Although I have worked with projects alone, I feel like this was a very different process in terms of research and development. Mainly my previous projects have been focused around what medium I want to use, rather than concept, so it was a great opportunity to explore and develop a project mainly focusing on a concept and deeper meaning.
Research was core to my project. I researched an array of subjects, from bio art to itself, to articles on evolution, the development of GMO's. I even stemmed out to body manipulations, made by artists, as well as looking at the significance of radical body manipulations within different cultures. It was important I had a strong research ground in order to support what I am trying to say within my piece.
I hit a lot of dead ends within my experiments, ones where I could not quite anchor a concept or certain meaning to what I wanted to show and ones where I just did not have the technical capabilities to create something 'good looking'. However, after experimentation I managed to find a style I was comfortable with, could stretch my abilities, while being fun at the same time. My brightly coloured, cartoon-like, fantasy style graphics have definitely been influenced by the interests such as animation films and previous projects including the reflections photography project. I used photographs that I professionally took in the studio in order to get a clear image of the face and shadows. Using shapes in photoshop I cut each part of the face, similar to cutting different colours of card to create layers, and different features. Not only did this challenge my technical skills, it also challenged my artistic skills, which have really been explored through innovation and interference this year.
Another technical skill I practiced was animation. I had never done animation before, and this was really eye opening when it came to looking at body movement, and how many frames I'd have to use to create a smooth animation. I feel I pulled of the blinking successfully, as it is smooth and subtle. The middle screen, I could of made the morph smoother. I did experiment with the morph quite at lot, firstly starting in after effects where I played with its morph add-ons but then moving on to frame by frame animation. I felt like the after effects did not look as good, and was not as smooth as I wanted. However when I did the animation frame by frame I felt it looked at lot more effective, and it allowed me to have more control of each frame and where I wanted the morph to go.
In terms of concept I had a pretty strong research ground to back up my work, however I was struggling with how to connect my sculpture to the screens, and also the deeper meaning behind this. This project was a good test for this, as I feel my previous works, although did have a concept, they lacked a deeper meaning. After decisions with several people, my meaning developed. I came to the conclusion that my work not only represents our ideas of fantasy and how in reality our fantasies may not always be achieved, but as an artist we have ideas and after experimentation we don't always get the output we want. This meaning actually really reflected the process of my project itself because I went through a lot of failure to get the output I wanted.
My sculpture, although painful to make at times, was very interesting to make. Tape and clingfilm were great materials to use, as they were very flexible as well as cost efficient. I used about 2 rolls of clingfilm, and 8 rolls of tape to create a mould of my body. It was a good experience looking at each part of my body, as I was stretching clingfilm around it. It strangely made me very self aware of my body and its shape.
My sculpture was originally made to stand up on its hands and knees, however when I put my sculpture in the room with the screens, I felt it looked better laying down, looking up at the screens, making it look more part of the piece. When I was setting up the installation I decided to put the light cord going through her belly button to look like she was connected to the screens, and almost being powered by them.
The skills that I had learned in planning a gallery very much transferred to this project. I have become more aware of space and presentation, and do enjoy organising things, and making sure they look as good as possible. I was very pleased when I managed to book out room G03 as it was such a good space to experiment in, and meant I could wall mount my screens.
With some moving about, we managed to create an exhibition space to display our works in. I do really enjoy creating installations, as it creates so many levels to the project, which could change at any stage. Although I had ideas in my head on how I wanted my installation to look like, it always changes slightly once you have all your components in the room.
The Final Outcome!
Overall I am really happy with my outcome. I have learnt a lot during the whole unit in terms of my artistic skills, technical skills, time management and organisation skills. I like how my brain project almost connects with this one. It has given me a chance to really experiment with physical art, as well as digital art. I have learned a lot with what works for me as an artist and what does not, and although thing do not always go to plan, I've learnt to not give up.
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