- quantity: more, fast drawings (overthink before a work?)
- girlfriend in a coma (novel - question the concepts of aging!)
- pointed out the painting of the doodle and the original doodle are doing different things (imagery of cat with candle is good)
- text experimentation: also to be more violent?
- cy twombly
- I turn things happening in everyday life into? more magical settings
- suggested I could go back to the charcoal / stop motion experimentations , fast, organic.
I went into the studio with a simple idea of 'birthdays' and wanting to just paint 'birthday colors' on the pieces of wood I primed previously this week. I drew in the sketchbook, thinking of ideas surrounding aging and youth. I feel that the sketches themselves were successful in some way, it’s always clear when I like a drawing and when I don’t. I wanted to put the imagery of the girl (reference picture of myself from my 20th birthday) and the floating cat with candles on a more presentable? Physical ? form. So I started to use black gouache with a thin black brush to outline the figure. It was a completely different experience - it feels more graphic, planned. sometimes, I get the urge to do this kind of clean painting, where colours are like thick blocks and cover the surface completely confidently... but it never ends up that way, everything I paint turns out looking somewhat uncertain with watery or very thin patches of pigment. Will, my tutor, said so too. He said although both of the drawings were good, they were doing very different things. The pen sketch was much more free and emotional, human, and I liked that much more. It was a good experiment testing this out though, since I’ve always wanted to produce a painting out of a doodle inside my head. He also really liked the imagery of the cat floating with candles, and suggested for me to be freer on the panel, perhaps with marker/charcoal/pen etc. which I totally agree on. I disliked the painted form quite a lot and I tried to add blocks of colour and of course, it didn’t happen that way. I started to smudge all the colours together until, at the end, it looks like someone puked a rainbow on the wood. I still didn’t like it that much... but I did go buy ink cartridge/bib and try out a freer approach or drawing on the panel.
Throughout the drawings my idea of birthdays extended more clearly to ageing/youth/life & death etc. I found that drawing really helps me churn out ideas gradually. usually I suddenly think of text that go with the drawing, which furthers my expiration into the subject. Will was right about making MORE work- quantity over quality because he recognised that I think too much before actually making a piece of work. I agreed, this was a big problem for me because I end up having too many vague ideas that could go into so many different smaller ideas and directions, I get caught up in the chaotic possible network of navigating the topic. and even though I’m not confident in drawing, from starting this course I’m slowly finding that confidence of just splattering out whatever the hell is on your mind, it doesn’t matter the slightest if the resulting drawing doesn’t look like anything. it’s a form of mark making, you’re making a mark in the world, at last. I plan to make lots of marks.
