#professionalcontexts

16/05/20 - I used the photos I took at the Albert Dock to create abstract collages inspired by work and techniques that were used during Dada. Many Dadaists experimented with automatism and chance processes to create artwork that was made without the use of the conscious mind. Automatic processes are seen as mechanical processes that involve some form of consciousness, e.g. being aware of the process you are undertaking, but yet not being aware of the final outcome. Chance is used but to an extent.

This collage technique was used and created by Hans Arp during Dada. he would use scraps and torn pieces of paper, drop them from a height onto the surface and glue them down in the exact position they fell. This is seen as automatism as he was aware of the process he was using but not of the outcome that this process would form.

Richard Long is an English sculptor, originating from Bristol, he is one of the most well known English land artists. His work is mainly based outdoors and involves himself walking great distances in the wilderness, then pausing to create works that relate to the nature and his reaction to it along the way. The outdoor environment allows Long to create pieces that trace his physical movement through space, this technique can be seen in her work A Line Made by Walking (1967). His work is inspired by his personal life, geographic history and plant life and he uses many natural materials such as water, rocks and mud, the materials are always found on the site that he’s working at and are never artificial. “I like the idea that art can be made anywhere,” the artist has said. “Perhaps seen by few people, or not recognised as art when they do.” Long’s work is not limited to a gallery exhibition, he has similar views to Robert Smithson about creating sculptures.

^ A Line Made by Walking (1967) ^

I am inspired by Long’s land sculptures because of how he utilises the space around him, and also uses himself to create the work, especially in A Line Made by Walking, it displays the personal connection of this piece. This is a technique that I wanted to achieve from the residency at the Merzbarn, to create pieces using the land and materials provided by nature but to also have a personal connection with the work.

Sources -

http://www.artnet.com/artists/richard-long/

https://sculpturemagazine.art/ideas-can-last-forever-a-conversation-with-richard-long/

Robert Smithson was an American Modernist artist from New Jersey. His main practice involved making installations in landscapes, which he took up in 1964. His work was often large-scale and took place in the American West and Southwest deserts. After moving to New York, he briefly studied at the Art Students League, where he was working as an Abstract Expressionist producing collages and paintings, working closely to Jackson Pollock and David Smith. After getting introduced to Carl Andre, Donald Judd, Claes Oldenburg, and his future wife Nancy Holt in the 60′s, he started to take up sculpture. He got disenchanted by exhibiting work in galleries, he described them as "mausoleums for art", “too bound up with commodification and commercialism, which were alien to the true and free artistic spirit.” When Smithson started working with the outdoors he wanted to reconnect with the environment. His work started to reflect his interest in science and geology, being made out of 6,650 tonnes of earth. His work then often included industrial and organic materials, working predominantly within the site environment. One of these pieces was his most famous work Spiral Jetty (1970). Spiral Jetty was located at Rozel Point, Great Salt Lake in Utah.  When the viewer is standing next to it, they feel a sense of smallness when they are in the presence of the piece.

^ Spiral Jetty (1970) ^

Robert Smithson’s sculptural installations have been very inspirational for me and my current residency at the Albert Dock, where I had the hopes of producing some form of installation work on the Dock. This was proving difficult for me as I wanted to use the environment around me but as this is a city-based tourist attraction, there was a lot of security restrictions and not really much nature to work with. Since I only had 4 days on this residency instead of 7-10 because of lockdown, I didn’t get chance to plan or prepare for this piece. This idea of making work within the landscape proved easier to do during the residency at the Merzbarn, but again due to lockdown this didn’t happen. Robert Smithson and his famous land sculptures have been a great inspiration for my ideas of creating site-based work at the Merzbarn, along with the installation work of Kurt Schwitters. I wanted to create a sculpture using the site and the materials this site provided, such as wood, branches, bark, leaves and soil. The same way land artists such as Robert Smithson, Richard Long and Kurt Schwitters have done.

Sources -

https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/artist/robert-smithson

http://www.artnet.com/artists/robert-smithson/

Trudy Benson is a contemporary American Abstract painter from Virginia, who lives and works in New York. She is known for her large-scale abstract paintings, exploring different compositions and hyperbolic gestures. She uses a range of brightly coloured grids, zigzags and squiggles, which cause a resemblance with 1980′s graphic design and early computing through her bold imagery. At the time Benson started creating these works, it was the time that people started familiarising themselves with computers and technology, which played a large part in Benson’s paintings

Benson’s abstract work is a modern development from Abstract Expressionism during the mid 20th century. Her work becomes more advanced in terms of the mediums and facilities she has access to, such as the increased saturation in her pieces. Benson likes to feel a psychical presence when in a room with her paintings, they hold a great desire within them, especially due to the colour contrast and the wispy thick layers of paint, encouraging the painting to become 3D in the eyes of the viewer. To achieve the thickness in the painting she often applies the paint using a pastry bag.

^ For RL (2013) - Acrylic, spray paint and oil on canvas ^

Jade Fadojutimi is a British Contemporary Abstract Artist, who lives and works in London. At the young age of 27, she has currently exhibited in 3 major galleries. After getting discovered by Pippy Houldsworth, she had her work exhibited in the Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, UK in 2017, and then in PEER Gallery, UK in 2019, as well as Galerie Gisela Captain in Germany in 2019. She is currently about to exhibit in Taka Ishii Gallery, Tokyo this year. Fadojutimi’s paintings portray the development and restraints of her identity, as she responds to personal experience. Her active paintings are filled with colourful layers of rhythmic and gestural brusuhstrokes, also actions of scraping the paint back off the canvas. She creates immersive environments within her work, exploring abstraction with a range of techniques.

The Missguided Thrill of Frills - Jade Fadojutimi

Just a good memory - Jade Fadojutimi

Fadojutimi’s paintings show an extensive amount of resemblance to many works from Abstract Expressionism, such as works from Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Lee Krasner and Franz Kline. Her work resembles these artists because of the painterly mark making techniques, lines, shapes and removing of paint that is possessed within her paintings. Also due to the personal connection she has with her paintings, it is one of the qualities that many abstract expressionist painters have. Including Pollock and how he would often drop his cigarettes within his paintings, by accident, but he would allow this to become part of the painting.

Day Bowman is a British Contemporary Abstract Artist who grew up, lived and worked in her seaside hometown in Somerset. Bowman works on large-scale canvases, producing vibrant expressive pieces that reference her connection with her hometown and her awareness of the features that this seaside town possesses. “I was acutely aware of the life of the seasons with the tsunami of summer visitors followed by the closed-up, out-of-season, winter months.” (Bowman) She experiments with a range of expressive mark making, brushstrokes, lines and shapes that echos the environment and culture of the seaside town. She references marks that were made on the site “in the wet, grey sand of her home town beach: thus the canvas becomes the beach that acted as the canvas of her child-hood.” (Bowman)

While making these works she has allowed herself to move freely from one work to another with a sense of play and random mark making. Through her use of colour, mark making, lines and drips of paint and contrasts in the paintings, she has attempted to capture the tides and gleam of sunshine from this beach landscape. “Today these fortress images represent something more sinister referencing an incoming tide of bigotry and intolerance.” (Bowman) Her paintings aren’t overtly political pieces, but represent a “questioning notion of the place, identity and belonging.” (Bowman)

Day Bowman’s paintings often resemble the paintings from the modernist movement Abstract Expressionism. In particular the work of Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Lee Krasner and Franz Kline. Her paintings possess a similar style of expression as these older artists, using a range of mark making techniques, random paint splats, lines and shapes. Her colour palette for many of these paintings remains consistent throughout the series, also portraying a contrast between black, white and greys, which is quickly brightened up by the vibrant bursts of oranges and yellows.

Day 1 -

Exploring the area, the Merzbarn itself and where Kurt Schwitters’ wall was, the woods and all the nature surrounding the site.

Take loads of photos of the site and the surroundings, landscape photos and some close ups.

Do some sketches and drawings. Experiment with frottage rubbings on newsprint paper, using a range of surfaces, including leaves, bark, the ground, bricks and many other surfaces that I find there.

Day 2 -

Make an installation piece using wood, branches, twigs and using rope or string to hold everything together to create a large environment within the woods. Initial idea was to create a tee pee. This idea was inspired by Kurt Schwitters and how he turned the nature and the woods around him into a working environment which he used as his studio.

Me, Henna and Natalie were discussing what we could do as a group and considered creating a performance piece one evening when it was dark. We were going to bring fairy lights with us and film ourselves running through the woods wrapped in fairy lights, and play around with settings to speed it up. This would hopefully get the effect of something magical happening, illustrating the magical place that the Merzbarn was for Schwitters.

Day 3 -