Inspiration of the Week - Marc Isaacs

Marc Isaacs is a documentary film maker whose films usually investigate people and their ordinary lives.

I first heard about his film Lift last year in our video skills class and thought that it was a brilliant documentary on the real people that live in the London flats and showed their real reactions to the camera man. 

The film documents the host of characters that all live in the building and shows how they increasingly more comfortable with the camera and the questions the camera man asks. 

The reason that I am looking at this artist is that I am both looking at how I am going to document my next project and also looking into the idea of interviewing real people or looking into real places, rather than how places are shown to be in the media.

Over the course of the documentary Isaacs doesn't move but just stays in the lift, which is an element of work that I am considering. I might try and go to the one space over a number of days and then move t a different one for another number of days. 

NB - all photographs here have been taken from these sites in which the artist is featured:
http://www.marcisaacsfilms.com/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJNAvyLCTik

I do not own any of the pictures on this post.

So that's all for now 

Byyyyyyyyyyeeeeeeee

Róisín -x

Inspiration of the Week - Sylvia de Swaan

Sylvia de Swaan is a photographer born in Romania in 1941, at age ten she immigrated to the United States. She has also lived and worked in Europe and Mexico. Her work is usually focused around specific projects and follows themes that are common to her work. These themes are: identity, personal history, individualism and collective memory.

The project that I am going to look at is her photography series titled Return.

In these series of photographs she looks back on her Jewish heritage and her Eastern European background. In some of her images she uses a combination of old photographs and images from her journey. Some of these pictures are taken on the train journey between destinations, this shows de Swaan’s physical journey, but could also symbolise her spiritual journey into her heritage and ancestry as she returns to her family’s home.

In my next project I am looking into doing a sort of journey and also how to document some of it. These photographs are very interesting and document a lot more than writing down words could.

I also feel that they aren't typical documentary photographs but the viewer is still able to follow the narrative of the journey.

I am also still looking for a purpose for my work and I think that Sylvia de Swaan's purpose here is very personal and poignant as she is going on a journey retracing her family' journey.

NB - all photographs here have been taken from the artist's site:
http://www.sylviadeswaan.com/
http://www.sylviadeswaan.com/return
I do not own any of the pictures on this post.

Until next time,
byyyyyeeeeeeeeeeee
Róisín -x

Internal Ephemeral

So this is an update on the stuff I did for my latest project over the Christmas break as I didn't have much time to blog during this time. 

After talking with one of my lecturers what I decided to do for my final piece was to make a set of swatch cards that are found when choosing colours from DIY Stores. These cards would depict my emotions over the course of 15 days through the colour of the card, and also feature a photograph of me with the colour projected onto my face. 

Photography Test 1

How I was going to project the colours onto my face was through using coloured pieces of acetate and an over head projector that was in the shed. 

This projected the colour well enough onto my face however I would need to make the blocks of colour bigger as in these photographs you can see the adjacent colour in the background. 

However what I discovered that was that the lines that the marker left on the sheet of acetate gave the photographs more texture and interest, rather than it just be one full plain block of colour. 

Photography Test 2

These photographs were done using the same process except this time I made the blocks of colour bigger so they took up more space when projected and I also deliberately made the lines of the marker more visible so that there was more texture in them. 

I also decided to wear a white t-shirt in the photos so that the colour would be reflected better below my neck.

I also tried adding some imagery to the photographs as one of the points I was making in this prject is that it is these emotions that make us who we are, and it makes us human. 

One of the things I tried was adding another layer of acetate on the projection screen with images drawn in black. These were sort of obscured but I still think they had a nice effect.

These ones were done by removing some of the pen ink using hand sanitiser and cotton buds to draw the designs. 

I really like the effect these gave as even though you might not necessarily be able to tell what they are, especially if I cropped the photo to fit on a card, the point and the design is still there, and there is more depth to the photo. 

Making prototypes

So my dad's shed is almost like a cave of wonders where you can can a lot of random and sometimes helpful stuff in there, an example of this is a small glass tank. My idea was to fill this tank with a bit of water and then splash ink in it to create almost the same effect as the acetate, but with a bit more movement.

I think this process worked extremely well as the effect was better than I could have imagined as it also gave the impression of mood more than the acetate did.

Making these prototypes also helped me to iron out any mistakes that I could make in the final steps for instance, I knew what inks would take more and look more intense.

Making the photos in this process also allowed me to colour the card as well to make the colour swatches, which I think adds to the process as it creates a gradient emotion and the exact colours in the photos were used in the card. The more colour I used in the projection, the stronger that emotion and therefore the more colour that would be on the card.

Final photos

So here are a few of the photos that I took to put on the cards.

Although some of them were a bit blurry purely because of how they had to be taken, I still think that they turned out really well, and were what I was hoping them to be. 

Card Examples

So my original plan was to take the photographs and then have the printed onto card almost like they would if they were real colour swatches from  real store, however I decided to go along with the ink idea as I felt that this added more to the project.

The Final 15

I image transferred the photos onto the card that i dyed after I took the photo with the in I used. I do like how these turned out as they are slightly fragile looking and imperfect which I feel also adds to it as they are meant to be a representation of me and to bring home the fact that I am huan and it is these things tat make me human.

So any way that's all I have for you just now. I am planning on doing a lot more Inspiration of the week posts to help me research for my upcoming brief which I have still to write D: so you can look forward to many of those with some updates on my work scattered in between :P

Until then

byyyyyyyeeeeeeeeeeee

Róisín -x

Inspiration of the Week - Richard Long

Richard Long is an artist who makes his pieces through following routes in landscapes and making sculptures and taking photographs of them along the way.

http://www.richardlong.org/Exhibitions/2012/box1.html

The reason that I have looked into this artist is that I am currently thinking of carrying on with my maps idea for my final exhibition work. My dad suggested I look into Richard Long's work for some idea as I'm not quite sure where to take my work just yet.

I really like his work as I find the shapes and materials he uses very organic, so I think this works well as he is                                                                                                             interacting almost naturally with                                                                                       his environment.

http://www.richardlong.org/Sculptures/2012/mont_blanc.html

In terms of inspiration I think it is a good idea to almost map out a journey through places artworks - almost like landmarks along the way. This got me thinking of orienteering and things like that, ie following a map or route to find different artworks of                                                                                                           mine.

http://www.richardlong.org/Sculptures/2011sculptures/fivestones.html

http://www.richardlong.org/Exhibitions/2011exhibitupgrades/whitwatercirc.html

http://www.richardlong.org/Drawings/drawings.html

http://www.richardlong.org/Drawings/drawings.html

http://www.richardlong.org/Exhibitions/2011exhibitions/muddywaterfall.html

NB - all photographs here have been taken from his site: http://www.richardlong.org/
I do not own any of the pictures on this post.

I will definitely look to Richard Long for inspiration in regards to my final piece, although I don't think my works will be as big as his are. I could maybe make his influence work on a smaller scale, and maybe indoors as well.

That's all for now, if you have any artists you want me to look at be sure to let me know :)
Róisín -x