Strange couple of days painting…anything but canvas though. Front of house, bathroom , shed you name it if it didn’t move I painted it with white gloss. After that i finally sat down in home studio to do some ‘graphic’ work. The resulting three drawings above. First one I consciously trying to stay small in mark-making. Middle one I did ‘blind’ to see if it loosened things up and finally a very fast drawing to try and preclude conscious acts. Finally I drew the ‘country alphabet’ above which comes from a slightly different angle and refers way back to a ‘alphabet’ of symbols I built up in late eighties. I will scan some examples from sketchbook next time I in ‘proper’ studio to compare with image above which actually more aligned with Mariscal than abstract expressionism or Paul Klee.
Category: cartoon (Page 3 of 4)
Presentation for MA students. A slightly odd experience. Especially when introduced as a ‘graduate’.
Back to studio and more subconscious un-directed drawing.
Hidden messages….crazy thoughts…mad equations..exploded peanuts characters…back to paul klee…taking the line for a walk..Bauhaus….
Found this fantastic image by Paul Klee of structure of the Bauhaus not unlike my plan for M.A. drawings ha ha ha….it all connects.
Simplistic but this rough outline of new directions is kind of accurate.
Path One: Traditional practice-led craft orientated production – drawings not theoretical more instinctive. Crossing into surrealist/automatic and subconscious areas.
Path Two: Literary/Historical..orientated toward factual and historical research linked to a wide gamut of technology in early stages affecting a specific area of the Thames Valley – possible PhD subject area? Relating developments in 1850s to present day impact of ubiquitous media. Possible crossover with poetry/cultural geography. e.g. Charles Tomlinson’s borders thesis.
Path Three: Criticism as Research/Graphic Research. Cartoons as investigative art criticism. James Elkins and Mark Staff Brandl connection. Political edge.
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- cartoon text 1
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- cartoon text 2
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- Right and left hand drawing
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- text drawing
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- cartoon fragments
Finally back in studio after Easter break and torn between the reading required for the Film History paper for Amsterdam and keeping drawing experiments going. In the end managed both. Above are drawings I did as usual trying not to think almost automatic and the larger ones at bottom slightly different. Inspired by some recent text paintings of my friend Zenon I played around with notion of text as drawing. I then produced the strange calligraphy like ‘hill’ drawing. Not sure exactly where this going but does seem to be laying on borderline between cartoon, text and drawing. I was reminded a lot of the Abstract Expressionist drawings I looked at a lot in the 1980’s.
Also been flicking through a Marukami Catalogue: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takashi_Murakami
Continuing the ‘automatic’ drawings which I have started doing in studio when waiting for software to fall over or repair itself..or machinery to work…or when I not reading up about impressionist painting and photography I do these small ‘doodles’…..
I not thinking about them just letting them fall as they might and will analyse later.
Starting to look like graphic designer’s maps:-)
I started to plan out the next phase of the ‘Research Odyssey’ and here two drawings and below the proposal sent to DRN for this year (not expecting to get accepted two years in a row) but happy that last year’s Moogee V Frayling has appeared in the proceedings for DRN 2012:-)
Link to publication here: http://www.drawing-research-network.org.uk/drn-2012-proceedings/
DRN proposal 2013
2013 A Research odyssey: The art object in search of new knowledge
Parodying both Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey and A Rake’s Progress (Hogarth mashed up with Hockney ) the paper will be a dual submission of traditional academic paper and cartoon strip.
Following on from the previous investigation of Frayling’s categories this time the focus of the research will be the character of ‘The Art Object’ . The paper will chart the rise of the notion of ‘The Art Object’ and search for examples of the ever elusive ‘new knowledge’ which presently beckons like the ‘final frontier’ at the centre of postgraduate artistic research .
It will draw on examples of a range of contemporary theories to try and understand where this ‘knowledge’ may or may not lie and its elicitation (if found) may guide future practice and inform pedagogic delivery especially at PhD level.
Interleaving graphic techniques and traditional academic paper methodology will in itself create a trans-disciplinary enquiry. This enquiry along with an animated sequential version of the cartoon forms the basis of a current M.A. by registered project enquiry into drawing, sequential narrative, animation and the current state of research methodology.
Keywords: Art and design research, PhD, studio art, methodology, practice-led research, final frontiers, new knowledge and woolly theory.
Shaun Belcher
Nottingham Trent University
Submission type:
• Drawn / Practice-based submissions + • Theoretical, philosophical or contextual papers
I finally managed to get some things working in studio after the old XP laptop that I had managed to set up the larger tablet on failed. I have upgraded slightly an old toshiba laptop thrown out by work and after ripping the now dead screen off it have a serviceable digital drawing workstation at last. the new cheap Medion tablet (£3.99 from Oxfam!) actually works ok with Windows 7. I then drew a couple of digital versions of the daily ‘doodle’ that I have been doing in studio when there. Not with any great research output in mind but just to keep hand in and to start thinking about the glorious ‘art object’.
Below are these digital drawings and the comparable ‘real’ works. Interesting to work with similar materials in digital and physical space. Two are digital rest are drawn and scanned.
The strange thing is that the two ‘digital’ drawings are much free-er and less ‘digital’ than the hand drawn ones. I felt less prescribed as was trying out tablet and also trying out various brush sizes and effects whereas with pens I had a narrower range of mark-making available ironically ( a large, medium and small sharpie for those interested in such things and a biro). When using biro as thinner, scratchier implement I tried to match that in digital arena with photoshop brushes.
The other interesting thing is the process of trying out some new ‘textures’ was same in both processes. Maybe I have used digital pad enough now to feel more comfortable with it whereas before I always felt inhibited by the technology . But does any of this constitute ‘new knowledge’? I started reading Scrivener’s Hertfordshire essay on knowledge and the art object as preparation for the ‘art object’ as cartoon character series.
http://sitem.herts.ac.uk/artdes_research/papers/wpades/vol2/scrivener.html
It is ‘Graphic Research’ Spock but not as we know it…
An earlier post (see below) relates my two year long tussle with the idea of a ‘Multimedia’ M.A.by research project which spawned tis separate research trajectory as a by-product.
The turning point for treating cartooning of art criticism/history as a viable research subject came with my acceptance for the Mostyn Humorous Intent Symposium in March and subsequently acceptance for three drawing related symposia in September 2012. All related to notions of practice and drawing in some way. All reflected my seven year output of critical cartoons and blog entries which began in 2005. In this period I have had work published by Axis, Arts Professional and Matter Magazine ( interview with Matthew Collings). Ironically none of this has been recognised ot supported in any way by my institution. Indeed this has been conducted beneath the radar because of the nature of the material created and because as a member of a ‘Multimedia’ faculty I was coerced into accepting a ‘Multimedia’ M.A. as part of professional development. Ironically again, professional development seemed to disappear when my course was closed down (it has two years to run) in October 2011 coinciding with my decision to take a year of absence because of my mother’s serious illness of which she passed away in June this year. Having removed both the raison d’etre of professional development and having offered no supervision or help at all during my first year of ‘study’ it not surprising I a little confused.
I took matters in my own hands in March 2012 by applying to the Mostyn conference which firmly in the Fine Art area. The drawing conferences could be seen as straddling both fine art and graphic design. In light of this it makes clear sense to me that if I attempt a PhD M.A. it should be re-assigned into one of these two areas and I hope to sort this out before commencing one. As the research also combines pedagogic research it may be difficult to find a supervisor again. Trent is presently lacking a art history professor or staff at that level with a art history background since Richard Woodfield left maybe the new Dean will freshen things up a bit. That is for future after the M.A. completed.
So I now have to complete the three symposia. Develop or rewrite the original MA:RPT proposal in light of changes of direction.and then focus on creating a body of work in the ‘graphic research’ area to lead up to PhD ( a term invented by myself in conversation with Ian Williams a.k.a.Thom Ferrier at a graphic novel conference at Nottingham Contemporary).
My interests going forward towards PhD (RESEARCH ROUTE) are firmly in the areas of art criticism/history (comic and written) and for M.A (PRACTICE ROUTE) new media and painting and drawing.
Even a week of travelling elsewhere artistically speaking is very welcome…..and maybe signals a new start.
I am busy preparing for three drawing related conferences in a row in early September 2012. It feels a bit like doing music or poetry gigs 🙂
The first is ‘Practice makes Perfect: Theorising method in in visual research’
at Swansea Metropolitan University on 9th/10th September.
http://www.smu.ac.uk/practicemakesperfect/
The second Drawing Research Network: ‘Drawing Knowledge’ at Loughborough University on 10th/11th September.
http://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/sota/tracey/DRN_conference_homepage.html
and finally ‘Thinking Through Drawing 2012: drawing in STEAM’ at Wimbledon College of Art on 12-14 September.
http://drawingandcognition.pressible.org/2012-2
The first and second will be a paper/presentation about my practice called
‘Perfect Maps and Imperfect Practice: How practice-led methodology turned into graphic research.’
probably delivered in a cartoon/comic strip or graphic novel style 🙂
The third is different in that I have been invited to perform live drawing whilst the conference events in progress alongside such artists as Robert Shadbolt see http://robertshadbolt.net and Yoon Bakh Royal College Innovation Design http://rca.academia.edu/YoonBahk.
Students and Staff at NCN ‘interactive drawing workshop’ March 2012.
Graphic Research Poster