Heritage

MA Y1 U1: Exploring Aesthetics – Part 1 – Using photos

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

In the ‘developing style’ strand of my practice, I have been exploring how to create ‘transcultural’ images in my art through a process of transcultural layering. I have done some work in this area before starting my MA and I now want to return to it to continue my exploration of transcultural aesthetics as part of my practice.

Below is a piece of work that I did a year ago and I now want to pick it up and develop the piece further with some new ideas, materials knowledge and techniques that I have learnt since starting the MA. The work was originally created using dispersion liquid to transfer a digital collage image from paper to a polyester satin canvas, then the Chinese brush painting was painted on top in ink. 

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I have recently researched into using better quality fabric as the canvas for digital printing as well as for Chinese brush painting. The findings are documented here and the results will be used in this work:

MA Y1 U1: Research – Digital printing on fabric

Below is the original digital collage created using Adobe Express. It has an image of the Bristol Clifton Suspension Bridge which is a famous iconic bridge in my home city of Bristol. I live very near the bridge and often drive or walk over it – it has meaning for me and is one of the images that means ‘home’ to me. Every August, there is a Bristol Balloon Fiesta and there are many images online with hot air balloons flying over the Clifton Suspension Bridge – again, those are iconic images for Bristol. When I made this original digital collage, I used Chinese lanterns instead of hot air balloons flying over the bridge as an attempt to create an overall effect that combined things from the different cultures that have been part of my life. The background teal colour and effect were purposely ambiguous – is the background image associated more with Chinese or Western culture? It’s up to the viewer to interpret.

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METHOD

Taking the original image, I wanted to create more depth and interest in the sky. Therefore, a few hot air balloons were layered over the top in the foreground with the Chinese lanterns appearing to be further back giving a better feeling of depth. Different hot air balloon images were tried and this was the final version. The colours of the balloons were adjusted in the software to harmonise with the existing images. I was happy with the bridge image and no further changes were made to that.

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As part of my narrative development work, I have been researching my family in Hong Kong and I have been given many old family photographs. I remember the photos very well because they were from the family photo albums at my childhood home. I have been wanting to use the photos in my work but I have been reluctant because I have not resolved my feelings towards them – I am not sure if I am ready to use them yet. 

I have always taken much inspiration from the Nigerian-born American artist Njideka Akunyili Crosby and her use of personal photographs. Below is one of her paintings that I saw recently in an exhibition at Tate Modern. Her technique of using faded photo images in the background is often seen in her work. Her images are evocative and they resonate with me because of what my family photos represent for me. 

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Furthermore, at my tutorial last year, I discussed my reluctance to use the family photos with my tutor and he suggested that I try to use a few, perhaps use the ones that were less meaningful to me as a trial. So I picked out a few that were of larger groups, many were family friends and not people that I had strong emotional bonds with. Nonetheless, they were wonderful photos that represented the place (Hong Kong) and a time period when my late parents were young. The photos still had meaning for me because I remember clearly seeing all of them in our family photo albums and many had images of my parents (who passed away some twenty years ago). The digital images of the chosen photos were imported into Adobe Express and arranged on the collage. The transparency of the images were increased so that the background colour of the collage came through partially giving a more faded and blended effect.

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REFLECTIONS

– From a personal perspective, I am pleased with this experiment as I feel I have made progress in making use of the family photos. Getting started was a challenge because all the photo images seemed too precious to use even though they were all digitised. I stared at the images for a while before deciding to choose the less precious ones. It was a strange process in determining the ‘rating’ of how precious or personal a photograph felt to me when each one held a story. The process eased once I got started so I am happy that I did this experiment because I feel I have a way forward in using the treasure trove of all the old family photos – this part of my exploration will remain a slow process but I have made a start.

– From the technical and aesthetic perspectives, I am happy with the new learning gained in using the digital tool to manipulate the images especially with the photo transparency. The outcome was the effect that I was looking to create. My ‘aesthetic goal’ is to create a transcultural feel for the piece, meaning the work represents and originates from my ‘Third Space’ (as described in the book The Location of Culture by Homi K Bhabha). Akunyili Crosby talks a lot about making work from her Third Space, hence I find much resonance with her work.

– This work is an example of where the two strands of my practice (developing style and developing narrative) mutually inform and I hope they will eventually converge when I have developed a more definitive style.

– I now have to source the fabric to print the image onto, then do a Chinese painting on top. I will source the printed fabric from Contrado as explained in this blog:

MA Y1 U1: Research – Digital printing on fabric

– I am considering making this work for the MA Interim Show in March 2024 if the rest of the process works according to plan. So I have been doing lots of practice Chinese brush paintings to test the techniques, composition and to choose the best paint brushes for the different parts of the intended painting – a plum blossom.  

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LEARNING

– I remain happy with the transcultural layering process that I started a year ago and I want to build on this line of enquiry with my latest learning to find the transcultural aesthetics that I have been searching for.

– Digital collages of a combination of found images and old family photos have a lot of potential for creating the transcultural aesthetics that I want. But I am looking for more than just a digital collage, so the collage can be the background on the canvas and then I can paint on top with Chinese brush painting (reflecting my heritage) and/or spray painting (reflecting my home city of Bristol which is famous for street art and there are plenty around for inspiration). Also, the oil and cold wax exploration that I have recently started can also be part of the layering process. I am mindful that the key is not to overdo the layers or overwhelm the image; I must remember to ‘leave room for the image to breathe’ creating tension on the canvas. My purpose for the different material explorations is to give myself options in my art making knowing what materials go together in order to create the desired aesthetical effects.

– I made a start in using my family photos and I feel I can do more with this approach, especially as the two strands of my practice start to mutually inform.

– I will proceed with this piece of work with the potential of using it in the MA Interim Show, so I need to think about how to hang the piece.

NEXT STEPS

– Order the chosen silk fabric and the printing of the digital collage.

– Decide on the final composition for the Chinese painting and practice on larger paper ready for the real thing.

– Think about ways to hang the piece.

– Make more work with using the family photos – a long term project.

MA Y1 U1: Research – Digital printing on fabric

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

Further to this blog:

https://eliza-rawlings.com/2023/10/10/ma-y1-u1-project-one-investigation-of-techniques-for-digital-printing-on-canvas/

I went onto the CSM campus to visit the Digital Printing Lab in January 2024 and discussed my requirements with a very helpful technician. Although the lab had great facilities, the only printer that could print onto silk is a UV printer. The effect would be very interesting but the size of the printable area is limited to around 77x33cm. The size is too small for a piece of work that I want to do for the MA interim show, but for other work, I could potentially use the UV printer and stitch together pieces of fabric which could be interesting.

So I have to turn to commercial companies for fabric printing. My MA colleagues suggested Contrado which also offers 40% student discount:

https://www.contrado.co.uk

I looked at their website and was delighted with the products and services they offer. The type of printing on silk of satin fabric that they do is Sublimation Printing. Sublimation printing explained:

https://www.contrado.co.uk/sublimation-fabric-printing

I proceeded onto finding the right fabric for this research experiment.

METHOD

I started off by ordering a collection of samples of all their materials and the relevant colour charts. Fabric samples are listed here:

https://www.contrado.co.uk/poly-satin?optionValue=3768

A large quantity of fabric samples and colour charts arrived and I sorted through them all to pick out four fabrics to proceed for testing. 

I ordered two poly satin and two natural silk materials. For the first print run experiment, I used a digital collage image that I had created previously and recently updated. One that I hope to use for the MA Interim show if this experiment works. 

The samples arrived and Contrado gave me a couple of extra prints of one of the materials which was a bonus. They all looked good and useable:

The idea is to do a Chinese brush painting of plum blossoms onto the fabric with the digital printing. The result of each experiment is show below:

Real 100% silk satin 85gsm
Silk sensation (poly) 90 gsm
Silk impression (poly) 41gsm
Mulberry silk Habotai 38gsm

REFLECTIONS

Reflecting on the results – the best outcome for me was the Mulberry silk Habotai 38gsm because:

– The material absorbency was just right. It absorbed the ink and contained the liquid well within the brush stroke. Whereas materials such as the Silk Impression (poly) was overly ‘sensitive’ in terms of absorbency; by this I meant it held onto the pigment but let the water from the ink spread beyond the painted area. This sensitivity would make it challenging to paint on because one has to carefully balance the water and pigment in the ink towards minimising the water which would make the brush flow (or glide) across the fabric difficult.

– The smoothness of the material surface, or fineness of the weave, was excellent. Meaning that the brush strokes did not pick up the weave pattern too much. Whereas Silk Sensation and Real Silk Satin both tended to show the weave too much. This would affect how the ‘flying white’ part of the brush stroke show up. For Flying White effect – see the tail end of the brush strokes in the Mulberry silk experiment where the canvas is partly shown in the stroke. The Flying White technique is important in Chinese brush painting and calligraphy because it shows the dynamism of the brush strokes.

– Area to be careful – the Mulberry silk Habotai material is quite transparent at 38gsm, so need to consider how to hang the final piece. E.g. to let light shine through or not.

LEARNING

– The key learning of the experiment is that Mulberry silk performed best and is the chosen material. I was delighted that I could find a suitable material with Contrado as they seem a good company to work with.

– I also learned a lot about how to analyse the results of Chinese brush painting on fabric – an area that is new to me.

NEXT STEPS

– Decide on the size of the piece to work on for the MA interim show and order the fabric.

– Complete the digital collage using Adobe Express – consider using old family photos.

– Practice painting the plum blossom and decide the final composition to go onto the fabric.

– Research and consider how to hang the piece, especially considering the transparency.

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Research notes on the last point:

Ways to hang silk paintings –

http://www.visibleinvisible.com/pages/media/silk-paintings/silk-display.php

How to Hang a Tapestry 8 Ways

MA Y1 U1: Exploring colours – Part 1 – red and blue

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

As part of my style development work, I have just completed a series of media exploration where I experimented with combining oil and cold wax with various ways of overlaying Chinese brush paintings on top without compromising either medium. I now want to progress onto exploring aesthetics starting with colours.

Despite having attended workshops on colour mixing over the years and researched how colours work together, I have always used colours intuitively in my paintings rather than follow any strict rules. However, I often feel that I should be more considered when using colours for my work. I attended an exhibition of London based Columbian artist, Ofelia Rodrigues, where I was inspired by her use of colours and images to express her culture giving a strong sense of place for her narrative.

For my art practice, I have reached a point where I want to re-evaluate and hone how I use colours, especially when my aim is to express my stories and narrative through my work. Also, my wish is to go towards semi-abstraction for my narrative work and I believe the use of colour is key. This is the first blog of the series on exploring the use of colour to express a sense of place for my transcultural narrative.

METHOD

To begin with, I needed some visual inspiration. I started by gathering books that I have on contemporary Chinese artists as well as chinoiserie style art. Although chinoiserie art has deep roots in political historical, its origin is not part of the research here. In my view, chinoiserie is an example of art in the ‘Third Space’ – where two cultures come together and something new emerges that has characteristics of the original cultures. Although the chinoiserie style of art does not appeal to or resonate with me, their use of colours is worth examining for my research purpose.

My aim here is to look through images in the books and choose one that resonates. Then mix the colours and explore similar colours as a ‘back to basics’ exercise to get my thought process going and to see where it takes me.

Books that I gathered:

The book that I have chosen for this exercise is by a contemporary Chinese artist, Wu Guan Zhong. The link below gives a good summary about the artist:

https://www.christies.com/en/stories/wu-guanzhong-an-artist-of-feeling-rather-than-fact-dd97ec0d995d47eb9c56753e3c280e41

The painting that I have chosen to kick start my colour exploration:

I got out all my various red oil paints and increased the lightness of each by tinting with titanium white:

Several matching possibilities came up in my ‘red’ chart:

Then the same exercise was repeated with all my blue oil paints:

Various matching possibilities came up:

I added a new turquoise paint that I bought recently to the chart:

An abstract painting was made with all the left over paint:

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REFLECTIONS

– Although it was not the intention, it turned out to be a useful inventory exercise for my oil paint. Since I often default to certain favourites, I have neglected others that have turned out to be ‘gems’ in the tinting process.

– There were also new findings about the different brands. I want to capture my thoughts here as a reminder for the future:

1. Michael Harding oil paint is always my favourite and this exercise reminded me that they deserve that top spot with the buttery consistency, pigment quality and load concentration.

2. Winsor and Newton artists oil was once a favourite before I went onto Michael Harding. This exercise reminded me of the quality of their pigment load, colour and how well they mixed. A solid product that I should not have neglected.

3. Daler Rowney Georgian oil was a brand that I used when I first started learning to paint in oil. It was sold to me as student grade oil. However, I recently read some reviews by artists saying they use it as their go-to oil so I decided to try them again. They are good value and I recently bought a batch ready for some larger scale oil experiments and they are just right for that. Pigment load is not as good as the above two but definitely good enough for some of my experiments where I plan to use a lot of oil. The ones I used for this exercise stood up well enough in the tinting process and produced some interesting colours.

4. I was introduced to Cass Art artist’s oil when I was in their shop. It’s a range that I have not tried before. It was sold as good value artist grade oil and better quality than the Daler Rowney Georgian oil that I was buying at the time. So I bought some to try, e.g. the turquoise in the last column of the blue tinting exercise. I was somewhat disappointed because the consistency was not as good as the other brand’s artist grade or even the DR Georgian oil performed better in this respect. I was also disappointed with the pigment colour and load. So I don’t think I will buy this brand again.

5. I have had a set of PEBEO oil for years and rarely use them despite the good range of vibrant colours. I got them out for this exercise and was pleasantly surprised. I always considered them as student grade quality and although it didn’t compare well to Nos. 1 and 2 above, it performed well in mixing and pigment load. The paint appeared more flat and matt compared to the other oils but it is certainly good enough for day-to-day projects. The wide variety of colours in the PEBEO set is a bonus that I have been neglecting.

– This was a good back-to-basics exercise that I needed to do to restart my colour exploration. I don’t know exactly what I’m looking for but I want to continue this with other colours.

– It occurred to me at the end of the exercise that I recently made a painting using similar colours to those in Wu’s painting. My painting was started by finding an old photograph of my parents’ lounge during one Chinese New Year when they were both alive many years ago. I don’t know why these two colours speak to me whenever I want to make narrative work. I also remember that I showed this painting at a crit session and I struggled to explain it. I need to think more about this…

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LEARNING

– Some good discoveries of tinted reds and blues for me to consider using when determining colour palette for future narrative work.

– The colours in Wu’s painting and some of the tints in this exercise clearly speak to me but I don’t know why yet. Interrogating this might reveal more clues and help to develop more depth for my narrative.

– I have not studied Wu’s work before and researching his work showed that he also worked with oil and Chinese ink. This is a useful finding as that’s what I am trying to do as well. Since Wu is a European (French) trained artist (painter) of Chinese origin, we have some common backgrounds and I will add Wu to my list of artists to research, especially about his chosen media and process.

NEXT STEPS

– Do another tinting or colour mixing exercise – find another painting for inspiration.

– Think more about why the colours in Wu’s painting speak to me.

– Add Wu to my list of artists to research.

Chinese painting: Sumi-e painting – animal

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

At my monthly Chinese painting class, we have started to learn Sumi-e painting. Sumi-e means ‘water ink’ and water ink painting originated in China around 300AD. Zen Buddhist monks from China introduced this style of ink art to Japan in the 14th century where over time the brush strokes were reduced in number and simplified forming the Japanese Sumi-e style painting of today.

At a previous lesson, we started to paint leaves by copying from worksheets and this lesson we practiced some more.

The homework this month was to paint an animal such as our pet. No worksheets were given and we had to work out how to create our simplified style Sumi-e animal painting (without looking online for hints). This blog records the method I used for the homework.

METHOD

As a warm up exercise, I mixed the Chinese ink with water to ‘find’ the five shades that would be needed to depict tone in the painting. It took a few attempts to get the right result.

I made some pencil tonal sketches from photos of my sadly departed cats. Then overlaid the Xuan (rice) paper on top for painting.

Result:

Using the same method, a few close up portraits were painted:

Then I used a photograph and overlaid the Xuan paper on top to paint/trace the tonal areas:

First attempt of ‘tracing’
Second attempt of ‘tracing’

Then I started painting freehand without tracing. I had seven attempts and each time reducing the number of brushstrokes and simplifying the image.

Seven attempts at freehand painting

Close up of the seventh and final attempt:

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REFLECTIONS

I have been wanting to learn Sumi-e painting because I see it as a way towards semi-abstraction in Chinese brush painting which is something that I’m interested in. I enjoy the thinking that is involved in this making process.

I enjoyed the exercise and was pleased with the outcomes as early attempts. I do find Chinese water-ink or Sumi-e painting very challenging. It is the most unforgiving style and painting medium that I have used. With oil and acrylic, one can correct mistakes by wiping off or painting over. Even watercolour can be corrected to a certain extent. Since the depiction in Sumi-e is done by one stroke and going over a stroke makes it look clumsy, therefore everything has to be as perfect as possible for each stroke, such as:

– Water/ink pigment balance for the tone.

– Amount of water/ink on the brush (and depending on the type of hair for the brush) to match the absorbency of the type of Xuan paper used for each stroke. The paper or silk is usually highly absorbent which makes it challenging.

– Placement of each stroke and the pressure along the travel.

It is very challenging and I love it. I feel the tension within myself in a way that is unlike any other painting media. I expect it’s also because I am so new to this and I need a lot more practice. The process of simplifying was also challenging like solving a puzzle which added to the pleasure of this way of making.

LEARNING

– Mixing the five tonal shades at the start and having plenty of ink of each shade made up really helped. However, I still find myself mixing as I went along especially for the ‘double loading’ technique.

– Tracing over tonal drawings or photos helped to give confidence at the practicing stage. Practicing in this way helped me to progress onto freestyle painting.

– Understanding the structure or anatomy of the subject is essential for the simplification process to work.

NEXT STEPS

– Keep practicing to build knowledge of the materials and process.

– Try other animals or objects.

– Start to think about how to incorporate this approach into my transcultural style development work.

UPDATE

Below is an update on Sumi-e painting progress since the session detailed above.

My tutor asked me to do a free-hand cat portrait without using any pencil drawings as guide under the Xuan paper. Below are the outcomes:

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The following lesson was on Sumi-e flowers:

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REFLECTIONS

I have enjoyed Sumi-e painting because I am more interested in free style Chinese painting (techniques are akin to Sumi-e) than the meticulous style. So these paintings have been good practice for me. The key is to keep practicing in order to master the skills required in applying paint having understood how the materials work together with the painter.

MA Y1 U1: Exploring media – Oil and cold wax – Part 6

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

I want to use this experiment to explore the Next Steps that were identified in Exploring Media – Oil and Cold Wax Part 5.

https://eliza-rawlings.com/2023/12/24/ma-y1-u1-exploring-oil-and-cold-wax-part-5/ 

The actions were to:

-Try out more Chinese brush paint collage onto oil and cold wax to refine this part of the process.

-Try exposing a larger area of the background image to see if that can work with the abstraction approach on the top layer. Experiment to find the right balance between revealing the base layer image without losing the sense of abstraction on the top layer.

-Try spray painting on top of the oil and cold wax surface – try when wet and then when dried.

Finished work for Part 6:

Mixed media on paper, A3

METHOD

A printed photo image of a tapestry that was gifted to me by my brother many years ago was used as the based image for this piece. The image was transferred onto a paper canvas using dispersion liquid. The paper used was 250 gsm oil paper.

After the dispersion liquid dried, the printed image was rubbed off with a wet sponge to reveal the transferred image on the canvas. This was the first time a paper canvas (as opposed to a cotton canvas) was used in this series of experiments and it was clear that the paper canvas was not robust enough for the process. See below image for damage to paper. However, there was sufficient integrity in the paper canvas to continue the piece. I was hoping that a thick layer of oil and cold wax would hide the damaged areas. There was also excessive buckling on the paper canvas.

Recalling my disappointment with the colour palette that I chose for Part 5 (pink and grey), I decided to research into abstract paintings that I like to learn from the colours used. One of my favourite abstract artists is Lee Krasner and below is the painting that I decided to study and learn from in terms of the colour palette used.

Desert Moon (1955):

A layer of oil and cold wax was then applied to the canvas:

Areas were scraped off to reveal the base tapestry image. Learning from Part 5, I wanted to reveal a larger area so that it was clear what the base image was about. Then additional oil and cold wax colours were added:

For the Chinese brush calligraphy, I chose a delicate silk fabric as a substrate that was almost transparent because I wanted the substrate to become as invisible as possible.

After writing the Chinese calligraphy onto silk, it was cut out and carefully pressed onto the oil and cold wax layer.

A small palette knife was used to press the silk into the oil and cold wax, taking care to avoid pressing the areas of the calligraphy characters which was challenging due to the complex shape of the characters. The yellow circle shows where part of the character was pressed into the oil and cold wax, partly obscuring the writing.

Additional marks were made – some were painted on and some were scratched off. The tapestry image was about children playing with lanterns and I have a lantern stencil that was made for previous work. So I wanted to experiment with spray painting onto wet oil and cold wax to see the effect.

Further spray painting was done – the phrase #3RD SP (for third space) was sprayed onto a dryer corner of the painting. All spray paint used were Montana GOLD 312g aerosol cans as popularly used by street artists:

Finished work with border tidied up:

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REFLECTIONS

I am happy with:

– The colour palette. I am much happier with this painting than the previous one in Part 5. A more considered approach in selecting the colour palette paid off here.

– The experiment with using an almost transparent substrate for the Chinese brush art worked well. The pieces (there were two in total) adhered well to the painted surface. Although the substrate was not completely invisible, it was acceptable as a solution.

– The scratched mark making especially the part at the top to echo the revealed based image of the children playing with lanterns.

– The overall look of the spray painting, especially the words – they added a contemporary feel to the piece which was what I was looking for.

– Feeling more confident using oil and cold wax as a medium.

I am not so happy with:

– The paper canvas, it was not robust enough. Although the damage by the image transfer process was covered up with oil and cold wax, it was clear that this would be the wrong material to use for this process.

– The spray painting of the lantern – it was sprayed onto very wet oil and cold wax. The outcome was not satisfactory – it felt and looked ‘gooey’ and not the intended effect. I believe this was partly due to my reluctance to place the stencil close to the wet oil paint as I didn’t want the back of the stencil to pick up the oil paint, causing the spray paint to loosely disperse around the stencilled image.

– Although I was happier with the colour palette, I felt there was more that could be done to add more complexity to the palette to increase depth to the piece.

General comment: the Chinese calligraphy is a famous ancient Chinese poem about being homesick. It is one of the few Chinese poems that I know as most children growing up in Hong Kong in my era were made to learn it, partly because it is a good poem and very easy to remember. Going forward, I feel that if I were to use more Chinese calligraphy then I should learn more about Chinese poetry so that I can use a wider variety of content in this respect. It will also help me to understand more about my Chinese heritage.

Other thoughts that came to me some time after completing this painting:

– Throughout the making process, my mind kept going back to celebrating the Mid Autumn Festival when I was a child in Hong Kong. The highlight as children was to be given a lantern each to play with. The choosing and buying of the lantern in preparation was always a source of excitement. The lanterns were lit with small candles. The children would use a long stick as handle for the lantern and go around the neighbourhood exploring with their lanterns, just like the children in my painting. The Mid Autumn Festival celebrated the fullest moon of the year and celebrations would only begin after dark when the full moon came out. Since we were not usually allowed out at night, it made the Festival especially popular with children. At times a lantern would catch fire which added much excitement. There would be lots of fruit and snacks laid out that were specific for the festival. I remember one year when we were older children (over ten years old), my brother and I went to a local park, sat on the swings and chatted all evening. It was when my family was going through a difficult period and to share that moment with him was very special, especially when we ended up spending most of the rest of our lives living in different countries. He gave me the children’s tapestry that I used for this painting which evoked all those memories while making this piece of work.

LEARNING

– More work is required to develop my sense in choosing an appropriate colour palette for the piece. This is increasingly important because my work is about storytelling as well as narrative and I believe having an appropriate colour palette helps to tell a story. So more research and experiments should be done in this respect.

– The silk substrate worked well for the Chinese calligraphy. However, I know there is a wide range of other delicate Chinese substrates and I will experiment with different materials to find the optimum.

– Layering the Chinese substrate onto oil is a risky process – as seen in the image with the yellow circle highlighting the part obscuring of the brush painting if pressed too much into the oil. To help with this, further experiments are required to improve this process. E.g. paint a barrier layer, such as a masking fluid that dries clear, onto the back of the Chinese brush painting or calligraphy to shield the image from the oil seeping in from underneath.

– Spray painting, especially words, adds a contemporary feel to the image which is a style that I want to incorporate into my work. This is relevant to me because I take much inspiration from the extensive street art scene in my home city of Bristol where many famous street artists work or have worked.

– Using the tapestry image evoked many memories, perhaps I could explore that more.

NEXT STEPS

– Research into colour palettes for the type of stories that I want to tell. Build confidence in this area.

– Continue to build experience and explore using oil and cold wax.

– Experiment with other transparent Chinese substrate materials to find one that is as close to invisible as possible when layered onto oil.

– Experiment with a barrier or masking fluid to prevent the oil from seeping into the Chinese brush painting images.

– Experiment with more spray painting – be bold and push boundaries.

– Ongoing learning – research into Chinese poetry to find more poems that resonate with me to use in future work.

– Explore the evoked memories.

ADDITIONAL WORK

After visiting the exhibition of Ofelia Rodriguez again at Spike Island in Bristol, I was inspired by the way she used fabric as a border to her paintings.

This gave me the idea to try that with my work, especially to use Chinese imagery border for a recent piece of work to add to the transcultural narrative.

I started with some patterned paper that I had to make a collage frame. But I was not happy with the effect. It seemed too busy and rather random as an idea.

I then returned to the original tapestry that I used as the base image for the painting. It was a tapestry that was gifted to me by my brother many years ago.

Image to show the border of the tapestry

It is a typical border for small scale tapestries of this type. Then images of the border were printed and cut out to create a collage border for the painting:

Final finished work:

Mixed media on paper, 54 x 41.5 cm.

REFLECTIONS

I am very happy with the outcome of this experiment inspired by Rodrigues. It has completed the painting for me and added a more transcultural feel alongside the painted images such as the spray painted words.

To improve this approach, I would spray paint the # words to partly cover the tapestry image frame. I think that would increase the contemporary feel for the piece juxtaposing the traditional Chinese tapestry border.

MA Y1 U1: Developing narrative – Bowling lawn incident

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

Following on from a previous piece of digital art work where I researched and experimented with Procreate and Adobe Fresco, I chose to use Adobe Fresco for this piece of work because I found using my MS Surface Pro with the MS Stylus worked well; it was an enjoyable way to create art that is new to me.

This is part of my narrative development work from memory, where I make work when thoughts or scenes come into mind. In this case, it was a childhood memory. The trigger for this memory came from researching into Homi K. Bhabha’s book, The Location of Culture, where he talked about ‘mimicry’. Bhabha asserts that the colonised people would try to mimic the behaviour and culture of the coloniser in order to be more accepted by those in authority. According to Bhabha, the coloniser wanted the colonised to mimic them because it was a form of imposing soft power making the colonised adopt the coloniser’s culture and habits as a higher standard. To reinforce the power structure, the coloniser would demonstrate their power by judging good and bad mimicry. The coloniser did not want the colonised to be great at mimicking because it was important to maintain a differentiation between the two to justify the act of colonising.

Understanding Bhabha’s explanation of ‘mimicry’ reminded me of an incident that happened in my childhood in Hong Kong on a bowling green… It was a case of bad mimicry and I got into trouble for it.

There was a pristine lawn bowling green in front of our apartment block where the British would bowl on sunny weekend afternoons. As local kids, we were not allowed to go onto the green – it was forbidden. However, it was too tempting so one day, my siblings and I (three of us) went to play on the lawn. We were soon shouted at by a white British man. We didn’t know what he was saying but he was clearly shouting for us to get off (shouting and waving his arms dismissively). Kids innocently playing on grass where they shouldn’t do was no big deal, it happened all the time everywhere in the world. But on this occasion, our father who worked for the British HK Government was angry when he heard about what we did. He wouldn’t usually get involved with discipline for us and certainly not for something so trivial, that side of parenting was left to our mother. But he personally told us off as soon as he was home from the office. The fact that he scolded us as soon as he got home meant that he was informed of the incident at work; the news somehow reached him through an official channel. Now in hindsight, I believe we made him look bad at work because we showed that his family were poor mimics, we didn’t respect the bowling green like good British people would. Our poor mimicry as kids must have undone the good mimicry work that my father was working so hard to portray at his work. We were bad kids and made him look bad in front of his superiors.

Researching into Bhabha’s idea on mimicry reminded me of that incident and I wanted to make a piece of work about it.

Finished work:

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METHOD

Adobe Fresco was used for this work. Below are images showing the layers that were created – some were imported images and others were painted or drawn using the software. The three little sparrows were metaphors for me and my siblings. There were always lots of small tree sparrows on our balcony when we were young and I like using that as a metaphor for me as a child in my narrative art work.

The base layer image was a scene I found online of the said bowling lawn dated back to WWII during the 1940s – the lawn in the image is mostly obscured by the Prison Officers’ Club house in the foreground. My father worked for the HK Crown Prison (Correctional) Service and the apartment block on the left was where we lived – it was called Block K. Out flat was on the middle floor on the left side of the block. Seeing the photo brought back so many memories of my childhood at Flat No. K3.

The base layer photo was found in this blog and the blog details some very interesting history about the area which was used as a POW camp during WWII and our Block K housed Dutch and Norwegian POWs.

http://battleforhongkong.blogspot.com/2016/12/december-2016-diary.html?m=1

REFLECTIONS

I have found Bhabha’s book, The Location of Culture, very insightful and I continue to enjoy using his theories to help me to make sense of my lived experiences as a transcultural person. This incident was an example of how this part of my learning worked.

I also enjoyed working with Adobe Fesco. I found the tool straight forward to use. I particularly like the fact that I can work on my phone on the go, then refine and build on my work when I’m at home with my Surface Pro. So I’ll continue to use Fesco as my go-to digital art tool.

Researching Bhabha’s theory of mimicry helped me to understand the incident and why my father was upset by what was a rather trivial act by his kids. A question I am asking myself is – how does doing narrative art work like this one help me? I do not have an answer yet but I want to note down this question as an ongoing enquiry.

LEARNING

Researching Bhabha’s work has inspired me to make work to develop my narrative. This is what I had hoped would happen so I’m happy with this progress and will continue this path of learning.

Adobe Fresco is a useful tool that I like, I should continue to explore its functionality.

I was unable to answer the question that I posed myself ‘How does my narrative work help me?’ – Why am I doing it? I need to give this more considered thoughts.

NEXT STEPS

– Keep going with research on The Location of Culture.

– Do another piece of work using Fresco, perhaps try the painting functions and not just drawing.

– Start to articulate my thoughts on how my narrative work helps me. I expect this to be a slow enquiry process…

UPDATE ON ENQUIRY

I have been thinking a lot about the above since posing those questions to myself ‘How does my narrative work help me?‘ and ‘Why am I doing it?’. In a recent Group Tutorial during our weekly MA online session, my group helped me to explore those questions. They also asked some additional useful questions, such as ‘Who am I doing it for?’ and ‘Has art ever solved any other problems for me?‘

Reflecting on the Group Tutorial, my latest thoughts are:

Firstly, ‘who am I doing it for?‘ My immediate answer was ‘for me, I am doing this for me’. 

Why am I doing it? My response was that the exploration helped me to understand more about myself, my behaviour and response to situations. 

How does my narrative work help me and has art ever solved any other problems for me? For this, my answer during the Group Tutorial was that art had never solved any problems for me but there have been cases where by exploring my narrative through my art practice, it had helped to crystalise or pinpoint a problem and brought better clarity. However, after the group discussion, I reflected further and felt that in fact on occasions, my art and practice research have helped me to find answers. Such as this case of the ‘bowling lawn incident’ – through my art making and research, I had a better insight into the colonial soft power structure that my father had to work in therefore giving me a better understanding of his environment and helped to explain some of his behaviour that impacted us all.  

Although I have made some progress, I am aware that these answers are still quite close to the surface and I want to take more time to continue this line of enquiry, hence it is still ongoing…

MA Y1 U1: Developing narrative – HK Street names Part 1

| elizarawlings

BACKGROUND

As part of my research on The Third Space (Ref. The location of culture by Homi K Bhabha), I have been seeking out ‘third space’ phenomena from my memory and surroundings in order to gain a deeper understanding of the concept. To this end, I decided to research and do a project on the street names of Hong Kong.

When HK was a British colony, many streets were named after British Governors or officials sent to manage HK. Their English names were converted into Chinese (Cantonese) using transliteration*. As a result, the street names when pronounced in Cantonese are meaningless and often nonsensical. Since street names are such a fundamental part of daily lives, those strange sounding streets names have become a natural part of the day-to-day language without anyone questioning their nonsensical nature.

This project is to highlight the transliteration of HK street names as an example of a third space phenomenon from a place that has deep personal relevance for me.

Finished painting – HK Street names 1 – oil and cold wax on inkjet printed paper, size 18.4 x 12.8 cm.

METHOD

This is the first step and an experiment to test out the idea and process.

I researched online images of street signs in HK and picked out those that were transliterated from British names. Since the HK street signs nowadays are of a new design that I am not familiar with, where possible, I have chosen images that were from the 1960s, 70s and 80s – the period when I lived in HK and when HK was still under colonial British rule.

A digital collage of the road signs was made using Adobe Express then inkjet printed onto paper.

Teal colour oil paint was mixed with cold wax in 50:50 ratio and the printed image was covered in a thick layer of the oil-wax mix.

My iPhone was set up in video capture mode to record – I gradually scraped off the paint revealing most of the street signs one by one as I read out in English then Cantonese each street name. The purpose of the voice over was to enable viewers to hear the Cantonese transliteration.

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REFLECTIONS

This was an experiment to test out the concept on a small scale before taking it onto a large canvas to create a painting. The aim is to ultimately create two pieces of work – a painting as well as a video accompanied by a piece of writing explaining the background of the street names used as part of my research into colonialism.

I believe the way these streets were named in HK was an example of how soft power worked in a British colony where the names of the colonisers such as Governors and Royalty were permanently imprinted into the day-to-day lives of the local people, serving as a reminder of the colonial power structure. The fact that road and streets were named in this way served as a constant reminder of who was in charge of the the land.

I started this project with casual research online, however, my interest in the topic increased as I went deeper into the research as it became clear the extent of the soft power exercised in these examples. As I looked at the street signs and read out each name, I could hear my late parents saying those names on a daily basis in conversation – which road had bad traffic jams, what was the shortest route to get to a place or giving directions to a shop. As a child, I listened to my parents using the transliterated and nonsensical street names like it was just normal. Everyone used those names without giving it a second thought. I left HK when I was a young teenager and never lived there as an adult. I now wonder what it was like for my parents to live their whole lives in a colony, to live, work and bring up children as colonised subjects. Doing this project has caused me to think about that more deeply. I always feel conflicted when I think about this topic – HK was a British Colony with in-built structural injustices that came with being colonised, but HK also became successful globally partly due to the commercial, legal and justice systems that were put in place by the British bringing prosperity to the city and stability for the people. This is a conflicted feeling that I will continue to examine – just like the transliterated street names, what seemed natural or normal once upon a time, now no longer make sense and I am still trying to unpack that conflicted feeling.

Regarding the art work, I was pleased with the outcome of the project, especially as an initial experiment. Through my research, I have found many more interesting facts about the naming of streets in HK, I could potentially divide them into categories and make several art work to create a series.

LEARNING

In the context of my art practice, this research project has helped me to gain a deeper understanding of The Third Space as coined by Homi K Bhabha. The phenomenon of the street names researched here is unique and only came about as a result of the English and Chinese languages coming together through colonisation. There is also the underlying cultural influences from both sides, e.g. holding military personnel in high esteem for the British and in the case of Bedford Road, the Chinese name reflecting the entrepreneurial mindset of the locals.

I am been struggling to make art through examining my third space – one that is personal to my lived experience. I have struggled to create images that is a result of that third space, instead, I have been layering together distinct images from the two cultures that have influenced me. To expand on this point with an example from the HK street names:

Example – take Wood Road that was named after John Roskruge Wood, an acting chief justice during the colonial period. If it were translated into Chinese, the character 木 for wood (as in wood from trees) would have been used. Instead, the phonetic sound of Wood was used in the transliteration, hence the Chinese character 活 meaning alive or living was used to get the closest sound to Wood. The Third Space phenomenon gave rise to a very different outcome.

Analysing the HK street names was the first time I found a concrete example of the third space phenomenon that is relevant to me and my heritage. So I will continue to research this topic as well as look for other signs of the colonial era in HK that may help with my personal identity research.

Whenever I struggle with creating images for my third space, I come back to researching the work of the artist Fiona Rae because I feel she has captured the essence of the third space well with her British and Asian influences. I will continue to research her work.

NEXT STEPS

– Repeat this work on a larger scale using proper canvas material to make a painting and a video.

– Test the video on non-Chinese speaking people to see if the transliteration sounds were noticeable, i.e. is the video voice over meaningful.

– Complete the piece of writing to accompany the art work.

– Research deeper into the HK street names to potentially make a series of work on this theme.

– Research further the history of HK to look for other third space phenomena to inform my personal identity work.

– Research Fiona Rae’s work and find more transcultural British/East Asian artists to add my list for research.

ADDITIONAL RESEARCH INFORMATION

Below is a table showing the background of every street name revealed in this painting and video – whom they were named after as well as amusing mistakes in translation or transliteration.

* What is transliteration?

Below are blogs and extracts explaining the meaning of transliteration in the context of this project.

The Meaning of Transliteration – Blog (aussietranslations.com.au)

Extract:

Translation provides the meaning of words in a second language. Transliteration does not provide the words’ meaning but it makes it easier to pronounce them. Transliteration alters the letters from a language or alphabet into characters of a similar-sounding in a different alphabet. It is quite clear that there is frequently a demand for the transliteration of some languages, especially in this globalised world where people who do not share the same language can have some access to languages with a dissimilar alphabet.

What’s the difference between translation and transliteration? | Foreign Tongues

Extract:

A transliteration doesn’t tell you the meaning of the word, but it gives you an idea of how the word is pronounced in a foreign language. It makes a language a little more accessible to people who are unfamiliar with that language’s alphabet.

MA Y1 U1: Exploring media – Oil and cold wax – Part 2 with a personal photo

| elizarawlings

Finished painting:

Oil and cold wax on canvas, size 12×16 inch

BACKGROUND

After experimenting with oil and cold wax, I wanted to do a painting with that medium. As for the subject of this work – I wanted to start with an old photograph of my parents’ home.

METHOD

After watching a video about sketchbooks recently, I decided to return to using my sketchbook to develop ideas. Here is what I came up with for this painting.

I took a digital copy of an old photo from my parents’ home, printed it out and transferred the image onto a 12×16 inch canvas board using dispersion liquid. One of the framed photos in the image was of me at my graduation with my parents from years earlier – I didn’t want to include that hence I cut it out to leave a blank space with the aim of raising questions or intrigue for the viewer.

Image being transferred onto canvas board

Below is a bare canvas board with the transferred photo image:

I would usually apply paint instinctively in response to the image on the canvas, however, I wanted to be more considered in my approach hence referring to The Art of Colour book to do some research and plan the colour palette for the work.

I picked out a green shade from the photo and did an acrylic wash to cover the canvas:

I was feeling lost despite faced with a very informative book. So I did some artist research to look at the colour palette on this painting by Fiona Rae – an artist that I admire and researching into her work was part of my intention from the last experiment:

That gave me the inspiration to start painting. I tried to stay with the idea developed in my sketchbook with blocks of colours in oil and cold wax reflecting the different cultural areas that I operate in.

I wanted to add connections between the two blocks to represent the stairwell connecting ‘the two rooms’ as in the analogy used by Homi K Bhabha in his book The Location of Culture about people living in different cultures simultaneously – one ends up running back and forth. I then scratched the oil and wax medium to create branches like those on the peach tree in the photo.

I masked the cut-out of my photo while painting. Below is with the mask removed after I finished painting:

I wanted to put a seal stamp on the painting from my late mother to connect her with this work. Here is one of her seals (she was a Chinese artist):

The seal was stamped on the top right of the photo image to complete the painting.

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REFLECTIONS

In The Location of Culture, Homi K Bhabha talks about the negotiation of cultures and where that takes place. He uses the analogy of a stairwell connecting different rooms and a transcultural person is constantly running in between those rooms. That analogy resonated with me and I wanted to build my image around this concept as captured in my sketchbook.

Regarding the use of a family photo – this idea came about when I was recently shown four photo albums that belonged to my family. I was asked to take them but I didn’t feel ready to take them yet. I wasn’t ready to start delving into my memory although working from memory is a key part of my narrative work. My deeper memory felt fragile hence I wanted to ease into the process. My tutor suggested that perhaps I could try working with one or two old photos to see how I got on. I chose one photo that was taken at Chinese New Year with the traditional new year peach blossoms surrounded by some framed family photos. It was taken many years after I left home and I didn’t feel a connection to my parents’ home even though I felt I should do. Hence I cut out the photo of me from the scene as I felt out of place there. The cutting out of part of an image from a photo was something that I wanted to try to see if it would convey that sense of ‘absence’ or ‘not belonging’. I was pleased with how it worked out on the image transfer and the masking process.

Despite the research into colour palettes and tone brilliance, I ended up doing it rather instinctively – this was a disappointment because I wanted to be more scientific and considered in my use of colours – so this remains an area of development.

I enjoyed using oil and cold wax and found that I had many options of mark making. I was pleased with how the scratched tree branches came out and the black thin marks helped to enhance the tree. I would have wanted to paint the tree in Chinese painting style but I have not worked out how to paint that delicately onto oil – ink doesn’t work on oil (materially incompatible) and oil is too viscous to achieve the delicate aesthetic – this remains an area that needs further investigation.

I presented the painting at a group crit. I didn’t mention the cut out photo and wanted to see if anyone would ask about it. No one did which made me think perhaps it was not an effective way to provoke a response.

At the crit, I was also asked by the facilitator if it would matter to me if no one understood my work. My instinctive answer was ‘no, it wouldn’t bother me’ although it’s always good if someone understood the work or found a connection with it. My take away was that perhaps this painting was aesthetically too confusing and hence people didn’t get it.

LEARNING

There were practical learning points such as to continue to work on colour theory and find ways to satisfactorily depict delicate Chinese brush painting onto a ‘western’ medium such as oil because I want to explore ways to bring different cultural genres together to convey my transcultural lived experience. This continues to be a key area of exploration for me.

On a personal point, although I liked this painting, I learnt that I still have some way to go to express myself in an abstract manner that connects with the viewer. My two colour zones with connections for the ‘stairwell’ didn’t really come across as I intended and the viewers seemed indifferent to the photo image. These made me think that what I wanted to say was not sufficiently thought-through, so I need to revisit what I wanted to say and not to rush in trying to say too much in one painting because all the messages and symbolic meanings would just get lost within the image. I have been advised before to avoid trying to say everything or too much in one painting – I must remember that.

NEXT STEPS

– Continue to learn and experiment with colours as I want to use colours appropriately to help me to convey my story.

– Do experiments: dig out some old oil painting exercises, cover with clear gesso and see if I can use Chinese ink on top of that.

– Revisit my style development. Do more research into the third space to really understand what that means to me and what it could look like aesthetically in order to develop a language that I can use. For this point, I want to develop my abstraction skills and will continue to explore oil and cold wax in this development.

– I want to continue to explore the cut-out photo technique to play with the notion of absence in my narrative. Although no one asked about it in this case, I remain excited about the possibilities.