During the Studio Practice unit I
concentrated upon one major project. I wanted to make a piece of moving image,
and also to employ lessons gleaned from the MA. I have previously made work
more or less knowing which concept or idea I wished to express. This would
suggest to me imagery, and a form and discipline would develop in order to
achieve the artwork, honing both the making of the work, and the formation of
the idea, until I was satisfied that I had concluded and expressed or summarised
my view. I decided upon a different approach, one that had more engagement with
research and structure from the beginning, and where I would create a process
first and discover where it would lead me to, believing that it would lead me
somewhere. I started out trusting and intending that the crossover from form
and structure into meaning would occur: in other words, that making structured
work would produce art.
I decided to draw sixty drawing
on subsequent days, and use these drawings to make a sixty minute piece of
moving image. I would not to plan the drawings or censure my work during making,
as an exploration towards automatic drawing and allowing the unconscious to
reveal imagery. The numbers struck me as a neat concept about time, compressing
time, and questioning the relative experience of time. I often make work
showing a different apparent experience of time. In Art and Time, (Heartney, 2008), Eleanor Heartney discusses the use
of video mediums by artists to manipulate time, giving a difference experience
than the everyday. This is something I do myself when I have differently paced
timeframes playing together in a piece. I also note science’s take on time,
which gives more questions rather than answers. In A Brief History of Time, (Hawking, 1995), Steven Hawkins poses
alternative realities of time which differ from our linear experience.
Although time was my initial
thinking and inspiration, I anticipated and allowed that other meanings would
occur or emerge during the making, and so I was not determined that this piece
would be “about” time. I predetermine the structure and discipline of working to
observe my processes and to link them to on-going research and reflection. This
examination of procedures required being uncharacteristically explicit about my
working processes, influences, thoughts and realisations as I work. This is an
inverse of my normal practice and an observation of my creativity as I
deconstruct it. Rather than a one-off exercise, I intend to bring more explicit
structure to my practice.
Using drawing and the underlying
mechanics of thought involved I redefined areas of my art I had previously
described as nebulous, or indescribable. I realise that I can allow intended
ambiguity within work whilst, conversely, clarifying areas of enquiry.
I limited the parameters of the
project and made an initial decision to limit the resources used, consistently
using pencil upon A3 size paper, so that the inventiveness and creativity would
remain contained within my overall idea rather than seeping into exploring new
ways to draw, or to question the basic understandings of what a drawing might
be through different media - it was already positioned to become moving image.
I am interested in multiple
approaches to drawing, although not espousing a particular practice as my
method. Although my drawing is non- representational and not involved in some
traditional pursuits of drawing such as perspective, neither do I make pretence
that it is naïve. I may use my left hand, hold the pencil oddly or take off my
glasses in order to achieve a feeling of spontaneity, but that is not to ape an
unknowing hand. In addition to Automatic drawing developed by Andre Masson in
the 1920’s, where Surrealist artists found ways to liberate their work by
drawing as if from the unconscious, (Dempsey, 2002). I also referred to research
which links drawing to complex and abstract ideas: Drawing to Learn, (Ridley and Rogers, 2010), and Art Students who Cannot Draw, (McManus,
2010), explore the process of drawing in the understanding of concepts. These
approaches examine ideas about what drawing might mean other than expression or
representation in visual arts, and towards mechanics of the thought process.
I apply insights into thinking
and the creative processes to my practice as I go along. It is both a process
of learning and uncovering. Andre Masson applied strict rules to his drawing
endeavours, (Gompertz, 2012), and while I apply discipline and structure, I
feel free to change my rules accordingly.
My practice includes a quest for
the meaning of terms to describe work. I ponder various meanings of terms such
as abstract, abstracted and minimal. These words are clusters of concepts,
whose meaning shifts as we comprehend them further. Words have multiple shades
of meaning, absorbed and evolved over time: a definitive absolute of a word or
term is not always possible. Added to that is a shade of miscomprehension or a personal
understanding of a word.
I initially read and understood
the chapter Art and The Quotidian Object,
Art and Today, (Heartney, 2008), and the word quotidian as if it was the
word and concept of quiddity. While quotidian is the everyday, quiddity is
about what an object is, or the essence or whatness of the object. If the quotidian
nature of water is rivers and rain, the quiddity of water is that it is wet. I
embrace my misunderstandings as extra insights and not mistakes, as they lead
me to realisations about my use of the quotidian object in work, and that I am
interested in the essence of objects, abstracted or removed from their original
use.
Contemporary definitions of words
bring with them a trail of previous indicators. I research words in old
dictionaries, (Nuttall, 1914), to find versions of definitions. It reminds that
even current dictionaries and definitions are moveable, and that words are
concepts or thoughts, and the agreed meanings become more nebulous and
debateable upon examination. While this is a personal insight, it allows me to
consider artwork from new subtleties of meaning, which I then present as art, with
titles and writing attached to the art offering additional insights to the
viewer.
There are words at the core of my
practice which I seek to clarify - minimalism in music – repetition with small
variations, as opposed to minimalism in art –– isolating and abstracting
elements, especially colour, line, shape in painting. The definition of minimalism
and my understanding is not always the same.
I have allowed previous work,
influences and knowledge to become more apparent, such as my background in classical
music which had lain dormant. I named diverse influences in painting, novels,
and culture, being specific about elements I relate to, and linked these to my
work in progress.
Producing the sixty drawings has
led me to new imagery I would not have predicted. Initial drawings were not
dissimilar to previous work:
Fig.
1
Fig.2
I found that the discipline of
the daily hour gave me indicators of further imagery to develop, for example,
drawings like maps:
Fig.3
Fig.
4
Processing the works,
photographing and videoing them for the moving image, suggested layers of
interpretation to develop, especially subtle and crumpled drawings which I
photographed emphasising their surface:
Fig.
5
I routinely imagine, use work in
negative, which emphasises qualities of the above image:
Fig.6
This image particularly speaks to
me and suggested the exploration of the moving image, to play on the surface
qualities of the drawings as objects, and not merely their graphic imagery.
This is the seminal image of the project, as it balances and contains within one
autonomous piece the graphic imagery and the surface reality of the drawing,
suggesting shadows and atmosphere. It is at once image and object, yet
paradoxically, because it is in negative, only exists digitally.
Elements of the way these works
were produced, the rationale behind their process, borrow from construction
processes in other disciplines, such as concrete poetry or serial music, where mathematical
order and syntax informs the work.
Perhaps not apparent within
current project, recent processes have made more aspects of practice available
to me, as I examine and reappraise resistances to transparency. This has meant
a restructuring of my thinking which has not been easy. I have noticed and
worked through unfamiliar hesitancy in my art practice through believing that
my system would be productive.
I realised that positioning art
in a contemporary context places it within linked ideas, rather than fixing and
defining it. This has made me freer to draw parallels and be transparent about
influences. In a postmodern artworld, where everything is available, (Freeland,
2008), links to other practices, ideas and contexts are moveable: the approach, methodology, and use of ideas
is constant and definable.
In positioning myself in
contemporary context I do seek to fix my practice into a definitive area, but
often cross and blur boundaries, as my practice is partly a seeking of form. In
describing and presenting work, I use terms and talk of influences outside the
realm of moving image. Rather than mentioning a science concept or an idea
about time or optics, I am becoming open about what that idea is, where I
researched it, how it resonates with my practice, and other artists who might
be exploring similar ideas.
Current art practice in drawing
and moving image is diverse, and there are a variety of links and parallels.
Positioning art practice could be related to imagery, concepts or working
practices. I especially relate to sole painters and novelists. I have a similar individual relationship to my
art as many of them, as opposed to other video artists who often collaborate,
delegate or work within a team to create work, (Phillpott, 2012). I therefore
contextualise my work within a continuum of cultural ideas.
I wish to give my viewer an
experience of duality or paradox. I use imagery which may be abstracted, but is
not completely abstract - there will be an element of recognition. I often include recognisable elements such
shadows, people passing, or windows. This gives the viewer a feeling that they
recognise the human experience, while seeing those images in an unfamiliar way.
I hope to engender a feeling of uncertainty in what the viewer is looking at,
which oscillates with recognition, as work moves between positive and negative,
actual and digitised, real and manipulated time. I make work to be read as
abstract photography or painting. I hope to, and almost hypnotise into a state
of recognising things differently, connecting memories to new ideas, entwining
the everyday with the universal, giving a sense of a beautiful insight.
My background of music training influences
and dictates structure in the pacing and attention span of moving work. I time
slowly moving images, when my attention wanders at about eight seconds. I want
to engage viewers, rather than making them endure. I make these choices in
timing according to my own perceptions, and not a scientifically measured
median or average, in the sway that a painter decides how much orange or how
much blank space they brave in painting according to their visual
sensibilities, rather that researching how colour and space is perceived by
viewers.
I often offer writing with work
in exhibition, where in a more poetic way, I indicate meaning. It is my
interpretation and summation. I am pondering how to include more specific
context in this. I see non-specificity as a value I wish to maintain, and like subtle
ways of alluding to research and influences without reducing ideas to a list of
facts. I attempt to defy definition and retain ambiguity, whilst positioning my
artwork in a context and continuum of ideas.
I look to the meanings of words
to find ways of thinking more deeply about art, and to realise more facets that
describe paradox and ambiguity.
1976 words
Illustrations
Fig. 1. MacFarlane, E (2012)
Drawing 1 [Drawing]. In possession of: The author, London.
Fig. 2 MacFarlane, E (2012)
Drawing 2 [Drawing]. In possession of: The author, London.
Fig. 3 MacFarlane, E (2012)
Drawing 41 [Drawing]. In possession of: The author, London.
Fig. 4 MacFarlane, E (2012)
Drawing 42 [Drawing]. In possession of: The author, London.
Fig. 5 MacFarlane, E (2012)
Drawing 57 [Drawing]. In possession of: The author, London.
Fig. 6 MacFarlane, E (2012)
Drawing 57a [Drawing]. In possession of: The author, London.
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December 2012
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