Final Evaluation

Since the beginning of my FMP a lot of things have changed. From the process of making my work, to the different medias used. As at the beginning I was unsure on what media to use, I experimented with many different ideas, from 3D wire structures to 2D large scale drawings. After researching into artists such as Francis Bacon and Sueng Mo Park, I decided to experiment firstly with 3d moulds of the body made in plaster and mod rock. I was quite impressed by the results, however, felt the pieces looked a little bare and needed bringing to life. I used acrylic paints and layered them on top of the moulds to see if it would improve the pieces but realised they looked a little too ‘a-levely’ and didn’t represent or show the meaning my project initially had.

After contacting Seung Mo Park with questions about his work and getting no reply, I decided to start creating wire pieces from my own initiative. I started off by using a mannequin and wrapping wire around the figure to see what result it would create. It worked better than I had previously imagined and I quite liked the transparency of the piece. I continued to add limbs to the body shape, however felt that even though the piece was successful it was lacking in something and maybe wire wasn’t the right media to continue with.

I decided to research into the artist, Giacometti. I found that his drawings were very similar in technique to my wire drawings, however, his pieces that intrigued me the most was the work that he created for his exhibition: ‘Alberto Giacometti. The origin of space; retrospective of the mature work’ at Kunstmuseum Wolfsberg. He made many different structures of the body using dense materials such as clay, bronze and glass. As I thought it would be rather unrealistic to get the materials and tools together to experiment with glass and bronze I decided to take a life drawing class and create 3D sculptures by moulding clay. The outcomes were rather disappointing as the pieces didn’t contain the detail and scale that I wanted to achieve.
The final media I still wanted to experiment with was 2D drawing. As it had been a while since I’d drawn and had been experimenting with 3D structures I decided to take another life drawing class to get back to the basics of composition, colour and technique.

I was quite pleased with the results of the life drawing class, however, decided that I still wanted to work in a much larger scale. I worked out that if I wanted my work to contain detail and depth as well as colour, then for me personally, I believed I would be more successful creating 2D work for my final piece. I felt as though I was much more mastered in the medium and it was really the only realistic way to create art on a very large scale whilst still keeping the detail and shape of the figure I wanted to portray.

A few days after the life drawing class I was given an amazing opportunity to go travelling with college to visit Africa, Botswana. I jumped at the chance as I believed it would be really interesting and inspiring seeing how people lived over there, especially the women. I researched into their culture, the different art works they produced and the way they lived/survived in such different circumstances than we are used to, over here in England. 

Before leaving, I talked to some people who had previously visited similar parts of the country to see what feedback they had and experiences they had been through whilst there. A tutor had travelled to Tanzania last year and shared some photographs with me of the village people she had met whilst on her travels. I decided to practice and experiment with some drawings before I left on the trip, using the photographs my tutor had given me. This gave me a better all round idea of what my final pieces would specifically look like, which scale and medias I would be using and the kind of people I would be drawing. I was very pleased with the outcome of the drawings and secured the idea in my mind that I would be using inks and charcoal to create my final piece/pieces.

After returning from Africa I had taken some photographs whilst there of women I had met. From my most successful photograph I decided to produce an A0 piece, (similar to the piece I created before I travelled to Africa) using bleach, black paint, charcoal and white chalk.

Now that my final Piece was completed all that was left to do was set up the exhibition space and getting work framed and hung up. If I had to repeat my FMP again the only thing I would change would be not wasting time experimenting with clay and mod rock, however, I suppose if I hadn’t tried I never would have known.