ITAP Week 4 Inspiration and Understanding

Research is the collecting of data, information and facts to increase our understanding of a topic or issue. This is separated into two different types of research, primary and secondary. Primary research is when you physically go out and get the information yourself and create new information that was not there before such as questionnaires. Whereas secondary research is when you use information that someone else has gone out, collected and you have found it by either reading books or via the Internet. Another way of researching something is by doing visual research, which is creating images, diagrams, illustrations or photographs of the subject. This method of research is what I will mainly be using to gather the information I need for my online magazine along with secondary research to gather information about the history of landmarks around Birmingham. A current artist that is good at completing this type of research is Paul Davis. He is a good example of this because he goes around daily with a notebook writing down phrases, words and drawing things that give him ideas so that when he comes to make a piece of work he already has lots of different ideas that he can use to help him make his final outcome. Inspiration can be found anywhere and take any shape. Inspiration usually comes when you let your mind wonder and just observe what’s around you. Some people find that by collecting things such as other artists work, toys, comics, books etc are useful because they then have a library of things they can reference at any time also, for some people collecting things helps stimulate the brain to become more creative and help them come up with something new. Others find that making their workspace full of things that inspire them helpful. So when they are working their surrounded by posters, books, CD’s and figures that they can take elements from such as what they look like, how they were made and what there made off and use it in their own work.

ITAP Week 3 Connectivity

As artist nothing we do is “original” it’s all connected to someone else’s ideas. It is essentially stealing. But where do we draw the line at stealing someone else’s ideas? Even great artists such as Pablo Picasso have done it. For example his painting of Las Meninas, he got the idea from another painting by Diego de Silva Velazquez, which was also called Las Meninas. The only difference is that Picasso’s painting was done 300 years after Diego’s and this shows that took the idea from his painting but put his own twist on the idea making it his own. Picasso is famous for saying “great minds steal” by this he means that good artists look at other artists work and take inspiration from what has gone before them using it in their own way, making something different based on the same idea. Another way artist get their influence is by looking at different forms of historical culture. For example many artists such as, Masaccio and Ron O’Donnel have looked at the creation story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. As well as this artist have draw inspiration from myths and legends about Greek gods and other figures of worship in religions. An example of this is a statue of the goddess’s ceremonial apron has had a modern twist on it using a photo of a women then editing it. Another piece of historical culture that artist have drawn inspiration from is the supernatural. Probably the most famous pieces are the five Cottingley Fairies photographs. These pieces were several years later, in the 1980s, were revealed to be fakes which at the time cleared up any uncertainty people had about their authenticity at the time of their release. But they have inspired many other artists such as Matt Collishaw, Rankin (Nokia) and was even part of a recent BBC advert. This all shows that to be a good artist/ designer you have too look around at what other artist and designers have done in the past and to use what you like from their work and not to be scared about admitting that that’s your inspiration because it is what every one does because nothing is “original” its all recycled ideas done in a new way. 

ITAP Week 2 Development of creative thought and structure in Illustration and Graphic Art

Overcoming mindsets is a deliberate thinking strategy to free you from the practice of solving everyday problems. In order to do this you need to break your natural way of thinking and move away from comfort zones freeing your mind to look at alternatives away from your normal conventional approach to problems. To do this I would start by questioning my traditional way of thinking by asking things like, what if? And why not? Also, by trying to go in with an open mind and not having any assumptions about the problem. Christoph Niemann is a graphic illustrator who comes up with very good simple visual ideas, which are fun and interesting to look at. Such as, his images of the toaster with bread popping out in different ways and the one with a god throwing lightening at a man, who catches it and throws back DNA. His work shows a non-conventional approach to things because the image is not something you would normally think of doing in association with the theme, for example the one with the person peaking though the fingers is talking about even with eyes covered theirs always someone peeking.

Developing ideational fluency is producing ideas that fulfill a requirement. Ideational fluency is the number of ideas to solve a problem rather then the quality of the ideas that you come up with. It’s all about getting ideas down on a page using methods such as mind maps and classification. I use mind mapping to get down my ideas because I find it an easy way to see all my ideas at the same time. It also, enables me to link some together as well as, going into more detail about my ideas for one thing branching off from the original thought. Such as, for the current magazine project, an initial idea was the history of Birmingham, which then led me to landmarks, which then linked back to another idea I had about culture in Birmingham. To help me think I have things around me in my room that I like and find interesting and they help give me ideas spontaneously. I find this works because things that inspire me surround me and I can draw inspiration from them.

ITAP Week 1 RVJ (Reflective Visual Journal)

Drawing is a personal and emotional way of expressing yourself on a page, which nearly everyone is conscious about, as it is one of the most recognised ways of seeing if you have ability or not, so you constantly feel judged and that every piece has to be a masterpiece. The RVJ is a great way of expressing ideas and your thought process though images regardless of their quality or style and it allows you to experiment and take risks with materials when creating an image, not necessarily using pencil, giving you no limits to what you can accomplish. An example of this is Danny Gregory who, in his journal volume 6, draws a range of everyday things he sees in there just to get ideas down. Some are quick sketches others time has gone into them, but it is clear he is going though a journey and capturing every thought that comes into his head though imagery.  Another example is Leonardo De Vinci, who is known for developing his ideas by “thinking on a page” describing his ideas though imagery rather than words, using the right side of his brain by experimenting with ideas then coming back and using the left side to analyse his work seeing what works and what doesn’t, then going back to the right side to come up with a new idea based on what he’d learnt. It is important to use both sides of the brain when it comes to getting the best creative work out of yourself. Using the right side of the brain to be experimental, curious and playful and the left to analyse, edit and ask what is useful. Neither side is better use to us then the other, as creative people we need both as they both complement each other helping us to achieve better results. 

T-Shirt designs

These are a couple of the designs I made for T-shirts which were influenced by the David Fullarton. What I took form David Fullartons work that I liked was the fact that he collects random scraps of things such as bus tickets and books so i went out and collected a few things like this to produce a load of different textures for my image and text like the ones above. These designs are my favourite because I like the way the graph paper and book pages have added to the mono print images also, the coffee stains made on the one help add to what I was trying to create. The message I'm trying to get across in these pieces was of lonelyness and by having ripped up pieces of paper with some overlapping it symbolises piecing things back together. 

Day of the Triffids book cover

This piece my target audience are adults, which I have tried to accomplish by giving the piece a sinister feel to it with the colours used in the background. Out of the four displayed I think the one in top right works the best because the text is clear and easy to read, the buildings in the background have blended well making a dark, mysterious backdrop in contrast to the foreground silhouette of buildings. The etching of the Triffid is not too over powering on the cover but fits in well with the background. 

I got the idea for this from looking at Katsushika Hokusai's work which gave me the inital idea to do a etching on perspex of corn, but when i left it to dry on its side it reminded me of a Triffid so i incorpreted it into a book cover design for the book "Day of the Triffids."  

Audi R8

As this is an advertising poster it has to be aspirational and to do this I found a dramatic image for the background that I could put the image I'd take of the car onto. By then making a mono print of the image created I layered it on top to add texture but keeping the drama it creates. To follow the texture given by the mono print I spray painted the text and blended it in so it all linked together but using different techniques. Also, I rendered the car in shades of red to make it stand out, so even though there it all this texture, text and dramatic backdrop the main focus is still the car and it is the first thing your eye is drawn to, hopefully making the car something desirable.