Brief

Future/Past

Source material for this project will consist of photographs I took of temples and the decaying walls of such during my visit to Thailand in march of this year. I also took much inspiration from the street art around Bangkok and the other urban areas of Thailand. This interest in street art and graffiti can also be carried on within Manchester as the city is adorned with street art. Within the Thailand inspiration I am mainly looking at the decay of the buildings; peeling paint and crumbling concrete. I also love finding new growth within these decayed and decrepit walls - much like the work of Paige Smith who I mentioned on an earlier blog post. I admire the idea of nature taking back over man-made things but also what is beneath the peel and decay. The rich colours of the temples also appeal to me and will be strong influence in my colour palette. I will look at more current street art and mix that source with the ancient Thai walls and this will represent the future/past theme I have chosen. i will also look into using traditional techniques like screen and lino print (represtning the past) and mix that up with layered over digital prints thus representing the future. I shall also experiment with using flocking for texture, foiling - similar to the golden foils covering the temple walls - and heat transfer dyes to create rich outcomes.

I shall develop my visual research by experimenting with collaging my drawings into more developed drawings but also fashion illustrations to see how the print design could work on the body and on garments. To do this I will need to to thorough trend research into the season and market I am designing for. To help me develop my designs I will have feedback from group tutorials and will analyse my ideas and designs against my target market.

I'll be designing for womens fashion for the Spring/Summer 16 season. I am focusing on the look peeling and decay which could possibly create a very abstract outcome that is dark in colour but rich in visual appeal and also possibly look into using appliqué or stitch to give texture. 

The market I would be designing for would be mid range high street that is trend aware and the demographic of females aged between 21 - 26. a majority of these will have graduated and earning around eighteen thousand pounds a year, possibly still living at home and are very fashion focused. To display this properly I shall create a sort of client board to achieve a visual for the kind of demographic I am designing for. The shops I will research for this are places like Topshop, Zara, Mango and Monsoon.

Drawings

Looking at the shapes I saw within the decorative walls of the temples in Thailand, I decided to use these shapes further in my drawings. I used a lot of diamond shapes within these two drawings because I like the contrast between the disparate lines of the diamond shapes with the rough organic marks of the gouache.

I have also introduced colour into these and have used a mixture of the current pinky and blue I use to create a purple shade, and also a rich yellow to represent the gold of the temple walls. What I didn't realise at the time about this colour combination is that whilst in Thailand, I would see bunting and flags of these colours.

I also introduced stitch into this drawing which I think this was a successful idea and may explore the idea using stitch within my samples.

Group Tutorial 12/10/15

During my group tutorial this week it was discussed that I should start drawing bigger drawings. As I am designing for fashion, my drawings should be as big as the garments i am designing for. this will also give me bigger experimental range on my mark making resulting my more creative outcomes. 

My drawings have a 3D aspect in the way that I use ripped pieces of paper to add more texture to the drawing. The fact I am also focusing on peeling and decay also naturally gives a more £D effect to my work and so it was suggested that I look into using appliqué with in my designs. But that also brings up the implication of how expensive that would be to produce in comparison to my market I am working towards. So that is also something i shall need to consider further. How will the cost of my process effect the potential cost of the final design and also how will that effect my chosen market.

To develop my drawings further i would like to photocopy them (and perhaps use that copier to manipulate the colours too) and create fashion illustrations and collages from these, just see how these early drawings could also work as prints and give me an idea of what kind of garment my designs could work on.

A mood board for colour should be created by next week. this doesn't have to be final colours but just loosely looking into what colours interest me. and also think about colour distribution. how much colour ratio and where abouts will it be in my designs?

I also need to look at current trends for fashion, so a trip into town to look at the clothes out there will give me a good idea of this. i will also use the internet to look at current trends and even lookbooks within shops.

'The event of thread' lecture and some personal reflection

Textile artist Hannah Leighton-Boyce held a lecture for her work 'The event of thread'. the piece is somewhat of a live sculpture, where using woollen yarn she had spun herself, she and the village of Helmshore, weaved 3300 yards of yarn through houses and over gardens tracing the lines of which the old mills tenter fields lay. during her research fir this installation she came across some information that mentioned when the mill worked would carry the tentered fabric through the village and some would say it resembled a Chinese dragon parading through the village. I felt this oriental comparison also related to my theme of work currently as I am looking at Thai and oriental sources.

However, on this note I also feel that I perhaps and running out sources and inspiration for this oriental theme and that my drawings are either all too similar or very very different in theme (i.e boats and walls of temples), so on this reflection I feel my sources developing from the old walls into using the word 'peel' and 'decay'. I also feel this development relates to my over ruling theme of future and past.

Looking further into Hannah Leighton-Boyce's earlier works I came across and interesting piece called 'composition - movimentum'. 

The piece was created in 2010 and When Leighton-Boyce travelled through London, Berlin and Stroud on foot, by bus and train. She was exploring the relationship between mark making and marking time. I find this interesting because there are many types of mark made here and the fact that it was achieved just through motion of walking, like the tremors of footsteps or a pothole in the road marking the paper is quite fascinating. Reflecting on this idea, I feel i should be a little more free with my drawings and less controlled. This would look fantastic having been machine stitched onto fabric also.

Drawing Workshop

As previously mentioned, I attended a drawing workshop. At the time I couldn't add photos but from now I can. 

I really wanted to focus on the peeling paint from the photo I had taken at the grand palace in Thailand. i took the essence of the photo and focused on the textures i could see within the peeling and decay.

To create this drawing I scrunched up paper and used ink to stamp the background in. I then used masking tape to create layers. I then used the same stamping technique over this. Finally, I rolled and peeled back half of each strip of masking tape and then used water colour on the softer ripped edges so that it would run through the tape. 

I also worked and a selection of 4 smaller mark making drawings inspired buy the same photo. this time I focussed more on the the shapes I saw in the photo this time as opposed to the textures.

The top two are similar in technique. I used masking tape and water colour to create texture and also rugged lines and shapes. I really like how the water colour bleeds into the masking tape. I also used fabric dye and bleach to create the pink and blue colours and also it creates an interesting transparency to the drawing. 

The third drawing wasn't as successful as the others but I could improve it. The fourth drawing was successful because I feel it reflects the 'hidden' vibe I am looking at within the peeled area. i created this by pushing graphite off of a shaped piece of card, then hiding parts of the drawing using mashing tape. i then used fabric dye to paint over that with and then applied bleach other that, resulting in yellow peach tones. I then removed the masking tape and exposed the graphite beneath. 

I could develop this further by using acetate to layer up my drawings.

Anther drawing using bleach, but this time I used the word 'scratched' to inspire the drawing. for this i also layered magic tape shapes similar to that i have seen on Thai temples. it has created quite an organic image but has subtle squares and lines within it.