Starting my 2nd Piece: Experimenting with Contemporary Colour

With my feedback in mind, I am exploring new approaches to painting my pieces rather than copying my collages in paint. In my second work, I will be exploring elements of the piece being shadowed and or highlighted with the contemporary colour of the colours in the collage. For example, the shadow on the green tree in the work will be red. I will be using the colour wheel to aid my use of complementary colour and experiment.

The use of contemporary colour will be combined with a sense of realism. I will have elements of the work painted more photographically in contrast to other parts of the painting being changed through technique and or colour throughout my series of works.

First Painting Complete: Evaluating the Success of the Background

I have completed my first painting. I feel it is incredibly successful, my painting skill has progressed and I have successfully transferred my collaged work into a painting. I am slightly concerned that even though this piece is visually appealing and well executed, that if there was a set of many of these paintings made directly from the collages I have made they could be quite a boring set of work. I am proud that I have managed to capture the realism within the imagery but I am not sure the viewer would read this work as a painting and possibly overlook it’s skill and the complexity by mistaking it for a collage.

Evaluating the background, I think that the grey and cream tones that I have worked into the background maybe detract from the central painting, the texture and brush marks are successful but maybe the texture in white would be more appropriate.

Progress: First Collage Painting

I have been working hard in the studio on my first painting of one of my collages this week and have really progressed with it. I have taken my time and built up layers of paint in glazes to create a painted representation of the original collaged work. The painting combines imagery of natural beauty with imagery of environmental harm, attracting the viewer to the beauty of the land and exposing them to the harm it experiences.

I am confident that my research and glazing and underpainting experimentation has paid off and as a result my painting skill has really improved. I have also learnt to observe more closely and paint what I see rather than what I think I see and to be patient in my approach. The factory smoke, tree stump and pipe water still need a bit of work and I am looking forward to seeing this finished and to progress on to the next one. I am very excited by the prospect of showing a series of these, I feel as if I am working towards my best work to date and I will be very proud of my degree show.

Progress: Painting from Collages

I am making progress on my first painting from one of my collages, I am working out the technique of glazing and layering up paint as I go along, I think it is going well and if I paint them all to a high standard, I am confident I will have a successful exhibition.

I have included an image of my paint palette as I cannot believe how many colours I am mixing to paint such small areas of work. The palette was clean when I started, each layer of paint is a different shade and the cliff area for example has about 9 layers of thin glazes on it, it is exciting to watch the image unfold if not a little bit stressful at the beginning when i’m not sure if the layers are coming together.

I am experiencing some problems along the way but I am overcoming them and developing as I paint. For example, not letting the colour underneath completely dry before applying the next layer is not successful and so I need to be more patient, I may be painting some parts of the piece too detailed in relation to the collage and so I need to make sure I am really observing the initial image. But also, I must remember that my works are paintings, not photographic images and if the colour isn’t exactly the same for example it doesn’t matter, they can be stylized and have artistic license and still be successful both visually and conceptually.  I am satisfied with my progress, I am a little bit concerned about the time scale of getting them finished but hopefully I will get quicker at painting them as I learn the techniques employed better.

Working on a Large Scale: Landscape Exploration, Nature Juxtaposed with Environmental Harm

After experimenting with contrasting nature and environmental harm in a landscape format, I decided to experiment with painting much larger to see what sort of impact that made and whether or not it brought anything to my work. I don’t think this experiment was particularly successful. I am glad I tried it and definitely have gained knowledge from it on reflection but I don’t think it highlights my concepts or works visually.

There are qualities about this work that I am happy with, however after a recent tutorial, I was posed questions that I hadn’t really considered and shown the faults in my work. I can see now that this work isn’t working on reflection, my skill in painting this work even though it was only a quick experiment is not good enough, the work is not believable and it quite cartoony. I have come to realise that I am no longer painting from life, and I should be. I am painting an imaginary image, an imaginary landscape that I am portraying to the viewer. It has no sense of reality and so exposing to the viewer the realities of today’s landscape and challenging traditional landscape nostalgia is not happening here.

I am determined to improve my painting work, my cut out collages have been a successful element of my project throughout and I cannot believe I haven’t thought about painting them before. They work, they are attractive and challenge the image of the land. Painting from something that is successful will hopefully make my work more successful and translate what is working in the collage into the paintings. Displaying these kind of paintings and a selection of collages for the degree show is definitely something I am considering now. I am also now thinking that painting large for the degree show is not a good idea. Why change how I work now? to impress? If scaling up means that my work is suffering, I need to tackle something more manageable.

Cutting out imagery of Environmental Harm Collaging it into Landscapes of Natural Beauty

After collaging scenes of environmental harm onto natural landscapes, I decided to experiment further and cut out the imagery and collage it into the landscape, as if the landscape had been subject to environmental harm or the factories and waste pipes existing within these untouched natural scenes.

These experiments are interesting and putting imagery associated with environmental harm into the natural land is successful. However, the images included in most cases are not on a believable scale as if fitted into the landscape, it is difficult to do so with collage. Creating paintings where the natural elements and the harming imagery exist together and are juxtaposed and contrasted with each other may be more successful. I will explore experimenting with collaging natural elements like trees and grass fields with environmental neglect and building up my own image.

Robert Bateman: Contrasts

Robert Bateman created paintings that contrast the natural land, environment and wildlife with land that has been harmed. The examples below show a forest contrasted with imagery of deforestation and wildlife with litter and oil that could harm the animals etc. This fits in with my ideas surrounding contrasting the natural land with environmental harm, although this work almost has a before and after theme to it.

I think the work is interesting in the fact that the artist hasn’t just directly split the image in half, there are more elements or the split isn’t directly in the middle.  Rather than integrating the imagery as I am currently doing, showing the beauty and the harm together in an image, the canvas is split into separate sections, maybe this is something I could think about exploring. Although I don’t want my work to emit the idea that the natural and the harmed land are separate because they exist in the same environment.

Collaging Scenes of Environmental Harm onto Landscapes of Natural Beauty

As initial experimentation, I have experimented with collaging scenes of environmental harm onto landscapes of natural beauty, juxtaposing and contrasting the two. These experiments have given me confirmation that incorporating both natural imagery and images associated with environmental harm is successful and an avenue that I need to continue exploring.

Initially, when you view the collages, you see the natural landscape and the squares on top but don’t necessarily know what they are. On closer inspection, you would be exposed to the imagery depicting environmental toll on the land. Contrasting these images together in the same image highlights the beautiful landscape people are drawn to and also portrays the fact that this is under threat. The initial appeal of the work is successful, I feel more successful than just showing the harming elements as people may initially ignore them as they aren’t attractive. I will continue experimenting with collage, maybe cutting out the harming images and fitting them into the landscapes.

Revised Artist Statement

Throughout my work, I am portraying and highlighting environmental issues and pollution and bring to attention a mass cause of the environmental harm that our world is facing today. My practice aims to challenge and confront our nostalgia for traditional landscape paintings which portray unrealistic and aesthetic views of the land and raise awareness of the pollution our earth experiences. It is easy to overlook and ignore the damage that is being done to our environment and to cling on to the image of an unspoiled landscape. I aim to expose the reality of our polluted and urbanized modern day landscapes by juxtaposing it with the beautiful landscape imagery we are used to in art. I intend to give this subject matter significance and importance and use art as a way of exposing people to imagery associated with pollution and the degeneration of the natural landscape, showcasing it as an issue that people should not turn a blind eye to. Visiting sites of pollution, documenting the causes of environmental harm around me through observational drawing and contrasting this environment with sites of natural beauty is a key element embedded in my practice. 

My ideas are portrayed through a variety of methods, focussing mainly on drawing, collage and painting. Contrasting beautiful imagery with environmental toll highlights what could be lost and physically depicts what is being damaged, encouraging people to realise that the beautiful landscapes they admire may one day be only a memory. Inspired by artists such as Alexis Rockman, Piers Seconda and Edward Burtynsky, my work exposes the reality of today’s landscape and the harmful and often poisonous gases that we are emitting into it by incorporating both imagery and materials connected with the environmental issue of pollution. People need to be made aware not only for the sake of the conservation of our natural environment but also for the sake of their health and future.

Naziha Mestaoui: One Beat, One Tree

Naziha Mestaoui’s piece “one beat, one tree” has deforestation and environmental issues at the heart of it, as well as today’s relationship between technology and nature. Conceptually, she is motivated by similar avenues and her work highlights environmental issues and a need to nurture.

 “the installation bridges the virtual and reality, technology and nature, as well as what is visible and invisible. spectators to the artwork are granted the opportunity to create a digital tree that they will be able to see growing on buildings in rhythm with their heart, via a heartbeat sensor controlled through a smartphone. the computerized tree is then actually planted in europe, latin america, africa or asia rendering ‘each citizen a co-creator of our collective future beyond individualism,’ – expressed the artist.”

Her work is an example of an artist challenging today’s issues of climate change and technological advancement and bringing it to the forefront. The work is projected on public monuments in Paris at the time of a Climate Change conference.