a reality! I have already shown previous Blog posts of my Chinese and english roof ideas and I will use them as part of my degree show to resemble the two different cultures. The Mahjong House installation has given me ideas to add the people with the mahjong game into my degree show.
I will also build my own dark space room and have the mahjong game inside with the two different chinese and english roofs on the outside of the dark room. next thing I must do is buy the big wooden panels to make my own dark space and then all I have to do is put all the other objects together with the dark space. Then hopefully The Time Mahjong will workout the way I want it. Will always keep updated of any new works and ideas.
How did I feel about using a Blog as a sketchbook?
Well… it was certainly an interesting new piece of software to learn and it wasn’t easy to learn straight away because there was a lot of technical issues and problems with uploading videos and images but after a few weeks I was ok. Once I properly understood how to use at least most of the technicalities of the Blog I was more than happy to get going with posting. I began to first post some old works to reflect on and how this inspired me to creating some new works in which I posted after.
How did the Blog help me?
It really did feel like a 21st century sketchbook where you can put anything on such as videos of process and videos of artist research. In normal sketchbooks you cannot do this which I find a bit annoying because when it comes to showing off the process of work to a teacher or anyone, They do not know the full story. But now I am happier than ever for people to see more of my working process and seeing everything in great detail.
Is the blog a good way of keeping a portfolio of work?
Yes I would say it is a magnificent way of showing off all the work that people have ever done in their whole life and the good thing is that it will always be there safe and sound. Sometimes there might be some works of mine that are not relevant anymore towards what I am trying to make but at least it is documented in the Blog. This way nothing is lost at all and at the end of the day I have this bid portfolio of work which I could use for interviews for a job or a course instead of carrying all my work with me!
What will I do in the future after Critical Review ends?
Hopefully I can still carry on using this blog like a sketchbook but obviously I will still do a normal sketchbook because its all part of the practical creativity as well. Hopefully when I start my masters degree, I can use this blog for that and keep producing more work to show on the blog for people to see and to help myself understand my practice more as an artist. using this blog really helps me understand myself more as an artist because it is a lot easier to see all my work on the blog than it is in a sketchbook.
What have I learnt from all of this?
well… I have certainly learnt a lot more skills when it come to uploading images in the right formats and scales and also how to create more nice videos to show for people to watch. In research terms it has enabled me to understand other artists work and what other artists do as an artist. Seeing what other artists do gives me a bigger insight of how I can make my work more unique and making myself better.
seeing how other artists do their work makes me wanna just be more free and make me wanna express more personal feeling into my art work. Despite having my laptop stolen at the time when I was doing this module, I have still enjoyed this critical Review very much and made me wanna just keep going to producing more ideas and work despite anything going wrong. This module had taught me something very valuable for my future and will always have something nice to show to anyone and I will always keep going!
