art

MA U3: ‘News’ Art – developing ideas for MA Degree Show

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

Since my recent re-evaluation of my art practice to enable me to respond to what has been happening in the world, I have been making a new body of work – ‘News’. I feel the urge to show my new work at my MA Degree Show. This blog is about the development of ideas and a plan for the Degree Show.

METHOD

Firstly, I wanted to explore if combining multiple sheets of ‘News’ would make a good composition. Since each sheet was made as an independent painting, I needed to see if they would ‘make sense’ together. So I stuck together a few paintings and put them up against two glass doors to see how I felt. I was encouraged by what I saw and felt there was potential in the concept. I then proceeded to design the installation – how should the paintings be presented?

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Below are some mock up ideas that I prepared to discuss with my tutor:

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After discussing with my tutor, we felt that the first option had the most potential for the CSM site. So I proceeded to think about how to create one large painting by combining multiple newspaper paintings together that would be appropriate for the Show both in demonstrating the concept and that is robust enough for a public exhibition.

My tutor showed me an installation by a previous student who stitched together pieces of paper to form a long drop. I liked the idea of stitching together the pieces rather than just taping because I think it would be more robust and also reflect my wish to mend what’s happening in the world through my work – somehow.

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I then tried out different ideas on my sketch book and decided a narrower long drop (rather than a wide one as in the original idea) could work well to resemble how newspapers are printed and processed in the factory. Working so intensely with newspapers and examining newsprint so closely has reminded me of my time as a young engineer working on control systems for newspaper printing presses including many Fleet Street titles. I remember vividly how exhilarating and awe-inspiring it was to see the newspaper webs flying at high speed between feeder rollers around the monumental machines (see example image below). Since my art practice is about exploring my identity and engineering has been such a large part of my life (35+ years), I wanted to make an installation at the degree show that incorporated elements of my memory from those days.

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I experimented with the ideas of using three tubes to represent parts of the printing machine. Initially, I looked into buying used feeder rollers from printing press refurbishment companies but they were costly. Then I considered using mild steel tubes (not stainless steel as they would be too shiny). Below is an initial design idea which I used to get some costing. A key objective was the ease of installation knowing how busy the build up would be with such a big student show.

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Then I wondered if three tubes would be too many and considered a two tubes design. In all cases, one or more flood lights would be used to illuminate the artwork from behind. Here is a two tubes design:

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After further discussions and advice from my tutor, the final design was to use 3 x copper plumbing pipes as the copper colour would complement well the Financial Times’ salmon paper. The second pipe on the floor would be placed behind the painting giving the look of the newspaper feeding into the wall. I considered using two small flood lights, but I might go with a dimmable flood light instead because I have found that the back-illumination light level could be critical – too bright and the images became saturated and if too dim then the reverse side images would be hardly visible. Hence a dimmable unit would give more flexibility for an unfamiliar site with unknown ambient light level. Here is the final design:

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The next task was to test out the stitching and the wrapping of the newspaper around a pipe to see how the paper behaved. Also to determine the optimum pipe diameter to use.

Using a sewing machine for large sheets of paper could be challenging because unlike fabric, the paper could not be bunched up to fit around the sewing machine body. Hence I rolled up the newspaper around a plastic tube and held the roll in place with a large paperclip so that it could be fed into the machine without damaging the paper. The two sheets of newspapers were held together using dressmaking pins just like I would do when binding fabrics.

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The machine settings were as follows with the stitch size fairly small for strength but not tiny as it might rip the paper:

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The paper was then fed slowly into the machine for sewing. Two rows of stitches were made to ensure strength of the bind:

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Completed sewing and with paper hanging vertically:

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Below are close up images of the stitching and how the paper wrapped around the tube. This tube was of 40mm diameter and the paper wrapped well around it:

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I tried wrapping around a smaller diameter tube (22mm) and it felt too tight and obviously would require more revolutions of wrapping and I felt that would introduce more risk in the paper not aligning and looking untidy:

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Another example of paper wrapped around a tube. This time with painted paper only as an experiment because the installation for the Show would only use unpainted paper to wrap around the tube.

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Since I am planning to create a painting size of 2 x double page spread broadsheets, that is approximately 1.36m wide and it would be difficult to feed into the sewing machine in one go, I created the following stitching plan to do the stitching half way, then turn around and do the other half from the opposite direction. I might try to do it all the way with some spare newspaper as an experiment to start with.

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Final selection of eight paintings to form a composition for the Degree Show:

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Mock up in front of flood light to test concept:

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REFLECTIONS

I started to re-evaluate my art practice just before the Low Res in March and I started to make ‘News’ art at the end of March which is less than two months ago. I cannot believe how much has happened and that I am planning to show this new body of work at the Degree Show. During my recent tutorial, my tutor said that everything I have been doing as well as my commitment to interrogation have been leading to this and it does feel that way to me. I am feeling a momentum that I had not felt before and I am very excited (and somewhat nervous but in a good way) about showing this work at the Show. I do not know if it would work out or if it would present itself as I imagined. But I take confidence from what David Bowie said in this video where he was giving advice to artists:

https://youtu.be/JRtZc_Nmo5w?si=PYU871rvIuJu7wjo

My main takeaway from Bowie’s video was when he said, ‘…Always remember the reason you initially started working, you felt there was something inside yourself that if you could manifest it in some way then you would understand more about yourself and how you co-exist with the rest of society… If you feel safe then you are not working in the right area. Always go a little out of your depth, when you feel your feet are not quite touching the bottom then you are just about in the right place to do something exciting.’

I sincerely hope that Bowie is right and I look forward to finding out!

Another point that I have been reflecting on is that this new body of work is aesthetically and topically very different to my last body of work, The Cheongsam Series, where I was making oil paintings on dress-shaped canvases to explore my transcultural journey.

Much of my work in the last two years have been about my transcultural identity, but I knew that at some point I would want to go beyond just talking about my transcultural journey onto issues about society – issues that are still related to me, my lived experience but about other aspects of my identity. I mentioned this in my Study Statement from Unit 1 as my intention, but as I was making my transcultural work I have at times felt bounded to that topic and I was unsure of how to progress or transition onto the next body of work without seeming incoherent. Then when the ‘calling’ came to make work about the rapid change in world order and how people close to me were being affected, my urge to move onto the next body of work felt like a natural progression. Of course, there was much time spent on reflecting, agonising, experimenting, observing and reflective-writing that led me to making ‘News’ art. I am very pleased that I have gone through the transition process from one body of work to the next while I was still on the MA programme. This is because I felt safe and secure in trying something completely different in a supportive environment and I made it happen. I have learnt that I could do it and it wasn’t as scary as I thought it might be. Guided by my reflective process and taking it step by step meant that I felt in control of the transition – not necessary in control of the making but in control of the change process which gave me a solid platform to take risks in the making. This learning experience has been very important for me as I now feel confident to do that again independently after the course. I feel I can move onto the next body of work when the next ‘calling’ comes. I know I can rely on my instincts guided by my reflective process to make it happen. I expect I will return to my transculturality work at some point because there is still much to explore and I certainly have not exhausted the subject yet – far from it.

LEARNING

I have learnt that I now feel able to transition from one body of work to the next and take risks along the way. I will follow my instincts and use my reflective process to guide me. This has been an important realisation as I go forward to develop my practice.

As for the Degree Show, there has been a lot to think about in planning for the show and I have really enjoyed the challenge. Especially looking at sourcing the right materials for the installation – I learnt a lot in that process, such as to consider the materials’ behaviour, the aesthetics and planning for a site that I am not familiar with including all the contingencies to consider. It’s all good experience for any future exhibitions. Creating the paintings is only half the work, presenting it properly and all the site considerations require just as much work which is something to bear in mind in the future. Planning and allowing plenty of time is key!

I have also learnt that I needed to introduce a new process of organising my materials – namely the newspapers! Especially considering news has a life span. My ‘News’ artwork needs to be about the here and now and can’t be left on the shelf for too long or the news story would have expired. So I needed to create a system to sort the newspapers so they don’t end up piling up in my studio. I decided to organise my newspapers as follows.

I found it helpful to have a specific topic for selecting the newspapers to paint on. In this case, it’s about the sudden change in world order due to the US Government’s drastic roll out of damaging policies.

So when I get a copy of the newspaper, I sort the pages into the following categories:

– Selected pages for painting – with the appropriate headline, perhaps an interesting image and not too much advertising especially not big dark blocks.

– Spares: top priority / second priority / good for practicing

– Not selected

Out of all the ‘News’ paintings that I have created, they were sorted into ‘possibles’ for the show and ‘not selected’. Then I continued to make more paintings until I had enough ‘good’ ones that I was happy with for the Show.

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NEXT STEPS

Make it happen for the Show!

Always remember Bowie’s advice!

Maintain my confidence, follow my instincts and reflective process to develop future bodies of work.

MA U3: ‘News’ Art – exploring compositions

| elizarawlings

I have continued to work on my latest body of work – ‘News’. I decided to explore different crow expressions to use in my compositions. In particular, more expressive, angry or ones in flight. So that I have a wider variety of expressions to choose from when responding to news articles that I see.

METHOD

Lately, whenever I feel unsure about how to proceed then I have been returning to drawing. I find the process comforting and grounding. So I started with a few drawings on expressive crows using my non-dominant hand.

Angry crow:

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This one was meant to be angry but actually looked anxious:

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I then went onto painting on newspaper. I used charcoal to mark the outline of a crow that I wanted to paint. The newspaper was chosen especially for this composition – a shouting crow:

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I then painted the crow – staying with my non-dominant hand. I was going to paint the wing behind the man’s head. But then decided to cover up the head. This was the finished work:

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The painting was held up to the light. The man’s head was slightly visible despite being covered. What came through was a woman speaking on a microphone on the reverse side of the newsprint which made the composition more interesting.

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Then I experimented with a crow looking in despair up to an article about the tariff trade war. Perhaps it was not totally in despair, but certainly questioning what’s going on:

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Again the finished painting was held up to the light as a metaphor for holding someone to account. The images on the reverse side made the photograph of the cars under the trade tariff headline more ambiguous.

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Crows in flight going in different directions:

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Putting together paintings to start exploring combined composition:

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Another shouting crow under the headline ‘We are all affected’. The crow was in line with the gun held up by the man on the left page. Then I noticed a large capital letter ‘O’ on the crow’s body – like it had been shot by the man in the photo. I added a pine tree around the greenery on the photo on the left, but I don’t think it worked. It distracted too much from what the crow was going through.

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A few landing crows:

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A large landing crow going for a prey:

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A screaming crow in flight aiming at a photo:

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REFLECTIONS

As I made more work, I became more confident about this new body of work. My confidence increased in both the concept and the process. My recent tutorial was very useful in helping me to reflect on my thinking behind the work and the progress so far. My increased confidence meant I was able to go for a more freestyle approach to my Chinese ink painting in the work listed above. The freestyle approach enabled me to be more expressive and spontaneous. The last few paintings shown here were done without needing to use charcoal upfront to mark out the composition which I was pleased about.

I was not happy with every outcome here, some of the depictions were more aligned with my intentions, some not so. But I was trying not to overthink it at this stage. Just wanted to keep making as I know from my Chinese painting class that it would get better with practice.

I continue to find Chinese ink painting ‘unforgiving’. I have written about this before and it still has not changed – it is just part of that medium and again, practice helps. ‘Just keep making’ is the key.

Also, I believe painting with my non-dominant hand has helped me to not agonise over my work too much because it’s not meant to be perfect. It will be what it will be! I have found it liberating to paint in this way and I plan to continue this exploration.

LEARNING

I am gaining confidence in the making process through practise and more importantly – I am pleasantly surprised by my confidence in tackling a completely new body of work that is very different from my previous transcultural work. I am happy that this major change happened during my MA course because the guidance available gave me the courage to do something completely new and experimental.

Also, the structure of my reflective practice has really helped me to realise the concept knowing that if I got stuck then the reflective process would help me to find answers or a way forward.

I feel very excited about this new body of work and I am really enjoying this way of making. It continues to help me to respond to what’s happening in the world through my practice which is very important for me right now.

To build on this, I want to think more about why painting with my non-dominant hand has become so important to me. Also I want to understand more about my overall process – from buying the newspaper to completing a painting.

NEXT STEPS

Think more about my reasons for using my non-dominant hand – especially think about this as I paint.

Start to be more considered when moving from one step to the next in my process to better understand the process with the aim of future improvement and development.

Keep making and think about what to do for the degree show.

MA U3: ‘News’ Art installation ideas – holding up to the light

| elizarawlings

When I first showed my News Art to my tutor, we talked about the way I photographed the paintings in front of a window and letting the light shine through was a metaphor for ‘holding the news up to the light’.

As the saying goes, if you are ‘holding something up to the light’, you see through and understand the true nature of it more clearly; or you hold something to account. I felt it was a good metaphor and if I were to show my News Art then I would want to hold it up to the light. This way of showing also reveals the images on the reverse side of the newspaper adding more intrigue and ambiguity to the overall composition.

METHOD

To find ways of showing the News Art with light shining through – it is necessary to not rely on having a window or sunshine for an installation. So I created a mock up lampshade frame to test how it would work if the light source was a light bulb.

Mock up lampshade frame

Then clipped the News Art to the frame with the light turned on:

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Tried a few different images:

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This showed the reverse side images were coming through well:

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Then I considered a design for a cylindrical light tower to display the paintings in an installation:

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Some ideas were found online at places like IKEA with floor standing lamps that could be used instead of a custom made frame with the latter being a potentially costly option.

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As an example, for the rectangular shade in paper shown above – it can take 2 double page spread of The FT at 3-high. It has more area than the circular one so would be better. This means 6 double page spreads per lamp. For a 3 lamp installation then that would mean 18 double page spreads in total. The rice paper lampshade could be slashed or torn to represent violence that is happening at the moment.

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However, the rice paper shade around the lamp might block too much of the light. Hence more tests were done with the mock up lampshade and rice paper.

Mock up lamp with rice paper shade

There was sufficient light coming through the rice paper lampshade to reveal the images on the reverse side of the newspaper:

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REFLECTIONS

The experiment was successful in demonstrating that a light bulb can illuminate the newspaper sufficiently to reveal the reverse side images, even with a layer of rice paper in between. This means the IKEA lamps could be used if I wanted a cylindrical installation.

A cylindrical installation means the viewer would have to walk around the lamp to see the whole composition. This maybe fine and could be a good way to install in the middle of a room with multiple floor standing lamps. However, if I wanted a large and flat composition like one large painting, then that would need to be hung on a wall or from the ceiling. If against a wall then I would need a light curtain of some kind to throw light onto the back of the newspaper. Ideally an enormous light panel or light box would be ideal but they tend to be very expensive. More to think about…

LEARNING

The experiments so far showed that a lamp with just one bulb was sufficient to show the reverse side images. Of course it would also depend on the distance between the light source and the newspaper. But the results were encouraging and I will continue to think about different ways to install my News Art work.

NEXT STEPS

Think of different ways to illuminate the art work in preparation for coming up with ideas for the degree show.

Also to just keep making!

MA U3: ‘News’ Art – exploring silhouettes

| elizarawlings

After reflecting on the News Art that I made in response to news headlines directly, I decided to be more subtle in the way I respond to the headlines. I decided to explore a more abstract way to express my feelings. What started my creating of News Art was the grief that I felt for the state of the world and my choice of using crows, inspired by the book ‘Grief is the thing with feathers’. So I returned to just painting some crow images as ideas came to me and not to overthink or be too deliberate.

METHOD

Without too much planning or thinking, I painted a few crows in flight using Chinese brush and ink in a free style Chinese painting approach. Then I held the painting up to the light:

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Another painting done in the same way with a similar composition:

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A more close-up view of a crow coming down for its prey with two others in the sky:

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Since I had done quite a few of the crow paintings, I laid them out to see how they would look as a larger composition to get ideas on how to install these paintings as a group:

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I finished by selecting two silhouette paintings that went well together and held them up to the light as one composition:

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REFLECTIONS

I am pleased with the silhouette paintings. I like painting in Chinese free style. Some of the crow bodies were not quite right but overall the wings have worked out well. I feel they do give a sense of movement in flight. I am also happier with the more subtle and abstract approach to the news headlines selected. I also purposely chose the ‘ring of hands’ for the crows to fly through, like an escape route for them. We all need one of those at the moment!

Doing my newly discovered News Art has given me a reason to read the newspaper when I have felt inclined to avoid the news. Looking through the newspaper to pick out headlines to respond to has given me courage to face what’s happening in the world in a way that I didn’t expect.

LEARNING

I feel excited by my new discovery of making art in this way. I am gradually developing a process and as I get to know more about the newsprint material, I feel able to push things further such as how wet I could make it (very wet, surprisingly). I really like painting on the newspaper because it is not a blank canvas and the contents and images on each page give me so many ideas which is great.

One thing to bear in mind is that newsprint is not archival. This would be a problem if I continue to pursue this way of making. I need to look into ways to preserve the artwork especially if I’m thinking about showing these work at some point. Proper research is needed including asking specialists at CSM.

Overall, the main learning is to just keep making more work to explore this way of making. Ideas flood in as I make.

NEXT STEPS

Make more News Art!

Research ways to make News Art archival.

MA U3: ‘News’ Art – responding to headlines

| elizarawlings

I have been continuing my experiments with making art on newspapers as a way to respond to what’s happening in the world. In previous blogs, I have talked about using crows to express the grief and the sense of loss that I have been feeling.

This blog captures the experiments where I have responded more directly to the news with the painted images. I have also tried to think more carefully about the process of this way of making. Through trial and error, I believe I have developed a more systematic process of producing these paintings which I have documented below.

METHOD

My response to some recent news about innocent people being killed in a war was to explore painting dead crows. I have often seen dead birds on the road or pavement, but I have never studied them closely. So the start of the making process was to research online images of dead crows.

Once I found a desired image, I would do a drawing in my sketchbook with my non-dominant hand. I have previously documented my wish and need to use my non-dominant hand to be more expressive while experiencing that feeling of not having complete control of what was happening.

Drawing of dead crow lying on its back

I then did a Chinese ink study of the same dead crow composition on a piece of A4 rice paper:

Chinese ink study of crow composition – A4

I then choose the newspaper and started to paint the chosen composition:

Finished dead crow:

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Painting held up to the light, taped to a glass window:

Finished painting – dead crow

A second experiment with a different dead crow was done following the same process, but with an added step of making a faint charcoal outline sketch on the newspaper of the crow before painting. This step was added because brush painting with ink on paper is unforgiving, hence having a sketch of the shape helps to ensure the composition is largely in the right place.

Sketchbook drawing of the second dead crow:

Sketchbook pencil drawing

Chinese brush painting study of crow body:

Chinese ink on rice paper – A4

Charcoal outline was drawn prior to painting to mark out the composition:

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Completed painting of dead crow lying on its side on pavement, held up to the light.

Painted dead crow on The FT

The last experiment on responding to the news involved an image of a man lighting a gas lamp. It was important for me to research how a street gas lamp worked so that I knew what I was drawing. The diagram below was very helpful.

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This time, I did two ink sketches as initial study to test the composition:

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The chosen newspaper page that I wanted to respond to was laid flat and a rough charcoal drawing of the composition was made:

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Then the painting was done and held up to the light. Gaslighting – Chinese ink on newspaper:

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REFLECTIONS

It was cathartic to directly respond to the news. So I enjoyed making these pieces of work. However, looking at them now, they feel rather literal and obvious. Dead crows to respond to innocent paramedics being killed and a man lighting a gas street lamp to respond to the gaslighting going on in many places. All seemed too obvious.

These paintings were made using my dominant hand – I think it was because these composition ideas were very new and I wanted to be more confident in my depiction. However, I believe the outcomes are less satisfactory than the previous ones where I used my non-dominant hand. The mark making here seemed too deliberate and lacking the energy that I had achieved previously.

Although the artistic outcome was not completely satisfactory, the process of responding to the news by directly calling it out was satisfying. It was like ranting without actually ranting. Also, I gained clarity and tested out the process in a more conscious way. So all was not lost.

LEARNING

The initial drawing and sketching step was helpful for new compositions. But I don’t feel it’s an essential step, depending on how familiar I am with the subject.

Using charcoal to mark out the composition on the newspaper was very useful and is an essential step that I should use.

Responding directly with images may end up being too literal or obvious. So use with care.

NEXT STEPS

Try different approaches to composition and images. Experiment with more abstract images.

Make more work.

MA U3: Reflecting on my Reflective Practice

| elizarawlings

METHOD

On 3rd October 2023, I wrote my first blog for my MA Fine Art (Digital) course. It was about my intention to structure my blogs in a way that would help me to create a sustainable reflective practice.

Link for the first blog:

https://eliza-rawlings.com/2023/10/05/ma-year-1-blogs-planning/

In the blog, I talked about my intention to base my blogs on Kolb’s learning cycle and as a result, I have created the following 4-stage structure and I have been using it for all my blogs throughout my MA course:

1. METHOD (Experiencing stage)

– To capture my making process and decisions along the way.

2. REFLECTIONS (Reflecting stage)

– To capture all my thoughts, feelings, reflections and personal insights throughout as well as after the making process. The aim is to think as broadly and be as uninhibited as possible to ‘open up the horizons’ and/or to ‘dig deep’.

3. LEARNING (Thinking stage)

– To bring my reflections back to the context of my art practice – what have I learnt and what does it all mean for my practice? Also to capture any emerging intentions if appropriate.

4. NEXT STEPS (Acting stage)

– To summarise ‘what to do next’ in clear actions to give direction to progress my practice.

Below is my reflective process in a diagram.

My reflective process

It will be referred to as The ‘MeReLeNe’ process for short from here on.

REFLECTIONS

Writing my blogs in this ‘MeReLeNe’ structure during my two year MA programme has helped me to cement a structured approach and develop my reflective practice. I have been an engineer all my life before coming to the arts and I need an underlying structure in order to liberate me to explore freely and safely, knowing that if I ever felt lost or ‘wobbly’ then I could come back to a tried and tested structure that would give me security and guidance. Since this is a structure that I have developed for myself and tested over a two year period, I feel that I can trust and rely on my process to progress my practice making it sustainable as I feel very committed to it. I have come to realise that it is much more than a safety structure… At times during the last two years, I have felt unsure about what direction to take or felt lost about what to make. Then inevitably I would realise that I have not written my blog for my last piece of work yet, hence I felt lost. Without exception, once I reflected properly in my blog and captured my learning in the context of my art practice, the next-steps would then reveal themselves naturally in the process. Sometimes the next-steps could be simply to ‘make some more’ and that simple statement may seem generic, but I would know where to take it as a result of going through the reflective process.

I am excited about having tested and embedded this structure into my practice. It is now such a fundamental part of my practice that I cannot image working without it because I would soon become lost.

Furthermore, in the last two years, at times I have felt unsure of what my ‘process’ was, was it painting with oil, oil and cold wax, making Cheongsam canvases or painting on newspapers? I found it hard to explain to people when asked about my practice, especially for anyone not familiar with contemporary art. People would ask if I painted landscapes or portraits; watercolour or oil. It’s impossible to give a straight answer when my medium and methods would vary depending on what I was trying to say. It might vary from project to project, but writing this blog has brought clarity to what my art practice is about:

‘My contemporary art practice is about exploring my identity and my environment through narratives. I use whatever medium that is appropriate to help me express what I want to say. My reflective practice is my process.’

LEARNING

I have learnt that I definitely need a structure to thrive in my practice. It provides a safe environment for me to wander and explore freely knowing I can ‘come home’ to this process to consolidate my learning and progress.

The key revelation for me is having the clarity that ‘My reflective practice is my process’. I believe my tutor has allured to this several times recently and I now know what he means.

NEXT STEPS

Continue to use and embed the ‘Method-Reflections-Learning-NextSteps’ (or MeReLeNe) process for my reflective practice.

Start to acknowledge that my reflective practice is my process. Own it.

MA U3: ‘Grief is the thing with feathers’ – Painting

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

Continuing with my exploration of the grief and sense of loss that I feel about the change in world order, I have decided to make some paintings with crows inspired by the book ‘Grief is the thing with feathers’ by Max Porter. The use of newspaper as a canvas for painting as I have done here was first inspired by William Kentridge’s work that I saw at his exhibition at the RA in 2022, where he made some monumental drawings on printed materials. Some examples below:

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I have recently seen an exhibition by Barbara Walker where she used printed documents extensively in her work. Below are some examples of her use of newspapers:

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Walker uses newspapers with content that directly links to her subject matter of social injustices whereas Kentridge is more subtle and often you cannot easily read the printed text in his work although I have read in the description of his work that there is always relevance in the text.

METHOD

Since my studio is out-of-action at the moment due to building work, I have set up a temporary studio in a different room and I am using Chinese ink on paper instead of my usual oil paint on canvas because of the limited facility that I have.

Learning from the crow drawings that I did with my non-dominant hand, I decided to use my non-dominant hand for the paintings here. Below are the paintings on Chinese rice paper, all A4 size done with my non-dominant hand except the one with the crow sticking out its tongue – that was done with my dominant hand for comparison.

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Then I decided to paint on a newspaper and I chose The Financial Times because it is one of the few newspapers that I can bear to read given my general frustrations with the biases in the news media. I have painted on the FT in the past and found the ’45 gsm salmon newsprint’ paper absorbency to be at a level that responded well to Chinese ink. I also like the salmon colour against the black Chinese ink. All three paintings below were mostly done with my non-dominant hand with some details such as the shape of the beak and the claws done with my dominant hand.

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Below is a video clip that I made using Instagram:

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Below is a crow painting on a double page spread of the newspaper where the previous ones were on a single page. The page here was chosen for the photograph of the chickens (about egg prices in the USA) with the painted crow looking in and one of the chickens staring back:

Below is the painting held up to the light:

REFLECTIONS

I have enjoyed developing a new process for painting on the newspapers. I find the paper works well with the Chinese ink, not overly absorbent and has enough material integrity to stay intact even if it gets very wet.

I have continued to enjoy painting with my non-dominant hand as the brush strokes were more expressive with less control. During the painting process, I constantly asked myself which hand I should use, e.g. with the more detailed work such as the curvature of the beak where more control was required, or highlighting the white in the eyeball, then I switch to my dominant hand for those details. I wanted to use as much of my non-dominant hand as possible because I prefer the marks made and it was a good metaphor for the helplessness I and many people feel about the world events at the moment.

Part of the process of this way of making involves buying a newspaper, something that I haven’t done for a long time since I mostly read the news online/on my phone nowadays. I enjoy the physicality of opening and turning the news pages, then reading the printed text and selecting the pages with headlines that stir me in some way.

Examining the newspaper so closely also reminded me of my early engineering career when I worked extensively on automating newspaper printing presses for Fleet Street as well as local newspapers with ‘cutting edge technology’ for that time period of the early 1990s using fibre optic based digitally synchronised ‘electronic line shaft’ control systems. The presses were enormous and ran at very high speed. It was exhilarating to work on those projects and machines especially as a young engineer. Decades later, I am now studying newsprint closely again for a different purpose – I used to scrutinise the print registration of the colours (poor registration would cause ghosting) and I would respond to the results by varying the control parameters for correction. Now I scrutinise the news content and respond by painting on the newspaper. I can say that the former was a lot easier – I felt completely in control of what was happening. Whereas I rarely feel in control of my painting process and I continue to feel zero control over what is happening in the world – all I can do is to read about them in the newspapers. This has become an interesting juxtaposition of my relationship with newspapers over the decades.

As I work more and more on these newspaper paintings, I have become calmer compared to when I first started as I have documented in some of my earlier blogs about voicelessness and going through the grief curve. I wonder if this is because the world situation has improved (no), or I have become desensitised by the constant revelations of world disasters (possibly) or having a way to respond to and express myself through paintings on the newspapers has given me a route to release my anger therefore making me feel that I am doing something about it. I think definitely ‘yes’ to the latter point, the painting process has certainly helped me to channel my thoughts and feelings.

LEARNING

I have developed a new process of painting on newspapers as a way to respond to what’s happening in the world. I have continued to use crows as a symbol of the grief that I feel about the loss of or change in world order. Working with newspapers reminded me of how my relationship with newspapers has changed over the decades since I was a young engineer. I feel this is the beginning of an exploration and I want to continue and do more because it gives me a way to respond to the world at the moment.

One point that I discussed with my tutor was how I ‘held the newspaper up to the light’ as an accidental discovery when I stuck the newspaper paintings to the glass window for photographing. It is a good metaphor for ‘exposing’ the news and also the light shining through the other side of the print revealed additional images therefore making the overall composition more ambiguous.

NEXT STEPS

Continue to make more paintings in this way to explore, to develop my ideas and the process.

Experiment with holding the painted newspaper to a light or lamp to see how it could work as an indoor installation.

MA U3: ‘Grief is the thing with feathers’ – Printmaking

| elizarawlings

Continuing with my exploration of the grief and the sense of loss that I feel for the drastic change in world order, I did some printmaking during my low residency week at CSM in London and I continued with the theme of crows as inspired by the book ‘Grief is the thing with feathers’ by Max Porter.

METHOD

During the low residency at CSM in London, we had a lino printing workshop. I created an image with a feather and translated ‘Grief is the thing with feathers’ into Chinese. I then had to write out the mirror-image of the characters for the printmaking process:

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We made prints in different colours and the blue one came out best for me:

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I then attended another printmaking workshop where we made some etched prints. I did the etched drawing of the crow with my non-dominant hand, but did the mirror-image Chinese writing with my dominant hand as writing Chinese backwards required the utmost control!

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First trial print to test the etching on the plate:

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Then I tried the aquatint process to add tone to the print:

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REFLECTIONS

I have enjoyed both workshops very much and I mostly learnt that printmaking is not easy! The lino print was easier as I am familiar with the process so I mostly knew what I was doing. The fact that it was a simpler process also helped for a printmaking novice.

The etching process was much more complex for me. It was my first time. The tutor was very patient with all of us and very helpful. The etching of the plate was fine, but the aquatint process was much more involved and clearly required good experience to create the desired effect. I thoroughly enjoyed the workshop but I don’t think I will be rushing to make more prints because I like to make art intuitively and that requires a good understanding of the process and the materials. For me to achieve that and make prints intuitively would require a lot of time investment to make it part of my practice. So I think I will leave it for now and may be investigate printmaking after I finish my MA when I have more time. Printmaking is something that I have often thought about because of the good facilities at the print studio locally at Spike Island in Bristol and they run courses for beginners.

Out of the prints made, I was happier with the image of the lino print. The etched crow turned out too cute like a plush toy and not really reflective of the grief that I wanted to portray. Also, the Chinese writing mostly disappeared in the aquatint process. I should have thought more about how to ‘protect’ that part of the plate in the process. Something to bear in mind in the future.

LEARNING

I have often admired printmaking artists’ prints and wondered about how the process works. Now I have gained more of an insight into the complexity involved and I very much respect what they do! For me, since I am still developing my practice and I often feel self-conscious that I am wanting to include more different disciplines (e.g. photography and film making), it is therefore useful to know that I don’t want to pursue printmaking (not in the near future anyway) because of the time investment required and I don’t think the process ‘speaks to me’ yet due to my lack of experience. I am equally inexperienced in photography and film making, but I find it easier to get to grips with those processes.

Overall, they were very enjoyable workshops and I learnt a lot. I may still do some lino prints for fun and I may treat myself to a printmaking course one day at Spike Island.

NEXT STEPS

Make more work!