Why Did I Photograph that?

I came back from Melbourne with 318 photos taken in the city, it's art galleries and museums. Why did I take photographs of these 318 things and not the thousands of others I saw?

As I was photographing I was asking myself why do I like this? What is it about this scene or artwork that I like? I wanted to identify what I enjoyed seeing so I could incorporate it into my own work. It turned out that the elements I was most interested in were:

• Line and graphic quality (typical of prints)
• Symmetry
• Reflections and light
• Pattern and repetition
• Shape
• Stories and Characters

I feel that line & graphic quality, symmetry and pattern are well represented in my own work whilst reflection & light, shape and stories & characters are elements that I use less often. This exercise has allowed me to identify the elements I might like to incorporate more often to improve my own satisfaction with my art work.

Of course many things were photographed because I liked more than one aspect of the scene. Other things I found interesting were:

• Colour
• Movement
• Texture
• Contrast
• Medium
• Subject matter

I also took some pictures purely because I liked the way the objects were displayed or the way the audience could interact with them even though I didn't particularly like the objects themselves. 

One of the most striking artworks we saw was this large sculpture by the SO-IL design firm at the National Gallery of Victoria International. I liked this one for several reasons. Firstly the bright, glowing colours and sharp angular shapes but also the contrasting grey graphic lines behind it formed by the gallery architecture. The reflections in the glass also added more interesting lines and angular shapes.

I did not like the objects displayed inside the pyramids - I think the artwork would be better with nothing inside at all.

The sharp angles of the display plinths arranged in a curve added to the artwork and emphasised the angles. It looked especially good from the balcony.

Here you can see the contrasting grey background with it's sympathetic angular lines which I liked. Had this been displayed against paintings I don't think it would have looked so effective.

The reflections of lines in the building add an extra element to the sculpture.

I think it will be fun to play around with this image in PhotoShop

I'll show you some more photographs from Melbourne in my next post. I'm hoping to print some and use them in my sketchbook soon.

Photos to Fabric

Here are another 2 great cotton fat quarters I've just received from Spoonflower. This time I combined multiple images and filters in PhotoShop to produce the patterned flower image. First I used a botanical photograph (I have no memory of which one) and a kaleidoscope filter to make the pattern in the leaves.

Then I combined the plant picture with a picture of some bamboo. Coloured filters were added on top.

The fat quarter on the right is a mirror image repeat of a photograph of some columns in a wall in Perth. You can see from the original photograph that I've changed up the colours a lot in PhotoShop. The Spoonflower website can take any image and make it into a mirror image repeat for you.

You can buy any of these designs (and others) in my Spoonflower shop.

Sketchbook Pages

I'm still working on the Creative Sketchbooks online course from DMTV. Here are some of my latest pages. This piece above makes use of some freezer paper stencils collaged with sponge prints and watercolours. 

This page combines a digitally altered photo with pen drawing, Gelli print and graphite.

These flowers are made with ink, dye and soluble graphite.

This page has a bleached ink drawing with digital photo, Gelli print, acrylics and paint pens.

Inspiration from Nature

It's spring here at last in Perth and Araluen Botanic Park is looking fantastic. I've taken loads of great photos to inspire some new artwork. I've also traced some of the images from my photographs and combined them together with a photograph in PhotoShop.

I love how the tracings themselves look when overlaid.

I think you are going to be seeing more tulips in my artwork in the next few weeks.

Line, Negative Space and PhotoShop

This week's tutorial on DMTV was about using line to emphasise negative space. I decided to take the ideas further and combine them with rubbings, water-soluble graphite, stitch and PhotoShop. First I used masks and stencils to fill negative space with lines and text. The cairn shapes have not been drawn in, but appear from the space as the eye interprets the lines as a solid shape.

I then decided to combine lines and text (drawn in waterproof pen) with rubbings and water-soluble graphite.

Next I interpreted the same technique into stitch. I used my machine's built in lettering and free motion stitching to make lines all across a piece of organza. I made sure to use polyester thread and used wash-away stabiliser whilst sewing. Once the stabiliser was removed I cut out the cairn motif with the soldering iron.

Lastly I photographed the pieces and imported them into PhotoShop where I played with the posterize and stamp filters to give them a real graphic look. I think mono-print might be another way to achieve a similar look. I'll try that next!

Photographing Glasses

I photographed some glasses in my kitchen cupboard. I liked all the reflections and the 2 different colours of glass. I've imported them into PhotoShop and played around with some effects. Next I'll do some drawing.