Design Development 2

I knew I wanted to base my collagraph print on the many drawings I have recently made in my sketchbook of plants and flowers. I have been following access art drawing prompts, many of which revolved around simple objects, so felt it would be illogical not to base my design on these. I hope to also take inspiration from my music explorations in the way of colors when printing.

Initially all of my design ideas were in layers. I found it hard to switch off this aspect of my planning having been so pivotal to the design process before when i made my multi block prints.

In this design I wanted to use sections of 3 drawings of different scales layered over each other to create contrast, each layer being made up of different collatype textures. This layering was not hugely effective, it was too busy and there is a lot of empty space in this design. I need to give the individual elements more space.

This design was a development of the previous design. I wanted to create the backgrounds with string but realized it would be very difficult to create such a complex, representational texture. The composition was stronger, as the different elements work together and complement each other better with more space around them. In my next design I need to maintain this balance but try some textures that would be easier to create in a collage block.

In one of my practice blocks I used sandpaper and painted on gesso to create an intaglio block. I tried using watercolour and masking fluid to explore possible designs using this technique.

This one lost its way, I don’t really know what I was trying to create in the second layer here. The first layer was successful, the use of the masking fluid was successful and could potentially translate to the intaglio block. I hadn't really figured out what technique I was going to use with the second laser, I just played with masking another area. Looking at it now I can see the white of the first mask leaps out makes this unbalanced.

This was more successful due to the more open texture of the top layer. The top layer here would be relief with two contrasting textures, the flowers being flat dense colour of mountboard, the leaves being open line work of string. I think this was successful because the white areas are balanced, as are the dark areas of the mount board flowers. The varying scales of the leaves is more subtle and creates contrast without unbalancing the image.

I hadn’t really explored 1 block images so tried this in the next design. I like the graphic quality of this:

The balance is successful in terms of value and lines and shapes. There is good contrast between the line based texture and the blocks. I feel this could be challenging to create and print, the mount board is hard to cut and there is a lot of it. I don't know if there is an alternative to using string for the line based background, perhaps a thick acrylic medium? I am finding this process challenging and while I think this could be one of my more successful designs I know it could be difficult. Trying to create all the interest in one block is a new set of challenges, potentially the block has to be more intricate to create enough interest. Conversely, a simple block such as the mount board flowers on their own allow for a big range of possibilities for variable inking.

I went back to two layers in this design exploring transparency.

I think this is less successful as the transparent flowers don't achieve the contrast of the previous design. Not to say it couldn't be inked in a solid color. I think the main reason this does not work as well is because the line flowers are too similar in outline shape to the main flowers, they should be in more contrast by filling the rest of the block and white areas.

In the end I chose this design because I felt it had the biggest range of textures and the range of techniques used would allow me the biggest variation in inking techniques. I was very torn between this and the one block design with the red pink and yellow flowers as this would also allow for varied inking techniques. 

Design Development

I displayed a lot of my drawings together to try and think of a way to develop some designs that grew from my explorations. I saw an artist doing this recently as a major part of her creative practice and wanted to try it.

I hoped to find a way to connect my music collages to my drawings.

I thought I would be drawn to the Bach collage and it’s colours, but instead I was struck by the brightness of the Mingus collages, and the yellow flower drawings. This made me consider how much I stick to familiar colour schemes and using music as a source of inspiration could be a useful tool to explore different combinations. I don’t know what I was expecting to come out of this review process, but other than colour I do not feel I made any significant new connections between my music collages and my drawings. The artist I observed doing reviewing her work in this way works to very open outcomes, her work could be 2 or 3D, big small, any media or setting. I am working to a fixed outcome, does this mean the music explorations have limited applications? Is this a bad thing? It is like a limited palette of colours that might be used to develop colour mixing skills. If I had any possible outcome available to me at this stage in the creative process which direction would my thoughts be going in now? I find this question very hard to answer as I don’t have a big range of skills at my disposal. I know if the current assignment did not specify a representational theme I would definitely be exploring music and art connections in much more abstract visual forms. Maybe to keep this exploration genuine I need to take this in an abstract direction, and not think about the assignment at all. This is not to say exploring connections between music and art cannot be representational at some stage, but the music I have been using to create my visual association collages is purely abstract, so I am unsure how I could apply this to a representational image. Maybe this highlights part of the problem in my working practices. I have found a theme to explore that is bigger than this particular assignment and it makes me question if I should be working or thinking in discrete assignments at all.

So this activity has raised many questions, it has also given me some ideas to develop further:

I could use a piece of music to create a style or theme to apply to an image. I could take lines and colors inspired by the music to style an image or take a simple block and use variable inking to create the theme on the block with colors. 

I could create a varied series of the same block each variation with a colour theme from a different piece of music. 

The question remains, would this work on a representational image? If I took a simple block would the image need to make some connection to the music?

As I am creating a representational image for my collagraph, I think I want to put some of these ideas on hold, and work on my assignment mainly as a development of my drawings of flowers. I can use color to apply one of my music 'themes' to this block, but I'm not sure really I have that idea figured out in my head yet.

Art and Music

I decided to get deeper into the idea of interpreting music in my art work I would try writing some music inspired by an artwork. I wrote two pieces about prints I have recently been looking at, I also found it a useful way to analyze the composition of these works in more detail.

The first print I analyzed like this was by Stefan Barton. I started by trying to create the aesthetic of the piece with one sound. This chord is reminiscent of the sound of the horn pictured and also expresses the dark character of the image through dissonance and the small highlights are shown by one higher register note.

Solid Rotation 

I then went on to recreate the circular shape through a repeating ostinato based around that chord with one note altered in the bass. I developed these ostinati into a short melody, then came back to the ostinato and chord, reinforcing the circular structure. I used gradual increases and decreases in tempo to accentuate this circular motion.

This is my short piece about the Estuary by Suzie Mackenzie .

The feature of this print that struck me most was the way my eye was lead around the image so I used that as my starting point. I started by creating a short passage about the distant hills then moved onto the closer hills, then the water, then the darker, more textured land in the foreground and finally returned to the hills. I used a mixolydian mode and 6/8 meter typical of Celtic music of the Scottish Highlands which set the scene effectively. This was mainly an interpretation of the narrative of the image rather than the visual qualities, however the modal harmony is comparable to a reduced color palette as it does not have the same range of harmonic color as the major or minor keys. Other details were more inspired by visual features, in my first section I used a high register to represent the light values showing distance, I moved down an octave to show the closer hills in darker value. In the next section about water I tried to recreate the sense of water flowing, I realize now that this is also describing the narrative of the image, I imagine the water flowing but there is not a specific visual representation of any movement of water. When representing the texture of the land in the foreground I showed the dark fuzzy textures with thick slow moving chords related to the previous passage. I then returned to the beginning melody to show the journey taken when viewing this work.

It was a very interesting exercise, particularly when I reflect on it now and realize that there are many aspects of the music that I took from the narrative of the images, not just the visual qualities, which invites the question would it really make sense to make purely abstract music from a representational work? Conversely, my next assignment is to create a representational collagraph, does it make sense to try and interpret purely abstract music in a representational image? Even if I used the music to inspire a series of backgrounds to a representational image, surely the image should have some connection with the music?

This exercise also allowed me to begin to deepen my thinking on which features of music I might represent visually. In the last research post I did on music and art I looked at some visualizations that specifically focus on color and pitch. I knew there were many more connections that could be made and this short exploration has already shown me that each piece of music would lend itself to different visual interpretations. I know I want to represent the overall aesthetic, and I think I have done that, but I was surprised how much I used the narrative of the work to achieve this. In my first music and art research post I looked at a piece of music inspired by Van Gogh's Starry Night

Timbres, espace, mouvement

Henri Dutilleux 1978

I felt this was heavily influenced by the knowledge of Van Gogh's mental state at the time of painting, and a very different score would have been produced if that knowledge had not been available. When I first listened to this I thought I would be able to create music more focused on visual qualities, and was surprised how much I too was influenced by the narrative of the work.

There are many more aspects of this I would like to pursue:

• Create music from a purely abstract work such as Jackson Pollock
• Create a series of mono prints representing different sections of a piece of music
• Create a layered mono print where layers represent different sections of a piece of music, I read about using spirits to thin oil based inks to create light washes, I am keen to try this
• Take a piece of program music about a specific scene and create a representational artwork

However, are any of these ideas suitable to pursue for my representational collagraph? I have done a lot of drawing of plants and flowers, but I feel that the piece of music must dictate the subject, rather than trying to find music to fit a subject I have already investigated and have material for.

Music and Art 2

I am very interested in using music in my art, I wrote a research post on it already after doing an exploratory exercise on it, and have found myself thinking about it a lot since.

So I did a bit more research and came across visual music, an art form where a lot of people are creating visualizations of music. All of these were moving image computer generated videos such as this video by Nancy Herman

Faure  Romance Without Words

I find this interesting, but really quite simplistic. The overall aesthetic is not represented, it is quite a literal translation of color and pitch, which does not allow for showing how those pitches interact. There is some representation of rhythm but so much else is not explored, such as articulation, and really the most important missing piece here for me is expression. Visually I also feel this is really narrow, all the colors are bright hues, there is no variation of value, line, shape, scale, which just doesn't do the many variations of rhythm, harmony, texture, pitch, timbre justice.

Bach  Aria from the Goldberg Variations

In a later development of this idea Herman has varied the shapes to show a bit of the articulation and phrasing but I still feel this only partially represents the details of the music and does not represent the aesthetic of the piece.

Herman began by creating these images as color in space, and although I feel these also suffer from many of the same aspects of narrow interpretation I do find it interesting how she has used symmetry, this could be a way of showing form.

These are taken from a small section of a piece, sonata in a minor by Corelli. More examples are on her website. The pitches have been translated into color and the colors presented in 2 or 4 way symmetry. However 'accurate' this literal translation may be it does nothing to represent the aesthetic of the music.

It is interesting to discover that Nancy Herman, in trying to create an instrument that can recreate sound with color, is following on from a long tradition of curious people who have also tried this. As early as 1740 there are records of composers creating and using 'color organs,' instruments that use light to create colors representing pitches.

This research has really helped me focus my ideas, while I do want to explore representing specific elements of music, this has to accompany an expressive interpretation of the aesthetic.

An artist who has also used music to develop the expressiveness of her art is Georgia O'Keefe.

In this work Music - Pink and Blue No. 2 painted in the early part of her career, 1918, O' Keefe was one of the pioneers of abstraction. Her teacher, Arthur Wesley Dow, encouraged her to reject representation and express her ideas through colors lines and shapes. He saw music as 'the key to the other fine arts' and had his students draw their responses to music as an exercise in free expression. ("Moma | Inventing Abstraction")

It would be fascinating to know exactly what music O'Keefe listened to, and why she chose to interpret in the way she did. I find this interesting because it is one still image representing a moving sound. To do this she must have interpreted the whole, or a whole section of the piece, it is not broken down into individual pitches. Many liken this work to later flower paintings and it is certainly unmistakably her individual style, so while she has represented the aesthetic of the music, she has also expressed her own individual aesthetic. The layers of pulsating curves make me imagine rich harmony. The soft pastel colors evoke the soft sound of voices and wind instruments.

These two contrasting examples show music can be expressed visually in very different ways and for very different reasons. By analyzing these I am starting to get a sense of how I may interpret music myself. I do want to show some sense of the music moving through time, but I am not interested in digital art forms at all. I can see some potential in a series of prints, although I can't visualize how this could be representational in any way.


"Moma | Inventing Abstraction". Moma.org. N.p., 2016. Web. 3 Dec. 2016.

Test Collagraph Prints

I made test blocks as per the course instructions and in imitation of the artist's I studied.

First I tried a large relief block with a range of materials from around the house as per the course instructions. I printed it with a roller and damp paper. There was too much variation in height, it was hard to ink and a bit patchy to print. I got some great textures from the textiles items I used.

I also tried a block with texture paste made from acrylic medium and sand and sugar as I did not have any polyfilla. There was again too much variation in height and the print was hard to print and many of the lines I made did not come out.

My next attempts used smaller blocks with less variety of materials per block.

This print used cardboard in relief like Carolyn Trant  I tried two kinds of card, mount board and corrugated card. I tried peeling off some of the layers and cutting shapes. There was still too much variety in heights for inking with a roller, but this block was even enough for a clear print. In this example I think the paper was too wet. Wet paper is another variable in this process I will need to learn to control. This is the first print I took on my new mini press by Fome from Jacksons Art. It was really easy to use.

 In my next cardboard block I tried inking with a dabber as per the course instructions and as described as the process used by Carolyn Trant. This made inking much easier and gave great results. I tried to follow the shadows and highlights I observed when drawing this as part of a drawing activity in my sketchbook course. I used an analogous color scheme, using red to create the shadows and a complementary scheme of purple shadows, however, these blended with the yellow to create browns. I added red to lift this print as the brown had dominated it, which then overpowered a lot of the yellow. I think i got some sense of form through these shadows even if the colors weren't quite what I intended.

  

 I used a tracing of the same drawing to create a whole series of test blocks. This block used textiles for textures. There was too much variation in height in this block, it was hard to ink even with a dabber. I printed it on its own and over the previous block, using the purple and yellow to better effect this time as the inks mixed less as they were printed in two layers. I also added red for interest. I really like the combination of the two layers but it was very hard to register the damp paper. I'm not sure whether in general printmakers use this process as two layers, I have not found any that do yet but will keep looking.

My last test blocks using this same design were intaglio inspired by Suzie Mackenzie.  I didn't have any carborundum grit, so I used I used a sandpaper base and then added foil and acrylic medium as demonstrated in Ann D'Arcy Hughes Printmaking. I found these textures a bit crude. I had more success with painting acrylic medium over the sandpaper in the second example and will try using this technique again as I really like the fluid marks and tonal range. I got this idea from a detailed PDF on collagraph on Bill Chambers website, he painted the medium over a block covered with carborundum, as this was unavailable I used sandpaper. As this process was completely new to me I kept the colors simple and just used one strong color, carbazole violet.

I found the intaglio process quite straight forward on my new press.

In these test prints I learnt that I need to keep the height of collage materials very similar. I also learnt about the textural possibilities of different materials and about creating color variations through dabbing.

Although I experimented with using more than one layer I am now wondering if this is in fact necessary, could I have achieved the same texture by collaging all of the textures onto one block, as long as I was careful maintaining the same height of the items?

I feel that I now have a vocabulary of textures to use in my print. I still need to take further test blocks to see if I will be using multiple blocks or combining textures on one block. I am also going to do some mono printing to explore the colors I want  to use.

Basing these tests on my drawings has shown me how really understanding a subject gives me the knowledge of its shadows and highlights to create much more subtle shades within my prints.