Wednesday 11 May 2016

Life Drawing//Year 1 reflection and analysis

Since starting on the BA drawing course I have found that my confidence has improved and I am now able to use my own sense of line to communicate an idea of the body and form of the figure in front of me. Whereas before I was very nervous in approaching what was in front of me, this showed in my first assessment where it was pointed out that my line was distinguishable between life drawing and my other practice. It was noted that my line was more cautious and this took away from what I was drawing. I tended to go full on straight away with documenting what was in front of me. The marks were chaotic and confused and I often found myself losing faith with what I was drawing.

Confidence has played a huge part in the progression of my life drawing in the second semester. I have found a way of working with line that I think gets across what I want to with drawing. The fundamentals of drawing for me is shape, line and mark making and I have found a minimal way of capturing this in one stroke which differs hugely from my work on foundation.

When working with my sense of line it is always important that I have been able to translate a sense of gesture with what I am doing. I have this habit of working very quickly as I want to translate what is in my head to paper as quickly as possible. This is something I want to work on next year and become more considered with what I am drawing. I am able to work quickly which is something I have improved on and I think this is a fundamental skill to have because of how it is important to use drawing to capture the world around us rather than just photographing or writing notes.

I think through doing quick warm up poses straight away it has made me think less about what I am drawing and thinking more about the figure in front of me and considering the line and curves of the form and how this is built up.



Printmaking analysis//relfection

Since starting on the BA Drawing course and the printmaking facilities being moved up to Woodlane I have been integrated into meeting other students and this has helped with my confidence and learning more about other processes and having the confidence to ask questions is something that I have never have had the confidence to do but this year is different because I am with more likeminded people and there are more print making facilities for me to throw myself into. Working bigger is still something that I am being encouraged to do but also I still don't have the confidence and patience to do so. I worked on an A2 piece of metal and incorporated some of my manipulations on the photocopier on it which was another way to push my process and ideas onto a new platform and scale.

The important thing about this course is that there is a structure which is suggested and set and then w can take it in any direction we want to. This is great as we all have the same starting point and when it comes to crits etc and it great to see where people take it. I now have the confidence to take it to another level with my practice rather than concentrating on how other people push it and feeling like I have to follow the same path as them I am able to trust my own judgement more. This is something that I have been struggling with since foundation but I think its safe to say that this year things have finally started to come together and having this confidence is having me in good stead and has stopped me thinking as much. This is always an issue with the way I work and this is why print-making grounds me so much. I am able to lose myself in a process and refine my work as I go because this is very much part of my practice in how I work and do things.

I have been working on more representational images for projects like the narrative outcome and this has been great because it's pushing my sense of mark making into a new direction and making it's audience wider. My mark making is very self indulgent and since having a conversation with Dane I have thought more about how I can use the signs and symbols project as a way to communicate my ideas in a different way. I am struggling with this currently and I think it is something I need to continue to work on after hand in. This is the beauty of the way I work, the ideas are very conceptual and fine art related and I want to put them more into a different kind of context. Whether this be illustration or something more design based.