Research

I enjoyed our visit to the Whitworth and finding out more of what this brief is all about. I have chosen to do visual research based on the contrast of colour and tonal greys at the Whitworth. I have done this by picking out colours from pieces of work in the gallery, my favorite being "Plato's Disco". For my tonal greys, I have done drawings of the floor and from sections of paintings.

This is some of my visual research:

I intend to combine the colourful elements of my drawings with the tonal greys whilst sampling so I can get an idea of the best proportions for effective colour contrasts. I would like to experiment with a combination of kantha hand stitch, bead work and machine free motion machine embroidery. It will also be interesting to experiment with different weights and textures of fabrics too.
I am not yet sure which of the two shops I would like to create a product for, I feel like the children’s shop would be most suited to my intense colour use, but it might be nice to try and refine that and make something for the high end shop.


I think I would like to design either a scarf for the high end shop, fabric for a patchwork fat quarter pack for the high end shop or maybe a patchwork kit designed for the kids shop. If I choose to make a scarf I will need to make some decisions about whether it will be an evening dress scarf or a warm practical scarf. If I choose to make a pack of Whitworth fabric fat quarters for quilting, I will need to choose a lightweight but reasonably strong and durable fabric and will need to think about placement of stitching in terms of avoiding breakages in stitch work if the customer wanted to cut the fabric to size.  For the patchwork kit for kids I’d have to consider packaging and an instruction booklet for it to be successful.

I have enjoyed presenting myself to others with the intention of perhaps collaborating, which I don’t think I will end up doing, but it was a really good exercise and has made me more enthusiastic about the idea of collaborating in the future. I enjoyed the feedback back session and giving feedback to other students however didn’t feel the benefit due to the stark contrast in the way we are used to presenting our visual research and ideas on the textiles course opposed to those who do 3D or Graphics.



  

Abstracting Drawings

After my tutorial, I have decided the Manchester Cathedral stained glass is the most inspiring and to do some more drawings that are less literal and are abstracting the bits I enjoy from the stained glass windows.

These are some of my more developed drawings, focusing mainly on colour combinations:

I quite like the way these line drawings capture the colours and the way they blend. I enjoyed using ink to create these vibrant colours.

To develope this further I used similar colour schemes to produce more relevant and refined drawings that reflect both the shapes and use of colour in the stained glass:

Locating: Visual Reasearch

Following feedback week, we were told to produce a body of visual research on a theme of our choosing. With Christmas decorations lighting up windows and buildings, I found myself looking more and more at the colour and patterns used in architechture. I decided to look deeper into stained glass windows and and the patterns used in stonework and railings.

My home town York has lots of old buildings that have stained glass tucked away in little alcoves, this was a piece I found in a local pub that displays York Minster:

Once back in Manchester, I went to the cathedral to take pictures of the stained glass there, I found it quite interesting as it was more modern stained glass, having been rebuilt after the bombings in the early 90s.

 

 

I also noticed quite a lot of traditional stained glass windows in window paines of doors on people's houses:

 

This week I plan to do some drawings based on the images I have collected, experimenting with mark making and colour work. 



Slow Progress

Unfortunately, I have been quite ill this week, and feel like I really haven’t hit my stride with drawing. In an attempt to be experimental, I tried to develop some bigger more close up recreations of the wavy lines using a mixture of paint, crayon, ink and collage. I feel these drawings came out a bit too eclectic and although studying the colours within the pictures more carefully has proven helpful, I feel the drawings I have created are a bit sloppy and not substantial enough.

After this I have taken a different approach back in my sketchbook mainly using inks to create the vivid colours and some of the lines. I don’t feel I have really produced enough work this week, so I’m motivated for next week to be more productive. Having spoken to my tutor I feel like I have more ideas for producing more interesting and refined drawings and hope to be ready to start producing samples after Monday’s tutorial. 

PDP Tutorials

Having had my PDP tutorial, I am very excited about this project. I have lots of bright colours to work with and have been advised to do drawings and try manipulating further my images I have photocopied. I am going to experiment with lots of different media to try and recreate the effects created by the manipulated photocopied images. 

Although I feel like I still have a very random collection of drawing across my two sketchbooks I feel like focusing on a few different images will help me refine my drawing and hopefully find a media that works for me.

 I think it might be interesting to try recreate the lines with collage or inks. I’m looking forward to having more drawings so I can start thinking about fabrics and techniques that I might use. 

Sound and Vision: Week 2

After having struggled a bit last week with mark making and finding a medium I enjoyed, this week I have felt a bit more confident working a bit more illustratively. I particularly enjoyed the theme from retro mood board task, really enjoying finding psychedelic patterns, 60s ephemera and presenting a colour palette with yarn wrappings. 

I really hope to take this work forward creating more drawings using the bright colours and swirly patterns. 

I feel like I have really enjoyed this project, and feel a bit more confident with my drawing. It is useful to know that I can turn non visual stimuli into illustrative drawings, which may come in handy getting “unstuck” in future projects. 

And although I have not really found my favourite medium to work with, I have enjoyed using the photocopier to manipulate my drawings. 

Sound and Vision: week 1

For my visual research weeks I have chosen the Sound and Vision project. This involves turning something audio into something visual which I think I will enjoy, being quite a big fan of music but will challenge me as well. 

Our first task was to listen to one song and create 15-30 drawings based one just that song. I chose a song called ……. By Dervish. This is an instrumental Irish folk song and these were some of the images I produced:

The next exercise I tried was called “Colour Fields”, we had to listen to a song with contrasts and create a colour palette and a composition using that colour palette that represents the song. I chose “Sea of Love” by Catpower. 

Finally I tried an exercise where we had to create our own graphic notation in response to a piece of music. I chose the instrumental piece “Music for a Found Harmonium” by the Penguin Café Orchestra I mainly responded to the “deh-deh-deh” sounds of the violin.

 

This week I feel I have struggled with the exercises, due to the abstract nature of the mark making and still haven’t really found a media I’m fully comfortable with, much like my summer sketchbook it feels a bit scattered and not really part of a collection.