BACKGROUND

After receiving my Unit 3 assessment feedback, I want to reflect on and respond to one of the points raised as I feel it is essential for progressing my current body of work ‘News’.

REFLECTIONS

Below is an extract from my assessment feedback that posed a question about my use of the crow as a metaphor:

‘…You talk about the crows being a metaphor for the awful events that are happening in today’s world but does a metaphor need to be more than that? In a novel or film it might be the timing of a crows arrival and departure in relation to events happening that turns it into a metaphor. Or in a poem it might be a detailed  description of a crows behaviour? How might this impact on the way you continue painting crows? In what way, if at all, does the pose of each crow relate to the headlines on the actual page, either the front of the page or the reverse side that might be revealed by a light source behind?‘

The timing of this question was very appropriate because I have been thinking about this a lot. I chose the crow as a metaphor for my grief for the loss of a world order that I understood. The crow was inspired by the book ‘Grief is the thing with feathers’ by Max Porter. When I started this series of work, I just wanted to paint something as I felt a sense of urgency and the book came to mind with the crow as a metaphor for grief. Hence I started there. The black feathers worked well with my chosen medium of Chinese ink and the characterful crows gave me lots of ideas to work with. I started without thinking too much about the pose or the composition of the pieces, I just wanted to paint and express how I felt. Then I started to locate the bird more purposefully next to headlines or images and experimented with compositions. Now that I have done many such paintings, I started to get an idea of what I wanted to achieve with this body of work and with the crow.

I want to use the crows to bring attention to certain news headlines. I noticed that when people look at my News paintings, they usually start with the crow. They would study it for a while, then their eyes would wander around the news headlines or images nearby and then focus on the articles. It was important for me to choose a neutral or as unbiased as possible a newspaper because I don’t want to tell or preach to the viewer what they should think about the news piece; I want the viewers to decide for themselves and to show a factual headline or news article to trigger their thinking is my intention.

Reflecting on the questions posed in my feedback, I believe my use of the crow has several roles. Like in the novel I referred to, the crow as a metaphor revealed itself to me when I started to despair about situations in the world – that was when the crow ‘entered stage’ as in a theatre. In the last few weeks, there were times when I felt perhaps it was time to move on from the crow as perhaps world events were settling down. That feeling lasted at most a day when something else happened that enrages me again and I had to bring the crow back to centre-stage. There seems to be an endless supply of headlines at the moment which is energising for my art but absolutely draining for me as a human.

As for the point about the pose of the crow, it has been an interesting development and revelation for me. I remember when I first started studying art, a tutor at the time said that how we felt would inevitably come through to our work; our work was influenced by our subconscious. I didn’t quite believe that at the time but was happy to keep an open mind. Of course, I have since experienced that many times. There have been a few News paintings where some unconscious expressions came through that I only noticed afterwards. Below are two examples.

Example 1 –

In the painting below, I wanted to position the crow to look like it was going for the bottle of ‘tariff medicine’. But since I do not do a mark up drawing on the page (not anymore) and I just leave the painting to chance, I do not have control of exactly what comes out especially as I’m painting with my non-dominant hand. In this case, the crow ended up overshooting the medicine bottle and it ended with an ‘uh-oh’ or ‘oh no…’ expression which was not my intention but highly appropriate.

Example 2 –

In this case, the chosen headline and image on the newspaper was about the US VP. I intended to bring in the crow from the right hand side (enter stage right) pointing towards the photo image. Again, I didn’t have too much control over the exact depiction but the crow came out screaming at the photo and its feathers somewhat ruffled. It seems to reflect what goes on in my consciousness.

As for the back lighting of the images and what they reveal – I tried at one point to place the bird purposely to align with images on the reverse side, but they rarely work out satisfactorily. So now I choose a newspaper page where there are headlines that I want to respond to on the front and although I do look at the reverse side to make sure there is something interesting on the back, I tend to locate the bird according to the front page and then leave the reverse side to chance. This means I don’t pose the bird according to the reverse image purposely and just wait to see what happens when the painting is finished. By not being overly deliberate, it has provided some interesting compositions. It also contributes to the notion of uncertainty that continues to form a large part of this body of work.

Final reflections regarding using the crow as a metaphor… as I was writing this blog, I have started to use theatre stage language to describe how I use the crow and I feel that is appropriate. The crow has become my actor on stage to carry a message, it has been on stage throughout this series of work. It comes in and out of the spot light depending on what it wants to draw attention to. It accompanies me as I navigate the ‘new world order’ and represents me when I want to say something. One day, when the world is right again (I remain hopeful) then perhaps Crow would exit stage left. I have started exploring bringing in other creatures to broaden the repertoire. I have enjoyed using the Chinese ink as a medium and I have thought about using a rat but that seems to be very controversial. I have also thought about spiders because I was inspired by Louise Bourgeois’ spiders and how she used them to signify strength. I certainly feel that I need as much strength as I can summon up everyday just to read the horrendous news at the moment. This idea is only at an early stage. I will keep thinking.

LEARNING

In writing my reflections and response to the Unit 3 feedback, it has helped me to crystallise my reasons for using the crow in my work – why I use it and how I use it. I feel there is still much to achieve with my crow and there is still some way to go on this journey. So I will continue with it but will be more mindful of how and why I’m using the crow as a metaphor as I progress. I sense that the metaphor has already shifted somewhat and has gone beyond just grief. It is becoming my voice which is also an appropriate metaphor because the crow is intelligent (can read my mind) and vocal (speak for me). Also, in many cultures and mythologies, crows and ravens are depicted as messengers, not necessarily from another world, but rather from between different realms of existence. So using the crow as my messenger has become part of the metaphor.

I will continue to explore other creatures that has a metaphorical meaning for me and that works well with my chosen media of Chinese ink on newspaper. Spiders are one possibility that I am considering.

NEXT STEPS

Continue to use the crow in this series of work, News.

Consider more deeply about the metaphors that I use – how they apply as a metaphor and how they evolve along the journey.

Explore other creatures or metaphors to bring into the work. Be sensitive to what they mean and think broadly to avoid unintentionally offending people.