Reflexive Practitioner

4.  21^st February 2011. Angela Rogers.                                                              

Visual Enquiry. Video Lecture.

Reflexivity. Artists/ strategies. Reviewing thinking, impact of reflection, sense of turning back to yourself. Contemplation and reviewing – the impact of things and actions – proactive implications. Strategies for developing a reflexive practice in contemporary practice.

Painter Graham Sutherland – research as art practice.

“Reflective practice is a kind of research activity that uses different methods to work against existing theories and practices and offers the possibilities of seeing things from new perspectives.” Sullivan (2010).

Donald Schon - Reflective Practitioner book

The subject  = the object.

It is about the awareness of the effect of one’s own thinking. Thinking about thinking, and learning from that. So awareness of influences and where one is amongst other artists within discipline. The essential aspect. Look at your work and the influences and where your work stands with other artists.

James Aldridge – painter – cold mouth prayer tate modern. James Aldridge – experience of drawing birds as a child, reintroduced into his work as an adult.

Michael Arrow – Professional Reflexive.

Tracy Emin – confessional.

Sean McNiff – the tension between the personal and the artwork. Separate - critical distance – subjective/objective.

Artists need to distance themselves from personal experience to balance the tension. Work can be personal, confessional, but the process needs to be objective – the artwork is separate. 

Langlands and Bell.  Meaning of art in the making. Practice research – the moral/ethical dimension. Bin Laden house.

Christiane Baumgartner – aeroplane - copied from video, handmade over 10 months, only close up the viewer sees the time in process. Has the look of video, handmade quality / colour blur. The slow art movement.

Rose Wylie painter – cloven hooves had a profound effect on Emily Bale – if she removed her attractive strokes what would be left?

Emily Bale book. Drawing and Painting People.

How to prevent ourselves from become slick. How to prevent ourselves from recycling our visual language or styles through familiarity.

John Skinner reworked Veronese's piece Scorn, after studying in depth. Tried a large painting which did not work, then concentrated on the two female heads. 
Homage also to Helen Chadwick Vanitas.

Audit – What I do in my Studio Space

A room of one’s own.

Identity as an artist. Social arena? Contact with other artists.
does it serve?

Rachel Whiteread  – thinking place.

Cycle  -  Experience - Observe - Reflect - Evaluate - Rethink - Plan – Process - Experience .....

Iterations...

Observe and Reflect strategies

Contemplate from different perspectives / move it

Paying it close attention

Use different materials – draw, photograph...

Write

Ask questions

Different environment – place next to other pieces

Create an imaginal dialogue with the work – give it a persona, interview it.

Evaluate

How do you know when it is finished?

How do you know if it works?

Is it intuitive? – Sense of righteousness? Is it intentionally executed.

Outside the Studio

Reflective

Understand the field – Fine Art , Western Creation?

Artists reveal, evoke, cultural, philosophical, definition, destination.

Who does Fine Art?

Artists, Assistants, Experts, Participants.

Products of Fine Art.

Galleries, public places, public spaces, clothing, postcards,

Evaluated – Art world, commentary, magazines, gallery sales, education, community.

Difference between Art and Crafts (& Design)

Craft techniques

Different audiences and markets.

Fine Art History and Theory

Intentions of Art - it does not solve real world or social problems, but highlights issues.

Art / medicine – concerns with healing, wellbeing, intention to do good.  

Artistry / Science

Anthropology

Cultural meaning in society

Be open to new and multiple interpretations of artworks.  
                                 
Debate and discuss processes and the meanings that come out of them.


Question the contexts in which art is made. 

Recognise and acknowledge whose work you are building on.

Be transparent in your methods and open about your methodology.

Be rigorous in your recording.

Be prepared to justify your methods.

Don't confuse effort and quantity with quality.
                                                               
Be modest in your claims.

Be careful of using theory to justify artwork.

Most importantly don’t lose your curiosity or your courage.

Reflection

Reflexivity is the circular relationship between cause and effect, each affecting the other.

conversation

I made a series of photographs and videos about this – it’s a recurrent theme I would like to revisit soon. I think the images held in a mirror or a screen is fascinating, as if it knows what it is reflecting.

Iterations – a design term, repeating process in stages, observing and reflecting. In my art work I think of this as dress rehearsals or mock-ups. Sometimes you have to pull things together to see if they will work as a whole before finalising component parts.

Imaginal – lovely new word to me. Apart from meaning referring to the imagination, there are links in this word to metaphysical realms, and a newer branch of psychology which is to do with the soul, and what images reveal and speak of the soul. 

What I do in my Studio Space

I had a proper studio for a while when I was setting up my solo exhibition in 2007 – it would not have possible without it, and since then , I have been unable to even contemplate such scale or larger works due to lack of autonomous space. I absolutely loved having my studio – it was a few minutes walk from my house, and I was so busy and had to be very organised. I always remember the thrill, the relief of getting there, closing the door, and knowing that the next couple of hours were purely for work. I was making several pieces at once, and had each in its own area. When I had reached a pause in one I would simply move on to the next, keeping precise notes of what each stage needed, and the overall progress. In many ways I established and proved my ideal ways of working. 


Yes, I do long for such a set up again, but in the meantime I make the most of what I have. I don’t really have a studio space, just tables and areas round the house which I appropriate as and when. The half bedroom which was for studio is now full of tools, materials and my archive and other storage. I’ve often felt myself to be quite an itinerant artist – when I studied I was always part time, and a parent, and so had to work in small blocks of time, and mostly carry what I needed.

I’ve always been determined that any circumstances needn’t curtail creativity – in fact, resourcefulness is akin to creativity. As a photographer and video maker, my studio pace is how I am on the days I will deliberately go and seek footage.

No, I don’t have the ideal studio space. I end up writing novels on my bed, making things at the kitchen table. I have had to get used to and make the most of distractions, although my children are older now. So, everything goes on in my studio, as it is anywhere, but when I can tell myself it is studio time, when I have carved some time out for that, then it doesn’t matter where I am. I find I can concentrate deeply and get on with it.

Virginia Woolf had it right a century ago in A Room of One’s Own, but even so, life goes on, art goes on.

Observation and Reflective Strategies

I like to try out pieces near and far, upside down, in poor and good light, etc. Some of the suggested strategies I have not felt the need to try – it’s a bit like the novelists advice of writing a list of what your character has in their fridge – some things you just don’t need to know. But perhaps I will deliberately add new strategies to see what happens – I like the interview idea.

22nd March 2011