I really think that my understanding of artwork is really bad. I couldn’t understand most of the classmates’ work while others seemed to think it obvious… I like Joe’s and Niko’s work best, especially Niko’s. I was amazed again by how Niko’s so good at making use of different materials and electrics. For my photographs, I got feedback multiple times that it should be dynamic. I did think about it but I just didn’t know how to realize it. For the object, Adam said it seemed a failed object, like something happened and it’s left there. I’m actually a bit confused if he meant this work was a failure or the object looked upset. Niko mentioned light was affect by magnetism, which was very interesting and I didn’t know about at all.

Yesterday after the open day, I had a talk with Jiao Shi and I realized the difference of how we approached art. I always extract elements and put them back together to convey a meaning in a very specific way while his work was more open and sometimes he didn’t have an answer for its development, which made sense when it came to why I understood Joe’s and Niko’s work while he didn’t really understand. Joe and Niko extracted elements and put them together as well, similar to my way of making art. I do find it troubling when artists don’t know their exact concepts about every detail of their work or why they start to create the work. I ask myself every time when I take an action to my work why I want to do it this way. I guess it’s true it brings many limits and constraints to the work but I’m not sure how I would deal with it. Jiao Shi said my work relied on my explanation a lot. But I don’t think it is certainly the problem of my way of making art but it’s probably due to the connections between objects and meanings are not strong enough, because I do think many successful artists use elements this way as well. Then I realized, the artists I especially liked and understood, which were not many, tended to use elements. It is very interesting. I have really never thought about another way to make art and I still don’t know how to do it or if I want to do it differently.

We also talked about space and how I thought Jess’s work more about capture of sound. I really didn’t see the connection with space. And I said I thought space’s just air. Jiao Shi found it charming haha while I thought it’s just my understanding of the simple definition.

I have never trusted myself in art actually. I can only make sure if it makes sense to me but it’s really subjective. The only motivation for me to do art is self-expression, which actually closely related to expecting others’ understanding. I don’t know.

Thought wool would look same as the nylon I used for my object. It turned out really different and difficult actually!

At the beginning, I tried to mix strips into a ball right away but they didn’t look like a whole. It was too smooth. I tried to wash them to see if they could curl like the nylon.

Then I tried to get smaller amount of the wool more gently to place it together and it worked better:

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Making bigger:

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Showed Isabel my object:

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I was very surprised she saw so much more than I did in my work. She liked my thought about the red flashlight as heartbeat because it made the object alive or animated. She shared Annette Messager’s work at Hayward Gallery and how her body parts objects seemed breathing. She suggested me to think about other parts of body as well. She found the material I used was nylon rather than wool. She said it could be transformative if I used wool from a body. My understanding of this so far is that the object I created looked like an eye ball somehow and it’s about humans’ desire, so material from a body may relate more, also like getting close to skin. Would try wool tomorrow.

After looking through my portfolio, she found color was a big element in my work, which I realized as well, so she shared John Gage’s Color and Culture: Practice and Meaning from Antiquity to Abstraction. She also said my object looked like an enlarged eye and shared Alexis Rockman’s Wonderful World about stylish human bodies.

There’s so much information to take in. It’s interesting that I made this object without many specific intentions while it conveyed many meanings than I expected or thought of. I’m very happy I did this experiment and appreciate Isabel encouraging me to develop my work.

Tried to display my work on TV. I want the effect to be in a dark room but then it’s hard to tell it’s on TV, not sure to show light or dark ones…

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Also made an object:

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It’s made without a plan. I just used objects I already had or found at 3D Making Space. Cotton is soft, fluffy, white and light, like fantasy, which is attractive. However, it’s got nails inside, which is harmful. The iris-shape magnet attracts and is also attracted by nails. Again, I’m trying to express irresistible desire to get close to attractive object that could hurt oneself.

Had an academic tutorial with Isabel on Tues. I showed her my photos:

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I was planning to try to get better photographs of the iron powder. However, Isabel said that would just be repeating. I was very surprised that she should see sexuality in my photos, which I wasn’t trying to address but after she mentioned that, I started to realize sexuality was really a hidden and even fundamental aspect of my starting point of this idea. She suggested me develop my work further to a physical object, maybe an eye that could be worn or an artwork that could be looked through. She shared Cathy De Monchaux whose work was both seductive and potentially harmful. She also mentioned projection of my photographs in a dark room could be attractive. She then shared Man Ray’s Indestructible Object. She advised me to see eyes more than just window of soul, but also think about being watched secretly or voyeurism. I’m not sure if I still have time for that because I also have to work on writing and the final presentation of my photographs but I will try.

On Thurs. I had a portfolio tutorial with Adam. He mentioned about the presentation of photography work. He shared Artie Verkant and Luckypdf. He also suggested maybe I could show the photos on the TV screen.

On Fri. we had a lecture with an artist working on moving images. Her work was very powerful and closely related to current British issues. She addressed big topics through focusing on specific aspects. It’s very impressive how she managed to find good locations and all the staff, and how she did research by documenting and interviewing people. She also shared NFTS as resource.

It was quite frustrating these two days! I tried to take better photos with better focus and place black round paper as pupil. I spent whole day yesterday and I had a really hard time to get the position of the iron powder or the light right because the copy stand wasn’t there so the setting was different.

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The workshop was really helpful. I learnt Tethering. It’s a big time saver because I don’t have to transport photos from SD card every time to view them. And I was reminded to have longer exposure time to increase the light! I should forget this. The ISO of the photos I had taken was very high because I had to show the red light and I couldn’t add stronger light. I was also reminded to check white balance. And I was also wondering about the print size of the photos as the actual size was actually small. Anna showed us this sheet:

After the workshop, I continued to try to get better photos with 100 ISO.

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I’m still not sure how to display them though. Thought about neon, heating element or lightbox, but haven’t got a clear idea yet.

There’s lots of information from yesterday’s critique. I found it difficult to fully understand others’ work and explanation sometimes especially ideas behind the work, which was a very important element to me for artwork. I displayed my photos:

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And I explained I wanted to show irresistible force/desire/impulse to get close to some objects alluring that would hurt you emotionally. I used the attraction between iron powder and magnets to suggest the irresistible force. And I used the form of iris to stand for the desire/emotion of a person. Eyes always look for light while they could get hurt if the light’s too strong. It’s like people look for warmth or relations from other people. When the iron powder got attracted, the form of the iris got damaged.

Clare asked me how I wanted to present it. Adam added the possibilities of the presentation, screen, projection or lightbox. I think it an interesting question. All the photos I took before remained digital on screen and I never really thought about other ways to present them. Maybe different presentations bring different effects. As I used light as an important element in the photos, Adam suggested me to think about how to introduce lights back into the images while presenting them. MC shared Petroc Sesti and Clare shared Mona Hatoum’s exhibition at white cube gallery bermondsey with me. Adam mentioned the photos looked like iron fillings in eyes and griffiti. And there’s something happening in between images because of the shifting of the size and form. He wondered if moving images could show those changes. Jess said my explanation was very strong while she could only see the attraction without repulsive aspect. MC also said I was too restricted with the eye. She thought of circle, nature and planet from the photos.

I have to spend time to think about these.

This morning, Julian introduced Reverse Subtraction Cutting. It was interesting. It seemed simple when the garment got undone but it also felt complicated to start that making process, like the position and amount of the holes. It still sounded surprising to me when Julian said he didn’t have a concrete idea of the result when he was making the garment. He would start to see how it went through the process. I’m still a bit afraid of making art this way especially with a tight deadline. It’s also very interesting that he got inspired by sculpture.

In the afternoon, had a writing tutorial with Nathan for my second draft of artist statement. There’s still a lot to keep working on, especially historical and contemporary influences, more critical analysis of why and how instead of description, and things to improve. We also talked about my project. Nathan mentioned the size of the pupil changed with different emotions and I might apply this element in my photos.

Had a look at how the bulb would be like overlooked and it just didn’t look right…

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So the form of “sun” didn’t really apply well in this setting. I turned to use the core meaning of “sun”, which was light. So I tried LED:

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I tried red + ceiling lights:

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I tried red light only:

I tried red + LED lights:

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I noticed when the light was really close to the glass, it showed an absorbing effect. So I tried to focus on the specific areas:

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So I went back to the complete overlooking angle with a big closer frame than the whole ones:

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I tried to crop it round but it didn’t look really well: