Evaluation

This project has taught me that I am very concept based; therefore when I get an idea that I don’t believe has been explored I thoroughly enjoy finding a way to visually translate it. I believe that this unit has forced me to progress; this can be seen in the advancements from the basic level of my publications from last year and through the more complex themes of my later editorial work. A more mature layout has created a minimalistic aspect to my work; the development of my use of negative space has seen me gain a better understanding in Art Direction.

As an artist I have grown up over the course of this unit because I now realize that I always need to be thinking about the audience of my work and the time frame to complete my work in. In this unit I have tried to move away from relying on my drawing and move more into the digital side of art. However rather then cut out drawing completely I simply want it to inform my work instead of defining it.

My variety of theme, content and execution of my work in this unit have kept me on my toes and allowed me to mature as an artist, thinking carefully about what defines and links certain aspects of my work. Looking at conceptual art gave me the opportunity to embody the abstract artist looking at the works of Sophie Calle and Vito Acconci, I tried to channel the unique style of their work and bring it to life in my Minor Project: ‘The Object People’. Whereas my live brief for ‘Patternmash’, a brief set monthly, the theme was ‘midwinter’ and for it I went back to what I loved about art and utilized my favourite medium, drawing. I chose my audience carefully and targeted children with a fawn and pinecone motif.

Experimentation was key in my previous years at University and I enjoyed trying a bit of everything, not worrying if it took me longer or wasn’t going to be the direction I ended up going into. However I found that because of the added pressure in this Unit, knowing that everything I produced affected my progression. I felt a bit constricted and did not experiment as much as I have previously. I feared wasting valuable time and resources,  that are very precious when taking into account the magnitude of this Unit.

This Unit has been undeniably useful to me in my progression and I hope to take an element from each project into Unit X and further establish myself in Art Direction. Layout will be a big focus for me in Unit X because I believe that it is vital in how the publication is viewed. Not to mention that I want to look at how the layout is altered from the physical page of the magazine to the computer screen in a digitized format. I will also make binding a focus of Unit X because I believe that if this is experimented with it could be integral in separating me from most other publications and set me apart from other Art Directors.

This Unit has has allowed me to see lots of different sides of art after University. It has done this through the many lectures and our constant contact with practicing artists in the outside world. In this Unit my fascination with magazines and the process with which they are created has deepened and my desire to get into this field has been increased. Over the course of this Unit I have become captivated with the process of witnessing a concept that I created, going through various stages of experimentation and then finally culminating into a physical hard copy on the page. Although the process was hard work and needed to be nurtured through many setbacks seeing my project come together from the moment of creation to the point of completion has made me very proud.

Masking

However another element I wanted to bring in was trying to mask this identity by creating masks. (influenced by artist Jane and Louis Wilson who use make-up as a form of camouflaging their faces from face recognition CCTV). 

Jane and Louise Wilson

Working in Photoshop over and over again in my minor project I wanted to go back to using just raw materials creating watercolour paintings depicting futuristic masks with geometric shapes, using the colours that I had taken from the 'DECRYPT' trend from WGSN. Here is an example shown below which I thought was really successful. 

These masks would prevent the human scanning process and would also be a piece of art within itself. I took inspiration from Picasso's cubist portraits and tribal masks, these worked really well by themselves but I wanted to bring them back into Photoshop and layer them on to the face. I did this to show what it would look like when these identity, this would be a section within what I would hope to be my final editorial magazine. masks were put on human faces to prevent the human barcode scanning process, giving a narrative to the images in the spread. 

This would act as my answer to a fashion spread, without including any garments, as it is more about the face. I also wanted to look at the figure as a whole and not just the face creating geometric and linear shapes for a masked garment, with the same colour palette to add more elements to the story. Masking the whole person and their identity. 

The Human barcode

Returning to my theme of barcodes and creating a human barcode I wanted to create an editorial spread with the idea behind it that each person has their own human barcode. This was shown through light vertically contouring the face as if they were being scanned. 

Trend publication

Considering the market for this magazine brought me to thinking about trend publications that influence the fashion industry creating high impact images that are then related to a theme, designers then take elements from these images to influence their designs or what they are trying to create. I was told to look on the trend website WGSN to see the latest trends and how they are laid out. 

WGSN

One particular trend that I felt linked to my own theme was 'DECRYPT', I found the images very intriguing particularly the use of colours that were extracted to create the colour palette and trigger inspiration in designers. I want to use this particular colour palette in my future work as I feel the colours depict a futuristic theme. Personally I am very interested in creating these high impact trend images that inspire and influence designers, particularly fashion designers. Here are a couple of my own images below with a similar colour palette.They have been manipulated in photoshop to create abstract images. 

Live brief Context

When designing the adult interior I decided 'Laura Ashley' would be a good company to base my work on, because they are a well-known interior brand. While investigating their current wallpaper designs I realised that they used a lot of vertical stripes, I used this as a base to work on by adding my own twist and incorporating the pinecone illustration within a diamond shape. 

I experimented with the palette that was set with the brief to see which colours complimented each other and which worked well as a whole. Of all my designs I found the interior for the children was most effective and the one that I had the most fun creating. However one element I need to consider is that the outline of an animal is very key to how it is perceived from a certain distance in the motif design of the fawn and the pinecone, from far away the outline of the fawn didn't look as fawn like as it could have. In future I need to consider this when thinking about the consumer because the outline is the first thing they are drawn to and it is what they will immediately relate to. With the adult interior I feel I have more to learn and to develop, as the overall design was quite harsh and not something I would necessarily see within an adult interior. I could develop this through thinking about my colour choice more clearly and the shapes I used to create them and the proportion of white used in the background. In saying this Hannah, who is the director at Patternmash, was very pleased with my designs and could see them in the context that I had set myself. They are now on the Patternmash blog for other designers to see and my contact details are on there should someone see them and like them. 

Decrypt

Decrypt has been a focus of moving my project forward. I was made aware after our presentations that if I was creating an editorial magazine, I should look at fashion influences and investigate trends this season. Using WSGN forecasting for colour usage and influential imagery. An image that stood out to me ( i heart studio image hand - find photographer + make up artist) I tried to recreate my own version shown below. 

The hand is subtle against the deep Indian ink colouring and dark background contrasting against the Orange (Cherry Tomato) circles in the shape of what could be in reference to the illuminate as the symbol is a pyramid shape and the theories consist of a conspire to eventually rule the world through an authoritarian world government enlighten intellectually or spiritually; enable to understand). What is so successful about this image is you are immediately draw to the Orange and its futuristic qualities. This image has been inspirational in moving my theme of barcodes forward and how I am going to translate a human barcode into an editorial magazine such as Acne paper. Take elements for the i heart studio image and translate it into my own work. I did this by projection some of my own images on to the face and figure using linear and geometric shapes, static imagery, technology (play button ) and the silhouette. Also looking at how long can translate a more futuristic tone.

These photographs were successful with the light cupping the face and contouring around features giving the image more depth and not seeming flat, particularly in image 1 and 4. Image 4 was particularly successful as the light is projecting a virtual balaclava. With an orange which I previously have mentioned being successful in creating a futuristic look. In order to move these images forward I looked at Brian McNamara and how he uses Rim lights and colour gel to create high impact photographs as shown below.  I would like to further my own images by adding abstract marks and bare skin to create a more decrypt tone to the final image. 

Barcodes

Furthering on from my minor project I wanted to explore and further the theme of barcodes in relation to humans, due to much of my work becoming very linear and representing the bars within the barcode could I in fact make a human barcode? However I wanted to consider this idea within a publication format directed at more of an editorial audience as the photographer Ricky Guest.

Rick Guest, Wayne's World

Guest creates futuristic images of linear moving figures that I felt influenced by as a way of showing a scanned human through photography and his work is often editorial based. This also made me consider other editorial magazines such as 'ACNE PAPER' which is directed at a fashion audience to influence designers which is something  I need to consider investigating as a lot of editorial magazine are rooted in fashion.  An aspect that I really like about ACNE is that it has a single theme that runs through the whole magazine and is portrayed in lots of different ways. For example the latest issue is called 'The Actress' and it looks at current and old actresses and everything from costumes to the theatre. 

ACNE Paper Magazine, The Actress

One thing I really like about the magazine is the A3 size and layout working harmoniously with the spreads. These made me think of the artist Hammershoi because his paintings are clean, crisp, well laid out and these qualities can be translated into the ACNE papers' layout. In particular how they use negative space surrounding the images and text 'framing' each page similar to Hammershoi. 

Vilhelm Hammershoi, Interior With Young Woman From Behind