research

Research

For the second semester this year I chose the painting project to further develop my previous passion for this skill. Painting again allowed me to revisit my comfort zone after experimenting in the last semester with installation and sculpture. Using different mediums has enabled me to add new elements to my skill set which includes industries outside of classic fine art such as, fashion and theatre design.

With this project,” Fantasy Voyage” inspired and motivated me from the outset. Being a film from the 1960s about a space age journey though the body, it has visuals of the organs, arteries and the systems that keep us functioning. These inspired me with their alien like forms, shapes and colours that combine to give an abstract appearance. However, not wanting to copy the film, I decided to take the journey within the brain and show its complex, amazing mechanisms and the formation of emotions that form our traits and personalities. Doing research into biological photography and Victorian illustrations taught me how the mind has been represented in art history. These images show the wide variety of colours and textures within the visualisations of anatomy. These stimulated me to experiment with abstract paintings using vibrant colour schemes and different mediums. In addition, I sought to illustrate a physcological side to my practise with more in-depth meanings concentrating on the brain structure, our emotions and mental health.  To achieve this, I also explored the concept of masks which allowed me to use the fashion element from the previous semester. Masks are worn to hide identity or conceal emotions. I found that I could explore a psychoanalytical view whereby the mask represents how individuals “mask” their mental health,  showing this on the exterior would show a positive contradiction and, relating back to the brief, would demonstrate body function.