Research point 1

In this first research exercise I looked at the artworks of Laura Slater, Eva Bellanger, Roanna Wells, Thomas Trum, Julie Mehretu, and Anastasia Faiella. I don’t know if my tutor will read through all of this (hello, Tutor, if you do!), but it seems a good point to take stock of what I have discovered and note down the methods and finished pieces that I particularly took a liking and inspiration from, and those that made me consider working in new ways.

From Laura Slater’s work the things i picked out and liked the most was the way she overlaps textures and shapes of differing colours, to make one cohesive whole [For example in her Assemble/Configure collection]. The way she uses repeating textures and applications of marks, but in different shapes is also very effective, and showed me you can use one tool or way of applying media and make it interesting by varying the size. [Grid Collection]

Looking at Roanna Wells’ work I saw how it looks good from a distance as a whole, but that the marks themselves are a large part of what I found interesting (the way the paint pooled and filled each mark slightly differently), so that looking up close I found it more interesting the longer I looked. [Her Brushmarks Series shows this especially well]

Thomas Trum’s work has simplicity used well, overlapping of one type of mark varies the depths of the shade and creates a kind of texture of its own [Most evident in his gallery works like this: Solo Gallerie Vivid] as the overlap ripples across the surface. The blank space around his marks in a lot of his works looks like part of the design too, well thought out.

I particularly enjoy Julie Mehetru’s work – which first discovered when reading Drawing Projects by Mick Maslen and Jack Southern – I was drawn to it, and I had fun looking into her process for my research. She seems to centre her work on a theme of repeated marks, or with all her different marks leading the eye to one focal place on the canvas.

In an Interview with Tim Marlow she talked about erasing into her art work ““[And] I keep working into the painting and then I usually push it too far and then I have to erase back into it” . Which made me think about how erasing is mark making in itself, and how altering media once it’s on the page – pushing or scraping through wet ink, some of which i did in previous exercises – is another engaging way to break up and alter the mark making.

The mirrored and repeating marks in Eva Bellinger’s work drew my eye, and how she uses the same shape in differing colours to create interest. She also uses the background to make up part of the pattern itself by having her marks and shapes touch and overlap [as seen in her Print Pattern Collections], it seems like something that would take a lot of practice to get right.
Her textile work matches and mirrors her work with drawing media too in a way I really like, the stitching or different materials creating pattern in the same way her drawings do; everything can be a piece of a drawing if you use it right! [Sahara Collection shows this similarity to her printed work well.]

Anastaia Faielle works on a large scale, and it shows off her mark making really well. She scrapes media across the canvas [Trust Me – oil and graphite on canvas, is a good example], and uses lines and marks that look like they are made quickly and intuitively. Her pieces that are made up into strips of different mark making that slowly change down the canvas from one to the next, changing a little more each time, I found very appealing. Something that might be easy to replicate, but making a canvas so busy seems to work well because of her limited choice of mark making.

I like the question she asks herself in her artist statement: how do I use my hands? How do I develop a craft? Reading is different from looking, and making is different from painting.” – mundane and ordinary things we all have can be used to great affect, I learned this in the previous exercise, I’d like to take it forward too.

I hope to take at least some of what I’ve picked out and found effective from their works as I move into the next part of my own mark making process and the next exercises in my course.
Particularly the use of the same textural mark making in different sizes or shapes or colours; repeating marks over and over where the mark itself becomes the point of interest; using marks to draw the eye around the page, or to create a directional flow; and using simplicity to great effect. These are methods I found interesting and feel I could understand how to replicate, and also that call back to previous work (like the communicative line or coded lines I explored in part one of the course, for instance) as well as perhaps being a good starting point for exploring the ways pattern and texture can enhance images or be used in design as I move forward.