I really think that my basic drawing skills are improving through practice which is something I set out to do with this brief. I want to get used to working with a combination of important elements at once. I am finding working while paying closer attention to the actual subject matter has got me to 'think' a lot more, which sometimes is a bit difficult/confusing.
Thinking about the message I want to portray, for example happiness in the below picture, has directly affected my choice of media and how I use it. The marks in red are bold and expressive to contrast with the softer yellows and blue, I need to communicate warmth and light. The facial expressions need to be indicative of this as well, using simple bold lines to give a basic outline to the smile and crows feet around the eyes makes the man look content with his surroundings. This page makes me feel happy.
I am also learning to 'finish' an image, I know when I am done - I used to keep working on a piece until it almost moved from being a picture to my thought processes on paper. It's hard trying to find a balance between what is too much and what isn't enough, everything affects it especially areas of colour.
Eyes are squinting - half moon shape - creases where cheeks meet mouth - light falling on top of cheeks
layout, composition - looking up - light beam - person in the foreground is perceived as being in the light because of the colour contrasts between him and the crowd - scale - ripped paper from cheek - sunlight - highlight - accident
Fine liners - scratchy - scan in - birds eye view of man on right drawn over
blend - gradient - print of word 'rjukan' using byro pen and hairspray - draw in reverse on back of paper - spray - ink seeps through paper onto other side
I have been making drawings of my research into Rjukan and focusing on the beams of light passing through the shade - almost like an analog version of Photoshop. I think these images need to be scanned and worked over to really become engaging enough to be included in the book.
I am wondering how I am going to make a story that makes sense without dumbing down my drawings, I have realised that some are not very clear/direct in their message. Maybe I need text or notes to help communicate the story - could be incorporated as if they are notes on the pages? Borders? Not sure I want writing though? Dilemma
Light bisecting an image - overlayed
Crowd condensed - packed into small space - sense of 'busy' - panning an environment
I have been looking further into Rjukan and how the town was able to solve the problem of darkness with mirrors. This idea relates to my initial research which focused on sadness and bleak grey days - this is an example of overcoming that - what to do to make things better
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-24747720
Mirrors finally bring winter sun to Rjukan in Norway
The people of Rjukan in Norway are celebrating the installation of giant mirrors, which have finally brought winter sunshine to their town centre.
Rjukan lies in a deep valley, and during the six months of winter the surrounding mountains cast a shadow over the town even at midday.
About 1,000 people, among them children in sunglasses, cheered when the main square became bathed in sun.
The idea of using mirrors in Rjukan was first proposed 100 years ago.
Rjukan's inhabitants gathered in the main square on Wednesday for the official inauguration of the mirrors.
Some sipped cocktails on sun loungers, while others played beach volleyball on a makeshift sand court.
As the sun's reflected rays illuminated the town square, a band played the song Let the Sunshine In, while Rjukan's townspeople cheered, among them hundreds of children with yellow suns painted on their faces, some waving Norwegian flags.
"A hundred-year-old idea has become reality today," said Steinar Bergsland, mayor of the Tinn municipality which includes Rjukan.
He said he hoped the mirrors would attract visitors to the region, which up till now has been associated more with the bravery of the men who sabotaged Hitler's attempt to develop the atomic bomb at a hydroelectric plant near Rjukan.
The problem of how to bring sunshine to Rjukan was first considered a century ago by a Norwegian engineer and industrialist, Sam Eyde, who developed the town to provide workers for the power plant, which lies at the foot of a waterfall.
At the time, the technology did not exist to fulfil his vision to harness the rays of the winter sun.
Instead, a cable car was installed to bring Rjukan's inhabitants to the top of an adjacent mountain for a fix of winter sun.
The three mirrors, 17sq m each, were brought in by helicopter and placed on a mountain, about 450m above the centre of the town.
Controlled by computers, the tilted mirrors follow the course of the sun to bring sunshine to Rjukan's main square below.
Rjukan is a place "where the impossible has become possible" said Mr Bergsland."
I am finding Rjukan's story really fascinating - the idea is so clever and the concept is really helping me think of pictures - light beams running through pages - small buildings - crowds of people - double page spread - tall mountains. I think this is the idea I need to do more work on - drawings of scenes from rjukan - book could be journey of light through town
"What it was, I think," he says, "is that living in the shade must make you afraid to dream of the sun. That's the only way I can explain the resistance: like the valley walls, minds without sun become somehow a little bit narrower."
But is the Solspeil, as it was at least originally conceived, art? "The people here don't see it that way," says Daniel Paida Larsen, a Rjukan-born, Berlin-based artist and close friend of Andersen's. "They see it – and, thankfully, now welcome it – as a technical project. Or a marketing tool."
But the sun mirror, nonetheless, is art, he says. "I don't know how exactly I'd define it," Larsen says. "An installation? A sculpture? It makes me think about how we need the sun, what happens to light when you reflect it. But what's really special is that it goes so deep into the public sphere. It touches something absolutely fundamental in this town."
At high school in Rjukan, Larsen remembers "walking down the street and looking up and seeing sunshine and blue sky and thinking: why can't I be there?" In the end, he says, "the only way to cope is to ignore that. To survive here in winter, you have to ignore the possibility of the sun."
But no longer. Now there's the Solspeil. "A work of art," Larsen says, "with a real, vital function, fulfilling a basic need in people's lives." Down on the square, Ingunn Sparbo might not put it in quite those terms, but she can't agree more.
"Look at this!" she says, almost beside herself. "Who'd have thought it? I've stepped out to get a bit of sun."
Trying to draw in a way that conveys sadness - highlights the muscles and pain.
I also want to try and build tension up around the eyes - line work - eyes are expressive in the same way a mouth is - squint - cry
There are two muscles on both corners of the mouth that pull the bottom lip down to make a sad face, the muscle is called triangularis - incorporate this into drawing in some way?
Thinking about the story of Rjukan and mirrors in a valley - maybe triangularis could be made into the hill - triangle - object - personify?
Triangularis as an object - photograph and work over?
Illustrating Rjukan's mirrors and the theory through photography
I've previously looked at Berenice Abbott's photography in another project but it would be really appropriate here using a glass pyramid - light refraction - but how does this tie in with drawing? Bringing different disciplines together?
Berenice Abbott - Light Through Prism
Photographing light refraction
Torch through glass pyramid creates interesting colour spectrum on the wall - could be used as texture/bacground in photoshop? I could draw over the top?
I have been drawing sad faces - maybe this could be a book just full of sad faces from grey days - but is that interesting enough? One sad face is enough really. Maybe I could combine it with jam - sad people and their grey day hobbies? What do you do when you are sad? Buy socks? Food? Jumpers?
I have noticed that blunt edges and lines using masking tape as a template in contrast with bold pencil marks and delicate hatching creates a greater sense of emotion within my drawing - the face is almost being pulled down and separated into heavy blocks of sad blue - emotive
4. How do people cheer themselves up when it is grey?
5. What are people's sad faces?
Peer Feedback
From the small research crit people seemed to like my initial idea of looking into how the grey weather affects us. They told me to get my camera and take pictures of more sad faces and to draw from them for visual research. I watched a documentary called 'Human Swarm' on tv and it explains all of societies' 'swarm behavior during the colder and warmer months. We are actually affected in a massive way by the temperature of our surroundings. Last year towards the end of the summer jam sales went up 200 something percent. Matt suggested I re-watch the documentary and pull some of these facts out - factual based illustration that is informed usually works - communication - story telling - purpose
Response to feedback
Shining light on things to make them better
Project Proposal
Matt also mentioned something interesting about a town called Rjukan in Norway that uses mirrors to reflect sunlight down a shaded valley - watch the documentary - clever idea with the mirrors
".....(we) don't just straighten and clarify the world, we reflect the world as we venture beyond problem solving into process, experiment and discovery." – Martin Venezky
I chose to visit Pret, The Park Square and a bench outside King Charles Arena to collect visual research through note taking, photographs and collecting. Whilst I was sat in these places I started to notice patterns and similarities in some of the elements I observed, for example I counted 22 bins from the bench in The Park Square - why so many bins? It was almost a bin per tree.
As well as looking at the finer details I noticed that everywhere outside was gloomy, colours and surfaces looked dull and muted and the sky was overcast permanently. This seemed to have an affect on people's moods. Hardly anyone who walked past me was smiling or laughing, just staring down with a straight face going about their business. However when I got inside Pret and sat down with a coffee I noticed a complete change in atmosphere and mood. People were sat talking and laughing and it was a cosy setting. The warm lights and furniture shielded from the cold combined with food and drink obviously had an affect on people's moods.
Unsure why I collected these, did I misunderstand the brief? I am slightly worried as to how well the data I have collected can be translated into a successful project. I might have to go off on a tangent with a loose connection to my original source material since I am worried it will be too generic and documentary of a place or objects, for example 'a book of rubbish'.
gloomy - sad - grey
pattern - texture - accidental drawing - mark making
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