Flat Earth News

Devotees of my work will surely remember my seminal Flat Earth installation and accompanying screen-printed book that I made at the end of 2015. Since then ideas about Flat Earth theory have been nagging away in my mind like some kind of well-meaning but irritating acquaintance so I have decided to explore it further and make a more resolved and visually satisfying project.

The main bulk of my work this year is 4 projects - 2 per semester - so they're supposed to be fairly weighty. For my first project of the year I decided to make a newsletter based on the Flat Earth News which the Flat Earth Society published in the 70s-90s, Reading the newsletters I was struck by the ridiculous phrasing and naive graphic design and thought it could be fun to make my own version as a sort of parody.

I started doing more research into Flat Earth theory and thinking about various subscription-based and fringe publications. I tried some risographs and stencil screenprints

I was struggling a bit to focus my ideas so decided to make the first edition a "Broader Horizon" issue and started developing some garish visuals and ideas which were quite in keeping with my installation. I was becoming frustrated with it though as I was finding it difficult to make anything that actually looked good, then I had a crit and completely psyched myself out about the whole idea, feeling that it wasn't enough, and veered very off course.

I did loads of research reading some articles and a collection of articles in book form called Lost At Sea by Jon Ronson. In that I read an article about a man who reinvented himself as a soul singer called Mingering Mike and made cardboard records, record sleeves, and recorded tapes spanning an entire fictional career. This got me thinking about outsider art which was interesting, learning about people with an uncontrollable urge to make things without necessarily intending anyone to see them. This made me feel pretty bad considering I had been sitting about for weeks doing virtually hee haw in an attempt to come up with something really original and smart. The more you think about creativity the more it can completely elude you, and the act of making can spark ideas, so I decided to revert back to my artists' block go-to and make some collages.

I was thinking about dimensions and flatness and made a collage with paving slabs which I thought was quite effective:

It was the only thing I'd done so far which I found visually rewarding so I got more photos of pavements and started playing about with collage screen-prints:

I'm pretty happy with how they look so far - I feel much better about the project now that I actually have something to show for it. Now I just need to work out how to bring together all the separate elements I've been thinking about into a final piece.

Pole Tay Pole - Final Outcome

I finally got some photos taken of the box I made for Pole Tay Pole all those many moons ago... Looking at this project project annoys me so much because I think I had a pretty good idea and just executed it quite poorly having rushed it so badly. I've been tempted to revisit this project and remake it before my assessment at the end of April; making my own box, getting a better copy of the photo and using nicer paper. On reflection though sometimes it's best just to leave these things and move on. Definitely a project I learnt a lot from but not my favourite work.

Growth and Form Prints

For my second self-initiated mini print project I decided to play about with screen printing bolder shapes than usual and using different materials to block the screen. Since last term I've been dipping in and out of D'Arcy Thompson's On Growth and Form, a textbook on mathematical biology which is a surprisingly good read, I promise... Anyway there are some really interesting points of inspiration about design in nature which I picked up on and decided to make some prints relating to structure in leaves so I poached a couple from a bush on campus, sourced a piece of netting from a satsuma box, and played about with some monoprints:

I love the simple almost photographic tonal quality of these prints and decided to incorporate the monoprint method into my final screen prints.

Little Boats

To get myself back into the printmaking workshop I set myself a couple of wee print projects during the Pole Tay Pole project. I wanted to do more with the lino boats I had made so decided to experiment with a bit of colour as I'm usually lazy and just use black.

Not exactly reinventing the wheel but I liked playing about with repetition and composition and I love the simplicity of these prints!

Lino Prints

During a particularly stressful week last semester I decided to take some time out and have a go at doing some lino prints using oil based inks, just to give myself a break from thinking about projects. I loved using lino but hadn't done it for a while and wanted to see how much better an effect oil-based rather than water-based ink would give me. I didn't plan the image just cut a pattern into the lino and played about with double-printing which gave such a good effect! Definitely going to have a go with more lino stuff this semester as I love the direct simplicity of the technique.

Art and Science - Flat Earth Installation

Art and Science exhibition was on Monday! Making the installation itself took a fair amount of work and took me out of my comfort zone venturing into the woodwork department. I didn't know how it would look all together until I assembled everything on the day of the exhibition and I was pleasantly surprised - while it's garish it isn't as horrendous as I'd feared which is the main thing.

The installation uses primary colours plus black and white. I decided to exclude other colours as a reference to exclusion of evidence and I actually really like the way it looks. All the elements focus on the idea of Zetetics - trusting your senses above all other evidence which ties in nicely with my visual way of thinking about things as an artist.

I also edited the conversation between David and Adam to manipulate their words and make it seem as they were in support of flat earth theory.

The installation got mixed reactions probably due to the "eye-catching" nature of it but I love the way it looks and I'm really proud of it! It was nice to work on a larger scale and I feel I definitely challenged myself producing some of the elements. All in all a good semesters work!