and all we've been through

had a fairly cultural saturday yesterday. went to see a few a couple of the smaller art galleries around manchester with a friend from my course.

first off was untitled gallery which currently has a show by marc provins, a photographer based in manchester. first off the gallery space, it is quite hidden away but i loved the magic of going to find the gallery, reminded me of the smaller galleries i went to see back home in london. i did really like the photography by provins, the work is looking at the unexpected and seeing the unexpected. the photos are small moments of life that people usually walk by, anything from a sun pattern on a car to a squashed hedgehog on the road!

http://www.untitledgallerymanchester.com/
http://www.marcprovins.co.uk/

secondly we went to see an exhibiton in kraak gallery in the northern quarter by a group of fine art manchester met students. again i loved the space but the work was not quite there. just small things like paintings not hanging quite straight or parts of work that have been cut out not quite straight. there also seemed to be a large gap between the artist statements we read and the work that we saw. i was impressed though with work by sean liddle and bianca lemus. sean liddle's work seemed the most confident and i liked the style and subject choice by bianca lemus.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?v=wall&gid=187652369622

we then went to the chinese arts centre where there is an exhibition called human error by household and dario uteras. re-makes of household appliances we take for granted such as printers and scanners have been made on a large scale so we have to work them. it was a fun exhibition to see and even better that you could interact with it. only bad part of this exhibtion is getting my finger caught in the 'scanner'!

in other news......my essay is done! i'm so happy =)
now back to my 'normal' practical work instead of panicing about the essay.

as it's coming up to the end of the academic year i've found that i've had lots of good ideas but i've not been very good at putting these ideas onto paper. i'm going to use the easter break to actually get some physical work done and not jus think lots about my ideas i need to do something with them!

children of the revolution

been doing a few little pieces to keep me sane whilst i plod through this essay.

i've enjoyed just doing these simple pieces of art and getting back to the basics of my practice.

a few days ago darren, ryan and myself went to see the space in salford shopping centre. it's quite a nice space (apart from bring painted cream!) and is right in the middle of the shopping centre. a good space for a first exhibition i think.

how come you dance so good?

today i had a little mosey around the cube gallery. upstairs there is an exhibition by OSA looking at rearranging objects from around manchester based on works by kurt schwitters. i liked the way that the pieces blended into the existing space in gallery and really took over the place.
downstairs there is an ongoing piece of work by jason minsky and william titley. they are looking into the development and growth of manchester especially one particular event where a village was destroyed to make way for the growth of a lake in the lake district so manchester could have enough water. they have been researching the lost village or mardale green and have made a model village out of kendal mint cake which they plan to flood with water from the lake.

http://www.cube.org.uk/

in other news i have bought a plant in a can. it looks like an odd shaped coke can and you peel  off the top, add water everydy and ta-da a plant in a can. ive bought lavender and pansies. i thought it would be nice to make my room a bit more summery. on a side note from this i love it when it starts to get sunny in england. none of us know how long the sun will last so we make the most of it today. i went out to the park at lunch and it was full of people all sunbathing in shorts and skirts and even some with flip-flops. one day of sun and we go crazy. no wonder the rest of the world think we're weird!

war, children, it's just a shot away. it's just a shot away.

so, i'm currently working mostly on my essay.  i have been working on other practical work but i know if i start anything concrete now then i won't do my essasy!
however, i have been doing a few little doodles and experiments in the studio just to see what happens. working with no idea in my mind just doing whatever pops up in there. i also have an interview this week to work for a new manchester arts and music magazine that is starting up so i've been doing a few illustration-y pieces for this to show the editor. they seem to be going ok but i haven't worked in this style for a while so it's hard to get back into it.

the 'working title' that i'm in with a few other people from my class now has the official title of MISC. we have a gallery in salford that is interested in showing our work so after my essay i'm going to get cracking on doing a piece for that. i want to work on the people in the background in photos. doing like a 'wanted poster' type thing and searching for these people that happen to be in my photos. i have looked up the legality of this and it is fine. the only concrete rules are about getting up in someones face when taking photos or documenting someones every move (aka stalking) but hey the paparazzi do that so yeah these laws do get broken regulary! i haven't decided whether to use existing photos i have or go about manchester taking photos.

i've also been to see the anish kapoor exhibition at the manchester art gallery. i did like the powdered colour and wax pieces but i particualry like his pieces using plain really dark colours. this work is all about the experience of it and in the informational video that is in the exhibition it says that kapoor creates 4-d work he uses time as well as the 3 dimensions. i like the pieces because they have a 'deepness' to them and you feel you can got lost in them.

sun in the sky you know how i feel

progress is slow. basically. continuing to make the bar scene, now made the actual bar and the shelves at the back of the bar.
a few of us in my class are getting together so we can do exhibitions together...kind of a collective but there is no links between our work and practice. i think i'm going to start a project for this to get some kind of idea of what i want to do for our first exhbition. this has come at a good time, i'm starting to lost steam with my animation project and it'll give me a chance to step back from my animation and come back at it soon with more enthusiasm! haven't quite decided what i want to do for this project but i have a few ideas circling around my head that i would like to exapand on.

i've recently found an artist called mariel clayton who has been making scenes of killer barbies. i like the pieces becuase although they are funny whilst being slightly disgusting! the sets have also been really well made. i've found i've enjoyed making the sets for my project a lot (i thibk more thatn i'll enjoy animating) . I would like to try this idea of making a set and photographing it. making a set scene.
http://www.thephotographymarielclayton.com/

i also like the work of designer Rita Botelho. i particularly like the simplicity in the designs. for example the 'ring for another' glass design. this is a cocktail glass design with a bell in the bottom, looking at how wealthy people could just ring for their servants to get them another drink.
i also really like the 'hanging' earring series. this is a series of silver wire earrings with small figures of people on them who like they are climbing of leaning against the wire. again i love the simplicity of this and also the turning of something everyday like an eariing into a work of art.
http://www.ritabotelho.com/

right that'll do for now
=)

de do do do, de da da da

so latest pictures from my set design. i feel ready now to start test filming some things with the park scene just to see what i can do and how my animating looks, things i need to work on on the set and in my technique animating etc. i have already seen just from taking these photos that the park scene would look betterwith more leaves on the tree. looking at it face-to-face you cannot notice this butonly from a photo can you see.

in the pub/bar scene i have made the stained glass windows for the doors. like with the leaves on the tree this does not look as good on a photo. i think i shall have to have some back lighting for animation to make this secction stand out more.

today i  went to see the exhibtion 'the people you're not' at the cornerhouse in manchester (http://www.cornerhouse.org/) part of this exhibtion was an idea by harry hill which involved set designs. what i likes about these designs were the different levels within them, like old puppet theatres with areas going into the background of the scene. i want to bring these different levels into at least more of my sets although how is another question!

i have recently read quirkology by richard wiseman. (http://www.quirkology.com/). wiseman is a psychologist who looks into the weird in everyday life. some of his studies have included whether star signs/ date of birth actually have any effect on your personality, which city has the fastest pace of life and the power of suggestion. the experiments into the power of suggestion caught my attention. one particular group of experiments involved making participants believe there were spirits in the room just from suggestion, this was done by simple trickery wih objects on a table then making participants believe and actually see the whole table move just be saying it was. another section that interested me was research as to why some people claim to see ghosts and feel 'something' in the room. this was found to be a particular very low sound wave that although we cannot hear it our bodies can feel it. it is sometimes refered to as the brown note because of the effects it can have on people's bowels when listened to in large doses! people were found to feel more moved by a piece of music when this note was played and it has also been found that you can hallucinate and see ghostly mirages when hearing this note. my research into this field continues...

hang me up to dry

first things first, my animation. i've taken a break from the burger place until i decide what else i need to make and i have now started to make a bar/pub set and a park set. so far in the bar/pub i have made some laminate flooring out of lolly sticks and in the park i have made a tree in one corner and i'm starting to make grass. i came back home the other day and i've spent the time writing the storyline. so far i just have the basic plot outline, i now need to pad it out a bit and get details down so i know exactly what to do when im filming.

recently someone from my class has been organising an exhibtion at the art corner in fallowfield for late april. after much deliberation about whether to have a theme or not all of us who are involved decided on the colour 'red' as our theme. this means all our work can be tied together but still have chance to be diverse. we had to write a proposal to be part of this. i have decided to use the skills i learnt in bookbinding to make books looking at the colour red. i have been looking at collecting red objects and also looking at anger. however, this is still early days and there wil be more to this in my final pieces.

last night i started to experiment with book making and have a go at making hard back covers. i just made a simple brown paper bound hardback notebook and also a book made of plastic pockets. i thought having a book made of pockets would be another way of displaying found objects. this was harder to make then i first though because the pockets are made of shiny plastic so it was hard to keep them in line whilst trying to sew them.

at uni there are films shown every monday evening and i went to see la jettee by chris marker. it is made up almost entirely of still images telling the story of a man who is sent into the past and the future to try and save his own time after world war 3. i found the film captivating and it draws you in to the storyline. because you are not seeing everything or hearing any dialogue apart from a few mutterings you make uo your own parts to the story.

last tuesday i went to the whitworth gallery to listen to their tuesday talk. it was by a curator called gabriel coxhead. parts of his talk were interesting but mostly it was fairly dull and him pausing to try and think of longer words to say to sound clever.

on a better note as a class we went to liverpool on thursday. we went to see the nam june paik exhibtions at fact and tate liverpool but we also went to see the underwater exhibtion at bluecoats. we started off at the fact museum. i was very impressed with the laser cone in the first room and enjoyed sitting under that and looking at the shapes created on the fabric. the rest of the works were video art which i can appreciate but are not really my thing. we then went to the underwater exhibtion (which ironically had video art which i liked!) the videos i liked were jellyfish lake by dorothy cross, becoming light by bill viola and he drowned in her eyes and she called him to follow by janaina tschape. my favourite of these is jellyfish lake. this is because it looks so serene and beautiful, this is due to the images but also because there is no sound in this piece. i think sound sound have shattered the calm feeling of the piece. finally, we went to the tate liverpool. after seeing the video art by nam june paik at fact we didnt really want to see any more or pay the entrance fee so we just looked round the permanent exhibtion there. my favourite piece there was axehead by tony cragg. i liked this because he's collected all of the objects and the differences between them but that they are bought together in this one piece.