I have done a whole batch now of similar quick sketches to the one in the last post. I am not sure if I have already stated the intention of these sketches, if not then I shall do now. I have have then perhaps this will provide a bit more clarity.
Firstly it should be stated there existence is not explicit in terms of any deep seated meaning. They come from a current desire to manipulate imagery, so are in the purest sense nothing more than an extension of that fascination. They are playful, if you like.
Beyond this I do think they are touching on areas of interest and broadening certainly iconographic potential in my work. I should at least attempt to explain more clearly what I mean by this. Once again, I hope this does not appear to be a justification, more a written clariifcation of the process. I am not sure how much difference there is between those two things.
In terms of broadening areas of interest i suppose I am talking about what we like to call content, subject matter. I know I am increasingly interested in what is found when something else is lost. The construction of images, moments and suggested narratives from the destruction (partial destruction I should say) of another.
These sketches are nothing more than images from newsppaers drawn over with biro and white acrylic. Yet I enjoy the point where the specifics of a figure and his context is lost. Where a footballer jumping to head a ball beceoms something more general. No longer a crowd, opposition play eror footabller around. With these props of recognised meaning removed he transforms. He becoems a figures floating, rising, falling in mid air. Someone locked inside some unknown narrative of potentially heroic proportions (this last statment is tenuous at best)
In terms of image making/destruction, the acrylic biro process has interested me. I know this because I have had the desire (and continued desire) to continue with it. It has not been over thought, i am just finding myself constantly picking up images from the paper and wishing to work them up/down in such a way. Ithink what I like is how when reduced to these basic tonal eleemnts (with detail of fabric and limbs removed) the figure seems to take on a weight, a solidity. Beyond this the continuity of surface in the figure and his surrounds seem to allow him to occupy space in an altogether different manner. He becomes a kind of heavy floating form in the ether; I think.
When reduced to simple lines the movement, energy and power of the various forms can be kept while their specific identiy is lost. I like it when the animalistic energy of a horse is kept but its part in a race, or even it looking like a horse, is lost. I like the idea of finding some kind of horse/dog/bull creature. I don't think I am interested in purposelly abstracting the animal to become some kind of mutant fantasy creature. Its hopefully more subtle than that. I think I just want a particular character of the animal, of which its species is not necessarily relevant. I am not sure I believe this, but my brain seems to want me to when I translate the thoughts into written form. Thats the trouble with words, terribly restructiuve, terribly dogmatic, terribly literal. TERRIBLY? Not sure why I am using such a pompous word, shhhhhhhh.
In terms of iconography I see the potential for these sketches to provide a kind of cast of characters. Figures adn actors who can be called upon to act out parts in new stage productions in the flat. Still Movies and silent actors. Once a cast is built they will help me find stories as much as they will fulfill certain rols I decide upon. Due to the limitations of the process I cannot predefine the stories I wish to make, I have to be guided, to an extent by the cast I have.
Yet seeing as I have created the cast, slected the images to work on, chosen how to work them up and then chosen what contexst to put them in... I obvioulsy have a directors role. That means I know the kind of 'picture play' I am trying to make. I know I am interested in lose, in memory, in rising adn falling, in tragedy, in beauty and melancholy, in transcience and stillness, in moment, in drama, in the post and the pre defining moment. These are all vague terms, but I know they provide the framework around which I wish these figures to act.
Hopefully these various visual and theoretical coordinates provide me with a kind of unknowing direction. With a path which leads us somewhere but through the dark and into something as yet undiscovered (undiscovered by me, not suggesting any search for originality here...I dont really give a toss about that...perhaps i do a little)
Which bring me full circle back to the destruction of the image. Its about what is found when something else is lost.
All that said, these are just crappy little sketches which pass the time when I am waiting for my toast to pop.
(obvisouly the playing with newspapers has a whole history. It takes us from the Cubists through to Andys comment about sourcing from the detritus of modern day life. Between these points lie a ton of people who source photographs, newspaper imagery etc to find imagery) I make no claim to be original, therefore, or to be competing with these past figures. I am merely acknowledging the hgistory from which such a process comes. Bacon is perhaps occupying my thoguhts in this sense most obviously at the moment. A true painters painter.
FUCK- this last paragraph sounds ludicrous. It would be false to remove it now though.
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