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.