Fine Art Foundation Degree

 The Museum Construct Why are museums important?  Museums teach critical thinking and help get people excited about the different forms art can take. They can expand the general knowledge of the public and the different cultures and opens art up for group conversations and open-ended prompts. They have the power to create unity on both a societal and political level and they provide a sense of community  by celebrating human history through the medium of art. Due to the rise of technology, many people choose to view art from the comfort of their own home. This allows them to focus on only a few aspects of the art world, through a narrow lens. Unless you know what to search for, the art you will see will only be a vary small fraction of the types of art that exists. This can be good in some scenarios where a person has already found the styles of art they like, but if not, you can end up developing 'tunnel-vision' and become unaware of the art that exists. Museums open up these

 Transgression and Taste Transgression Transgressive art is art that aims to outrage or violate basic morals and sensibilities. It aims to portray a 'shock value' that could potentially offend the viewer. But in most examples, artists choose a topic they want to portray, such as human bodily autonomy, and focus in on one specific aspect that is not commonly highlighted in art, e.g. periods and a tampon. In this piece (Red Flag, Judy Chicago), she has chosen to highlight the very natural process that half of the worlds population has to deal with. Instead of keeping the process hidden, as many menstruating people have learnt to do through the shame surrounding menstruation that has been ingrained in us from an early age, she has instead she has used this as the focus of her piece. Show the true art and beauty around the menstruating body.  Through paintings such as 'Red Flag' Chicago 'began to find her voice as a woman', these images evolved into a series called

 Politics and Identity Throughout the course of humanity, art has been used to reflect the political and societal views of the time. They could be used as propaganda to both 'sides', promoting the political agendas, or showing the public how these agendas could damage and harm a society. There are many different aspects of Political art which I will try to cover at least a few. Identity Politics Identity politics describes the anti-authoritarian political and cultural movement in the mid 1980s in the USA and Europe. It promotes talking about identity, repression, inequality and injustice, and it often focuses on marginalised groups (think race, LGBTQ+ and disability).  It emerged through the 1960s Black Civil Rights Movement, the second wave of feminism (1960s -1980s), and LGBTQ+ liberation. It was meant to be confrontational, forcing the public to ask questions about the societies views on who art was made for and its messages. It focused on re-writing the history of art to in

 Abstraction and Process Abstract art is art that does not attempt to represent an accurate depiction or 'replica' of a visual reality, instead uses shapes, colours, forms and gestural marks to achieve the desired effect.  They are two types of abstract art. The first is when an artists has a particular object in mind and they remove (abstract) elements from the object to create a more simplified form. The second is when the artist is not trying to depict a certain object or view, but is instead depicting a feeling or emotion. This type of art is often described as 'concrete art' or 'non-objective art' but the term 'abstract' is used to cover both approaches as the distinction between the two are not always obvious. Juan Gris This painting by Gris named 'Bottle of Rum and Newspaper' is a great example of cubism. An art form under the umbrella term of 'Abstract art'. With realism, artists would paint scenes as they actually looked, with on

Professionalism and the Amateur  Professionals Vs Amateurs Often, people are lead to believe that an amateur is someone without the skills and representation needed to become a professional in their field. However, the main difference between the two is that professionals make their living off of producing and selling art, whereas amateurs do not. Amateurs can still sell their art if they so choose, but it's not their primary income. It's instead a side-job, or just a hobby or passion that they choose to pursue.  Being a professional doesn't automatically mean you have a higher level of skill compared to that of an amateur, just that they rely on their skills to produce their income. Being a professional can often change their approach to producing art, they don't have as much freedom to experiment or produce inconsistent art. This is because as a professional, they often have collectors and the public expecting a certain standard or product from them. Many professional

 The Male Gaze 'I am a woman, not an exhibit' Iris Whittle In 1975, film critic Laura Mulvey first used the term 'the male gaze' in reference to the presentation of women from a heterosexual male perspective where women are depicted as sexual objects and entirely for the pleasure of the male. 'Men have agency; women are passive and dehumanized'. In feminist theory, the world has been conditioned, through media to equate male success with money, power and control, and female success with beauty, ability to reproduce and ability to keep a household. Even with a quick google search, 'how is male success measured' brings up articles in how to be good in business and men's health, yet if you google 'how is female success measured', you are overwhelmingly shown articles about reproduction. Through such imagery, it is ingrained in us from an early age that a woman's' main goal in life is to create a family with a rich and successful man, and

Ceramics Sculpting Pinch Pots This process was to just to get me used to working with clay, and was a nice starter task. I first took a small piece of clay and molded it into a ball. I then pushed into the center with my thumbs and started to stretch out the sides with my fingers. I made three little pots, which turned into little dishes, around the size of little trinket trays. I tried to vary the size and shape of the pots by changing the amount of clay I started with, and molding the clay differently to create different shapes. Although I like the freedom of this process, I didn't really like how rough and imperfect the final results were as I didn't find them that aesthetically pleasing. If I was to do this again I would take more care to mold them slower so that I could take more care and not try and correct an already 'ruined' pot. Flower For this one I wanted to include the theme of fabricated nature into my ceramics practice, I thought the easiest way to do this

 Wire Sculpture Experiments This was the second task we were given in college. Trying to make wire structures within the are of 'fabricated nature'. I chose to make basic leaf branches as I'd learn how to attach small pieces of wire, without them slipping down or distorting the branch, as well as making a large amount of small fiddly leaves. The first of the two pieces I made. I cut the wire into smaller lengths and used pliers and my hands to mold the wire into the shapes I wanted and attached them to the main branch by twisting the wore over each other till they stayed. This was the hardest part of the process as the two pieces kept slipping over each other and sliding down the branch. I ended up having to change my process. Instead of attaching the leaf to the branch, I extended the length of the leaf 'stem', and attached this to the last leaf. This new leaf stem then became the new branch until it eventually trailed off, and was replaced by another. I like the o

Charcoal Drawings This is the first task we were given when starting college. Drawing natural forms from life as well as our own drawings using charcoal and chalk. I started with the spindly 'flower bomb' drawing referenced by a physical flower on the table. I have always struggled drawing from life as I can never quite get the dimensions looking right so I thought choosing a flower with lots of straight lines was my best bet.  Although I'm not completely happy with this one, I like how I layered the white chalk over the charcoal as it helped add definition so the very 2D looking plant., next time I'd like to make the seed pods look more complete and 3D, and add more 'leaves' of pods to make it look busier and more eye-catching. I then tried adding a generic branch of leaves in the corner. I really liked these as they were quick and easy to produce, but by adding more leaves I could make it look more busy and realistic. I did however like the shading created by

 Paper Flowers Experimentation For this section of my project I wanted to explore the idea of mimicking nature from manufactured or processed materials. I used mass manufactured paper cups to try and emulate the beauty of natural flowers in nature. I first drew a stencil onto the paper cup (I didn't have to worry about these lines being visible as they would become the back of the flower) then cut them out using scissors. I also tried using a scalpel but this just ended squishing the paper and made it harder to cut.        I experimented with different numbers of petals and the number of 'layers' (amount of cups) used to make each flower         Through this process I decided I preferred the look of the flowers when they had more petals and more layers as they looked busier and often more natural. Using Scraps Through the process of making the flowers I collected a mountain of scrap card so I tried to use these to make different shaped flowers.             Although this wa