art quote of the day

Work is self-expression. We must not think of self expression as something we may do or something we may not do. Self-expression is inevitable. In your work, in the way that you do your work and in the results of your work your self is expressed. Behind and before self expression is a developing awareness in the mind that effects the work. This developing awareness I will also call "the work": There is the work in our minds, the work in our hands and the work as a result.

Agnes Martin

Martin, Agnes 1992, 'On the perfection underlying life', in Writings, Winterthur, Kunstmuseum Winterthur

This is something I read in first year at Uni, (nearly three years ago) and have been coming back to ever since. It resonates for me and says a lot about process. Agnes Martin's writing on art is philosophical, often meditative and of a more mystical leaning, rather than being academic.

The essay was written with specific application to art, however it's interesting to think of these words in relation to 23 things and the discussion revolving around Tom and Dana's observations on anonymous blogging. The self will be expressed, even though no name is attached.

You can see some of Agnes Martin's work here and here.

If you're in Melbourne, go along to the NGV International and see the Guggenheim Collection. There are a couple of excellent Agnes Martin's there, though the position they have been hung in is flawed. The glass used in the framing picks up the colours of the painting hung diagonally opposite, and interferes with the works. It's on until 7th October.

more wall documentation

This has been painted over now with orange and blue paint. Cadmium orange on the right and ultramarine blue on the left, mixed with a bit of white. I bought three pencils on Friday, produced by three different manufacturers, all labeled ultramarine and the colour was different for all of them. one was substantially darker. The same observation can be made when buying paint.

I still have ongoing issues with documentation. the image above looks good when opened into the larger format, but here it looks average.

I have signed up with flickr and joined the painting group, though I haven't added any images to the group yet.

ahoy me hearties

avast ye land lubbers! arrr! today be "international talk like a pirate day" in today's honour me blog entry be wrrritten in pirrate speak. maybe you'll find some trrrreasure buried deep in t' pages o' me blog!

trrranslate your pages heeerrre me hearties.

or heeerrre

here be pictures o' some pirates...

picture was found buried heeerrre
X marks t' spot forrr this picturrre


this picture was found buried heerrre

23 things: part the first

This is my first Swinburne 23 things post. 23 things is a program designed to facilitate learning about web technologies,especially those being used by students just entering uni. I look at some of the technologies that the sessions explore (flickr, blogs, i have an i google page, google maps), but haven't actively used or created pages for things like flickr until now. It should be fun and also useful. I have a two-fold interest in learning about all of these things: (perhaps even threefold) firstly, it will be good for work, secondly, it will be good in terms of exploring art and how I can use web technologies with my art and thirdly, it will be fun. For example, did you know that the following people have myspace pages?
Mia Dyson
Gillian Welch
Neil Young

I can also use it for a bit of promotion...
find out about the RMIT 3rd year painting students art auction on Wed 19th September at the Lounge here

pearly lines

wall piece 4 (detail)
pencil and acrylic on wall, 2007
297mm x 420mm (A3 size or thereabouts)

this piece sits in the middle of the corridor wall at uni (not swinburne). I used an iridescent pearl paint, by golden paints. this year i have started to use some of the acrylic paints that golden produce. the paint goes a long way, even when mixed with other colours because it has more pigment in it. it does cost a little bit more too.

With artists materials, i guess you do end up paying for quality. it's a choice that has implications not only for the immediate presentation of the work but for the future. Buying a decent blue paint now means that it hasn't faded in 5 years time. i like buying good paper. a good piece of paper can transform a piece of art. a bad piece of paper can make work look slapdash and awful. it's also a question of what one can afford too, though i am increasingly choosing to go with quality over the price. It's a good thing i haven't had to pay for the wall!

a work in progress

acrylic and pencil on wall. dimensions variable. This is the first part of a piece of work. the colour should look a bit more orange, with the pencil drawn out in red and green. the next step is to paint the wall blue. it would have been done a couple of weeks ago, excepting the cold i managed to contract, which morphed into flu and a frustrating ear infection.

process

putting a piece on the wall takes time and involves certain steps.

1. using a map as a basis, i paint a line with acrylic on an A5 size piece of paper. i do around 50 of these at a time. red mark is an example of one of these small paintings.
2. next i photocopy the image on to an overhead transparency, enlarging it to A4 size. i'll also enlarge the image, photocopying it onto A3 sized paper. this means that i can trace the image off and make works on paper too.
3. with the transparency, i then project the mark on to the wall. with some i took photos of the projection, and that's the work. with other pieces, i then trace around the projection, making marks and lines on the wall. on a bigger, longer corridor wall, i select different overheads and the piece builds and morphs down the wall.

wall piece three detail #2