Marco Rea

Marco Rea is a Rome based artist representing Italy's lowbrow/pop surrealism. He takes glossy billboards of lip gloss kissed women in today's advertising and defaces them.  Taking the smooth Photoshopped skin and bright highlighted eyes and armed with spray cans, destroys the original intent, resulting in something a lot darker. 

For me he's taken away the fake branded posing model and replaced her with a beautiful melancholic disturbed being. It's funny how what could lie underneath is being plastered on with a mask of paint

So here's to Marco Rea for turning the pin up women who belong on your walls into monsters under your bed.

Friday Playlist

Thought I'd share a few songs that are helping me draw right now, don't think it's actually possible for me to make art without music :)

Anxiety

I don't even feel like I can explain this image with any form of words, it's just perfect. And encapsulates the feeling of anxiety so well. This is an image by Beethy Photography who is primarily a Cosplay photographer, but felt the need to express his feelings through the creative process. Here is a quote from his online journal on the piece 'anxiety'

         "At any random point in the day I can get these attacks. During these attacks I'm overwhelmed with the feeling of imminent death. No rational thinking can erase the thought or feeling. Imagine having a gun held to your head. And you know it's going to go off. You just don't know when. That's what happens when I experience an attack."

He mentions with the piece he found Eric Johansson's TED talk on composition very useful when crafting this image. To create something that doesn't exist. Erik talks about 3 simple rules to achieve a realistic result:

1. Photos combines should have the same perspective

2. Photos combined should have the same type of light 

3. Making the image seamless, so it's impossible to distinguish where the different images begin and end.

Links:

Beethy's Photography

Beethy on Facebook

Erik Johansson's TED Talk

Erik Johansson's Photography

Screen Print Virgin

So something I've never got along well with is screen-print, so in the theme of becoming a better artist I decided to give some a try. So first of all I looked at pieces of my existing work and sought out digitallt to get an idea which ones would make the best screen prints. Then it will be on to producing some originals based on the style of the best outcomes! 

I find the best ones we're the ones that has the most dark colours to begin with as a lot is lost when you increase contrast and levels in Photoshop as the delicacy of the drawing is what I often liked best about it in the first place. My favorite one was the third one down, I like the grungy feel to it and actually prefer it to the original.


Z x

Ethics in art

This is something I've had to consider over the past few weeks, as I've been working on projects surrounding delicate issues. As an artist, ethics need to be considered as insensitivity can easily cause offence. Or maybe thats the intent, and I'm all for stepping on peoples toes a little, but I'm sure we can agree people can go a little too far. Aslong as the work is thought provoking opposed to hurtful, I'm all for it. Bullying just gets everybody nowhere fast. And a closed mind shouldn't be opened with a sledgehammer..

I've been illustrating around the subjects of Parkinson's disease and the Ebola outbreak, so looking at those affected, the individuals with the disease themselves and those surrounding them, ranging from their loved ones, to healthcare staff and then stretching to the media. Just to educate myself and see which angle I would like to pursue the projects from.

With a healthcare background it felt pretty natural to look at how it would feel to care for people with these illnesses. When taking ethics in consideration I didn't want to pretend I knew what it felt like to have Ebola or Parkinson's disease. I was too worried about coming across as presumptuous, naive or insulting to those who are genuinely going through it. And even reading other peoples experiences, taking those and making them my own just didn't feel right. So I decided to take these projects on as an observer, empathising with the individual and trying to understand, because in reality I will never truly know how they feel, nobody ever can.

'Artists are conditioned by their context'

     -The Philosophy Book

It Only Takes a Girl

I'm just going to leave this here..

Click here to donate 

John L. Walters: Editor of Eye Magazine

Today I had the privilege of attending a lecture given by a man with a passion for magazine making, persevering the physical form in an ever technologically advancing world. John L. Walters is the editor of the world renowned Eye Magazine, a graphic design journal comprising of stunning and remarkable images accompanied by thought provoking words.  

He spoke to us in detail about Issue 87: Food special, which first springs haute cuisine and high end food blogs to mind, but it's a lot better than that. This issue covers topics from the stamped logos on heroin 'baggies' referencing pop culture and escapism to Spanish meat packaging featuring cartoon animals meeting their demise with a butchers knife. This issue is a lot more food for thought than the latest food trend taking over your Instagram feed.

As I'm a student, meeting people who are already successful in the industry in an insightful and invaluable experience for me. To learn about the process of how a magazine is made was an absolute pleasure to hear direct from a successful editor himself. He tells us about his appreciation for having a physical magazine in your hand, to which he does not compromise on the quality, keeping the paper thick and ink vivid, it allows for the artwork to be presented how it was intended and in context. With which I wholeheartedly agree it should be, and is very refreshing to hear as an illustrator. As personally I feel images on screens can become somewhat of a commodity, we spend so much time transfixed on our phones and laptops it's hard for something to stick out and resonate with us.

I managed to get the chance to pick his brain a little and find a little more about what he looks for in his contributors, I was happy to hear that he accepts work from anyone with talent, you don't need to be famous or credited to get in Eye Magazine, you just have to have to be good. 

When looking for content he has an eye for the unusual an interesting, seeking out contributors who have a deep pool of knowledge and are passionate about their subject. I think this makes the magazine more personal, it isn't about elitism or celebrity, it's about people who share a common interest, whether they are creators or avid observers.  So if you want your curiosity quenched and your knowledge expanded I would definitely recommend Eye Magazine

   Useful Links:

Eye Magazine

Have a flick through Issue 87

A great book on visual culture (if you're a newbie!)

Nix the Phoenix

It's good to look back on your work to see if there's anything missing and I found my relationship with colour is use them all or none at all. This is one of said pieces I did for a short story I wrote, there really aren't many of them! 

So new goal: work more with colour.

My Phoenix is red
He sleeps in my bed
No one can see him
He's all in my head

A Body without Organs

The Cornerhouse in Manchester is currently showing 'How to build a Body without Organs' a collaborative exhibition curated by Alessandro Bucci, featuring work by Hernán Chavar, Marco Rea, Fernanda Veron, Nicol Vizioli and Wallenburg. And this is their manifesto:

'What’s in a body? Which features make the body what is it? We might say organs and bones, but French philosophers Deleuze & Guattari reject this answer. Their theory Body Without Organs suggests that the body isn't merely about the parts that make it work, but rather is the fulfillment of potential to create something whole. In this selection of works, the artists have reflected upon the process of clothing the body, emphasising the role of dress in getting us closer to our whole 'self'. Here, dress is no longer an attribute of the body, as the two create a singular identity which cannot be separated.'

The Body without Organs is an extract from 'a thousand plateus' a paper written by Deleuze and Guattari in 1947 and it wasn't an easy read for me who prefers fantasy fiction over deep philosophical concepts. But I persevered and was delighted by what I discovered and understood, here's what I took from it.

After speaking to my more analytic better half on the subject we came to the following conclusion, the Body without Organs is the ideal, it's what we strive to create, it's how we build ourselves, yet we can never actually acheive it. It's a result of all you put into it, whether that be misery or ecstasy. The philosophers question why when we can fill ourselves with pure happiness do we choose the opposite, pain. But to those who choose it, it brings them satisfaction, and they feel incompatible and uneasy around elation and optimism. What method we use to construct ourselves with, is what we seek to build ourselves in the future, and for some people, pain brings pleasure. Which if you don't 'get it' explains the ever elusive masochist.

To further explain this concept I came up an analogy. We each have our own internal puzzle pieces and we live each day collecting more, desiring to create the full image of oneself, the pieces are the Organs and the finished picture is the Body without. What puzzle pieces you start with and how you obtain them influence the rest, as with a puzzle, they have to match up, making it impossible to build your puzzle without some sort of connection.

Alessandro Bucci took this concept and applied it to the clothes we wear, signifying them as an extension of ourselves. So like everything we choose to build, fashion and clothing can be one of them. Whether the entwining threads that make you are a beautiful flowing silk or an itchy jumper that has a few holes in. It's just one more way to extend and express yourself. In the exhibition the photographer Nicol Vizioli stood out for me the most, the subjects in his images look like they are feeling the clothing around them, as seen below hugging it close in the cold or looking broken without any at all.

Nicol Vizioli

Hildegard Von Bingen

Anti-Fashion Manifesto

Links:

Cornerhouse Exhibition

A Body without Organs: Original Paper

An easy to digest book on Philosophy

Brain Storming

When I get a new brief or am looking for a little inspiration, creating a mind map often helps me. It's a non linear way to make new connections, which is good with illustration because you find a new way to say something, without being too obvious. I stumbled across Eva Strohmeier who has made her mind maps into pieces of art work themselves. It also gave me the idea of when struggling with a subject, it would help if somebody else made one on the subject for you, and you could take it from there

Maths and Van Gogh's "The Starry Night"

Today I found this interesting video that provided me with a little food for thought, so I decided to delve a little deeper into the theories behind it.

According to José Luis Aragón of the National Autonomous University in Mexico during Van Gogh's most psychotic episodes he accurately painted the patterns of turbulence in his painting Starry Night, which was painted during his time in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence Asylum.[1] He used luminescence in the piece, generating a sense of motion.  It was a popular technique among impressionists of the time, such as Munch and Monet.

It was found that Van Gogh suffered from a mental epilepsy, Naith and Smith wrote "Not the kind, known since antiquity, that caused the limbs to jerk and the body to collapse ('the falling sickness', as it was sometimes called), but a mental epilepsy—a seizing up of the mind: a collapse of thought, perception, reason, and emotion that manifested itself entirely in the brain and often prompted bizarre, dramatic behavior." The symptoms of the seizures "resembled fireworks of electrical impulses in the brain."[2] And interestingly in his letters to his brother Theo, he compared the stars to dots on a map and mused that, as one takes a train to travel on earth, "we take death to reach a star."[3] Gogh is at one with nature in many of his works, which if he successfully depicted the pattern of turbulence, would make sense, with his mental illness he accessed new parts of his mind, normally ones we don't get to use.


References
1. http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0606246
2. http://stevennaifeh.com/van-gogh-the-life/
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Starry_Night

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Whilst looking around for answers I came across some of the other mathematical concepts that could be used in artistic work. As I found impressionists only started experimenting with complementary colours from scientific discoveries of them in the 19th century. I thought having a look might bring something new and fresh to my work, I especially want to start creating digital patterns with my traditional work.

Fractals

Graphs

The Holocaust Memorial

You look in awe at the size of it, I've never seen an installation of this scale and it seems to grow the more you explore it. There are children running around playing hide and seek, people looking bored and people absorbing every aspect of what this place signifies. It's good to walk through it alone, you know there are so many others around you doing the exact same thing but you only get to see them for a split second, like an echo. 

From a distance, each stone seems to be a sunken or raised copy of the next but up close you get to appreciate and touch the small imperfections that make them, anonymous and unique all at the same time. The pillars loom over you, it can be claustrophobic or somewhat comforting, I found myself feeling both. The place is hauntingly peaceful, a sense the dead have been layed to rest. 

Here are mine and my brother's photographs from the memorial, he also has many more of the wonderful sites of Berlin, click here for his website.

Team Building at Islington Mill

Islington Mill in Salford are currently running a print exhibition called  Team Building, parodying corporate team building exercises, and I went to the Q&A. 

Six artists worked on this project in an intense collaboration, producing an exhibition in merely six days, from morning until night, they ate, worked and bonded together in a high intensity environment. They found it challenging to work in such a new way, their usual methods are alone or with just one other. It gave them a way to merge styles and find if it worked or didn't, they've made something unique which couldn't be achieved alone. The whole process sounded tiring and taxing yet enjoyable and worth it, and it looks like they had a lot of fun with it. They tell us about the daily activities they used to build their team, one being a playful artistic take on the classic Chinese whispers. A general positive attitude and a mutual understanding got them through, inspiring and teaching each other new processes along the way. 

When it came to grafting hard they took no prisoners, the process almost became automatic for them. One difficulty faced was producing art surrounded by people and with a deadline, leaving no room to be intimidated by a blank canvas. There was simply no time for precautions, taking these away they found a new sense of freedom when producing ideas. I asked if they felt their own voice came through in their work with so many other people shouting, and I got an excellent response from Marion of Palefroi, she stated it's more like a choir, and it shows, they are all singing the same song each with their individual lines weaving in and out of each other. In the end they were surprised and happy with the amount of work they managed to produce and felt the images developed their own narrative. Their only conflict being about how the exhibition should be set out! 

My favorite piece was a black and white fabric print, spanning around 10 meters, mixing art and textiles isn't something I normally consider, yet the result was gorgeous, this method also leaves your work open to a wider range of use. This for me highlighted the the range of possibilities you can explore with print. It felt good to take a first step into Manchester's art scene, as I always work alone quite isolated. It has inspired me to see how this project totally made itself instead of breaking. And I'm now more confident about working with other people to see what exciting things we can create.

Some photos of the take away publication

Artists and venue:

Islington Mill Events

Palefroi

DR-ME

SJ Hockett

John Powell Jones

Social Awareness in Illustration

I'm currently producing a small personal illustrative publication. In my previous post I looked at the power of words and I wanted to carry this into my work. I want the subject matter to be hard hitting and serve a purpose, to move people. So I chose to work with the Ebola outbreak, it’s something we are seeing in the news all the time but to us in the UK seems worlds away. I found a wealth of information online of individual’s personal accounts, people who have survived Ebola and those treating it, and I want their raw real feelings to come across in my work, opposed to the statistics in the news.

I have recently started writing so with this new found passion I will be producing 3-4 poems surrounding the Ebola outbreak and illustrating them. This I am then going to print into a small booklet as well as posting on here. Sensitivity towards those affected, along with their families is essential, the aim of this publication is to raise awareness and understanding and not to exploit people in a vulnerable situation.

With the style of art used in the project I want to challenge myself and find new methods of working. As I normally work with graphite pencils, heavily focusing on shading techniques and my subject matter doesn't normally have a lot of depth in terms of perspective. Below are some artists I am going to be taking inspiration from and the techniques of producing art I would like to try out.

Frank Miller - Black & White

Ben Rider - Screen Print

Gustave Caillebotte - Perspective

Georges Seurat - Pointillism

Spoken Word

Growing up I've never really had an interest in poetry, yet I started watching spoken word videos and I was hooked. It brings words to life in a way I'd never seen before, suddenly poetry was so powerful, it got me angry, upset and wanting to make changes myself. Exploring and listening to these has ingrained it into my brain. I'm starting to think lyrically, which has lead to me writing poetry and short stories, at which I'm surprised and overjoyed.

As an artist I want to try and express this power in my work, to make an impact about things I care about. Spoken word artists get so passionate and reel you in, making you believe every single word. And really, why should we do things by halves?

Here are a few spoken word videos by two amazing women. 

Hollie's work is straight to the point, it flows, she's honest and fresh, and as she would probably appreciate me saying, free from bullshit.

Oh Melissa, she is one powerful lady, I don't think I need to say much more, just listen.

Medusa's Revenge

Legend does not simply die, this is my illustration of Medusa in her afterlife and a few words I wrote to go with it, enjoy.

Cursed, deadly, vicious, all these things I am

Surrounded by inanimate faces grey and cold

I am collateral damage, a product of almighty wars bigger than myself 

My mutilated body a reflection

Eyes to look upon yet all you'll see is stone

Defeat me, a looking glass and a sharp blade is all you need

Do it from kindness and I shall bare my neck

But to die for your glory, do not be surprised when I snarl and bite  

And who are you? Those we pray and praise to 

Looking down on us, your uncontested asperity our example

Stricken and sickened by the same faults you condemn

Here I stand a product of sin, yours, mine?
It makes no matter

Now go, work, wash the blood away with more blood

Climb over the dead to get to the top

I'm sure the view is beautiful

Life Support

The human body is an amazing machine, at our peak we can be deadly and strong, yet with one malfunction we can become ever so fragile. My painting above shows us in that state, as the title explains, this patient is on life support, he is stuck in his own mind with no escape. In the most vulnerable of positions I wanted to capture the fear and grittiness of this subject, he is alive artificially and living on borrowed time.

Below are a few small studies of our anatomy I drew after taking some inspiration from scientific illustrations in old textbooks, their accuracy and intricacy incredible. I also looked at Da Vinci's work who really is the Jack of all trades and master of them all! I love the way he sees the world, he can take something scientific and make it into a work of art.

The Bell Jar: Illustrated

A book of despair, torment and secrets, a young woman all alone in her own personal world of mental illness.

Under the guise of Esther Greenwood we're taken through Sylvia Plath's journey, and it feels real. It's personal and intimate, we all have one, our own journey in our own mind. There's no heroes nor glory and no happily ever after. And all the bad guys are in your head.

Depression is an illness that tears your mind left from right, life and death. And you're stranded somewhere in the middle not knowing which to choose. Neither feels like a solution nor can you summon the strength to decide.

This book threw me, as a person recovering and getting better, the casual tone brought memories and feelings back without me even realising it. As with depression, it creeps up on you, there's not always dramatic outbursts or screaming, it's often a quiet infestation of the mind. The book is a metaphor for this process, building up slowly with soft whispers of warning, which you disregard as an insignificant passing thought.Then all of a sudden you're down the rabbit hole and not even those you hold dear can reach you to pull you back out.

Plath encapsulates this all so beautifully, I didn't find myself particularly liking Esther yet I related to her all the same, reading this book made me feel, even if it wasn't always a positive experience. That's what books should do, make you feel.

Here's a few of my illustrations, I hope they do the story justice.

Skin Deep

Electroconvulsive Therapy

Self Image                                                                        The Bell Jar

Writers Block

The Life Trees

And as Sylvia so perfectly put it “Is there no way out of the mind?"