Week 4: Artist Model Research

This week I did some research into some potential designer and artist models to influence my work. Below is my research.

ANISH KAPOOR

Anish Kapoor is a British-Indian sculptor born in Mumbai, India in 1954. He specialises in both installation art and conceptual art.

Cloud Gate

Above is Kapoor’s Cloud Gate located in Chicago, Illinois. This is a reflective stainless steel structure that is 10m x 20m x 12.8m in dimensions. The sculpture has become a well known tourist attraction for the city of Chicago.

(http://anishkapoor.com/110/cloud-gate-2)

C-Curve

Kapoor’s C-Curve is a sculpture that has been installed in many different locations over the years. The sculpture, like a lot of Kapoor’s work, is made from reflective stainless steel. The dimensions of this piece are 220cm x 770cm x 300cm.

(http://anishkapoor.com/117/c-curve)

Sky Mirror

Above is Kapoor’s Sky Mirror (for Hendrik), another sculpture made from stainless steel. Kapoor designed and created a range of different Sky Mirrors located all around the world. This specific Sky Mirror is 6.5m x 2.5m x 2m.

(http://anishkapoor.com/4865/sky-mirror-for-hendrik)

Kapoor manipulates and plays with light and image in this reflective sculpture. He uses the changing and temporal light and colour in the surrounding environment to create the piece. The surrounding environment is the sculpture, it acts as the paint on the canvas of the stainless steel.

DO-HO SUH

Do-ho Suh is a Korean sculptor and installation artist born in Seoul, South Korea 1962.

Passage/s

Suh most frequently uses a sheer translucent fabric as seen above in his work Passage/s. This piece can be found at the Victoria Miro Gallery in London. Passage/s is a combination of spacial sections that replicate his homes and studios he has lived and worked in around the world. The transparent fabric creates a ghostly and nostalgic impression of the space that the Suh once occupied. The impressions of Suh’s environment directly influences his designs and creative practice.

(https://thespaces.com/do-ho-suh-victoria-miro-gallery-london/)

MONA HATOUM

Mona Hatoum is a Palestinian multimedia and installation artist. Born in Beirut, Lebanon in 1952, Hatoum now lives in London.

Light Sentence

Above is one of Hatoum’s pieces of work that I found most interesting and inspiring. This is called Light Sentence, created in 1992. It is 198 cm x 185 cm x 490 cm in dimensions and is made up of galvanized wire mesh lockers, an electric motor and light bulb. I have become increasingly interested in the affect of light and shadow in creating an atmosphere, mood and experience. I find it fascinating how the shadow engulfs the space and even when not inside of the ‘cage’, there is a sense of encapsulation and surrounding. The shadow and light create a sense of space and structure outside of the physical structure of the lockers.

(https://brooklynrail.org/2016/06/artseen/mona-hatoum)

Hatoum’s work is structured, simple yet effective. Her work creates a sense of space in the surroundings and environment of her work; they don’t sit alone in a vacuum, but have an impact and create meaning and atmosphere in the spaces in between, where her work doesn’t physically exist.

OLAFUR ELIASSON

Olafur Eliasson is a Danish-Icelandic artist born in Copenhagen, Denmark in 1967. He is well known for his large scale installations and sculptures and likes to use aspects of the elements such as water, light and air temperature.

Beauty

Eliasson’s Beauty was an installation in the Tate Modern in London in 1993. The affect of the work was created by a spotlight, water, nozzles, wood, hose and pump. What I like about this work is not only its illusion-like affect, but also its ability to adapts and change depending on the way the viewer occupies, moves and observes the space. I am really interested in exploring the viewer as a part of the space in my own work.

(https://olafureliasson.net/archive/artwork/WEK101824/beauty)

Eine Beschreibung einer Reflexion, oder aber eine angenehme Übung zu deren Eigenschaften

This piece by Eliasson was an installation at the Tate Modern, London in 1995. It also appeared in many other spaces around the world over the years. The work was created with a spotlight, mirrors, projection foil, motor and tripod. This work looks more into the manipulation, transformation and projection of light. I found that it was very science and physics based and instead of showing just the final aesthetic result, Eliasson exposes the making and creation of the lighting affect. I am very interested in the organic, abstract and euphoric image projected on the screen and its visual movement.

(https://olafureliasson.net/archive/artwork/WEK101778/eine-beschreibung-einer-reflexion-oder-aber-eine-angenehme-ubung-zu-deren-eigenschaften)

Your uncertain shadow (colour)

Although the image above was taken at Studio Olafur Eliasson in Berlin in 2010, Your uncertain shadow (colour) was installed also at the Tate Modern in London. The installation consists of HMI lamps (green, orange, blue, magenta), glass, aluminium and transformers. What is intriguing about this work is the influence that the viewer has over the design and space. Something that will carried through to my own design from this work is the element of interaction between the viewer/occupant and the space.

(https://olafureliasson.net/archive/artwork/WEK100100/your-uncertain-shadow-colour#slideshow)

What is most inspiring about Eliasson’s work is the way he incorporates the viewer into the design to create a more immersive experience. By leaving some of the creation up to the viewer, it gives the design a sense of chance and temporality which is something I am considering exploring in y own work.

JUDY MILLAR

Judy Millar is a New Zealand artist born in Auckland in 1957. She lives in both Auckland, New Zealand and Berlin, Germany.

Untitled

Above is one of Millar’s pieces that I found most interesting. The painting consists of acrylic and oil paints on paper. What I like about this painting and also Millar’s style is the sense of depth and form through her dark line-work. I also like this specific colour palette; the pastel colours are given depth through the application of a darker colour such as black. The colours are soft and aren’t in your face.

(https://judymillar.com/conversation/)

YAYOI KUSAMA

Yayoi Kusama is a Japanese contemporay artist who is most well known for her installation art. With this said, she also practices in sculpture, painting, fashion, film, performance and poetry. She was born in Matsumoto, Japan in 1929.

Infinity Mirror Rooms

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Infinity rooms is a collection of installations by Kusama that have appeared in galleries all around the world. The rooms are a combination of mirrors, acrylic, plastic and lighting. The Infinity mirror rooms were an application of her repetitiveness in her paintings into the form of an experiential space.

(https://hirshhorn.si.edu/kusama/infinity-rooms/)

What I find most interesting and inspiring about Kusama’s work is the way she uses reflection and light to create an illusionary sense of space and depth. The repetition of image creates a immersive sense of calm, peace and serenity.

GEORGIA O’KEEFFE

Georgia O’Keeffe was one of the first American artists to explore pure abstraction. Born in Wisconsin in 1887, O’Keeffe lived and worked in New York and New Mexico. It was in New Mexico where she drew her inspiration from during the majority of her career. In the mid 1950’s, she traveled internationally to draw inspiration from places such as Peru and Mt Fuji. O’Keeffe painted her last unassisted painting in 1972 due to failing eyesight before her death in 1986.

(https://www.okeeffemuseum.org/about-georgia-okeeffe/)

Music – Pink and Blue No. 1 

Music – Pink and Blue No. 1
Georgia O’Keeffe
1918
Oil on canvas
88.9 cm x 73.7 cm 

Music – Pink and Blue No. 2

Music – Pink and Blue No. 2
Georgia O’Keeffe
1918
Oil on canvas
88.9 cm x 74 cm

Grey Lines with Black, Blue and Yellow

Grey Lines with Black, Blue and Yellow
Georgia O’Keeffe
1923
Oil on canvas

Abstraction White Rose

Abstraction White Rose
Georgia O’Keeffe
1927
Oil on canvas
91.4 cm × 76.2 cm 

Black Iris

Black Iris
Georgia O’Keeffe
1926
Oil on canvas
91.4 cm x 75.9 cm

We were given a series of questions to answer in relation to our artist model research. Because I have done previous studies and paintings inspired by Georgia O’Keeffe and am a fan of her work, I decided to start with answering the questions in relation to her and her work.

1. Find out when and where they produced their work.

O’Keeffe produced majority of her work from her successful years in northern New Mexico from mid-late 1920’s until her death in 1986. Her work was not only inspired by the landscape, indigenous at and adobe architecture, but also her abstracted style inspired by Arthur Wesley Dow as opposed to a realism approach. 

2. Identify the key conceptual ideas that underpin their work.

O’Keeffe creates layering affects using tones and shades of similar colours to create a sense of depth in her work. She also, in a range of her works, explores a subject in a magnified sense and abstracting it to give the work another context. 

3. Identify their critical position on colour in relation to their work (i.e. how is colour applied, in what proportions, what particular theories about colour inform the making of the work, how does colour change dependent upon the environment in which the work is viewed.

O’Keeffe applies colour to surface through mediums such as oil paints, pastels, watercolours and charcoal along with sketches in graphite. She uses a range of warm and cool colour in each work. She uses tints and lightened versions of vibrant colours, specifically focusing on blues, reds, yellows and greens. Because she uses lightened, pastel colours, the pieces still stand out and catch the eye but aren’t overwhelming. She also allows space to create depth within her work with deeper, darker versions of the colour. O’Keeffe uses complimentary colours in a hidden way. She applies white versions of complimentary colours to make the work pop and other aspects of the painting stand out without overloading on colour. 

4. What type of surface treatments are used in the work? Do they use matte, satin, or gloss paints or material finishes or all of them together? Why might they do this and what is the effect of doing this?

O’Keeffe often used either oil on canvas in her works or watercolour on paper. These were her two main mediums and techniques she used. She also used charcoal and pastels, but these works aren’t as prominent. 

5. What scale are the artworks you have researched? How does scale impact on how the work is experienced and how colour and materiality are perceived?

O’Keeffe’s works were often on average between 50-100 cm x 50-100 cm. This isn’t extremely large or extremely small but because of her work consisting of magnified abstracted subjects. This scale can make the painting seem larger and have more of a presence. 

To further my exploration and research of O’Keeffe, I did some quick drawings to investigate aspects of her work.

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In the first drawing I explored form, depth and visual movement through the fluid abstract shape and folds. This was done with pencil on paper.

In my second drawing I explored O’Keeffe’s colour palette in some of her work. I also explored through watercolour because this was a medium that O’Keeffe sometimes used. The black outline and slight pencil shading explored form but I didn’t want to it to distract from the stud of colour.

The third drawing I tried to combine the aspects I explored in my first and second drawing. I used graphite pencil to explore form, depth and movement and applied colour by coloured pencil to highlight certain aspects. I didn’t really like the way that this drawing turned out but glad that I explored it.

RESEARCH CONCLUSION

After some indepth research into a variety of artists and designers, I have come to the decided to focus my work on Georgia O’Keeffe and Anish Kapoor.

I chose Georgia O’Keeffe because not only am I a fan of her work, but I also see similarities in my own practice with the exploration and focus on form, depth and materiality. I want to explore this further. Also, O’Keeffe’s work is created through wet media. I used to paint a lot in high school and want to take this opportunity to explore the use of paint in terms of spatial design.

The reason why I chose Anish Kapoor is because of the way he explore lights, colour and image through reflection. In previous model making exercises I explored reflective surfaces to iterate the idea of perspective changing the view of something. Ever since the walk to the site in the first week, reflection, filtration and manipulation of light, shadow, colour and image has been a focal point for me. I did do research on other artists/designers that explored their work through reflection and mirrors but what interested me most about Kapoor was how it was the environment and surrounding of his sculptures that created the sculpture; it acted as if they were dependent on each other. In my work I am focusing on highlighting the disregarded through change in movement and perspective and Kapoor’s work best correlated to my ideas.

O’Keeffe and Kapoor’s work are very different in many aspects but I think that exploring fluidity, form, depth, materiality with reflection, manipulation and filtration of light, shadow and image could create an interesting and unique combination that best explores my ideas and interests as a designer.