Art & Design - Urban Landscape; Developing Sketches.

Right, so after watching Tony's brief tutorial on perspective drawing I decided to give it a go, I though I'd start where he showed us and go for one perspective. Below is the sketch I came out with, basically a view looking down a street of houses.

This was quite a simple task, but one that I learnt a hell of a lot from. This also gave me the idea and inspiration to take this technique further and develop it.

In order to develop this style, I introduced multiple perspectives to my work. The sketch below is what I came up with when working with multiple perspectives.

The idea for this came from a mixture of secondary sources (photographs) and my own mind, this piece really caught my imagination and sparked the beginning of the concept I planned to go on to develop even further.

So, after this came out pretty well, I noticed that the layout of the piece was very similar to the perspective grid in Adobe Illustrator, and coming from a computer background, I didn't need an excuse to jump onto the MAC and develop this even further.

So I took the image and scanned it into the computer, I then used the perspective grid in Illustrator to line up the image. The live trace feature allowed me to vectorize the shapes and turn them into solid objects.

Then after some work, I was able to create more detail in the building which resulted in this...

This is where I really found myself, and planned to use this on my final piece. However I once again decided to take this further, and again develop it.

So, back into Illustrator I went and duplication the whole image a few times, each time applying different effects and playing around with the opacity.

The my once humble sketch became a real finished piece in it's own right, this is now the vector I will use on my final piece...

Evaluation:

So I thought the process and technique of the perspective drawing was extremely useful, it helped me develop ideas and gave me the basis to build my urban landscape for my final piece. If there was any bad things about it, it would be that I would maybe have liked to use a primary source for this, however I'm not the best photographer and wouldn't be able to compose a shot of the calibre needed to pull this off, therefore it was left to what I am good at, taking something so simplistic and turning into high quality digital piece of art - I feel I really explored mixed media in this piece.

Art & Design - Urban Landscape Research; Sources.

There are different kinds of sources in art, they can be documented in many different ways also, so here's a brief explanation of them.

Primary Sources:

Primary Sources are basically a firsthand account of something, may it be an event, location etc. These can be recorded in different ways, whether they're documented in writing or in images - to be Primary they must be documented in some way by the witness to the event, location etc.

Secondary Sources:

A Secondary Source is therefore something that wasn't witnessed by the person using the source, it's simply becomes their interpretation of someone else's primary source. Secondary sources often include pictures, quotes or graphics that have taken and interpreted by someone else.

My Primary Sources:

These are some images I documented on route to college one evening, these are evidence of my ability to identify and record my own primary sources.

Secondary Sources:

Here's some images I found while researching urban landscapes, these were documented by someone else therefore they're classed as secondary sources.

Textiles in Art & Design - Research

Do Ho Suh - 1962, Seoul, Korea.

Do Ho Suh a Korean artist really inspired me, he achieved a BFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design and a MFA in sculpture from Yale University. He is interested in the malleability of space in both it's physical and metaphorical manifestations. He creates installations specific to each site, his work explores the relation between individuality, collectivity and anonymity.

He has just completed his largest artwork to date, the piece called "Home within home within home within home within home" situated at Seoul's National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, the installation represents two previous homes he lived in at 1:1scale, built with silk the structure gives the impression of a 3D blueprint.

The two homes splice traditional Korean homes with a modern apartment building from the United States, the piece is so large visitors can walk inside and explore it.

Art & Design - Urban Landscape Research

While researching various Urban Landscape artists I came across some, who's work I really, really like. The first one is Angela Wakefield, she paints contemporary Urban Landscapes which are quite stunning.

Below are some pieces of her work.

The realism of them is extraordinary, they almost look like edited photographs. I really like this kind of work, will keep an eye on her future work.

The second artist I became really fond of is Leo Verhoeven, his work is usually based on London cityscapes as he focuses on modernist architecture. His use of colour and the simplicity of work is genius.

I think I'm drawn to the work by these artist because of my love for illustration, given my computer background I can really relate to the style of work, although these are not created using a computer, the style is very, very similar to a computer illustrated piece. 

Textiles in Art & Design - Image Maker

After taking the computer components apart I decided to try and develop some ideas that had come to me. I started by photographing different parts of the computers.

This is a built up section of parts that resemble two things in my mind, firstly I though it resembled an industrial type scene but also secondly it could easily be perceived as a petrol station. You do have to be open minded to see different things within this though. 

So I then took a close up photograph of a section within this structure;

Now this close up really has an industrial feel to it in my opinion, so I decided to go ahead and use this image. I then decided to develop it into a textile sample by using Image Maker. 

Image Maker allows you to transfer photocopied/printed pictures onto fabric, using black and white or coloured photocopies. 

Here's the method;  

1. Print/Photocopy the desired image and choose the fabric you want it to be transferred onto.

2. Apply Image Maker paste/solution evenly over the picture, be generous with the paste.

3. Place picture onto the fabric, paste side down.

4. Press the picture on firmly, smooth out any wrinkles.

5. Allow to dry, use a hair dryer to quicken up the process.

6. Soak the printer paper and gently rub it away, starting in the centre and working outwards.

7. Allow the fabric to dry and apply oil to it in order to seal the surface. 

So, using this method I developed the picture into the following sample;

It didn't come out too good, and I believe the reasons for this to be;

1. Image was black and white and not colour.

2. I didn't apply any oil after it dried. 

3. Fabric wasn't the best. 

So, with the flaws I believed to be the problem in mind I decided to have another shot with a different image to see if I could improve the final outcome. 

New image is a of a colourful circuit board, I then followed the steps and I feel it came out a lot better than my first try, I used a better material which took the transfer better. I then added oil as the final step and which really helped the image lift and gave it an added dimension, it literally looks like a photograph on fabric.

I was very please with the outcome on this.

Outcome.

Textiles in Art & Design - Progress

So i've been playing around with computer components trying out different things in order to get an idea for my final piece.

Here's some images of computer parts I've pulled apart and dismantled.

Found myself becoming fascinated in the circuit/mother boards themselves during this, they almost look like cities from an aerial view with all the lines and channels. 

Textiles in Art & Design - Material Distressing/Manipulating

Not updated in a while so thought it's best to catch up, I didn't update on this task at the time so I'll start here. We had two distressing tasks the first was with a netted material made from individual strands and the second was with a mesh type copper material.

I went with the same theme for both and attempted to dismantle them and re-construct them into batches of wires (going along my computer theme)

Here's the first;

I pulled the individual strands apart and then clustered them together using strands to tie them into place.

Here's the second;

I used the same technique again with this one, obviously this one came out a lot better as it was stronger and held together far better.